Saturday, September 21, 2019

Review: The Man Who Folded Himself

The Man Who Folded Himself The Man Who Folded Himself by David Gerrold
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

When Daniel Eakins's Uncle Jim dies, he inherits a belt that allows him to travel through time...

I haven't had a ton of time to read since my son was born. In fact, I'm typing this with him asleep in the crook of my arm. The two or three weeks it took me to finish this are no indication of the book's quality. It was pretty fucking good.

In The Man Who Folded Himself, David Gerrold uses Daniel Eakins to explore the nature of time and of man himself. The way he handles time travel has been used by other writers since this book's original publication: changing the past creates a parallel universe and the time traveler is the only one who knows of the existence of the previous timeline.

Daniel travels through time, meeting other versions of himself, and sometimes having sex with them., sometimes with multiple versions at a time. Is it gay if you're having sex with another version of yourself? Joking aside, Daniel goes on a journey of self discovery and ultimately winds up back where he started, as I suspected he might.

The Man Who Folded Himself may be the best time travel story I've ever read. 4.5 out of 5 tribbles.

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Sunday, September 8, 2019

Review: Life Is Short and So Am I: My Life in and Out of the Wrestling Ring

Life Is Short and So Am I: My Life in and Out of the Wrestling Ring Life Is Short and So Am I: My Life in and Out of the Wrestling Ring by Dylan "hornswoggle" Postl
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Life Is Short and So Am I is the autobiography of Dylan Postl, aka WWE superstar Hornswoggle, aka independent wrestler Swoggle.

Shortly after the birth of my son, someone from ECW press hit me up to read this. I said I would and forgot about it until my wife and I were watching Swoggle wrestle Jordynn Grace on IWTV. It was damn good.

Dylan had a rough start, being born with achondroplasia, a form of dwarfism, in addition to family problems. He overcame it all and became not only a pro-wrestler but a WWE superstar.

I have to admit that most of the time Dylan was wrestling, I was on a wrestling hiatus. Still, I found his biography fascinating. His early life was terrible, even without taking his dwarfism into consideration. His journey from the independents to the WWE and beyond held my interest even through my lack of sleep. His account of the inner workings of the WWE was entertaining and informative. A lot of wrestling books skimp on the road stories but this one had a lot of them in it.
Since he's no longer with the company, he was a lot more free with information than current WWE employees. Dylan also isn't afraid to bring his own bad behavior to light, like cheating on the mother of his son.

I almost balked on this since Swoggle is younger than me by a few years but he's got a wealth of great stories. I highly recommend this to wrestling fans. Now, I'll have to track down that Swoggle vs. Joey Ryan match. 4 out of 5 stars.

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