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Brazil: Food & Drink

Brazil Travel post #5: Food & Drink (intro post is here).

Brazil was a culinary delight. Travel not only serves to open one’s mind, but to broaden your palate as well. Join me now as I show the best this self-proclaimed foodie discovered on our trip.

Churrascaria

Brazil is known for red meat and a “Churrasco” is the ultimate steakhouse experience.

Stock photo because I was drooling too much to take a picture.

It’s a special experience where young men (sometimes dressed in traditional cowboy garb), bring choice cuts of meat to your table, slice you off a bite, and continue on. You choose how much you’d like, which cuts, and if you’d like to make room for the salad bar. Hint: you’re not here for salad.

This type of experience can be found in MURDERED if you choose to go to São Paulo with Agent Bertram:

 “Ever have churrasco?” Agent Bertram asks when he picks you up. Before you can answer, he adds, “There’s a great place near here.”
Flames leap out from the kitchen, kissing the meat as the chefs rotate each skewer, trying to keep in as much of the juices as they can. You’re in the Churrascaria now, a high-end restaurant dedicated to Brazilian beef. Churrasco is synonymous with barbeque in this country, and they have a specialized way of cooking it. The sizzling spit from the grill and the smell coming from the kitchen is intoxicating and on an empty stomach, you start to salivate.
“You’re in for a treat, Hotshot. Good luck looking the same at steak back in the US ever again.”

While we weren’t able to make it to São Paulo, we did go to the famed Churrascaria Búfalo in Manaus. If you’re in the area, go.

For dessert? Flame-roasted pinneapple with a sweet-spiced glaze.
For dessert? Flame-roasted pineapple with a sweet-spiced glaze.

High-end Cuisine

As mentioned, the exchange rate in Brazil is currently very favorable for those with American dollars to spend. To this end, we went for a gourmet sushi experience for our first night in Ipanema at a restaurant called Tenkai. We ordered specialty sake cocktails that blended Brazilian tastes with Japanese style. The Brazilian-made sake with lychee fruit was to die for. We couldn’t quite decide what to eat, so we opted for a 60-piece sushi feast. It was so big, they had to sail it in on a boat…

Another stock photo because I suck at pictures when I’m hungry.

Traditional Brazilian

Aside from red meat, if you’re eating like the locals, you’re eating seafood and some variation of manioc (a root that’s a staple of the diet). Stews are ubiquitous, usually accompanied by rice. Breaded and fried entrees are common.

One of the best places for this type of food was at a restaurant in Urca called (wait for it)… Bar Urca.

I did it! I managed to take a picture before we ate!
I did it! I managed to take a picture before we ate!

Fish

Unlike most countries with a large oceanic border, Brazil seemed to serve primarily river fish. With the largest freshwater waterway in the world, this isn’t very surprising, but the entrees themselves certainly were. We tried many variety of fish on our Rio Negro boat tour (blog posts on this topic will arrive eventually, I promise!), and each one was new and exciting. If you’re someone who’s not into seafood because of that “fishy taste” — I’d recommend trying some river fish.

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Piranha! Very different, very good. In fact, for me, piranha tasted more like poultry than fish. Everything new tastes like chicken, right?

Bebidas — drinks!

Brazil also offered a full array of new and exciting drinks, from coffee to fruit juices to alcohol.

Everyone loves Calvin and Hobbes!
Everyone loves Calvin and Hobbes!

The drink you’ll find everywhere is the caipirinha, Brazil’s national cocktail. Sugarcane rum, lime, ice, and more sugar.

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Ready for tourists!

Beer is also common, and even those imported from outside of Brazil could be exotic to us.

Cervezas!
Cervezas!

To end our drink experience, we decided to try to the Brazilian take on Colorado craft brews:

Our Brazilian Airbnb hostess was quite taken aback by the darker beer. Not common in Brazil, apparently.
Our Brazilian Airbnb hostess was quite taken aback by the darker beer. Not common in Brazil, apparently.

That’s it for today. I tried not to retread over the food/drink mentioned in previous posts (like the amazing breakfast at the Copacabana Palace!) or spoil too much for the future (piranha fishing! piranha fishing! OMG, piranha fishing!).

Click to continue: Let’s go sightseeing!

Thanks for reading! Do you have an adventurous palate? What would you most like to try?

Feel free to comment below, and don’t forget to share and subscribe!

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Brazil: Into the Favelas!

Brazil Travel post #4: The Favelas (intro post is here).
Come on, let's explore the winding alleys and hilltop views of the favela together.
Come on, let’s explore the winding alleys and hilltop views of the favela together.

Today, we journey into one of Brazil’s favelas. What exactly is a favela, you ask? At it’s simplest, a slum, but the favelas are so much more than that. 11.4 million people live in one of Brazil’s ramshackle hillside communities. Let’s explore exactly what makes a favela so unique.

The favelas of Rio de Janeiro are world renowned stacks of poverty, drug use, prostitution, and violence. Rivaled only by the slums of Mumbai, you will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy than in the favelas of Rio. Or at least that’s how it used to be.

First, some history.

View from Rocinha favela.

Before “favela” became a generic term, it was the name of one particular village. The first favela was formed at the turn of the 20th century, after the War of Canudos, the bloodiest military-on-civilian massacre in Brazil’s history. The soldiers killed nearly every man, woman, and child in a 30,000 person settlement in a military action dubbed a civil war.

When these 20,000 soldiers, many of whom were suffering from what we would today call PTSD returned to Rio, they found no government assistance nor any place to live. They founded the first favela, and it was named after a skin-irritating tree found in the massacre region.

From these inauspicious beginnings, more favelas cropped up as more poor citizens were displaced and found no other option but to band together and fend for themselves.

Rocinha is the largest favela in Rio.
Rocinha is the largest favela in Rio.

If your choices in MURDERED lead you to work with Agent Danly, and his subsequent investigation leads him into the favelas, it’s a prospect so dangerous that he’s hesitant to allow you to accompany him.

“Listen, you’re doing great, but I’m not sure you should stay with me. I aim to get to the bottom of this, even if that means coming head-to-head with the drug cartels in the favelas. You can’t even imagine what it’s like in there—gangsters dance in the clubs while shooting AK-47s in the air. Even the kids are armed and they won’t hesitate to shoot you if they think it’s worth a laugh. I can’t put your life in jeopardy like that…”

So if these place are so dangerous, why were we crazy enough to visit?

Pacification

In preparation for 2014’s World Cup and this summer’s 2016 Olympics, Brazil has made a considerable crackdown on crime, and this includes “pacification” of the favelas. Pacification is a hostile take-over of the slums in a military operation. Elite special forces are sent in to take out any violent resistance, and then a permanent police force is left to keep the region free of drugs and firearms. In fact, once a favela has been pacified, the Brazilian flag is placed on a high building top — to show that the government has conquered this foreign territory within its own borders.

So while I was expecting this:

What we got was this:

A favela musician and his "manager." The man spoke perfect English and includes favela children on his albums.
A favela musician and his “manager.” The man spoke perfect English and includes favela children on his albums.
A vibrant city market attracting customers from all over, much like a farmer's market in the states.
A vibrant city market attracting customers from all over, much like a farmer’s market in the US.
Might want to cook your meats well-done, just to be safe.
Might want to cook your meats well-done, just to be safe.
"Jackfruit" is common, but has a love-it-or-hate-it taste.
“Jackfruit” is common, but has a love-it-or-hate-it taste.
Pet fish?
Pet fish?
Fresh fruits, spices, everything.
Fresh fruits, spices, everything.

Rocinha is one of Rio’s older pacified favelas, having been pacified in 2011, and our visit was full of unexpected experiences. The people who live there can range up to middle class, our guide informed us, and in addition to pacification, the city government has helped the community receive clean water, free electricity, even wi-fi.

We were a bit wary of a visit, not because we thought we’d be unsafe, but because we didn’t want to offend or exploit people or go on some sort of voyeur tour.

The visit was anything but. Our guide is a well-known figure in the community and the tour company gives back a portion of every ticket, totaling to tens of thousands of dollars donated thus far. There were smiling faces waiting to greet him by name, and we were even given a trip to see the schools they support.

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Stepping into another world.
Our guide, Alfredo, in the school.
Our guide, Alfredo, in the school.
Even English classes provided.
Even English classes are provided.
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Feliz Natal (Merry Christmas!).
Who knew the kids were fans of the zombie genre? (heh)
Who knew the kids were fans of the zombie genre? (heh)
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The locals take pride in the unique look of their communities.
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We did!

In addition to the portion of our tour price donated, we bought jewelry made by the students, music and paintings made by locals, and even the “best caipirinha in Rio” at an alley shop.

If you ever get the opportunity, I’d highly recommend a visit to the favelas. Just make sure the one you go to has been pacified, use a reputable guide, and don’t go at night. Just because improvements are made, doesn’t mean those elements that gave the favelas their reputation are gone completely.

That’s it for today. Up next? I don’t know about you, but I’m getting hungry. Let’s check out Brazil’s food and drink!

Thanks for reading! Did you enjoy your trip into the favelas?

Feel free to comment below, and don’t forget to share and subscribe!

 

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Brazil: Graffiti

This is post #3 in my Brazil Travel series. If you haven’t kept up from the start, you can check that out here.

Graffiti has a big role to play in MURDERED. In fact, taking a picture of a graffiti mural is the whole reason your tourist character leaves a public street and becomes forever embroiled in a murder mystery. While the mural I describe in the book exists solely in my mind, the real street art of Rio inspired my imagination:

“In the preview on the LCD screen, you notice there’s the beginning of a graffiti mural sticking out from the adjoining alley. You peek around the corner to see the full image. It’s an angel, larger than life and in stunning detail. His hair is long and his face is placid, much like a beardless Christ.  Yet this is a dark angel; his wings, not feathered, are formed from two AK-47 machine guns divided in broad symmetry. Two snakes wrap around his legs, originating from behind his ankles and enveloping his lower half like the caduceus, their heads biting his wrists and spreading his arms. A nuclear mushroom cloud which serves as his halo bursts forth from behind his flowing mane. In stylized calligraphy, the caption above reads, ‘Vou testemunhar.’“

It’s called anything from vandalism to street art, but no matter what you call it, tagging can be a powerful method of expression in large cities, specifically by its poorer citizens. While I don’t think this justifies someone putting their initials or callsign wherever they can, I do think that some graffiti transcends into art. Here are a few examples that stuck out to me during my travels. Unless otherwise noted, all pictures are from Rio de Janeiro.

Manaus
Manaus traffic circle. Child with the colors of the Brazilian flag.
Manaus
Manaus traffic circle. Left unfinished by choice or circumstance.
A simple Merry Christmas, or deeper meaning?
A simple Merry Christmas, or perhaps a deeper meaning?
Favela stack design painted on an actual favela stack in Rocinha. So meta.
Favela stack design painted on an actual favela stack in Rocinha. So meta.
Rocinha. Great use of colors and perspective.
Rocinha. Great use of colors and perspective.
Taken in Rocinha. A deeper meaning might be gleaned by those who read Portuguese.
Rocinha. A deeper meaning might be gleaned by those who read Portuguese.
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The juxtaposition of Brazilian pride and abject poverty really spoke to me.
In some favelas, there are so many alleyways that they decided to give them street names. This "heart labyrinth" is beautiful.
This “heart labyrinth” is beautiful. Note: In some favelas, there are so many alleyways that they decided to give them street names.
Brazilian mascot for the World Cup.
Brazilian mascot for the World Cup.
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Love the expressions, and the use of color.
Its always interesting to me where youll find graffiti. Like this dirt lot on the other side of a neighborhood.
It’s always interesting to me where you’ll find graffiti. Like this dirt lot on the other side of a neighborhood.
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Looks inviting, right?
Mural Part One
Mural Part One.
Mural Part Two
Mural Part Two.
Full sign was "Money is Violence" but I like "Bus Violence." It s rare to see murals in English.
Full sign was “Money is Violence” but I like “Bus Violence.” It’s rare to see murals in English.
St Sebastion the Martyr is a common image, here re-imagined as a beach bum. The pattern on his board shorts is also recurring theme in Brazil.
St Sebastion the Martyr is a common image, here re-imagined as a beach bum. The patterns on his board shorts are also recurring theme in Brazil.
Michaela says she has seen this "oil angel" several places in South America.
Michaela says she saw this “oil angel” several places in Rio.
Dracula and zombies. Nuff said.
Dracula and zombies. Nuff said.

Good one to end it on? Sure, good as any. The point is, it’s not like I asked a cab driver to take me around to all the best graffiti in the city. The stuff is just everywhere! These are all designs I just happened to see as I explored. In face, over half were taken from moving taxi windows. In my humble opinion, it adds character to the city. A certain depth and color, both literally and figuratively.

Click to continue: Brazil: Into the Favelas!

Thanks for reading! Where do you stand on graffiti? Eye-sore or art?

Feel free to comment below, and don’t forget to share and subscribe!

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Brazil: All about the Beaches

This is topic #2 in my Brazil Travel series. If you want to start at the beginning with the intro post, you can check that out here.

It’s impossible to think of Rio de Janeiro, and Brazil as a whole, without thinking of the beaches. And seeing as how we left Colorado in December, it’s one of the parts I was most looking forward to. Here’s a picture taken the day before we flew out.

The dog was warm, at least.
The dog was warm, at least.

And here is the view we found after landing:

Photo taken from outside the Tropical Resort.

River Beaches

I’ve mentioned that Manaus is a port city, but what you might not have known is that it’s solely a river port. And these are river beaches. In fact, the area of the Rio Negro where we visited is the largest freshwater archipelago in the world. That’s how big the rivers are down here!

Meant to show scale, but if you look closely, you can see heron flying along the water and a caimen swimming as well.
If you click and zoom in, you can see a heron flying along the water and a caimen swimming center left.

The water is full of predators, as small as bacteria or parasites, famous like the anaconda or flesh-eating piranha, large and aggressive like caimen, or dangerously stealthy like the river stingrays lurking at the bottom. In MURDERED, I mentioned that the biggest bull sharks are known to swim upriver to hunt in fresh water.

But the absolute worst thing down here is the candiru, a parasitic fish that seeks out the smell of urine and will swim up your urethra if you pee. Plus, it has barbed fins so it can’t be easily pulled back out.

So, of course, we decided to go swimming in the river.

Aggressive river animals HATE selfies.

Since my mom is probably reading this, I will say we swam by a sandbar, which is safer because the animals are attracted to vegetation and a sandbar is essentially the desert of the river. Didn’t stomp around on the bottom, didn’t wiggle my toes, didn’t swim near anything that looked like a log, and definitely didn’t pee in the river.

The real beaches, however, are those famed spots found in Rio de Janeiro.

Ipanema Beach

Good luck going to Ipanema without this song in your head.

This place is a world-renowned paradise. They have a wonderful beachfront walkway, including a sepearate bike path. During peak daylight hours, the whole side of traffic nearest to the beach is closed off for pedestrian use. People walk along, tan themselves on the beach, play volleyball or soccer (or a mix of both) and generally enjoy life. It’s legal to consume alcohol in public in Rio, so many enjoy drinks on the beach as well. Check out the view for yourself:

That's a favela on the far hillside. A great irony here is that the poorest neighborhoods often have the best views.
That’s a favela on the far hillside. A great irony here is that the poorest neighborhoods often have the best views.

There are, of course, a few downsides. Crowds, for one. Another biggie is the poorwater quality. According to the Associated Press, the bacteria and virus levels are about as high as swimming in raw sewage. While we saw quite a few people in the water, we skipped this swim. Remember that urethra fish? Yeah, we would rather swim around that guy than go in the ocean in Rio. A fact that is made all the more painful by how oppressively hot it is down here. And I mean hot:

So, there’s a lot of sweating involved. Yet the perfect solution is waiting for you every quarter mile in the form of snack & drink stands. The perfect treat for my money was “Coco Verde”–a green coconut split open with a machete, ready for you to plunge a straw inside and taste the sweet, cool coconut water within. The first I tried was probably one of the most refreshing experiences in my entire life.

R$6, or under $2 USD at the time of our visit.

Sweet nectar of life.

Copacabana Beach

Connected just down the road from Ipanema, but if you’re not careful, you won’t even notice the transition.

Equally famed, this part of Rio does get it’s own earworm worthy song too:

During our visit, Copacabana beach was getting ready for the New Year celebration, which included some great sand castle art like the shot below:

Christmas, New Years, Christ the Redeemer, and the Olympics–this sand castle had it all!

Yet it isn’t all fun-and-games and sight-seeing. Rio can still be a dangerous city, even with the massive police crackdown that’s been going on since the World Cup and has ramped up for the Olympics. Opportunistic thieves are still prevalent in popular areas, and with so many people, the police often have to deal with violent outbreaks.

One such day, as we were walking on Ipanema beach, riot police stormed down to the shore. I couldn’t see what was going on, but a helicopter circled above with militarized police hanging out the sides, machine guns drawn.

Stock photo because I’m not brave enough to lift my camera when armed military police are running past. Sorry, not sorry.

We chose to keep walking without exploring the scene. What ever happened? I’m not sure, and I can’t find anything about it in the news either. Who knows, maybe I passed up a chance to work with Rio cops and DSS agents to try and solve a murder….

Click to check out the next topic: Graffiti.

Thanks for reading! What do YOU think? Should I have swam in the ocean? What about deciding to do so in the river?

Feel free to comment below, and don’t forget to share and subscribe!

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Brazil: Resort, Hostel, Palace, Guestroom

For the first post in my Brazil Travel series, we’re going to talk about lodgings. If you missed yesterday’s intro post, you can check that out here.

These are the places we stayed: A resort, a hostel, a palace, and a guestroom. As mentioned, we also stayed on a boat for a week, but that’s a post for another day.

Eco-Resort Hotel Tropical

Before we embarked on said boat, we stayed at a resort. When we flew into Brazil, our first stop was the port town of Manaus. The boat trip met at the lobby of this particular hotel, so we decided we should splurge and stay here. It’s unfortunate that Brazil’s economy isn’t doing so great right now, but as a result, this resort cost about as much as an average night in a chain-hotel in the United States. And here’s what we got:

tropical-manaus-ecoresort
I didn’t take this photo, but it gives you a sense of the amazing location.

What a fantastic way to end 22 hours of travel (three flights, each with layovers that required us to exit the terminal and go through security again at a new part of the airport. Not fun. I’m calling you out, Miami and Brasilia!). Everything was reasonably priced and they do mean “resort.” Three restaurants, two bars, tennis courts, massive swimming pool, private beach, and a mini-mall on site. This place even has its own zoo!

If you ever end up in Manaus, stay here. Just don’t use the taxis parked out front. Once in Rio de Janeiro, we quickly realized that the Manaus resort taxis were probably charging 3x what the city taxis would have cost.

Because we stayed in Rio from December 26th through the 31st (one of the most popular travel times in Brazil, matching up the holidays with summer in the southern hemisphere) the hotel situation was rather difficult. I wanted to stay where “you” stay in MURDERED, and I managed this to a point, but we couldn’t stay there the whole time due to the location’s massive popularity. We were forced to move around, which ended up being a lot of fun once we embraced it.

Hostel Che Lagarto Ipanema

Here’s where your American tourist character is staying with friends at the start of the book. Back when I was doing research, I picked this location because it’s a popular spot for young, unattached travelers, and it’s a location in the thick of things. It’s also recommended in the Lonely Planet tourist guidebook I consulted, so it seemed likely your character might have done the same.

As you can see in the hostel’s Facebook post above, I told the staff that I wrote a book featuring their location and they were very appreciative. The manager didn’t believe me at first, but once I showed him in the text, he flipped out. In a great way. He started off by showing all the workers on duty, then he moved on to showing all the guests who were present in the main lounge. That skin tone is due in part to the tropical heat, but mostly because it was a little embarrassing.

"Behind the scenes" of that facebook post.
“Behind the scenes” of that facebook post. In addition to the photos and handshakes, I left a signed copy of the book at the hostel too.

The hostel itself does what it says on the tin, and they’re quite good at it. They host events that change every day, ranging from parties to sight seeing. Each evening, there’s a “happy hour” where you get as many free drinks as you can down in half an hour (Caipirinhas, specifically. They’re the sugarcane-rum-based national cocktail). That, of course, is only the beginning of the party.

We’re a few years older than the target demographic, so we opted for a private room rather than sharing a communal area of bunkbeds and showers that is the signature of hostel lodging. If you decide to visit, bring earplugs. And ask to see the book!

Heres the master at work.
Here’s the master at work. Needless to say, it’s a busy 30 minutes for the man.

PS — If you so choose, in MURDERED you can end up back at your hostel on the first night and meet the bartender at this very location.

The Copacabana Palace

Here’s how the next hotel is described in the book:

“The government SUV pulls up to the city’s most famous hotel, the Copacabana Palace. Only three miles up the road from your old hostel in Ipanema but three times the price for a room, you’re greeted with all the pomp and circumstance of a visiting rock star. The white façade is something out of the 1920s, and to be quite honest, it looks more like a presidential home than a hotel.”

Wanna come check out a friggin PALACE?! Yeah, me too.
Wanna come check out a friggin’ PALACE?! Yeah, me too.

Your other lodging choice in the book is getting set up at this luxurious hotel located directly on Copacabana beach. The center-stage for the New Year’s celebration known as “Réveillon” was set up on the beach directly in front of the hotel and a private archway was constructed so guests could move to and from the party. The rates for the holiday (New Years is huge in Brazil) were higher than the already normally pricey rooms.

Turns out…we didn’t actually stay here. It was way too expensive for us–BUT, we did manage to come for the poolside breakfast, and if you get the chance, I would highly recommend doing so yourself. A smorgasbord of fruits, pastries, and other exotic treats awaits.

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If you’re able to afford it, I’d recommend you not miss this spot. And if you stop by to visit, they have a signed book too, so ask to see it!

Airbnb by the Sea

For our final lodging, we found a diamond in the rough. And by rough, I mean we rented a spare room in an affluent neighborhood right next to the ocean. Check out this view!

View from our window.
View from where that dude was standing.

Go ahead, zoom in on that last picture. Just across the bay…it’s the iconic Christ the Redeemer statue! How amazing is that? We picked this place because it’s (a bit) out of the way, and because we could check out the other half of the city. The room is called Urca with beautiful view!!! and the deal is impossible to beat. Clean, and beautiful indeed, with a great price to boot. If you go, tell Cissa we said hi! She has a copy of the book too.

Click to continue to the next topic: All about the Beaches

Thanks for reading! Where would you most want to stay? Questions for me?

Feel free to comment below, and don’t forget to share and subscribe!

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Come with me, Vamos o Brasil!

I’m back from spending the holidays with my wife in Brazil! As promised, I’m going to tell you all about it.

The trip was split into two parts. First, we took a riverboat deep into the Amazon jungle. The Amazon river itself is far too settled for a true rainforest experience, with industry and cities crowding her mighty banks. Instead, we went on the adjoining Rio Negro, living on the boat for a week. During this time we took day excursions into the jungle on foot and explored the islands, inlets, and archipelagos with smaller watercraft.

The Tucano! Our home on the river.
The Tucano! Our home on the river.

It was a magical, crazy experience that included fishing for (and eating!) piranha, seeing our guide “charm” an enormous, bird-eating tarantula bigger than my hand out of its burrow,  watching giant river otter chase a large caiman alligator onto land, and much, much more.  I’ll blog about these stories (with pictures!) day-by-day as we go along.

For the second half, we journeyed to Rio de Janeiro, a vibrant city home to more than 12 million people, and the setting for the vast majority of the events featured in MURDERED. Here we saw the sights, ate like locals, strolled the beaches — and found adventure as well.

One of Rio's many "favela" slums. Yep, we went here.
One of Rio’s many “favela” slums that dot the hillsides. Yep, we went here.

Each day, I’m going to share with you pictures and stories from the trip, as well as highlight those experiences that you can live for yourself in MURDERED.

I’m not going to present all the photos and stories chronologically, lest I risk turning this into a family vacation slideshow. Instead, I’m going to share my experiences in Brazil by subject. I’ll show the people, the places, graffiti, food, the jungle, and more. Because my book begins in Rio and moves out to the jungle, so will this blog. Each day will be something new.

How many days? I’m not sure yet, but I hope you’ll join me in reliving this truly epic journey.

Click to continue to the first topic: Brazil: Resort, Hostel, Palace, Guestroom

Thanks for reading! What parts of Brazil are you most excited to see? Have you ever been? Requests for stories or anecdotes on travel?

Feel free to comment below, and don’t forget to share and subscribe!

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So…there are four Star Wars movies now.

So, I just got back from Brazil (blog posts incoming!) and I had to go see The Force Awakens before I could log onto the internet.

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There is quite a bit I’m glad I didn’t read online. Whew!

Walking to the theater, I determined there were four possible outcomes:

  1. The movie would make me angry (like the prequels).
  2. It would be better than the prequels, but not great.
  3. It would be a really fun movie, but without reaching instant classic status.
  4. It would somehow achieve the impossible task of being as good as the Original Trilogy.

And I must say, I really, really enjoyed the film. Much more than I thought I would. Here I was, prepared to call the director Jar Jar Abrams should he fail me, and all my doubts were unfounded. The movie easily hits #3. Not sure yet if it’s #4-worthy, but I’m already planning on seeing it again. Brian, my collaborator on the Reboot the Prequels project, has already declared the movie his favorite Star Wars movie. Ever.

I’m not sure I’m ready for such declarations, but I can say that I’m genuinely excited to see the next film. By contrast, waiting for Episode III felt like waiting for a dental appointment.

Sure, I have a few gripes. (Spoilers) I still don’t like the crossguard saber. Rey using force-based skills without any training felt rushed, the Skywalker saber seeming to have a will of its own didn’t sit well, and I’m not sure how I feel about Giant Smeagol as the new Big Bad (end spoilers). But I can let those slide, for one particularly wonderful reason:

It felt like a Star Wars movie. Great banter and chemistry. A real sense of fun. Almost no prequel references. No over-explaining everything. No politics. Hell, they blew up the senate!

Which leads to one awesome point: Our prequel reboot is still a go, and now has a stronger case than ever. Especially with a Mandalorian-centered plot.

Did you catch this Easter Egg?

What did YOU think? Love the movie? Hate it? Meh? Let me know in the comments below, and don’t forget to share, like, and subscribe!

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My Big Trip — To Brazil!

Redeemer
Can you guess how excited I am? Thiiiiiiisss much.

In a few days, my wife and I are headed on the trip of a lifetime. A bucket-list trip, if you will. We’re going to Brazil, first to take a boat down the Amazon, see the jungle, and then head to Rio de Janeiro to see the sites like the one above.

I know what you’re thinking–didn’t I release MURDERED two years ago?

Sure did, and I made the setting as authentic as I could–for someone who had never visited Brazil. And in doing that research, I created a travel guide of sorts that I now aim to follow.

Originally, I thought I’d blog about the trip as I went, but after some thought I’ve decided to delay that until the return. I don’t want to have to rush to an internet cafe everyday and I don’t even think it would be feasible for my river/jungle portion. Instead, I’m going to blog each day as it happens, day by day, then publish it when I get back in daily episodes as if the whole thing were only on a delayed timer.

So when I get back, I’ll tell you all about it.

I’m going to stay in the hostel your character is staying in at the start of the book. Eat at the same Copacabana Palace you can eat at in the book. Ride the cog train up to the Christ statue. I’ll even head into the favelas! During the day, of course. I know the consequences…

Test your detective skills in the shantytowns of Rio de Janeiro's favelas.
And, more than anything, I’m going to paint the town red.

I hope you all enjoy your Christmas break as much as I will and I’ll catch you in the new year!

Edit: I’ve started blogging about the trip. Check that out here.

So, what do YOU think? Have you ever been on a trip like this? Doing anything fun over winter?

Feel free to comment below, and don’t forget to share and subscribe!

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Signed Books Make the Best Gifts!

Looks like it’s a tradition now. First, I offer up my favorite reads of the year. Then, I offer to sign some of my books for you. Which is what’s happening now.

horisign2

If you’re interested, I’ll sign and ship to you, a friend, family, co-worker, Secret Santa, whoever or wherever. Call it $20 even and I’ll pay for shipping. I’m limited to what I have on hand, so it’s first-come first-served until they’re gone. All three books, same deal. Because flat rate envelopes are where it’s at, unfortunately, I cannot combine shipping costs.

Hit me up on my contact form and we can iron out the payment details over email. I’m going on vacation the second half of December (more on that later — this is going to be a HUGE trip with relevance to Click Your Poison!), so I need all orders in before the 15th of December.

I usually reserve signed books for in-person appearances, so this is a once-a-year opportunity to get me to scribble for you via the internet.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

Meeting the author not include. Accessories sold separately. See fine print for details. Exclusions may apply. Not valid with any other author.
Meeting the author not included. No purchase necessary to be a hero or a villain. Accessories sold separately. See fine print for details. Exclusions may apply. Not valid with any other author.

 

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2015 JS Book Recommendations

As I first did last year, it’s time to recommend the best books I’ve read this year. Maybe you’ll like them too. Or, maybe someone on your gift list will.

Turns out, I read a lot of good books in 2015! It wasn’t easy to whittle down the list, but here they are, the five books I absolutely could not put down in 2015. I’ve given a brief explanation why you should read each, but hopefully not enough to spoil anything.

1) I’ll start with a book I’ve been meaning to read for a long time, Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy. If you don’t mind dark and gritty (and if you read my books, I assume you don’t), this book is simply stunning. It’s on the top of my “read again if you ever decide to write a western” list.

2) The next two are books I’ve loved for a long time, but re-read this year, so I’ll lump them together. Catch-22 by Joseph Heller and Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut. Many people read these books in high school, but I’d recommend saving them for (or re-reading later with) an adult’s perspective on the world.

3) While writing SUPERPOWERED, I got into a lot of graphic novels. One that has stuck with me and that I continue to read as issues are released is Saga by by Brian K. Vaughan (Author), Fiona Staples (Illustrator). It would be overly simplistic to call the story Romeo and Juliet set in space, but I think it’s great proof that adding a different spice (and this one is spicy!) can completely change a familiar dish.

4) The Girl with all the Gifts by M. R. Carey. Minor spoiler: This book contains sentient zombies. Which, normally, I don’t like. I’d rather see new human perspectives in the zombie apocalypse than I would like to see the ZA itself re-invented. That said, this book has a lot of heart and a lot of creativity, without too much gore. Stuff it in the stocking of the most sensitive zombie fan you know.

5) Rounding out this year’s list in the only Indie book on here (I know, I should be better than that!): Reapers by the Thornton Brothers. What starts off as a clever Lord of the Rings parallel to the Iraq war (our cast is comprised of “black ops” rangers, but the setting is high fantasy) eventually evolves into something much more. I won’t say too much, because there is some massively creative storytelling in here.

Honorable Mentions

First, we have The Strain by Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan. I went into this story blind, simply because GdT is one of my favorite filmmakers, and the audiobook is narrated by the delightful Ron Perlman. If you want your own Monet Experience, I’d highly recommend picking up the book and diving in. The opening air of mystery is fantastic. It didn’t make my top reads cut, however, because it’s a cliff-hangar book. None of the story is resolved by the end and I’m assuming you have to read all three to get any closure. To boot, Perlman only narrates the first book. So I’ve started watched the TV show instead of continuing the series.

Next up is All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr, which falls just short of amazing. The book jumps around its timeline, presenting some chapters in a WWII “present” and then going back to the backstory for others. I know this is a popular technique to keep readers hooked by teasing the climax, but I feel like it cheapened the experience here. In fact, if you decide to check out this book, I’d recommend you go through and write down the dates at the front of each chapter, then read the book chronologically. I’m willing to bet you’ll have a brilliant experience with it.

Over the summer, I listened to the audiobook of A Long Time Until Now by Michael Z Williamson. On the cover, it shows a caveman, a centurion, and a modern US soldier standing atop a jeep and fighting off ice age beasts. Nuff said, right? I’m a sucker for a good time travel story. And I wanted to love this one, but there just wasn’t any interpersonal conflict in the novel. Several groups of people were shuffled through time, and they were all just like, “cool, let’s do this.” I needed a bit more.

I was looking forward to The Fold by Peter Clines for a long time. It’s the sister-book to 14, which was one of my favorites of the previous year. The story is still a lot of fun, but the main character’s (minor spoiler) perfect “mimetic memory” is too much of a superpower. I loved the average Joe falls into a crazy world that 14 gave me, but the protagonist of The Fold feels like an AI computer and so the stakes were lowered. I always felt he’d come out on top. Still, this book was worth the read and I’d check out another written in that same universe.

Finally, we have Armada by Ernest Cline. This author is on fire, and he’s delivered another fun book, but not quite to the level of his first, Ready Player One. This book feels just a little bit too inspired by Ender’s Game and the conclusion felt somewhat truncated. That said, it’s a fun, quick read (or a cool listen by narrator Wil Wheaton). Worth it, but not amazing.

So, what do YOU think? Have you read any of the titles listed? Any suggestions for me?

Feel free to comment below, and don’t forget to share and subscribe!

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