You Mean Toads in England Really Don't Drive Cars?

For a large portion of my weird little childhood, my mother would take my sister and me on an annual trip to Florida. The first year we went was 1989, just weeks after hurricane Hugo had swamped the place. I can still picture the Days Inn Hotel with the doors to all their rooms open to be aired out. We went through three rooms or so before they put us in one where the damp carpet wouldn’t likely cause mold to grow in our lungs.

Other than that though, I can barely remember the hotel or the rooms or anything else about these trips to Florida. As with most families taking small children to this southern state of oranges and old people, there is really only one reason to travel. Disneyworld.

I love Disneyworld. Even as an adult, I still love it, like a dirty, ice cream-faced, five-year-old. You can imagine then, how my curiosity was piqued when my former co-worker presented me with a most interesting memoir, titled “Cast Member Confidential.” The author, a sports photographer named Chris Mitchell, was no one I’d ever heard of, and if you know me at all, you know that the word ‘sports’ might as well be synonymous with ‘painful childhood memories.’ “I’ve heard this is good,” my coworker told me. “It’s about people who play the characters at Disneyworld.” Say no more, bookstore employee friend! You’ve made a sale!

Anyone who has been a member of a school or community theater group can imagine the sort of individuals they hire to play the numerous Disney characters prancing about their parks. Even aside from that though, the subculture that exists behind the ‘Cast Members Only’ doors is both bizarre and fascinating. That’s what they call them after all, ‘cast members,’ and not just the ladies dressed up as Cinderella, but every single employee out amongst the guests. The photographers. The greeters. The janitors. That woman ladling jambalaya into your bread bowl outside the Haunted Mansion is not a lunch lady. She is a cast member, and she has to keep smiling at you no matter what.

Young Chris Mitchell was having a bit of a life crisis when he fled Los Angeles to find gainful employment within the artificially beautiful walls of the Walt Disneyworld Resort. Instantly, his skills as a photographer set him apart from the crowd. Unfortunately, so did his rebellious and sarcastic attitude. The memoir follows Mitchell both in his quest to face the issues that sent him to Florida, but also in his desire to fit in amongst the Disney magic and those that worship at its shrine. Mitchell gives you a short rundown to his previous job, photographing seemingly heathenish skateboarders who think nothing of graffiti and using cemeteries as skate parks. While his Disney coworkers were certainly not all saints, they all possess a curious sense of purpose and ability to find joy in everything. Or so it seems at first.

Add on to that, the endless rules that accompany the job of cast member, and you’ll never look at the guy snapping your photo with Winnie the Pooh the same way again. Heck, you’ll never look at Winnie the Pooh the same way again. “Cast Member Confidential” is the sort of trivia laden book that will have you stopping every five minutes to shout at the nearest person, “Did you know they don’t sell gum at Disneyworld?” and various other useless but fascinating bits of knowledge. I got a kick out of how Mitchell fell into the habit of describing everyone he met in terms of what character they could play according to their height. Every character performer has to be a specific height, within the range of two inches. Otherwise, some observant tot might notice if the Mickey who left for a cheese break is slightly taller or shorter than the one who returned. If there is anything you learn from this book, it’s the lengths Disneyworld goes to maintain the magic, for better or worse.

In the end, the book is more about a man struggling with his own sense of self than a Disney tell-all, which is exactly the way it should be in my opinion. Honestly, as much as I like to stick it to the Man, Disney is one Man I’d rather leave alone. Who wants to rip apart their own childhood dreams and fantasies? Not me. And if you don’t believe me, come with me next Christmas to Disneyland, and watch me cry at the fake snow.

If You Had Magic Powers, You Know You'd Do It Too

Today, my merry little blogflowers, we are going to discuss that most irritating literary occurrence: the crappy ending. You know the feeling, when you’ve spent two hours watching a movie, and then you find out it was allllll a dream. Or a split personality. Or an identical twin. In other words, some lame concept, because by that point the screenwriter was either an idiot, lazy, or dying from malnourishment, and couldn’t come up with anything better.

In a book, it’s even worse, because you haven’t just spent an hour or two, but sometimes days or weeks, depending on the speed in which you consume the written word. I’m not talking about the sort of rubbish that you can tell from page one how painful it will be to mentally consume. No, no. At least those books are honest about what they are. This particular brand of Steinho ire is reserved for the book that pulls you in, offers up a slew of diverse and developed characters, then at the peak of excitement, the main character will suddenly get knocked unconscious, or fall down a well, or turn out to be crazy, and every bit of excitement was alllllll in his head. I will never forgive you, “Shutter Island.” Never.

A horrible ending is always worse when the other 95% of the book is pure gold. One example is Lev Grossman’s “The Magicians.” That’s Lev Grossman, not to be confused with the obnoxious Tom Cruise character, Les Grossman, from the movie “Tropic Thunder.”

“The Magicians” started out so promising. To describe it as simply as possible, it‘s, “Harry Potter and The Drunken College Years.” And if it wasn’t enough to draw upon one lovable kids fantasy series, it also pays homage to C. S. Lewis’s “The Chronicles of Narnia.” What really happens when after years of sneaking off to a magical land of talking animals, called Fillory in this book, one simply grows up to be boring and old? How would that twist one’s mind? Team Narnia, mature as they are, willingly accept their fate. In “The Magicians,” one of the wee tots, (instead of the Pevensies, we have the Chatwins) grows so miserable at being ejected from his fancy through-the-portal lifestyle, that he goes insane, turns evil, and magically eats a few people along the way.

So the novel had a great villain, lots of dark magic and danger. It also had it’s share of salacious college party life. For example, while turned into a goose, our broody and charming main character, Quentin, is instinctively inspired to get busy with one of his similarly transformed classmates. It sort of put me in mind to T.H White’s “The Once and Future King.” If you don’t get the reference, think back to Disney’s version of “The Sword in the Stone,” where to teach young Arthur about life, Merlin turns him into a fish, a squirrel and a bird. Teach him about life indeed!

Sprawling, vine-covered university of weirdo professors. Check. Danger at the hands of an enraged, supernatural, wannabe Edmund Pevensie. Check. Some hot goose-on-goose action. Double check. What could be bad about this book?

Well, nothing, until the ending. Pardon the spoiler alert, but when the young Quentin and his team of wizard over-achievers finally make it to Fillory, nothing happens. They walk around. They learn how the land of Fillory has been on the decline ever since those darling Chatwins left. Then, after a few minor skirmishes, they end up in a cave. Blah blah blah, the villain flat out explains his evil schemes, blah blah blah, some of Quentin’s friends get dismembered, bladdy blah blah, Quentin gets knocked out, and wakes up in a centaur hospital, without knowing exactly what happened, what became of his friends, or what to do next. Eventually he returns home, and gets an office job at a magical corporation. An office job.

Perhaps Grossman was trying to make a statement on how when we are young, we dream of whimsical adventures, flying on dragons, sailing with pirates. When you grow up, you realize that like everything else, even magic would be mundane, tedious, and probably involve a lot of bureaucracy. You’d probably have to get a license for your dragon, and think of the amount of money you’d spend to feed it.

Or maybe, Grossman was just tired. Fortunately, he got his act together for the last two paragraphs, where he literally had the remains of Quentin’s posse smash in, Batman style, through the window of his office building, and insult our hero into giving up his day job, and getting back into the magic game. Hopefully for the sequel, Grossman will listen to his own advice.

Less paperwork. More goose sex.

Gooble Gobble! Gooble Gobble! Read This Book! Read This Book!

Ahh, the holidays! The time each year when we are subjected to the various horrifying whims of our extended family. Smelly babies. Old people asking us hypothetical questions about why teenagers today listen to that ‘rap music’ and act like whores. I don’t know, Great Aunt Mildred. I’m twenty-seven, and have poor social skills. Even as a young person myself, I had no idea what was going on.

Well, it could be worse. Instead of having a family full of freaks, you could be a family of actual freaks, like with extra or missing limbs, maybe some animal parts, extraneous hair, possibly a penchant for shoving flaming or pointy objects down your gullet.

That is exactly the sort of family imagined in Katherine Dunn’s novel “Geek Love.” I really wonder how many people in the past couple years have picked up her book and thought, “Yippee! Nerd romance!” Not quite, termite. Here’s a little etymology lesson for you. The original meaning of the word geek, according to Merriam Webster, is a carnival performer, usually billed as a wild man, whose act was to bite the head off of a live chicken or snake. Perhaps Katherine Dunn was worried readers would get the wrong idea if they saw a book titled “Freak Love” and therefore dredged up this antiquated term to fill in the blank. Because freaks, after all, are what this book is about. Freaks in love with other freaks, living normal freaky lives, despite looking positively freakish.

Dunn need not have worried. This was one of those books where someone simply tells me the premise and I buy it. What’s that you say? A book about circus freaks? I’m there! I think every reader has that list of certain words, that when they see it on a book dust jacket, their interest is instantly piqued. Well, circus is one of my words. Pair that with ‘haunted’ or ‘evil’ or ‘necromancer’ and not only have I bought the book, but I’ve read half of it in line already on the way to the cashier. I admit, it’s not a fool proof plan, a point never made more clearly than with Jonathan L. Howard’s “Johannes Cabal: Necromancer.” Never have I read a book with necromancer in the title so utterly devoid of necromancy. For shame, Mr. Howard. For shame.

As I mentioned before, “Geek Love” is a simple story about a family, with the same boring hopes and dreams as everybody else. The story starts with a loving couple; he the inheritor of a rundown traveling show, she the resident geek girl. Yup, the chicken head biting kind. They fall in love, and like every young couple in love, they purposely expose her pregnant belly to toxic chemicals in the hopes of producing better acts for their circus. And it works! A couple years later, they’ve got a megalomaniac flipper boy, a sassy and musically gifted pair of conjoined twins, and Olympia, a moody, angst-filled bald girl with a hunchback. Oh, and a perfectly lovely blond boy with telekinetic powers. He has an inferiority complex because he’s the most adorable and flawless looking child ever birthed.

I’m worried this sounds like a bad review. It’s a bizarre read, to be sure, but I really, really loved it. I consumed it in its entirety on a four hour plane ride, so that has to count for something. Those folks who recall the short-lived HBO show “Carnival” will likely enjoy its diverse and intriguing cast of characters. It might also put you in mind of the 1932 film “Freaks,” only not quite as visually horrifying.

What I loved most about “Geek Love” was how the family of freaks, especially Olympia, who is considered too boring by her parents to be put in any act, deals with the same issues as any regular, traditional looking family. At times, they were so normal in their arguments, their emotional blow ups, their backstabbing and scheming,. Then they’d start in on the telekinetic powers and cult religions and journey off down some tangential road that would zap me back to fantasyland.

I can safely say, “Geek Love” is a book the likes of which you have probably not seen. Unless you’re also in the habit of finding the weirdest book in the store and reading it forthwith. In that case, we should hang out.

Because That Chocolate Factory Money Didn't Last Forever

As a teenager, Roald Dahl studied at Repton School in Derbyshire. When I was fourteen, I traveled to Repton with the Flint Youth Symphony. Later in life, I was nearly caught lying about pretending to be British, by a British person. I was saved by mentioning that I had studied at Repton. Apparently knowing the name of an obscure British prep school is acceptable proof of nationality. Thank you, youth symphony and thank you, Roald Dahl.

What do we normally know Roald Dahl for, other than saving me from humiliating myself in front of his compatriots? “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory” is probably one of his most well known kids‘ books. Most of the wee lads and lasses I grew up with had read at least a few of his other works, too. “The Witches,” “Matilda,” and “The BFG,” come to mind. They’re often dark and strange children‘s book, full of imagination and often violence. Still, they’re children’s books, and most often, Dahl is thought of as a children‘s author.

But what about Roald Dahl, purveyor of sexy fiction?

I say to you what I said to my mother upon learning that Sherlock Holmes had a brother named Mycroft.

Whaaaaaaaaaat?

Yes, many do not know that Roald Dahl wrote adult books, let alone books that may or may not be considered of an erotic nature. His first published work was a short story detailing his life as a fighter pilot in the Royal Air Force. Another short story, “The Smoker,” was later adapted into the fourth section of the film “Four Rooms.” For those of you who’ve seen it, it’s the one with Quentin Tarantino, where a guy gets his finger whacked off in a bet.

Well, with Tarantino involved, it now may not seem so strange that Dahl wrote not just one, but several erotic novels, such as “Stitch Bitch.” His book, “Dirty Beasts,” however, is ironically meant for kids.

The title of his other titillating tome is “My Uncle Oswald,” and let me just say that it’s simply delightful. By today’s supersexed teenage pregnancy standards, it’s not even that dirty. I mean, we’re not talking about Lewis Carroll here, so get your mind out of that filthy 2010s gutter and wallow in this charming, old, 1930s romp! Dahl sets up “My Uncle Oswald” as a collection of passages from the narrator’s uncle’s diary, detailing his exploits and schemes, some of a financial nature, others with a more sensual motivation. Good old Uncle Oswald appeared multiple times in Dahl’s writing career, with these so called diary excerpts being published in magazines from The New Yorker to Playboy. That’s right! Playboy! I’ll give you a moment to fall out of your chair with shock. Hang on, it’s going to get even more outrageous!

In, “My Uncle Oswald,” a young Oswald learns of a Sudanese blister beetle, that when ground up and ingested, makes Viagra look like one of those comically large mallets that knock cartoon characters unconscious. The drug is cleverly marketed as a potency pill. That’s the brilliance of a book like this. We all know what he’s talking about, but there‘s just something about British people using a whole lot of ridiculous euphemisms for sexual encounters that makes me titter with joy. At first the crafty junior entrepreneur, Oswald, makes a small fortune selling this wonder pill to Britain’s oldest fornicators. Yet, like all ridiculous plots, Oswald is not content with his meager earnings. That’s where Yasmin Howcomely comes in.

That name alone is enough to send me into a fit of giggles. You thought Ian Fleming was clever with Pussy Galore? As if! Miss Howcomely has an important, um, position, to play in Oswald’s business proposal. With the aid of Oswald’s potency pill, and Yasmin’s charms, the pair set out to trick the world’s greatest thinkers, artists, politicians, plus a few royals, into unknowingly donating a, shall we say, specimen, to sell to wealthy women who would like to be the mothers of great thinkers, artists, etc. We’re all adults here. You can put pieces together exactly how Yasmin Howcomely helps in this process. Oddly, Dahl uses the same sort of silly, ridiculous humor in “My Uncle Oswald,” that he does in his children’s books. Only instead of describing how Charlie was chased by an evil vermicious knid, he discusses how Yasmin was chased around the room by a half naked Bernard Shaw! If that isn’t whimsical, I don’t know what is.