Here’s the good thing about IKEA: while it’s true that a lot of their items are cheap in a pejorative sense, if you look around carefully you can get some great deals on some wonderful pieces of furniture. We found an awesome dining room set there, a couple of very nice dressers, and some bookcases we desperately need.

Here’s the problem: since there’s no way we could fit that stuff in our car, we ordered it over the internet and arranged to have it delivered. It arrived last night, and about half of it is going to have to go back.

Three bookcases were totally loose. As in, the shelves and hardware were stacked freely in the truck. The delivery folks even looked shocked when they saw that. One of the pieces of backing is cracked through; several shelves are splintered, crunched, or broken, even just at first glance; and we have no idea whether anything’s missing.

Several other boxes had been so thoroughly broken open that things got damaged or, once again, we have no way of knowing if anything’s missing—that’s a fourth bookcase and BOTH dressers. In fact, the only things we’re going to be able to hold onto are one full-sized bookcase, one narrow bookcase, and the dining room set. Truthfully a couple of those boxes were damaged, too, but the damage was little enough that we could see the items themselves weren’t damaged or missing anything.

Well, it’ll be an interesting test of IKEA’s customer service to see if we end up with what we ordered, and how difficult the process is.

In the interests of not simply griping on this rainy Friday morning, here are two review links and two cute cat pics. First, reviews of Crichton’s classic The Andromeda Strain and Pamela Clare’s new and fantastic Unlawful Contact. Finally, cuddly cat photos. Well okay, the first one isn’t so cuddly; if you tried, you’d probably get a few playful scratches:

Oy… I meant to post a bunch of stuff today. I put up some new designs in the Gamers’ Heaven cafepress shop, finished a book to review, wanted to chat a bit about a 48-hour reading marathon coming up in June (and some friends who will most likely be guest-posting here as a part of that)… lots of stuff like that. I also wanted to do more agave nectar-baking today, although I think that’ll have to wait until Sunday.

Anyway, at least I did get some gardening done, and I’ll post a slideshow of the latest pics at the bottom. I’m also going to see Ironman tonight—usually I try to avoid opening weekend, but it’s one of those ‘meet up with a bunch of friends’ things. It’s also at 11 pm, which is rather late for me. And tomorrow there’s a friend’s retirement picnic…

But I’m babbling, so I’ll just post those pics and go. Have a great weekend!

You know you’ve been receiving too many review books when the FedEx guy thanks you for keeping him in a job.

You know you review too many books when a relative tells you they might be gluten sensitive and the first thing you say is, “I have a review copy of a book about that…”

You know too many of your review copies are of the ’spicy’ variety when you have to start a separate book to take with you to the gym most nights. (It’s a family-friendly gym.)

Speaking of review books, here are two more reviews: Janelle Denison’s Wild for Him and, from Sensorotika, Erotika: Bedtime Stories.

And now, for today’s re-worked T-shirt design, perfect for roleplayers and gamers:

I see dead people…

I’ve always loved martial arts flicks. The problem is, these days they tend to use CGI and/or wire-work to enhance the wild and crazy stunts they portray. While I can enjoy a CGI or wire-work movie if that’s what I’m in the mood for, when I want to watch a martial arts flick it’s generally because I want to see just what the human body can do when it’s properly trained and pushed to its limits. CGI could turn anyone into a martial arts madman on screen—I want to be amazed by what someone can REALLY do.

Recently my husband and I started visiting some friends in Virginia for occasional movie nights, and it turns out that they’re huge martial arts fiends. They introduced us to some Thai movies, and we’re completely and utterly hooked. Our two favorites so far are Ong-Bak and Born to Fight. As expected the plot is flimsy and largely there to provide an excuse for the fight scenes, but that’s to be expected. Thai martial arts are amazing to watch, and the man who produced both of these films apparently feels that the way in which Thai films can distinguish themselves, since they don’t have the resources of Hollywood or Hong Kong, is through their death-defying stunts and unique forms of martial arts. Boy howdy is he right. These are incredibly visceral movies, and if you watch the ‘making of’ specials on the Born to Fight DVD you’ll see at least one stunt that came entirely too close to killing a stunt man.

Ong-Bak is particularly amazing for its chase scenes and its long fights involving Thai martial arts. Born to Fight takes a bunch of professional athletes (seriously: they used real professional athletes instead of actors) so that they could do jaw-dropping stunts and fight scenes that mixed athletics and martial arts. It’s every bit as good as watching an old-style Jackie Chan-style scene using props to their fullest. I can’t wait to see The Protector next.

Apropos of nothing, the latest reviews are of two J.D. Robb/Nora Roberts books: Strangers in Death (her latest), and Naked in Death (the first in the series).

I’m finally getting around to reading & reviewing some more fiction. Wheee! Today’s review is of P.D. Gilson’s Gaea: Beyond the Son, and I have two more novels that I read over the weekend and at the end of last week that I need to review. I finally read a Nora Roberts/J.D. Robb mystery out of curiosity, and I read Craig Smith’s The Painted Messiah.

I wanted to link to Murder By the Book today after reading this post by Sam Houston. Not only does it sound like a fantastic bookstore, but apparently one of the folks there got the bright idea to start up a publishing company aimed at reprinting now-out-of-print mysteries. You know the ones—where you go to buy book ten in a series by an author you just heard of, and you think you should start at the beginning of the series, only it turns out that books one through seven are out of print now? That always drives me insane! Anyway, these folks got the wonderful idea to try to fix that. Go visit Busted Flush Press!

Then, take a moment to watch this fontariffic video:

(Found via book/daddy.)

Today’s Booking Through Thursday:

What’s your favorite book that nobody else has heard of? You know, not Little Women or Huckleberry Finn, not the latest best-seller . . . whether they’ve read them or not, everybody “knows” those books. I’m talking about the best book that, when you tell people that you love it, they go, “Huh? Never heard of it?”

I can do you one better—one of my whole favorite authors, not just a single book. Many of the people I talk with about books have heard of most of my favorite authors, at least in passing: Anne Bishop, Garth Nix, Tobias Buckell. However, almost no one has heard of Thomas Ligotti. He has a very loyal cult following among a very small number of people because he writes extremely unusual, bizarre fiction. It’s absolutely captivating. I highly recommend his Noctuary, with Songs of a Dead Dreamer coming in a close second:

When all the landscape is dying, descending fragrantly to earth, we alone rise up. After light and warmth have passed from the world, when everyone stands melancholy at the graveside of nature, we alone return to keep them company. This is our season to be reborn.

I could also list Bettie Sharpe among my little-known faves, but that’s only because she’s just barely started publishing.

Edited to add: I went and found Ligotti’s website for folks interested in exploring his work.

And, a handful of links:

• Mercury in sushi—I mourn.
• Free Fall by Isaac Marion—weird and beautiful fiction.
• Loud Neighbors—another weird and fascinating Isaac Marion story.
• Best source for specialty cooking stuff EVER: King Arthur Flour Company.
• The most bizarre item we’ve ever sold through Cafepress, and I’ll tell you right now that we’ve sold more than one: Level 70 Hottie Thong. Yes, you read that right—thong.

It isn’t often that I feel the need to gush over a writer’s ability, but twice in the last year I’ve been bowled over by an author’s debut of one sort or another. First time it was Tobias Buckell’s Crystal Rain, and now it’s Bettie Sharpe’s Ember. And in the case of Ember, I wasn’t even asked to review it—it was posted as a ten-part serial at Dionne Galace and now is up as a free ebook at Bettie’s site. I just loved it so much that I had to review it—not just so you can go read it, but in the hopes you’ll go check out Bettie’s first ebook, A Thief in the Night, released today (I’ve got my copy!). Both books are erotic romances, and they’re so far from formulaic. Ember is an incredibly fresh and unique take on the Cinderella story that totally tickled my fancy.

I also have to pass on one other odd fiction-link: I Am a Zombie Filled with Love by Isaac Marion. It’s poignant, insightful, and funny, all at the same time.

I was up late last night playing D&D, so I’m a bit dead on my feet today. One of the cats seems to be a bit sick, too, so cleaning up cat puke at 11:30 pm (yay, raw bunny vomit that apparently had been drying onto the hardwood all day while we were gone), 5:30 am, and 11:30 am didn’t help. I hope he feels better soon, poor thing.

There’s plenty for me to put up this week (including reviews of Demolition Desserts, The Five Secrets You Must Discover Before You Die, Bettie Sharpe’s Ember (coming tomorrow!), and New England Cooking), but they won’t go up today. I’m also putting off playing Pirates until later, because the update seems to be wreaking a little havoc with my ability to play, and I don’t have the patience this afternoon to try again; maybe tonight or tomorrow.

So, I’m mostly posting to point you to a blog that you really should check out. It’s authored by our partner-in-crime Jervis, and called Thraveon.

What makes it worth reading? Well, Jervis has been all over the world, and somehow managed to have all sorts of insane experiences. Better yet, he’s a hysterically fun storyteller. If you want an example, check out the entry he calls ‘Airport Skiing’ and I call Bowling for Monks. Share it with your friends, leave comments… help us encourage Jervis to write more and more about his entertaining experiences.

Okay, okay, I give up. You all made the LibraryThing book cataloging service sound so good that I had to go and join. And immediately become addicted.

Maybe I’ll be able to keep up with it, maybe not, but right now it’s an awesomely fun toy. Besides, I’d really love to have a listing of our books for insurance purposes if nothing else—who’d ever believe how many books we have in this house?! $25 for a lifetime membership is really very cheap, and $15 for the bar code scanner is something I’m more than willing to shell out with the number of books we have.

Besides, there are cool features. I’m having fun posting a few brief versions of some of my reviews, and looking up other folks’ opinions of books, and who’s reading what.

I knew I shouldn’t try it out. I just knew I’d never be able to resist if I did!