Felonious Monk

Meet Tommy Martini, the monk with an anger management problem. Since killing somebody with a single punch is not a needed talent in a monastery, he spends his time praying, meditating, and taking his anger management medicine. But his meditations are interrupted by a legacy from his uncle, a crooked priest. Arriving in a New Age Arizona town to claim his inheritance, Brother Tommy meets a charismatic, smoking-hot cult leader who claims that women are being impregnated by alien beings while they sleep. Tommy’s own sleep is disturbed—by cartel hitmen, Mafia bill collectors, and women intrigued by his vow of chastity. He loses his anger management medicine in time to deal with the hitmen, but the women present an uphill battle. William Kotzwinkle’s quicksilver touch has produced an effervescent piece of entertainment filled with suspense, turns you won’t see coming, and the humor for which he is famous.

The first full biography of Thelonious Monk, written by a brilliant historian, with full access to the family's archives and with dozens of interviews.

Of all the major jazz artists, Thelonious Monk was one of the most original musical thinkers--nonconformist, idiosyncratic, imaginative, eccentric--in a word, unique. In The Thelonious Monk Reader, Rob van der Bliek has brought together some of the most revealing pieces ever written on Monk, providing a full portrait of the musician and his impact on the jazz world. Here is a wealth of information that was previously scattered and difficult to locate, including a wide range of articles, profiles, reviews, interviews, liner notes, and music analyses. Ranging in date from 1947 to 1999, these 39 pieces feature the work of some of our best jazz critics, including Leonard Feather, Ira Gitler, Nat Hentoff, Andre Hodeir, Gunther Schuller, Martin Williams, and many others. The book spans Monk's childhood and early recordings with Blue Note and Prestige, his Riverside period and the critical recognition that followed the release of Brilliant Corners, and his fame and fortune during his Columbia years. Readers will find colorful descriptions of Monk's eccentric lifestyle as well as thoughtful commentary on his unorthodox piano technique, which was marked by off-center accents and idiosyncratic voicings, broken rhythms, alternately dense and stripped down chords, and creative use of silence. Rob van der Bliek also provides a general introduction and brief introductions to each piece as well as critical annotations that place the work in context. Controversial, often contradictory, and always engaging, these readings offer a complete view of the man, his music, and his time. The only such book on Monk's life and work, this volume will be "must reading" for jazz fans and scholars, musicians, music lovers, and readers with an interest in African-American culture.

"Horse Badorties (Son of the Ginger Man, father of the Dude) rides again...Badorties' narration of his down-at-the-heels drug-fueled befuddlement in New York City circa 1970." --

Percival Everett's blistering satire about race and publishing, now adapted for the screen as AMERICAN FICTION, directed by Cord Jefferson and starring Jeffrey Wright and Tracee Ellis Ross Thelonious "Monk" Ellison's writing career has bottomed out: his latest manuscript has been rejected by seventeen publishers, which stings all the more because his previous novels have been "critically acclaimed." He seethes on the sidelines of the literary establishment as he watches the meteoric success of We's Lives in Da Ghetto, a first novel by a woman who once visited "some relatives in Harlem for a couple of days." Meanwhile, Monk struggles with real family tragedies—his aged mother is fast succumbing to Alzheimer's, and he still grapples with the reverberations of his father's suicide seven years before. In his rage and despair, Monk dashes off a novel meant to be an indictment of Juanita Mae Jenkins's bestseller. He doesn't intend for My Pafology to be published, let alone taken seriously, but it is—under the pseudonym Stagg R. Leigh—and soon it becomes the Next Big Thing. How Monk deals with the personal and professional fallout galvanizes this audacious, hysterical, and quietly devastating novel.

The bestselling forensic psychologist examines the true crimes that inspired the television smash hit, C.S.I. Katherine Ramsland follows the evidence and revisits some of the most absorbing episodes of the phenomenally popular C.S.I. television franchise, and explores the real-life crimes that inspired them. She also looks into the authenticity of the forensic investigations recreated for the dramatizations, and the painstaking real-life forensic process employed in every one of the actual cases?from notorious mass-murderer Richard Speck, to the massacre of Buddhist monks in an Arizona Temple, to a baffling case of apparent spontaneous combustion.

(Artist Books). The music of Thelonious Monk is among the most requested of any jazz composer, but accurate lead sheets and sources have never been widely available until now. This folio has 70 of the master composer/pianist's most familiar pieces, as well as a number of obscure and unrecorded tunes, in easy-to-read versions. Includes counterlines and ensemble parts for many pieces, as well as bass-lines and piano voicings where applicable. Also includes a biography, a glossary, and a definitive discography of the compositions in the book. Titles include: Ask Me Now * Bemsha Swing * Blue Monk * Blue Sphere * Boo Boo's Birthday * Bright Mississippi * Brilliant Corners * Bye-Ya * Crepuscule With Nellie * Criss Cross * 52nd Street Theme * Functional * Gallop's Gallop * Hackensack * I Mean You * In Walked Bud * Jackie-ing * Let's Cool One * Little Rootie Tootie * Misterioso * Monk's Mood * Nutty * Off Minor * Pannonica * Played Twice * Rhythm-a-ning * 'Round Midnight * Ruby, My Dear * Straight No Chaser * Thelonious * Well You Needn't * and 39 more.