Posts Tagged ‘ Andrew Klavan ’

Klavan’s ‘Agnes Mallory’ Will Break Your Heart

November 30, 2011
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Klavan’s ‘Agnes Mallory’ Will Break Your Heart

Back in 1985, the young author author Andrew Klavan had a novel published in England which didn't find a home in the U.S. This novel is Agnes Mallory, which is now, thankfully, available in a Kindle edition from Mysterious Press.

Once Harry Bernard was a little boy who dreamed of virtue and heroism. He met a little girl named Agnes, who shaped wonderful figures out of clay. He became her friend, and then they were torn apart by forces they could not understand. And when they came together at last, years later, he was on the run from the police and she was on the brink of tragic celebrity, and their reunion was a deadly collision of hopeless yearnings and unsatisfied needs.

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Klavan: Baby Boomers Undermined Liberty

October 18, 2011
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Klavan: Baby Boomers Undermined Liberty

Andrew Klavan is one of the most perceptive cultural analysts of our day, and his Klavan on Culture at Pajamas Media is a frequent stop of mine. In a recent post on a new book called Willpower, Klavan takes the Baby Boomer generation to task for ruining American culture. I suppose Boomers can be an easy target for such a charge, but Klavan does it in a way that shows how our liberties are lost at the door of license. Without personal responsibility, as the Founders of our country knew, true liberty is unattainable. Klavan understands and argues well that when we throw away moral values for a self-centered freedom to do whatever we want, we in fact get statist coercion running our lives. A great writer, he knows how to make his case: ehaving well, behaving responsibly, learning the norms of politeness and refusing to abandon them without good reason tend to make you a more self-controlled, successful, and finally better person. This is precisely the wisdom my generation threw away. Their promiscuity, adolescent foul-mouthedness, bad manners, and disregard for tradition — all of which they claimed were a new kind of freedom — were in fact the precursors

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“The Final Hour” Is a Compelling One

July 22, 2011
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“The Final Hour” Is a Compelling One

By Lars Walker I’ll get out, I told myself. Rose’ll get me out. Two months, maybe three. I just need courage. I just have to survive. That’s what I told myself. But I was way wrong. Andrew Klavan has completely realized his purpose in writing The Final Hour, the fourth and last in his The Homelanders young adult action series. He’s crafted a moral story that’s so exciting teenage boys will put off going back to their video games until they’ve finished it. Is it over the top? Unquestionably. Poor Charlie West, the hero, caroms from one deathly peril to another, chapter after chapter. It’s like an Indiana Jones movie, except that Indie wouldn’t be able to keep up Charlie’s pace. If you’ve been following the series, you’ll know that the first book, The Last Thing I Remember, opened with Charlie waking up bound to a chair in a strange room, with terrorists outside the door discussing how much further to torture him. Since then he’s escaped and learned that (during a year that he’s forgotten completely) he’s been arrested and convicted of the murder of a high school friend. He’s escaped from custody since then, and has been on

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Prose & Poetry Update

May 9, 2011
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Prose & Poetry Update

Enjoy a bevy of literary links including Andrew Klavan, Rudyard Kipling, Evelyn Waugh, John Buchan, George Washington’s Beer, and a love poem by Pablo Neruda. But first some quotes from great literature concerning justice, war and liberty. “There are times, young fellah, when every one of us must make a stand for human right and justice, or you never feel clean again.” – Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, The Lost World “The Almighty gave us our lives, and I suppose He meant us to defend them, at least I have always acted on that, and I hope it will not be brought up against me when my clock strikes.” – H. Rider Haggard, King Solomon’s Mines “Peril, loneliness, an uncertain future, are not oppressive evils, so long as the frame is healthy and the faculties are employed; so long, especially, as Liberty lends us her wings, and Hope guides us by her star.” – Charlotte Bronte, Villette “You know, there are two good things in life, freedom of thought and freedom of action.” – W. Somerset Maugham, Of Human Bondage Short Fiction A Creed, A Word and a Blade of Grass by Peter Orullian “The familiar glow of candlelight was the

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TAC Fiction Review

December 26, 2010
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TAC Fiction Review

Let’s call it the after-Christmas Merry Christmas issue (or maybe the Boxing Day issue). After all, Dickens noted at the end of A Christmas Carol, the day Christ is born is a day we should keep in our hearts all through the year. Therefore … This week’s issue focuses, naturally, on Christmas stories, particularly those of the mysterious variety. As Mike Gray notes, in his review linked below, “Some of the finest mystery authors regard the Yuletide season as the perfect opportunity for crime.” It is fascinating that so many writers regale us with tales of nefarious activity built around the day God came to us as a babe wrapped in swaddling clothes. Could it be because mysteries generally present us with good breaking through our limited perceptions and eventually triumphing over evil? Whatever the reason, there is nothing quite like settling in next to a roaring fire, perhaps wrapped in that new Snuggy your beloved bestowed on you, with a good whodunit. In his introduction to a collection of supernatural and mysterious tales, titled simply Stories, Neil Gaiman shared a question he was asked about what he might inscribe on a wall located in a library’s children’s area. He

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TAC Fiction Review

December 10, 2010
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TAC Fiction Review

A weekend’s worth of reading – short fiction, reviews, commentary, criticism, news and miscellaneous other bits from around the publishing world. Highlighting this week’s Review is Andrew Klavan’s short story “The Windows.” It is the first short story ever published by in the Manhattan Institute’s City Journal. Andrew’s story is a fascinating exploration of real world threats and personal paranoia. Let’s hope City Journal continues presenting quality short fiction, such as this, alongside its excellent selection of political and cultural essays. Another item that might interest American Culture readers is Gerald Howard’s essay, titled “Never Give An Inch.” Tin House, the literary journal that originally published it, subtitled the article, “The Working Class Meets the Literary Class.” Howard’s essay opens a topic that demands greater exploration. Short Fiction The Windows by Andrew Klavan “During his life — that’s how he thought about it: back in the old days, during his life — he had had a reputation as a hard case, a tough guy.” May Day by F. Scott Fitzgerald “All through the long spring days the returning soldiers marched up the chief highway behind the strump of drums and the joyous, resonant wind of the brasses, while merchants and

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A Cultural Think Tank for America

December 6, 2010
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A Cultural Think Tank for America

By Daniel P. Crandall You just finished another long day in the office. The project is ahead of schedule and under budget. Your boss calls you into his office before you leave for the night. Your heart skips a beat as you wonder if unemployment looms behind his doors. Once you walk in, he looks you in the eye and gives you a hearty congratulations; you’ve received glowing accolades from customers that will lead to future projects, and you are to be honored by your peers at an upcoming convention. This is the feedback laborers in the corporate fields crave. Nothing drives productivity like compliments and rewards for a job well done. Every rational person recognizes the power awards and positive reviews have in reinforcing behavior and producing the products we enjoy. So why, when it comes to popular culture, do most conservatives do little but shovel burning coals on writers, artists, filmmakers, and others laboring in the cultural influence professions? There is an old adage that you can tell what someone values when you open her checkbook. Conservative organizations, for years, told purveyors of pop culture that political activism is far more valuable a commodity than artistic endeavors. Look

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No Mistaken Identity Here: Klavan’s Book Is Masterful

November 15, 2010
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No Mistaken Identity Here: Klavan’s Book Is Masterful

The theme of the story, as the title implies, is human identity. Who are we as individuals? Are we capable of choosing how we will live, or are we determined by heredity and environment and social pressure? Do we find our personal identities in our individual choices and character, or in our ethnicity?

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TAC Fiction Review

November 14, 2010
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TAC Fiction Review

It’s back to fiction with a taste of poetry, toward the end, this week. First up, is an excerpt from Andrew Klavan’s novel The Identity Man, a book Brad Thor described as “a masterwork by an author clearly at the top of his game.” Next is an excerpt from Looking for the King, a novel featuring C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, Charles Williams, and others from Oxford’s well-known Inklings. Joseph Pearce, author of Tolkien: Man and Myth, described Downing’s novel as a “superbly gripping novel about dreams coming true… Lewis and Tolkien come alive as real-life characters, playing their sagacious parts to realistic perfection as the protagonists follow their Arthurian quest pursued by deadly enemies. For lovers of Arthurian romance and for admirers of Tolkien and Lewis, this is indeed a dream come true!” Then it’s on to a man whose work greatly influenced Lewis, Tolkien and other Inklings. Below is Chesterton’s short story about a ‘Superman’ who bears little resemblance to the character created by Jerry Siegel. Wright’s Writing Corner returns. I round things out with a sample of John Donne’s poetry and, of course, a bevy of links to stories, news, opinion and reviews from around the inter-webs. Excerpts

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Andrew Klavan’s The Truth of the Matter: A Compelling Ride for Young Adults

November 10, 2010
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Andrew Klavan’s The Truth of the Matter: A Compelling Ride for Young Adults

These are books for boys who like video games (at one point Charlie West, the book's hero, even gets to use an actual weapon that works like a video game controller) and extreme sports. “Extreme” describes The Truth of the Matter well—not in the sense of extreme shock content or extreme edginess, but in the sense of action that never slackens, but constantly ratchets up the dramatic tension.

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A Prose and Poetry Cornucopia

September 25, 2010
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A Prose and Poetry Cornucopia

A plethora of links to stories, excerpts, commentary, criticism, news and knick-knacks that just might  satisfy your hunger for info from around the world of prose and poetry. Short Fiction: Excerpt: Chapters One & Two from Sloane Hall by Libby Sternberg Excerpt: “Il Colore Ritrovato” from The Pacific and Other Stories by Mark Helprin “Napoleon and the Spectre” by Charlotte Bronte “The Whistling Room” by William Hope Hodgson “Can These Bones Live?” by Manley Wade Wellman Commentary and Criticism: Jane Eyre: An Introduction by Joyce Carol Oates Episode, Scene, Speech, and Word: The Madness of Lear by Norman Maclean About Sloane Hall and its Inspiration, Jane Eyre by Libby Sternberg The Literary Tenor of the Times by Mark Helprin Literature and the Realm of Moral Values News, Reviews, and Other Interesting Tidbits: Review: Haunted and Confused – Andrew Klavan reviews The Hilliker Curse by James Ellroy Barnes & Noble has Setback in Struggle over Board Stigma of the Paperback Originals Lost Libraries – The strange afterlife of authors’ book collections Lessons in Manliness from Beowulf Brian Gruley discusses his second novel, The Hanging Tree – video from WSJ.com Will the Real Shakespeare Please Stand Up? – Chapter One from The

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Prose Fiction Update With A Bit of Poetry

July 30, 2010
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Prose Fiction Update With A Bit of Poetry

Another week, another passel of links into the wide, wide world of wondrous word-smithery.  This week closes out with a bit of verse from Gerard Manley Hopkins, who was born on July 28, 1844. Short Fiction: “The Doors” by E.B. White When Jane Met Rochester – A scene from Libby Sternberg’s soon to be released novel Sloane Hall The Sisters of the Sacred Heart Criticism and Commentary: The Real Carver: Expansive or Minimal? “The Designs of E.B. White” by Gerald Weales What is Art? A Fish Studying Water – On studying and teaching one’s native language Comics and Graphic Novels vs. The Critics Fritz Leiber Tackled the Oil Spill First News and Reviews: “If any form of pleasure is exhibited, report to me and it will be prohibited…” – A brief review of Lars Walker’s West Oversea. In Defence of Amazon – The online bookseller isn’t to blame for the book industry’s failures Point Break - John J. Miller’s brief comments on Stephen Koch‘s The Breaking Point: Hemingway, Dos Passos, and the Murder of Jose Robles Andrew Klavan reviews David Wong’s John Dies At The End The Writing Life: Wright’s Writing Corner: Cotton Candy Writing And now for some of that high culture stuff. A bit

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