Rule No. 1: Don’t talk about Book Club…

Welcome to NoVa Pop! Without any further ado (although a good amount of ado is always acceptable) let’s begin with a little thing called Monday Morning Book Club. It’s like a Monday morning quarterback but with lots more literature. (And speaking of QBs, how about my boy Colt Brennan last night for the Redskins? I hereby begin the official “Start Colt Brennan Now!” movement. But I digress.)

You’ve heard of books being adapted into movies, but how about the movies being turned into a book? Former big-screen dolly grip Billy Taylor used to work on movies such as “My Cousin Vinny” and his experiences have inspired his debut comic tale “Based on the Movie.” If you liked Nick Hornby’s humorously conversational “High Fidelity” style, you’ll dig this cat. His star, Bobby Conlon, is a one-time film student and now dolly grip on one clunker of a movie. Between the flick and his flighty producer wife’s tryst with a charismatic yet vapid director that make him wish he hadn’t kicked his Xanax addiction, things couldn’t get any worse. But, this is Hollywood, where neuroses reign, so of course they do. He travels down to Texas for the cinematic disaster, loses his prized grip truck, a porky animal star develops pneumonia, and his estranged betrothed and her boy toy are called in to save the film from certain implosion. The writing is filled with guffaw-inducing, caustic wit, and the interludes are neat little diversions that never take away from the main plot line. Even if you have no knowledge of Hollywood’s inner workings, Taylor brings you up to speed on dollies, grips and the true nuttiness of movie people. The same movie people who are probably planning on turning this into a feature film.

The big book news of this past weekend, though, was the release of “Breaking Dawn,” Stephenie Meyer’s fourth and final (?) chapter in her “Twilight” saga. Folks, this thing has Harry Potter-esque buzz on it, with midnight launch parties for all the teenage “Twihards” and various other followers who adore Meyer’s story of a young girl and the vampire dude she’s crushing on. (Oh yeah, there’s a werewolf involved, too.) And the buzz will be even more deafening as we get closer to the “Twilight” movie in December. But looking at the user reviews on Amazon, it looks like the fan base is pretty torn: Some loved it, while others think Meyer crashed and burned. What do you think? If you’ve read it and want to sound off, drop some knowledge on us in the comments section.

And while we’re on the whole movies angle, let’s talk “Watchmen.” If you haven’t read this literary masterpiece from way back in 1987, I can’t recommend it more. For me, it’s up there with Frank Miller’s “The Dark Knight Returns” and Mark Waid’s “Kingdom Come.” I geeked out when I first read it at 11 and it’s only gotten better since. (What can I say, I was an 11-year-old who was down with subversive superheroes with morality issues, five terms of a Nixon administration and possible nuclear war.) With the new movie adaptation of the Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons masterwork coming out in March, trade paperbacks are flying off the shelves. Last week, I stopped by my local comic shop – Laughing Ogre Comics in Lansdowne – and the cashier girl told me they cleaned out Watchmen stock at their local warehouse. (Never fear – word is that DC Comics is revving up a new printing soon.) It ain’t called the “Citizen Kane” of comic books for nothing. Get your read on.

If you have any suggestions for upcoming novels for the Monday Morning Book Club or for yours truly, send some of that email stuff to novapoppin@gmail.com.

Tags: books, comics