R-Rated Harry Potter

I'm typically reading about 8 to 10 books at the same time. Well, no not at the exact same time, not simultaneously. Just during any given period, I'm typically reading quite a few books. I find that doing so helps me to keep reading. When you're reading just one book, you have to be in the mood for that book. If you're not in the mood, you're less likely to read. Reading several books simultaneously means that you can't use that excuse not to read. There will almost always be some kind of book that will be right for the mood.

That means that I like to keep good variety of books around. Some are fiction. Some are non-fiction. I read a lot about the world, about investing, about history and about international politics. Some books are educational. Others are simply for entertainment. Fantasy and sci-fi stuff that I've liked since I started to read books in general. I'm going to mention one book that I'm currently reading that falls very squarely in the latter category: "Lord Loss" by Darren Shaw.

This is probably the least ambitious book that I have read during the last 4 years (not counting porn of course, though that can get a little ambitious at times, and not counting "101 Tips About Wine" that I brought back from California, which, as far as I could tell, wasn't serious enough to convince any person to overcome his or her embarrassment and list him or herself as the author of that "book").

But, Lord Loss is easy to read. And it's kind of fun, in a very amateurish kind of way. I've only read the first 48 pages or so, but I read them in under an hour. The story is about this kid, Grubbs, living a fairly ordinary life in an ordinary town in modern times, who one day finds out that his parents are actually secret devil worshippers. I have to admit, I like that kind of premise for a book.

Chapter 1 concerns character development, where the author builds up the characters enough that the reader develops a mild apathetic sympathy for them after about 20 pages or so. The family likes to play chess together. The kids sometimes fight. Grubbs gets in trouble with his dad for smoking at school. You know, prosaic family type stuff.

In Chapter 2, those sympathies are shredded as Grubbs's mother, father and sister are brutally massacred by the demons that they summon during a seance that goes awry. The father is decapitated in fact. So much for character development. Three out of the first four characters introduced are dead wtihin the first 30 pages. I love it.

But, in Chapter 3 it turns out that Grubbs's uncle is a magician. Uncle Dervish, as he is called, takes pity on Grubbs and takes him in from the mental asylum in which Grubbs is staying in the aftermath of his parents' brutal slaughter and houses him in a massive mansion in the country side. Hopefully Uncle Dervish isn't also a pedophile. But with this book, it's anything goes, so I wouldn't be completely surprised if things indeed begin to take a queer turn. I'm on about page 48 already and Uncle Dervish has just offered to teach Grubbs a few "magic spells". It sounds a lot like something Michael Jackson might do. Can you see where all this is going?

It seems to be basically Harry Potter for "adults", if you know what I mean.

Anyway, I just thought I'd start the online discussion with a very unambitious book. Hopefully with the bar lowered, people will feel more inclined to post something and we'll get some discussion going.

The cover pretty much says it all...