For a few dollars more

So this Tuesday, I bought a copy of the new SPLINTER CELL novel, CHECKMATE, by David Michaels. Before tax, it cost me $9.99. For a mass market paperback. This is a full two dollars more than the two previous titles in this series, all because it's in that fancy-schmancy new "easier to read" format. You know the kind: the paperbacks that are taller and skinnier than your ordinary ones. And that's it. Somehow, this merits a heftier price. Whatever.

Onto less pressing matters, here are highlights from this week at BOOKGASM – click the links for the full review:

• EIFELHEIM by Michael Flynn – "It’s not really a fair comparison to pit Michael Flynn’s EIFELHEIM against Umberto Eco’s masterwork, but there are similarities. The authorial presence, the sheer confidence with which Flynn rattles off complicated scientific concepts, the casualness when he imparts major clues to the reader, the subject matter itself, the one-line witticisms, the willingness to let things stand in their own actuality instead of using some hackneyed metaphor, to call an aquamanile an aquamanile when necessary. And that’s a very good thing indeed. ... A remarkably rich and dense work, EIFELHEIM instantly slotted itself into my top 10 books of the year list."

• THE REAL ANIMAL HOUSE: THE AWESOMELY DEPRAVED SAGA OF THE FRATERNITY THAT INSPIRED THE MOVIE by Chris Miller – "...contains the stories on which one of the funniest films ever made was based. I just wish these stories were as funny. ... I mean, if you find countless stories of throwing up a laugh riot in and of themselves, then this book is for you, since vomiting accounts for probably 70 percent of the stories here. It seems Miller – one of HOUSE's screenwriters – is looking back at his own college days with rose-colored glasses. "

• MY LOLITA COMPLEX AND OTHER TALES OF SEX AND VIOLENCE by Max Allan Collins and Matthew V. Clemens – "COMPLEX makes good on its title, offering one mystery after another crackling with sexual tension  – if not outright fornication – and fisticuffs, scuffles and more fatal fights. Don't misjudge the sex, either; though hot 'n' bothered, it's more of a hard-R nature than trenchcoat-friendly pornography, and it doesn't detract from the plots. In fact, it might even heighten them."

Want more? We also covered David Hewson's new thriller, a Roger Ebert hate machine, Michael Slade's KAMIKAZE, some old Ellery Queen novels, F. Paul Wilson's Repairman Jack series, the latest (and best) DC UNIVERSE novel, a Rolling Stones tell-all and some comics. Plus, we found time to bitch belatedly about the Quills. If that's not worth a click, what is?