Dogpatch Press

Fluff Pieces Every Week

Category: Reviews

July 5, 2016

Frolic ‘the original furry nightclub’ to lose historic venue – community responds.

by Patch O'Furr

The future is as dim as the lighting at The Stud, one of San Francisco’s most loved dive/gay bars.  The property is being swept up in a wave of real estate speculation and gentrification that shows no sign of ebbing.  Some luminaries of local culture are just treading water, while many are sinking under. They just can’t afford to live in their own city any more.

One by one, the lights of San Francisco night life are going out.  Now the Stud is set to close.

On every second Saturday each month, furries flock there for Frolic dance party.  It’s the premiere event for their thriving local scene.  The venue loves furries as much as they love each other, so Frolic has been steadily supported since 2010. Their success bore a litter of furry club events across North America that look up to it for inspiration, from Foxtrot in Denver, to Suit-Up Saturday in Minneapolis.

Calling it “the Original” furry dance party may be debatable (credit may be due for a few rave-type events outside of North America) – but there’s no debating its influence.  It will be very sad if Frolic loses it’s home.

It’s a local story, but in spirit, it touches furries anywhere who love to dance and have their own paw-hold in the nightlife.  Having their own established club doesn’t happen easily for an isolated niche of maligned yet super loveable young people.  Frolic set the bar high for that.  It isn’t your average family-friendly daytime convention – its power comes after dark.  Talking animal-people look and feel better to dance with in the magical murk of a club from an alternate fantasy dimension.  Have a drink and hug one for an experience better than drugs. Or pick one up.  Say: “knock knock” – “who’s there”? – “knot me…” Read the rest of this entry »

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July 1, 2016

The Lottery – Furry, by Karen Ranney – Book Review by Fred Patten

by Pup Matthias

Submitted by Fred Patten, Furry’s favorite historian and reviewer.

41vGf3jdd5L._SX331_BO1,204,203,200_The Lottery – Furry, by Karen Ranney
Seattle, WA, CreateSpace, April 2016, trade paperback $9.95 (232 pages), Kindle $2.99.

This book seems to have drifted in to this furry review site by mistake. Despite its title, and its label as Book 1 of The Furry Chronicles trilogy, it’s a werewolf novel – or more precisely a woman’s paranormal romance novel.

That’s probably natural since Karen Ranney is a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of women’s romances; not a furry author. In fact, the three volumes of The Furry Chronicles are a spinoff of Ranney’s previous The Montgomery Chronicles. “You’ll see what happens to Opie, meet Antonia, and follow Torrance’s adventures as well.” (Ranney’s website)

Torrance Boyd is a young junior vet working at Alamo Veterinary Services LLC in San Antonio. She’s a soft touch for all of the stray dogs that an elderly do-gooder finds and brings in there. Torrance can’t bring herself to throw them out again, so she personally pays for heartworm testing, flea dipping, and other medical expenses; which keeps her perpetually broke.

She has another problem:

“I didn’t know, for certain, that dogs shared a communicative bond, but as a species I wasn’t far removed from them. You see, I’m a Were. Ever since my younger brother asked me if that meant we were weird I’ve called myself a Furry, a label that doesn’t endear me to either my family or my friends. At least, those who knew what I was.

Only another Were could recognize me, but even then, we didn’t go around acknowledging each other in public. In other words, we don’t sniff each other. We don’t even venture near the nether regions in our four legged form. Can you imagine meeting the eyes of someone whose butt you just checked out when he was furry?” (p. 5)

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June 21, 2016

The Art of Finding Dory, Foreword by Andrew Stanton – Book Review by Fred Patten.

by Patch O'Furr

Submitted by Fred Patten, Furry’s favorite historian and reviewer.

414KAEEKD5L._SY379_BO1,204,203,200_The Art of Finding Dory. Preface by John Lasseter. Foreword by Andrew Stanton. Intro by Steve Pilcher.
San Francisco, CA, Chronicle Books, May 2016, hardcover $40.00 (176 pages), Kindle $17.49.

Here is another “all about” coffee-table art book about the making of a high-profile animated feature: Disney/Pixar’s Finding Dory, the sequel to the studio’s 2003 award-winning Finding Nemo, released on June 17, 2016.

But this is about the art, not the story of the movie. Since the movie takes place almost entirely underwater, there is a tremendous emphasis on the underwater lighting. Steve Pilcher, the production designer, explains how the lighting constantly changes more than out-of-the-water lighting. Not only is there different lighting for the different levels of depth in the ocean; between really deep and among the coral reefs near the surface (there is much more light closer to the surface), there is a big difference between underwater in the ocean and underwater in the tanks of the Marine Life Institute.

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June 17, 2016

Spirit Hunters Book 2: The Open Road, by Paul Kidd – Book Review by Fred Patten

by Pup Matthias

Submitted by Fred Patten, Furry’s favorite historian and reviewer.

UnknownSpirit Hunters. Book 2: The Open Road, by Paul Kidd. Illustrated.
Raleigh, NC, Lulu.com/Perth, Western Australia, Kitsune Press, May 2016, trade paperback $25.84 (395 pages), Kindle $7.99.

Spirit Hunters. Book 1: The Way of the Fox was published in September 2014, and reviewed here in January 2015. It contains the first three Encounters of about a hundred pages each. I said that, “Spirit Hunters is set in the realm of traditional Japanese mythology, vaguely around 900 or 1000 A.D.” The Spirit Hunters are a quartet who wander throughout medieval mythical Japan hunting yokai — supernatural spirits. Lady Kitsune nō Sura, a fox woman, and her companion Tsunetomo Tonbo, a huge human samurai with “a solid iron staff longer than he was tall. The business end was grimly studded with spikes. It was the weapon of a monster slayer – a thing designed to obliterate helmets, armour and anything organic that might get in its way,” are “itinerant Spirit Hunters, traveling throughout Japan looking for evil Spirits to kill – hopefully for pay.” Asodo Kuno is a young bottom-ranking samurai who hopes that killing demons will gain him a reputation and higher status. Chiri is a shy rat-spirit who Sura persuades to join them. She is accompanied by two little spirits of her own: Daitanishi the rock elemental, and Bifuuko the apparent insect; an air elemental.

Sura and Chiri are the main characters who make this a furry book. Sura is described in the first book as:

“A fox woman lounged upon a fallen log like a reclining Buddha, eating a roasted chicken leg. Beside her, there were the embers of a camp fire and a pair of backpacks ready for travel. The fox woman had a long, clever pointed muzzle, and great, green eyes filled with humour. Her body was human in size and shape – excepting for its lush pelt of fur, her fox head with muzzle and long pointed ears, and her long, elegant red tail. She wore a priestess’ robes decorated with images of peaches – with each peach missing a single bite. The fox called out to Kuno in a loud and merry voice while she wriggled her black-furred toes.” (The Way of the Fox, p. 12) She gets the quartet into their adventures, blithely assuring them, “Trust me – I’m a fox!”

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June 16, 2016

Insect Dreams: The Half Life of Gregor Samsa, by Marc Estrin – Book Review by Fred Patten

by Pup Matthias

Submitted by Fred Patten, Furry’s favorite historian and reviewer.

41VSJXE6BQL._SX323_BO1,204,203,200_Insect Dreams: The Half Life of Gregor Samsa, by Marc Estrin.
NYC, Penguin Putnam/BlueHen Books, February 2002, hardcover $26.95 (468 [+1] pages), Kindle $13.99.

Estrin’s fantasy is not so much a sequel to The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka (1915) as an unauthorized variation or continuation of it. It is witty and erudite, but it will never replace Kafka’s original novella.

In Kafka’s classic, Gregor Samsa is a young fabric salesman living in Prague, then a part of Austro-Hungary, who awakens one morning transformed into a giant insect. (Kafka was adamant for the rest of his life that the insect should not be specified – he refused to allow the bug to be illustrated – to enable the reader to imagine the kind of giant insect that most terrified her or her. As soon as Kafka died, the insect was specified in text and art as a giant cockroach.) Samsa is horrified, and his parents and sister are horrified. Samsa refuses to leave his bedroom, growing weaker and weaker, until he dies. His body is thrown into the trash by the Samsas’ cleaning lady.

Estrin’s novel, about five times as long as Kafka’s novella, emphasizes cockroach, cockroach, cockroach. According to him, Samsa’s death is a ruse by the family’s cleaning lady, who sells him, still alive, to a Viennese sideshow. His family, who were embarrassed by the giant bug in the bedroom, were glad to get rid of it and did not ask questions.

Amadeus Ernst Hoffnung, the proprietor of the sideshow – an eclectic collection of freaks such as a 600-pound man – sees nothing more unusual than usual in a 5’6” talking cockroach. Since Gregor is naturally shy and rather intellectual, he and Anton relax in the evenings together in friendly conversations. When Gregor wants learned books to read, Amadeus gets them for him. Gregor adds what he reads into his performance:

“His ‘act’ evolved over time. Originally billed as ‘A Visitor from the Early Carboniferous Period’ (perhaps ‘Vomfruhesteinkohlzeitbesucher’ seems less awkward in German), he gave short talks about the steaming interior marshes of the then single landmass of North America, South America, Africa, Australia, Asia, Eurasia, and Antarctica. But this soon seemed canned and phony, and Amadeus wondered if some in the audience might think he was some kind of lifelike automaton. So Gregor went on to giving advice. ‘The Advisor from the Early Carboniferous.’ People would ask questions about business or personal problems, or what books to read or (while the cinemas were still open) [the cinemas were closed in Vienna during World War I] what films to see. Once a child asked, ‘Are there really Angels, and do they bring the Christmas presents, or do parents bring them?’ Gregor assured her that no one feels really at home in an interpreted world – which must have given her something to think about. At least she didn’t cry.” (p. 14)

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June 9, 2016

Timbuktu: A Novel, by Paul Auster – Book Review by Fred Patten

by Pup Matthias

Submitted by Fred Patten, Furry’s favorite historian and reviewer.

TimbuktuNovelTimbuktu; A Novel, by Paul Auster.
NYC, Henry Holt and Co., May 1999, hardcover $22.00 (181 pages).

It can be argued that Timbuktu is the opposite of an anthropomorphic novella. It is about a dog, Mr. Bones, whose beloved human companion, the pseudonymous Willy B. Christmas, a homeless East Coast “street poet” is dying. Timbuktu does an excellent job of portraying the despairing thoughts of a mostly unanthropomorphized but exaggeratedly intelligent and loyal dog. He understands “Ingloosh” more than most dogs, but still from a canine viewpoint.

“Mr. Bones knew that Willy wasn’t long for this world. The cough had been inside him for over six months, and by now there wasn’t a chance in hell that he would ever get rid of it. Slowly and inexorably, without once taking a turn for the better, the thing had assumed a life of its own, advancing from a faint, phlegm-filled rattle in the lungs on February third to the wheezy sputum-jigs and gobby convulsions of high summer.” (p. 3)

“What was a poor dog to do? Mr. Bones had been with Willy since his earliest days as a pup, and by now it was next to impossible for him to imagine a world that did not have his master in it. Every thought, every memory, every particle of the earth and air was saturated with Willy’s presence. Habits die hard, and no doubt there’s some truth to the adage about old dogs and new tricks, but it was more than just love or devotion that caused Mr. Bones to dread what was coming. It was pure ontological terror. Subtract Willy from the world, and the odds were that the world itself would cease to exist.” (p. 4)

Willy is aware that he is dying. As he and Mr. Bones wander the streets of Baltimore, Willy tries to prepare the dog for life after him. He rambles to him about “how to avoid the dogcatchers and constables, the paddy wagons and unmarked cars, the hypocrites from the so-called humane societies. No matter how sweetly they talked to you, the word shelter meant trouble.”   Mr. Bones is a sweet but ugly, smelly, adult mongrel. “No one was going to want to rescue him. As the homeless bard was fond of putting it, the outcome was written in stone. Unless Mr. Bones found another master in one quick hurry, he was a pooch primed for oblivion.” (p. 5)

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June 7, 2016

Special Feature, by Charles V DeVet – Book Review by Fred Patten

by Pup Matthias

Submitted by Fred Patten, Furry’s favorite historian and reviewer.

UnknownSpecial Feature, by Charles V. DeVet.
NYC, Avon Books, June 1975, paperback 95¢ (176 pages)

Special Feature is a terrible s-f novel about terrible characters. It is hard to tell which are the more unlikable, the humans or the cat-people. But taken as a noir thriller in which the reader is gradually brought to sympathize with some seriously flawed characters, or as a funky “how many things can you find wrong with this s-f scenario?” quiz, Special Feature is an unusual and fascinating page-turner.

Pentizel, a cat-women from the banned planet Paarae, has stolen a spaceship and flown to Earth. Due to the icy climate of Paarae, she chooses St. Paul, Minnesota in winter in which to secretly hide.

Although her goal is pointedly kept mysterious (except for being given away in the cover blurb), she is immediately identified as arrogant, cruel, and contemptuous of humanity:

“Once inside her room [in a slum hotel], she locked the door, drew in a deep breath and let it out. Her whole body relaxed with the expelled breath. A world lay within her eager grasp, a world in which to lose herself. And a billion decadent weaklings to be maneuvered in any way that suited her.” (p. 8)

Unknown to Pentizel, St. Paul is completely covered by surveillance cameras, in seemingly every street and almost every room of every building. Howard Benidt, manager of TV station RBC, sees the cat-woman’s assault and stealing of a pedestrian’s clothes, and her checking into the flophouse in disguise. Benidt decides to make a “Special Feature” out of this alien invasion of Earth, to boost his channel’s ratings and his own prestige among its management:

“The room was getting warm. Benidt took off his coat and hung it on the back of his chair. ‘Now I want a top-grade build-up on this. Play up strong the potentiality of violence: assault, murder, blood. Make it good. Start cutting in immediately — on whatever program’s running on the channel now – with tantalizers. Don’t tell them exactly what the feature will be. Let them use their imagination. Build up their curiosity – and impatience – for the start of the biggest, live thrill show in the annals of video.” (p. 15)

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June 6, 2016

Zootopia: “A Call For Balance” – guest post by Alex Reynard.

by Patch O'Furr

Zootopia’s Blu-ray/DVD release is June 7, 2016.

Zootopia_Lionheart_and_Judy_pose

Dogpatch Press welcomes Furry fanfic writer Alex Reynard.  See also Inquisitr.com: “Is Zootopia a modern version of Animal Farm?”  

ZOOTOPIA has been out for a while now.  In that time, I cannot count how many times I’ve seen it called “propaganda”.

Left-wing propaganda, right-wing propaganda, commie propaganda, gender propaganda, race propaganda.

It’s ridiculous. And it’s unfair to what the movie actually is.

I’m gonna assume that we, being furries, have all seen the film a kazillion times by now. If not, then this is me HONKING THE SPOILER HORN. TOOT TOOT. I want to start this with a synopsis, so I can talk about how the themes of this cute animated children’s film are really really important.

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June 2, 2016

Mouse Mission, by Prudence Breitrose – Book Review by Fred Patten

by Pup Matthias

Submitted by Fred Patten, Furry’s favorite historian and reviewer.

51Nw6dacHlL._SX331_BO1,204,203,200_Mouse Mission, by Prudence Breitrose. Illustrated by Stephanie Yue.
NYC, Disney•Hyperion, October 2015, hardcover $16.99 (266 pages), Kindle $9.99.

Mouse Mission is The Mousenet, Book 3; the conclusion of the trilogy that began with Mousenet and Mousemobile (both 2013). To repeat the events in the first two books, 10/11-year-old Megan Miller learns that the mice of the world are as intelligent as humans, but are too small and fragile to create a civilization. They’re isolated in small groups; and they can’t be heard by humans unless they scream all the time. The mice learn that Megan’s uncle, Fred Barnes, is an electronic tinkerer who has invented a miniature computer just for his own amusement, but which would be ideal for mice to communicate with each other throughout the world; and with humans.

In the first two books, Megan and Uncle Fred become part of the Humans Who Know about the Mouse Nation, and the mice figure out how the five humans can mass-produce the Thumbtop computers, supposedly as toy keychains but actually for the mice to use. Megan’s uncle and step-dad, Fred Barnes and Jake Fisher, create their home-run Planet Mouse factory in Cleveland, ostensibly to manufacture only a tiny number of miniature computer toys, but actually with a secret assembly line of seven hundred mice making Thumbtops for mice all around the world.

One of the Humans Who Know is Megan’s mother Susan Fisher, who is an environmental activist. Breitrose unfortunately allowed Mousemobile to become very preachy about the danger of Climate Change, which the five Humans Who Know and all the mice are very passionate about. The message of Mouse Mission, Saving the Rainforest, is fortunately integrated into the plot much better.

Susan Fisher’s current environmental campaign is saving the rainforest that covers the fictional island-nation of Marisco in the Indian Ocean (a pastiche of Madagascar).

“This was one of the last forests on that part of the planet that was still completely wild, and it had been kept that way by the government of Marisco until recently, when a group of generals seized power. A month ago, mice had found a document on the generals’ computers – a document that revealed their plan to sell the rights to the forest to Loggocorp, a huge international timber company.” (p. 16)

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June 1, 2016

Zen: Meditations of an Egotistical Duck, by Phicil – Book Review by Fred Patten

by Pup Matthias

Submitted by Fred Patten, Furry’s favorite historian and reviewer.

5193RSt5quL._SX349_BO1,204,203,200_Zen: Meditations d’Un Canard Égoiste (Zen: Meditations of an Egotistical Duck), by Phicil
Paris, Éditions Carabas, November 2015; hardcover €16,00 (80 pages).

Google’s automatic translator says that “un canard égoiste” is “a selfish duck”, but in this case “egotistical” is a better translation than “selfish”. Jean Plumo sees everything as revolving around himself, but he’s not particularly selfish once the needs and desires of others are brought to his attention.

The Patten-Nakashima conspiracy to get you to read French funny-animal bandes dessinées that aren’t likely to be published in English has probably let you down this time.

Jean Plumo, a mallard office-worker in a funny-animal world, is fed up with not only being yelled at by an unsympathetic boss, but at not getting the respect he feels that he’s due from his fellow deskmates. When he sees a copy of Bronzage (“Tanning”) magazine on his boss’ desk with an article about a luxurious vacation retreat to study zen meditation all day (implied under the sun; a good way to get a tan), he decides to sign up for it.

It’s not what he expects.

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