Housekeeping

What with the Twitter and the Facebook and other distractions, I took a long time away from blogging and am trying to get back into the rhythm of it.

Since July, I've contributed but two book columns to The Chronicle. The first covered new novels by Lev Grossman and Richard Kadrey, plus a graphic novel written by Ian Rankin, creator of the Inspector Rebus mysteries. I wholeheartedly recommend the first two and was less than impressed by Rankin's interpretation of one of my favorite comics characters, John Constantine.

Earlier this month the paper ran my round-up of recent kids'/YA books of note. I covered the latest from Kage Baker, John Connolly and Laurence Yep. All three are good, but Connolly's is the stand-out, I think.

I should have plenty to post in November. I'm doing full-length reviews of John Irving's "Last Night at Twisted River,"Michael Crichton's posthumous "Pirate Latitudes" and Stephen King's "Under the Dome," as well as another round-up featuring new releases from Iain M. Banks, Anne Rice and Peter Straub. Plus, I'll be doing some kind of version of my "holiday books/best of the year" column.

And still the books keep coming...