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By Ruel S. De Vera Associate Editor I was always in awe of encyclopedias. As a child, having a set of reference books at home was an advantage for school work and fun whenever we got bored. My parents were helping out an uncle so we had several different kinds of encyclopedias at home; among our favorites were the Lexicon (great photos), the Encyclopedia of Science (great for homework), the Bible Encyclopedia (really unusual) and the Peanuts Encyclopedia (more fun than useful but super fun). We never did get the top of the food chain: the complete Encyclopedia Brittanica. We did have it in school, complete with dog-eared and even missing, torn pages (nothing like taking the reference home). Back then, the photocopier was still a relatively exotic piece of machinery so many students simply tore the pages and ran. My high school library kept my attention even beyond school work. There was an encyclopedia of the Wild West as well as reference books on the Second World War which I constantly referred to. In college, the library was useful for all the research subjects, be it abstracts or APA material. Whenever I got even more bored, I would set over to the bound periodicals where I discovered Sports Illustrated, a habit that remains with me today. Obviously, all this happened before the Internet. Back then, the only way to really do research was actually set foot in the library. We slaved over those books. We understood the value of long hours in the shhh-infused environment of the library. We don't discount the value of today's one-button search for what used to take us weeks. It's more about the loss of wonder and awe about books and what they contained inside. Leg work mattered. Everybody needed to crack open a book or two. Wikipedia wasn't the end all and be all. Today's children have the world at their fingertips with a single visit to Google being all it took. It's an amazing world, but surely one that could be enriched by understanding how the old fogies used to do it. Book and button together; that is a killer combination for research. Find out all about the Internet and our children today in the November 15, 2009 issue of the Sunday Inquirer Magazine.

By Ruel S. De Vera, Associate Editor Sunday Inquirer Magazine WHEN my father was a child growing up in the province of Bicol, he devised a way of making some money by buying komiks and renting them out at the neighborhood general store in the post-war years. This is a particularly cool fact considering how much I love comic books today. Most children, at one point or another, become interested in comic books—and then are expected to leave them behind as they grow up. Thus it has become a bit of a stigma to still like comic books once you enter and exit the teen years. Many people would be surprised when it turns out that their favorite athletes or artists profess a serious devotion to comic books, as if implying that their idols are too cool to like something as kiddie as comic books. I consider myself lucky never to have had that problem. Funny Comics (Superkat! Nik-nok!) was weekly ritual. Classics Illustrated was an awesome way to read legendary stories. I remember trading for my first comic book ever in grade school, trading away a soundtrack cassette of “E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial” for a giant-size “The Legion of Super-heroes,” an issue that featured Grimbor the Chainsman on the cover. The very fact I can identify that guy on the cover speaks to my utter geekiness. I remember that comic book in particular—everything about it. I even remember the full-page ad at the back of the issue, touting what wonderful things you get for free if you sold issues of a newspaper called Grit. I know of other ads as well, speaking of Sea Monkeys and X-Ray Specs. When I began reading Marvel Comics, I noticed the comics-style ads for Hostess Twinkies. I read a lot of comics during those years, even enjoying the intersection of comics and toys by reading “Transformers” and “G.I. Joe.” But my favorite comic title back then was unusual. It was“All-Star Squadron,” a DC Comics title written by Roy Thomas that featured authentic (and not-so-authentic) superheroes from World War II. It utterly fascinated me, all these obscure heroes and villains, something that has become a trademark of my reading. I fell behind in my reading a bit as I entered college, though I was peripherally aware that Superman had died and Batman had his back broken. I wasn’t ashamed of my comics habit—quite the contrary—I was just too busy with other things to keep it up. I was already working when I picked up my comics habit. It began innocuously enough, with me picking up a few issues then subscribing through Filbars to the Abnett and Lanning Legion of Super-heroes. It was my first time reading the work of the duo and I was hooked. Gravitating to a store called Comic Quest, I made good friends and picked up more titles. Aside from a renewed interest in the Transformers, I really got into the fantastic DC title “JSA,” which, no surprise here, featured WWII heroes. It was an amazing title, full of heroes both familiar and new. The writers, James Robinson, Geoff Johns and David Goyer, were perfect fits. I had the opportunity years later to see Goyer in the flesh, telling him that “JSA” was the greatest comic title ever, meaning every single word. In the process, I have also savored the work of comic books from other parts of the world, particularly Europe where Goscinny and Uderzo’s Asterix The Gaul provide entertainment like no other. I myself have always identified with poor Cacofonix the Bard, who ends every adventure bound and gagged because he wants to sing. And the comic books from the Philippines took me by surprise, and are now beloved. Gerry Alanguilan’s “Wasted” really disturbed me, making an indelible mark. Arnold Arre’s “The Mythology Class” charmed me. I consider comic books and komiks to be iterations of the same substance in different styles, and so I revel in the legacy of Mars Ravelo’s Captain Barbell as much as I do in the spooky seeking of Budjette Tan’s Alexandra Trese. Comic books have a different vibe now, partly because of the success of so many comic book-based movies. When even a challenging series like “Watchmen” can be made into a movie, you know you’re living in a new world. It is a time with its transcendent adaptations (“The Dark Knight”) and its crash and-burn attempts (“Steel”). And I try to catch each one. The monthly periodicals (affectionately referred to as “floppies”) are an endangered species, while the graphic novel and the collected trade paperback ensure a longer lifespan for the stories. Even collecting is different now, with comics suddenly expensive collector’s items and some people sliding the mint edition issues into Mylar sleeves, never to be read. That’s anathema to me, because comic books are almost as pure an incarnation of storytelling as you’ll ever find, a melding of the visual and literary narratives. Comics are meant to be read, to be shared, not stashed away far from the eyes of would-be readers. Today, I read a lot of comic books and love it. I remain unabashed about my love for the medium because there is simply no other like it. From my father’s rental stock to my bedside table, we continue to read—and we are legion. Read all about the joy of comic books in the May 17, 2009 issue of the Sunday Inquirer Magazine.

IT is always weird to be sitting somewhere quiet and then someone reading a book suddenly bursts out in uncontrollable laughter. But such is the power of really, really funny books. Sense of humor being relative and all, some books are clearly funnier than others. Here are a few recommendations, books that, if read while you’re drinking soda, will send softdrinks through your nose: 1. “Twisted” by Jessica Zafra: The first of Zafra’s smart, acerbic essay collections remains the best. Originally published in 1995, it is still sharp after over a decade. 2. “The Best of Pugad Baboy” by Pol Medina Jr.: These small books gathering Medina’s strips about the overweight denizens of Pugad Baboy are particularly effective when read in moving vehicles and waiting rooms. 3. “No Shitting in the Toilet” by Peter Moore: Aussie Moore has been around the world, riding and eating and drinking it up. His tips, recommendations and warnings are universal. 4. "Leading with my Chin” by Jay Leno: If you think Leno is hilarious now, you should read about him growing up. This memoir shows that he found the funny in everything—especially school. 5. “Confessions of a DOM” and pretty much anything by Gary Lising: The manic Lising can’t stop being funny even when doing regular things and his go-to topics (his looks, sex, stupidity) are evergreen. 6. “The More The Manyer”: Wow, we use a lot of bizarre malapropisms, don’t we? “Keep that bear in mind” is a good one and Elbert Or’s drawings are a good pulutan. 7. “Ngalang Pinoy” edited by Nenin Sta. Romana-Cruz: From nicknames to storefronts, this book has all the evidence you need that we find humor in any situation. 8. “Me Talk Pretty One Day” by David Sedaris: To borrow the phrase, the Sedarises puts the “fun” in dysfunctional. You won’t believe what David and his mates come up with to keep from being boredom. 9. “Nextwave: Agents of Hate” by Warren Ellis and Stuart Immonen: This comic book series from Marvel Comics takes superhero tropes and sends them up—in regular Marvel continuity. Oddly enough, Aaron Stack—Machine Man—came out of this run a hot commodity. 10. “Wala Lang” by Bud Tomas: This underrated collection of essays about a guy’s travails through grade school all the way to high school is smart and hits the right spot. Read about all the funny stuff in the March 8 issue of the Sunday Inquirer Magazine.

By Ruel S. De Vera, Associate Editor Sunday Inquirer Magazine LIKE a twist in one of his books, news of Michael Crichton’s demise arrived as a shock. No one knew the author was even sick, so finding out Crichton was really dead at 66 after a battle with cancer was truly startling. What it also does is remove one of the few authors who really had a following after all these decades. Crichton was never the easiest author to read. His prose tended to be heavy with dense paragraphs of explanations, often moving at the speed of crawling magma. The movies adapted from his books essentially pared down his narrative to just action. He always considered explaining how these things happened as important as why. What he never lacked was the big idea. This was partly because of his truly unique background. He moved from studying English at Harvard to studying medicine at Harvard, writing in his spare time before finally quitting med school. Most readers know Crichton hit the big time when his dinosaur-redux novel “Jurassic Park” gobbled up the competition on the shelves in 1990 and then the box office in 1993. That movie changed our idea of modern day monsters forever, launching a merchandising empire and making dinos cool again. The real defining moment of Crichton’s writing, in my mind, came much earlier, in 1969, when he wrote “The Andromeda Strain.” That novel, plus the 1971 Robert Wise movie, came to define our idea of pandemic panic. Its claustrophobic setting became the definitive environment for any unseen bug that runs wild in a lab. That very same paranoia informs every single sickness movie today, from “Outbreak” to “28 Days Later.” Plus the stark, minimalist 1971 film is superior in every way to the slick but stunted, nearly unintelligible 2008 TV remake. He made us fear the biohazard symbol. It was then that Crichton hatched his idea that science can indeed be scary. After an early stint writing books under the pseudonym John Lange, he has since explored that theme, from time travel (“Timeline”) to aircraft safety (“Airframe”), from robotics (“Westworld”) to nanotechnology (“Prey”), from aliens (“Sphere”) to mutant apes (“Congo”), even delving into social issues (“Disclosure”) and courting controversy by railing against the very concept of global warming (“State of Fear”). That Hollywood often failed to capture the essence of his books did not stop the movies from being successful for the most part. “Congo” and “Sphere,” in particular, were turkeys. Ironically, “Jurassic Park” was, among his more recent work, the movie that hewed closest of his book, it was the sequel “The Lost World,” that really ran off the tracks. The movie hardly even resembled the book in any way. The third and planned fourth film were not adapted from novels. He did many other things, of course, directing films (“Coma”), writing films (“Twister”) and creating TV series (“E.R.”). It should not be surprising then that his best books also resulted in the best movies, though decades apart. “The Andromeda Strain” and “Jurassic Park” don’t even seem to have anything in common save for their author, yet both stand as remarkable explorations of science and the zeitgeist at the time. Even as he terrified us with the prospect of science unleashed, he told us why and how it should be. He gave mad science a face, whether it was the invisible organism, Yul Bryner’s cybernetic cowboy, or the T-Rex chomping down on a lawyer. He made science a star, and that we will miss the most.

By Ruel S. De Vera, Associate Editor Sunday Inquirer Magazine I first encountered the phrase "Bring on the Bad Guys" in one of my favorite media: comic books. It was the title of a Marvel Comics compendium covering the Marvel Universe's top villains, the work of creators like Stan Lee, Steve Ditko and the King Jack Kirby. It was irresistible, the idea of a book dedicated to the villains instead of the heroes, a novel concept back in the 1980s. Since then, it has become far more common to highlight the lowlifes as the bad guys, the black hats, the black hearts, are always cooler. We have our favorite TV foes, our top movie villains, so now let me indulge my inner reader by celebrating my top ten villains from written literature, in no particular order:

1. Lord Voldemort: It's a little hard to be scared of Ralph Fiennes' movie version because, (a) It's Ralph Fiennes -- even his villains look handsome and (b) He has no nose; it's like being scared of someone from Sesame Street. But J.K. Rowling's resurrected font of evil -- the erstwhile Tom Riddle -- doesn't sweat possessing school girls, doesn't hesitate to sacrifice his own people if it serves his purpose and, gasp, was a good student. His is the never-spoken name of evil for an entirely new generation of youngsters who didn't think they liked reading.
2. Baron Harkonnen: As vile as the screen versions of the baddie from Frank Herbert's desert epic "Dune" seem to be, it's nothing compared to the original version. In the book, Harkonnen is vile, disgusting, obese, perverse, and floats because he's too heavy. Yuck.
3. Pennywise The Clown: Stephen King has uncorked an entire Pandora's Box of horrific things, but nothing matches the horror that is Pennywise the Clown from the novel "It." Yes, he can turn into pretty much anything you're scared of, but it is in the form of the actual Pennywise that he remembers the simple truth learned at birthday parties: Clowns are scary.
4. Craddock: Joe Hill may sound like a relatively anonymous name, but Hill, a brilliant writer in his own right, is also the son of Stephen King. And early on, he has already unleashed a villain deserving of the pedigree: Craddock, the suit-wearing ghost from "Heart-Shaped Box." Who knew online auctions can be so dangerous?
5. Mr. Harvey: He is the seemingly innocuous neighbor from Alice Sebold's "The Lovely Bones," and from the very first chapter, we know it was Harvey who raped and murdered the narrator, a young girl named Susie Salmon. That nobody else could seem to figure out that Harvey is a child-seeking serial killer only adds to the scare factor of this not-so-good neighbor.
6. James: That he is immortal and fearless only adds to the danger represented by the thirsty vampire of Stephenie Meyer's "Twilight." His companion Victoria seems scarier because she seems constantly on the verge of losing control, but James's smile and calculating nature makes him much, much more of a threat.
7. Pumpkin: Most will point at the temperamental geisha Hatsumomo as the antagonist of Arthur Golden's "Memoirs of a Geisha," but it was the homely Pumpkin's willful betrayal and resentment of the well-meaning Sayuri that left an impression on me. Nothing hurts or scares more than when someone you're helping actually resents you and wishes you ill because of it.
8. Grendel: This is literally going old school, but the man-hating creature at the dark heart of "Beowulf" represents the antagonist as a force of nature. Though his mother avenges him effectively later on, it is the creature Grendel who first taught children the meaning of unnatural.
9. The White Witch: The ice queen of C.S. Lewis' "The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe" set the standard for beautifully wicked monarchs. Plus, she used Trukish Delight to ensnare one of the Pevensies. Now that's low.
10. Padre Salvi: Have to admit, Ambeth Ocampo was right about this one. The entire time, we kept focusing on Padre Damaso and his conflict with Crisostomo Ibarra in Jose Rizal's "Noli me Tangere," but it was actually the malicious successor, Pade Salvi who did the real damage, all disguised by his clerical office. Yikes.

By Pennie Azarcon-dela Cruz, Executive Editor Sunday Inquirer Magazine "HEY, this book is all about me and my sisters," I thought, awe-stricken, after reading the first few chapters of Louisa May Alcott's "Little Women." Well, how could anybody miss the similarity in the names and temperament of the March sisters and my own siblings? Meg, the eldest sister, is sweet and domesticated, exactly like my Ate who even took up cooking lessons to perfect her sans rival. Jo, that tomboyish and spirited budding writer, is definitely me, with my baptismal name Josefina, my love of books, the penchant for writing poetry in grade school, and the physical scrapes I always got into with my male cousins. Amy, the pretty and vain sister, is my third sibling, whose fair good looks became her main ID. Elizabeth March, the sickly sister, is my fourth sibling, whose severe asthma attacks kept her away from school most of the time. Why, they even have similar names! I must have been in fourth grade when I made this astounding discovery that I had a fictional twin. Only, it didn't feel fictional at that time. After all, this was a real book, a hardbound book with no pictures, only pages of text that marked it as serious reading. It was worlds away from the household staple, the komiks that defined our childhood. We read them all -- Pilipino Komiks, Redondo, Kulafu, Aliwan, Tagalog Klasiks, Wakasan, and those vernacular magazines Liwayway and Bulaklak. These were my parents' favorite reading fare, a comforting habit they took with them to the city where they fled to start life anew after the war. Of peasant stock, they had to stop schooling during the "Japanese time," forced to a hardscrabble existence in the mountains of Central Luzon. Starting over in Tondo in the 1950s wasn't easy, but they had their trove of komiks to turn to after a hard day, where they would cozy up with Mars Ravelo's Dyesebel and Darna and vicariously feel empowered as these characters fought off evil. It was this fantastic world we reveled in as kids, so it was quite refreshing to find out that people didn't need to have a fish tail or fly in a costume to have books written about them, that stories could be about ordinary folk and their everyday life and still sound interesting. "Little Women" made it so. More magically the book told my story, or so I thought, and I made sure to hew closely to the novel's storyline as the years went by. I guess that's how I wound up as a writer. For more books — life-changing, uplifting or plain entertaining — check out the Sunday Inquirer Magazine’s Summer Reading Issue this Sunday, March 30.

By Ruel S. De Vera, Associate Editor Sunday Inquirer Magazine HAVING learned to read from comic books, the SRA series (remember those? The Gold ones were awesome) and the Hardy Boys (all-time favorite: "The Mysterious Caravan"), I always enjoyed reading but was not really passionate about it as a child. My parents, both teachers at one point, loved to read and had books everywhere in the house. We had every encyclopedia imaginable, including a retro science encyclopedia, an antebellum Bible Encyclopedia and our top choice, the full-color and lavishly-illustrated Lexicon. There were many books that had quite an impact on me. Edilberto Tiempo's "To Be Free" helped me discover novels by Filipinos. Nick Joaquin's "Nora Aunor & Other Profiles" wowed me. Comic books were a passion, be it the oversized "Legion of Super-Heroes" I traded a Michael Jackson cassette for, or the unique high jinks of the Gauls in the Asterix books. They still are. But one particularly meaningful gift was a copy of James Clavell's "Whirlwind." I was in high school and the thick paperback was a gift from a friend, one of the school's guidance counselors. It was the first grown-up book I owned (not counting the comic books, which are, I declare, grown-up reading as well. That's my story and I'm sticking to it). I remember feeling all grown up just in the book's presence. I weighed it in my hand and read it as quickly as I could -- which wasn't very fast considering how complex it was. I still have that very book somewhere in my old room, missing a bunch of pages. I can't remember actually having finished that book, but I did read and finished a lot of others. I adore books now, can't help without them, can't sleep without reading one. In fact, just having a book with me when I'm running errands comforts me, a charm against boredom and idleness. For more books — life-changing, uplifting or plain entertaining — check out the Sunday Inquirer Magazine’s Summer Reading Issue this Sunday, March 30.

By Eric S. Caruncho, Staff Writer Sunday Inquirer Magazine IN MY last summer of high school, I worked a part-time job at my tita’s gravel and sand company. It involved long hours of doing nothing more than watching trucks come and go, so I started bringing books to pass the time. I had always been a voracious reader, and regularly scoured the book stores along Recto and Avenida for bargains. I'm dating myself, but in those days when National Book Store held a "cut-price book sale," paperbacks went for one peso each. Among my finds were the Grove Press editions of Henry Miller’s books. At that time, there was still an air of the illicit around Henry Miller's works. They had been banned in the US until a landmark court decision ruled they were literature, not pornography. (This was before the advent of "Deep Throat" and the whole sexual revolution that followed.) Anyway, I started with the first of the series, "Tropic of Cancer," and was immediately hooked by Miller's semi-autobiographical account of his bohemian days in Paris in the early 1930s, living on his wits and managing a ménage a trois with his wife and another female character clearly based on Anais Nin. I quickly devoured the rest of Miller's ouvre: "Tropic of Capricorn," "Sexus," "Plexus," "Nexus," "Black Spring," and "Quiet Days in Clichy." To my delight, when I enrolled in my freshman year of college (as a business major!), I discovered that the university library was well-stocked with Miller's other works (as well as Nin's). I read "The Air Conditioned Nightmare," "Big Sur and the Oranges of Hieronymous Bosch" and the rest of the canon. Finally, I came to the last book of Miller's that the library had, which was "The Books In My Life," his loving tribute to the books that he had read and which had made an impact on his life. I tracked down each and every title in his list that the library had, among them Balzac's mystical "Seraphita" and Knut Hamsun's "Hunger." (Miller also had a taste for Franz Werfel -- author of "The Song of Bernadette" -- which I never acquired.) Each book led to others, and by the time I had worked my way through the cycle, I realized that I was on my way to becoming a writer. Much later, a colleague at work -- a published fictionist -- would huff "The dirty old man of literature!" whenever Henry Miller's name came up in conversation. I could only smile. For more books — life-changing, uplifting or plain entertaining — check out the Sunday Inquirer Magazine's Summer Reading Issue this Sunday, March 30.

By Leica R. Carpo, Publisher Sunday Inquirer Magazine I COULD say it was F. Scott Fitzgerald’s “Great Gatsby,” Dickens’ “Great Expectations” or even Margaret Mitchell’s “Gone with the Wind” that turned me onto reading. But that would be a lie. I must confess that historical novels were my secret passion and I was a Barbara Cartland girl first and foremost. I fell in love first with the opulent 18th century Regency settings and later with the witty repartee between the spitfire heroines and the handsome cynical heroes. Cartland’s ladies often found themselves living in beautiful windswept Scottish moors, trapped in decadent Moorish kasbahs or bored silly by the London season of whirlwind balls and soirees. The heroines almost always turn out to be long lost daughters of Dukes and Marquis who had to work as governesses to make ends meet or who happened to stow aboard pirate ships disguised as deck hands seeking freedom from wicked guardians and arranged marriages. I don’t remember the exact title of the Regency Romance that made the biggest impact in my life, but the courage of the heroines and the chivalry of the gentlemen in the novels translated into my daily life by making me expect ‘romance and gentlemanly behavior’ from all my future suitors. Moreover this was a secret I shared with my Abuelita (grandmother) who was my main supplier as I was only 10 years old at the time and my mom was still buying me Nancy Drew books. I still remember Abuelita reclining in her chaise lounge near a big picture window overlooking the garden at three in the afternoon enjoying the latest Cartland installment. She believed in taking time to enjoy life, traveling as an integral way to round out one’s education and reading romance novels as every girl’s right of passage. She was from an era when “happily ever afters” was the norm and not just found in books. I no longer read Cartland novels or expect "happily ever afters," but to this day I don’t expect chivalry -- I demand it. From this week on, the intrepid staffers of the Sunday Inquirer Magazine will share their thoughts on all sorts of ideas arising from the week's forthcoming issue of SIM. It is available exclusively on INQUIRER.net and will serve as an appetizer for the Sunday lineup. For more books -- life-changing, uplifting or plain entertaining -- check out the Sunday Inquirer Magazine’s Summer Reading Issue this Sunday, March 30.