Parenthetical.net

Book reviews, snark, and adventures in locovoration

Parenthetical.net bookshelf

The Pool of Fire, by John Christopher (1968)

April 30th, 2010 · 3 Comments

After the discussion of trilogies (and Martini-Corona’s eternal John Christopher obsession), I decided this project wouldn’t be complete without a Tripod book. The Tripod trilogy (…heh) might have been the first major YA science fiction trilogy, and is certainly a classic.

If you somehow missed these books, the premise is that aliens invade, in giant metal [...]

[Read more →]

Tags: Old-School Apocalypse April · Reviews

Ten! Years!

March 2nd, 2009 · 1 Comment

In the immortal words of Jeremy Piven in Grosse Pointe Blank: “Ten years! Ten years! Ten! Years!” Yes, believe it or not, I have owned this domain for an entire decade. It’s been home to everything from passive-aggressive collegiate angst to stories of my travel adventures to this YA lit [...]

[Read more →]

Tags: Musing

When 3.5 in. floppies looked futuristic

January 14th, 2009 · No Comments

My friend, a public librarian, found this in her library’s attic:
Behold, fabulously 80s library poster!
Comment here

[Read more →]

Tags: Uncategorized

Hey you kids, get off my 3 1/2 inch lawn!

January 13th, 2009 · 5 Comments

This morning I checked out a digital camera to a middle schooler. The only one we had left was one of the old ones that stores the pictures on a floppy disk. I explained this to my student. Her friend overheard and asked, “What’s a floppy?”
The first student’s answer? “It’s like [...]

[Read more →]

Tags: Uncategorized

Strange Tomorrow, by Jean Karl

January 6th, 2009 · 4 Comments

Hey, everybody, it’s post-apocalyptic YA from the ’80s! Home, sweet home. It even has a watercolory cover and a fresh-faced, all-American heroine named “Janie Johnson”! This book was brought to my attention recently [and by "recently," I mean about six months ago, when I actually read it -- Ed.] by an old [...]

[Read more →]

Tags: Uncategorized

I just went back in time…

December 6th, 2008 · 1 Comment

…on the internet. (I mean, how else would you do it?) Last week I bought a mini-VGA to video adapter and a headphone jack to audio cable adapter, and now all of the beautiful streaming video of the internet is available for viewing on my television. One $25 purchase is a hell [...]

[Read more →]

Tags: Links