What to read, watch, listen to, and play this weekend
The book to read
Stephen King, The Outsider
“Stephen King’s The Outsider is in many ways a throwback novel, a creature feature that seems ripped from his ’80s heyday, his pulpiest book since perhaps Cell, but a work undeniably founded in today’s fears. Ostensibly centered around a shapeshifting Pennywise-like murderer of children, its darkest threats are less fantastical and defeatable than uncontainable and unnervingly mundane. King’s real subjects here are a world spinning out of control, the dangers of people who refuse to see the truth, and the rotting of a society in moral decay, like a supernatural No Country For Old Men.”
Read the rest of our review here.
The comedy special to watch
Tig Notaro: Happy To Be Here
“Tig Notaro commits to the present—and the future—in Happy To Be Here. She trusts that we know enough about her past not to ask her to wallow in it; and, as sublime as her grief is, Notaro proves there’s so much more to her comedy than tragedy. Her happiness doesn’t blunt any of her humor, and it also provides a fitting end to Notaro’s unofficial trilogy. If Live marked her lowest point, then the giddy-in-comparison Boyish Girl Interrupted declared Notaro’s intention to fight back. Happy To Be Here is both the fulfillment of that promise and Notaro’s reward.”
Read the rest of our review here.
The album to listen to
Low Cut Connie, Dirty Pictures (Part 2)
“On Dirty Pictures (Part 2), ragged soul-rockers Low Cut Connie harness their live energy within crisp songwriting that’s reverent (but not slavish) toward decades of popular music: gritty honky tonk (‘All These Kids Are Way Too High’), gospel-driven rock (‘Every Time You Turn Around’), and boogie-woogie blues (the Rolling Stones-esque ‘Desegregation’). Yet the Philadelphia band’s keen sense of dynamics, as well as deceptively simple lyrics that hint at greater truths, elevate Part 2.”
Read the rest of our review here.