If you like clever historical fiction, you will love these.
A recent pick for Granta magazine's list of the top 20 young British novelists, Dan Rhodes has made a leap from his clever short fiction to TIMOLEON VIETA COME HOME: A Sentimental Journey (Canongate, $23), a whimsical, menacing exploration of thwarted love.
If you don't like these clever meta-fictions, there are also other clever meta-fictions: "A Study in Emerald" is Gaiman's innovative merger of the writings of Arthur Conan Doyle and H. P. Lovecraft (wait until you've seen what he's done to poor Queen Victoria).
(Even the nearly five-hour-long "Until the End of the World," for all its apocalyptic foreboding, globetrotting production, and clever science-fiction gizmos, is just a very long road-movie film noir).
In addition to the intense romantic and clever detective-fiction elements, there are funny moments tweaking academia and more.
Carl Kimlinger of Anime News Network gave the film a "B" rating, calling it a "swift-moving futuristic crime film with some clever science-fiction twists and solid action" but criticizing it was "wordy, confusing and somewhat bloodless".
But, miracles of miracles, Men In Black 3 isn't just good but the best film of the series, a warmhearted and clever science-fiction comedy that keeps its focus firmly rooted in character relationships.
When not chronicling the exploits of this unflappable police detective, Ms. Rendell has written vigorous, clever stand-alone fiction (most notably "The Water's Lovely" last year).
"Faking It: Manipulated Photography Before Photoshop," the savvy, eye-opening exhibition that the curator Mia Fineman has organized at the Met, finds evidence that, within a decade of its invention in 1839, the medium was already a clever mix of fiction and fact.
