The Book Pirate

The Book Pirate welcomes a new shipmate to the crew, the Book Parrot! He is currently reading five books…updates to come.

Avast! Today be national talk like a pirate day. Arr. Celebrate by enjoying downloading Tales of Monkey Island: Episode 1 for free.

You could also seek out the following pirate themed books:
- The Pirates!: An Adventure with Scientists & An Adventure with Ahab
- Pirateology
- Under the Black Flag: The Romance and the Reality of Life Among the Pirates
- A Pirate of Her Own

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies is still sitting on the NY Times bestseller list (currently at #5). I worry about what the popularity of this book will do to the book industry. In particular, I think that this book will spawn a number or “me too” books similar to what happened after The Da Vinci Code and every book seemed to be about a hidden code.

To beat people to the punch, I have come up with some ideas:

First, Pirates make everything better.

The Old Man and the Sea and Pirates would be the perfect pop culture/classic literature crossover. I haven’t read The Old Man and the Sea but judging from the title it’s about an old man and the sea. I imagine that the the old man could run in to pirates while on the sea and, I dunno, join them while learning valuable life lessons.

Second, Ninjas make an excellient additions to novels.

Again, haven’t read War and Peace. But War and Peace and Ninjas could depic the invasion of Russia by France who hire a ninja army who get fought off by the Russians while learning valuable life lessons.

Yes, this may be a good idea.

Aardman Animations, the people behind such films as Chicken Run and every Wallace & Gromit feature, have announced that they are making a stop-motion adaptation of Gideon Defoe’s pirate themed novel The Pirates! In an Adventure with Scientists. The Aardman Animation website says that the film will be based on two books from the series (the first two?) and that the screenplay was written by Defoe himself. It will be directed be Peter Lord who directed Chicken Run. Above is some early concept art for the film.

Earlier this month (or late last month, I don’t remember) Defoe finally released the fourth book in the series, The Pirates! In an Adventure with Napoleon, in the US (after having been released in the UK last year). Currently that book is sitting comfortably in my To Read pile.

All I can say is YAY!

I am a big fan of Lucasart’s Monkey Island games. I have been waiting for the 5th game in the series ever since it was teased in the 4th game. There were times when I thought it would never happen. Luckily, at this weeks E3, Telltale Games announce that they are going to be releasing monthly episodes this summer.

This is possibly the best video game involving pirates.

I came across this article on You Thought We Wouldn’t Notice last and thought it was interesting enough to post about.

Do you remember the children’s book Nate the Great? Me neither. But it was a book published back in 1972 about a boy detective who solves murders petty crimes. In the book series this is this girl who goes by Rosamond who can only be described as “strange”.

See? They call her strange. Anyway, if you’ve been in Hot Topic recently (you can admit it, I wont think less of you), you may have noticed this girl.

Her name is Emily and she is “strange” as well. Emily was the poster child for skateboards in the early 90’s and have since become a pop culture icon with her very own book series.

Notice anything different? Me neither aside from a few words. YTWWN has more detailed information about this possible copyright infringement.

(click for larger)

As drawn by Terry Blas.

Avast! Tina Fey, who you may more commonly know as Sarah Palin, is also a fellow book pirate!

Thank to The Hidden Side of a Leaf for bringing this important bit of information to my attention.

Ahoy, booklubbers. Today be National Talk Like a Pirate Day. So ye had best be doin’ that.

Tomorrow we be also celebrating with the ceremonial grog at the Portland Pirate Festival.

Arrr.