Monday, December 14, 2015

The limits of art; the boundaries of obsession


By Lars Trodson


Something in me didn’t even want to pick up the book.

Something felt unfinished; I wasn’t focused when I wrote it but I didn’t want to admit that. I'm talking about when my second novel, “Tide Turning,” came out. I did not feel the rush of excitement I felt with the first book. Not because the experience of having a novel published was old hat, it was rather because I just didn’t feel I had done a good job. I felt I had let everybody down. I was half-hearted about its very existence, and when people who read the book said that it didn’t quite work, I tried to suggest that they were looking at it in the wrong way. I said they perceived it as a mystery when they should be reading it as a character study. That seemed to help some, but I knew, deep down, that even that approach would not explain away the book’s shortcomings.



Saturday, December 5, 2015

Review: A Very Murray Christmas


By Lars Trodson

There is no doubt that Bill Murray is a dry, dour comedian. He has a classic, sad sack face. His eyes are sad. He has Lenny Bruce eyes. But he's insanely funny. I was unaware, I must admit, how much Bill Murray meant to people until I saw the film "The Grand Budapest Hotel." The audience I saw that movie with was having none of it, but there was a moment when Murray showed up and the audience awoke and cheered. All he had to to do was show his face, and he made people happy.