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With a weird name like Wilkie Collins, he sounds like a young hooligan from a Dickens novel, perhaps as a grimy compatriot to the Artful Dodger or the scheming school chum to Pip Pirrup. Thank goodness, young Master Wilkie was born to wealthy parents, and was therefore spared a life of poverty and such traumatizing though serendipitous coincidences that plagued the lives of Oliver Twist and David Copperfield.
For the sake of my own amusement, I will break with standard grammar of referring to authors by their last name, and address this week’s writer in question by his delightful first name. Wilkie. If I feel so inclined, I might even throw in a ‘dear Wilkie,’ or ‘that silly Mr. Wilkie,’ because Wilkie Collins is no longer alive, and will never read my blog, and can’t yell at me for mocking his name.
Up until about a year ago, I had never heard the name Wilkie Collins, writer of “The Moonstone,” and “The Woman in White.” Oh, University of Michigan English professors, how I have failed you! My first introduction came while reading a non-fiction book, “The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher,” the history of Jonathan Whicher, a real life Scotland Yard detective from the late 1800s. It was Whicher’s famous skills of observation and deduction that inspired a certain knighted writer to create a character whose name rhymes with Shmerlock Sholmes. He also inspired an equally weirdly named author to write what is known as the earliest forms of detective or mystery novels. That weirdly named author was none other than our previous Wilkiekins.
Really though, I have only good things to say about our sweet little Wilkie. Every once in awhile, I like to read a classic to remind myself how much smarter I am than everyone else. On this occasion, the source of my literary superiority was one of Wilkie’s later works, titled “The Moonstone.” The book follows the scandal surrounding the theft of an allegedly cursed Indian diamond, which was originally stolen from a Hindu temple during the British conquest! Scandal indeed!
Sure enough, Wilkie’s writing made me remember why classics are considered classics. It’s not just because they’re old and our teachers make us read them. Most of them actually are light years better than the shlock clogging the shelves of Barnes and Noble these days.
On top of his immense writing prowess, his royal Wilkiness was also a gentleman of great intrigue and curiosity. I can just imagine the whispering behind fans that occurred whenever dear Wilkie entered a ballroom or tea parlor! Let me enlighten you to a few delectable morsels from our precious Wilkie’s life history. His first job was working for a bunch of tea merchants. Tea merchants! Just think of the sort of mischief he got into under their employment. Next he made friends with Charles Dickens (speaking of serendipitous coincidences!) and they took turns editing and publishing each other’s work while they’re younger siblings got married. Later, he grew a gigantic bushy beard, and from the years 1870 to his death in 1889, he was getting it on with two different women. He married neither.
If nothing else can be said of this grand wordsmith of yore, Wilkie Collins was a professional. The dear old chap included an introduction into “The Moonstone,” where he describes the unfortunate affliction of rheumatic gout that struck him just as his mother was dying of some other horrible British malady. Anyway, this came somewhere in the middle of writing “The Moonstone,” but instead of trying to get some rest, or taking time to mourn the passing of his mother dearest, Wilkie refused to stop working out of loyalty to his fans. He continued to write, dictating to an assistant as he laid suffering in his bed. Kinda makes me feel bad for slacking off on my blog just because I’m on vacation.
“The Moonstone” is the sort of novel that makes me wish I had been born in the Victorian era. I mean they really had every sort of spazzmoid and hilarious character back then. Like Betteredge, the wacky old butler obsessed with Robinson Crusoe, or the spinster cousin who tries to hide religious paraphernalia in her dying aunt’s bathroom, just in case she would like to read about saving her soul while on the toilet. There’s Rosanna Spearman, the hunchbacked, former thief turned second housemaid, who flings her crippled body into quicksand after falling in love with a man above her station. She actually drowns in quicksand! How tragic! How sensational! Add onto that a team of mad Colonels, villainous foreigners with weirdly speckled hair, engagements made and broken, not to mention the amount of opium consumed, and you’ve got more intrigue than a Jason Bourne movie. No, they did not need the antics of teen celebridiots to entertain them in the 1800s. They had dear Wilkie to amuse them.
Wednesday, November 24, 2010
Monday, November 15, 2010
Aron Ralston: Hero? Saint? Chuck Norris' Long Lost Son?
At any given moment, I could recite to you about ten things that are currently making me anxious. Paying the bills. Finding an awesome new job. Possibly dying of some disease I don‘t yet know I have. Though my doctor sister has assured me of the improbability of my having throat cancer, I remain terrified.
It is far too easy to focus on the negative, on everything that can possibly go wrong. This is another one of those downsides to having an overactive imagination. As children, we create imaginary friends and monsters. As adults, I create imaginary tumors in my larynx and futures where I’m forced to live under a bridge and eat grilled cheese crusts I find in bins around Santa Monica. Needless to say, inspirational posters featuring fluffy, adorable baby animals are usually lost on me.
What does inspire me is when horrible things happen to people, and through the sheer power of their will and mind, they come out all right. Cue Aron Ralston, the famous mountain climber who had to amputate his own arm with a utility tool to free himself from a canyon in Utah. Has anyone ever asked you, if you had to be stranded on a deserted island with one person, who would you want to labor away under the blistering tropical sun with? Seeing as Jacques Cousteau is dead, I’ll take Aron Ralston. I apologize to his wife and newborn son for kidnapping their husband/father, but this is my hypothetical, and I want to live, damn it! I want to live!
A few years ago, I was putzing around the non-fiction section of Borders, and I came across Ralston’s book, “Between a Rock and a Hard Place.” Never has there been a more literal interpretation of that metaphor.
My God, what a book. What a story. You think you have problems? You think your life is hard? Well, you don’t and it’s not, because you are not currently pinned under a boulder in Utah, dying of starvation and possibly septic shock. If this were a game of who has been through more, and you are not a child in a war-torn, third-world country, or Aron Ralston, then you lose. Do you have both your arms? Lose. Haven’t drank your own urine yet? Lose. Tired after spending a whole day on your feet? What a good day to be a loser. Ralston was unable to lay down and rest his legs for almost a week.
Yes, Ralston’s book is absolutely horrifying to read at times, especially if you’re squeamish. He doesn’t hold back with anything, not with the emotional turmoil, not concerning the terrifying transformation as his body began to wither, his damaged right hand actually starting to fester though still attached to his arm.
The most graphic part, of course, is the amputation itself. Reading it made me wince and cry and gasp. I repeat, just reading about it. Imagine actually performing the act yourself. I can’t. The description in the book lasts a couple pages. The actual ordeal took forty minutes. Forty minutes of pausing, cautiously cutting, prodding and examining the wound, and cutting more. Without anesthetics. It was cut your arm off or die, and Ralston chose not to die.
Some may criticize Ralston for having made stupid mistakes that got him into this situation. I myself posted a blog not too long ago, mocking that idiot kid from “Into the Wild” for getting his silly self killed back in Alaska. What was different about Ralston? He made a near fatal mistake of telling no one where he was planning to hike. He himself discusses in the book, the sort of hubris he suffered from that pushed him into these dangerous situations. So what makes him different from the other shmucks who froze to death, or starved to death or got eaten by bears or pygmies or rabid baboons? Is it that he lived to be humbled? Perhaps. All I can say is that after reading the book, I liked Aron Ralston. I admired him, and I felt that if he could have the courage and determination to saw through his own flesh and snap the bones in his own forearm, if it meant living a little longer, than surely I can accept life’s minute frustrations and trials. Perspective, dear friends. It’s all about perspective. More moving even than the detailed descriptions of his physical suffering, were his reflections on family, on friends, on mistakes and regrets, and in the end, what he had left to stay alive for. I also loved the little anecdotes at the end, where Ralston’s sense of humor helps him to adapt to life with only one hand. There’s a particularly hysterical bit concerning a high five gone awry.
These pathetic words cannot convey how Aron Ralston has affected me. I’ve never met him, though I’d like to, for no other reason than to thank him for giving the world something good to think about and reminding me that extraordinary things can happen out of the darkest moments.
Slap that on a motivational poster!
Now, if you happen to live in a big city, or possess a career that allows you to globe trot to international film festivals, you may have seen the film based off of Ralston’s horrific incident, “127 Hours.” Starring the every dreamy James Franco, this is easily the most intense film I have ever watched. Remember those few pages I mentioned? While director Danny Boyle manages to condense Ralston’s forty minutes of self-surgery down to a five minute scene, they were five minutes of movie viewing I will not soon forget.
Let me close with this. Whenever I’m whining about something, my father always asks me, “Are you dying?” To date, I have yet to answer yes. I hope to not answer yes for a long, long time. In other words, I have nothing to whine about. Aron Ralston was dying, and then he turned around, and punched dying in the face with his own amputated arm. Aron Ralston wins.
It is far too easy to focus on the negative, on everything that can possibly go wrong. This is another one of those downsides to having an overactive imagination. As children, we create imaginary friends and monsters. As adults, I create imaginary tumors in my larynx and futures where I’m forced to live under a bridge and eat grilled cheese crusts I find in bins around Santa Monica. Needless to say, inspirational posters featuring fluffy, adorable baby animals are usually lost on me.
What does inspire me is when horrible things happen to people, and through the sheer power of their will and mind, they come out all right. Cue Aron Ralston, the famous mountain climber who had to amputate his own arm with a utility tool to free himself from a canyon in Utah. Has anyone ever asked you, if you had to be stranded on a deserted island with one person, who would you want to labor away under the blistering tropical sun with? Seeing as Jacques Cousteau is dead, I’ll take Aron Ralston. I apologize to his wife and newborn son for kidnapping their husband/father, but this is my hypothetical, and I want to live, damn it! I want to live!
A few years ago, I was putzing around the non-fiction section of Borders, and I came across Ralston’s book, “Between a Rock and a Hard Place.” Never has there been a more literal interpretation of that metaphor.
My God, what a book. What a story. You think you have problems? You think your life is hard? Well, you don’t and it’s not, because you are not currently pinned under a boulder in Utah, dying of starvation and possibly septic shock. If this were a game of who has been through more, and you are not a child in a war-torn, third-world country, or Aron Ralston, then you lose. Do you have both your arms? Lose. Haven’t drank your own urine yet? Lose. Tired after spending a whole day on your feet? What a good day to be a loser. Ralston was unable to lay down and rest his legs for almost a week.
Yes, Ralston’s book is absolutely horrifying to read at times, especially if you’re squeamish. He doesn’t hold back with anything, not with the emotional turmoil, not concerning the terrifying transformation as his body began to wither, his damaged right hand actually starting to fester though still attached to his arm.
The most graphic part, of course, is the amputation itself. Reading it made me wince and cry and gasp. I repeat, just reading about it. Imagine actually performing the act yourself. I can’t. The description in the book lasts a couple pages. The actual ordeal took forty minutes. Forty minutes of pausing, cautiously cutting, prodding and examining the wound, and cutting more. Without anesthetics. It was cut your arm off or die, and Ralston chose not to die.
Some may criticize Ralston for having made stupid mistakes that got him into this situation. I myself posted a blog not too long ago, mocking that idiot kid from “Into the Wild” for getting his silly self killed back in Alaska. What was different about Ralston? He made a near fatal mistake of telling no one where he was planning to hike. He himself discusses in the book, the sort of hubris he suffered from that pushed him into these dangerous situations. So what makes him different from the other shmucks who froze to death, or starved to death or got eaten by bears or pygmies or rabid baboons? Is it that he lived to be humbled? Perhaps. All I can say is that after reading the book, I liked Aron Ralston. I admired him, and I felt that if he could have the courage and determination to saw through his own flesh and snap the bones in his own forearm, if it meant living a little longer, than surely I can accept life’s minute frustrations and trials. Perspective, dear friends. It’s all about perspective. More moving even than the detailed descriptions of his physical suffering, were his reflections on family, on friends, on mistakes and regrets, and in the end, what he had left to stay alive for. I also loved the little anecdotes at the end, where Ralston’s sense of humor helps him to adapt to life with only one hand. There’s a particularly hysterical bit concerning a high five gone awry.
These pathetic words cannot convey how Aron Ralston has affected me. I’ve never met him, though I’d like to, for no other reason than to thank him for giving the world something good to think about and reminding me that extraordinary things can happen out of the darkest moments.
Slap that on a motivational poster!
Now, if you happen to live in a big city, or possess a career that allows you to globe trot to international film festivals, you may have seen the film based off of Ralston’s horrific incident, “127 Hours.” Starring the every dreamy James Franco, this is easily the most intense film I have ever watched. Remember those few pages I mentioned? While director Danny Boyle manages to condense Ralston’s forty minutes of self-surgery down to a five minute scene, they were five minutes of movie viewing I will not soon forget.
Let me close with this. Whenever I’m whining about something, my father always asks me, “Are you dying?” To date, I have yet to answer yes. I hope to not answer yes for a long, long time. In other words, I have nothing to whine about. Aron Ralston was dying, and then he turned around, and punched dying in the face with his own amputated arm. Aron Ralston wins.
Monday, November 8, 2010
I Was Murdered By Bandits! P.S. Craig Likes Lisa
Mary Roach likes to write about dead people And sex. And also space. All interesting topics, though some more pleasant than others.
Mary Roach is a woman with an enviable writing career and very lovely reddish-blond hair. As she says on her website, she’s not a scientist, but she is smart enough to harass scientists into teaching her what she wants to know. Having dated several scientists, this is a definite skill.
Her first book, “Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers,” follows the various mischief your corpse can get into post-breathing, should you opt for something less than the traditional pine box or tiny urn on your loved one’s fireplace mantel. Such activities include testing everything from weapons to the safety of automobiles, aiding med students in honing their scalpel skills, or showing forensic specialists exactly what a body would look like if it were abandoned in a forest on a warm summer’s day for five to seven hours. Messy work for both the living and the dead, but valuable all the same.
Informative and disgusting, “Stiff” is not a book to bring up while at a dinner party, hosted by your future in-laws who you’ve just met. Unless your in-laws are weirdos. In that case, let the grossing-out commence. And did you really want to marry that stuck-up jerk/bimbo who questioned your reading taste anyway? I say, you’re better off.
Fantastic! Now that you’ve thrown away all hope of marital bliss, you’ll have plenty of time to read the rest of Madame Roach’s books. Despite having only four in publication so far, the topics discussed run a wide enough gamut that there is a Roach paperback for every curious mind. After “Stiff” came “Spook,” a scientific search for the human soul/spirit, followed by “Bonk,” a biological and physiological study on sex. If you’ve ever wondered, what does Viagra have to do with pandas, then “Bonk” is the book for you. This past October, Roach published her fourth piece, titled “Packing for Mars.” I haven’t read it yet, but it promises to teach me more about ejecting bodily fluids in zero gravity than I ever wanted to know. I can’t wait.
As October drew to a close, I thought I’d take one last crack at Halloween related reading material. With such chapter titles as ‘Soul in a Dunce Cap‘ and ‘Chaffin vs. The Dead Guy in the Overcoat,’ “Spook” seemed an appropriate and intriguing choice. Roach starts the book out with a vow to remain as open-minded as possible while questing for the human soul. A skeptic and non-believer by nature, she seems to want nothing more than to be proven wrong through real, hard evidence of life after death. Of course, even before I read the first page, I knew her search would be fruitless. Considering this book came out five years ago, and barring a world-wide government conspiracy, I think it likely we would have all seen the Barbara Walters special by now if Roach really had communicated with those in the great beyond.
Still, no one can deny, just as with all her other books, she flung herself mercilessly into this project. Mary Roach is the sort of researcher that college professors have sexy dreams about. She interviewed doctors testing cardiac patients for out of body experiences. She poured over 19th century journals on the various ridiculous attempts to measure the soul, including the infamous study of dying patients claiming we all lose 21 grams of body weight upon the moment of expiration. To better understand the subtle art of psychic mediums, she attended an actual class on it, subjecting herself to all sorts of scorn and hilarity at the hands of her fellow pupils. I honestly know the feeling. At childhood slumber parties, deranged though my imagination was, I simply could not believe that some spirit would take the time to painstakingly spell out the names of all the cute boys in our fourth grade class on a Ouija board. What I would always feel was not disbelief, but disappointment. My gut told me that spirits were real, but they likely had better things to do than hang around a pack of tweens.
Maybe it’s because I’d like to believe all those weirdos from the 1920s really were shooting ectoplasm out of their mouth during seances and not just soggy cheesecloth, but I admit to feeling that same disappointment while reading certain chapters of “Spook.” Mary Roach chose to focus on a lot of nutty characters in her attempt to find proof of life after death. Does that mean the idea itself is nutty? Perhaps. Or perhaps all the ghosts were too busy hanging around slumber parties to tell Madame Roach what she wanted to know. Therefore, if we never successfully prove the existence of an afterlife, we know who to blame.
Teenage girls.
Mary Roach is a woman with an enviable writing career and very lovely reddish-blond hair. As she says on her website, she’s not a scientist, but she is smart enough to harass scientists into teaching her what she wants to know. Having dated several scientists, this is a definite skill.
Her first book, “Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers,” follows the various mischief your corpse can get into post-breathing, should you opt for something less than the traditional pine box or tiny urn on your loved one’s fireplace mantel. Such activities include testing everything from weapons to the safety of automobiles, aiding med students in honing their scalpel skills, or showing forensic specialists exactly what a body would look like if it were abandoned in a forest on a warm summer’s day for five to seven hours. Messy work for both the living and the dead, but valuable all the same.
Informative and disgusting, “Stiff” is not a book to bring up while at a dinner party, hosted by your future in-laws who you’ve just met. Unless your in-laws are weirdos. In that case, let the grossing-out commence. And did you really want to marry that stuck-up jerk/bimbo who questioned your reading taste anyway? I say, you’re better off.
Fantastic! Now that you’ve thrown away all hope of marital bliss, you’ll have plenty of time to read the rest of Madame Roach’s books. Despite having only four in publication so far, the topics discussed run a wide enough gamut that there is a Roach paperback for every curious mind. After “Stiff” came “Spook,” a scientific search for the human soul/spirit, followed by “Bonk,” a biological and physiological study on sex. If you’ve ever wondered, what does Viagra have to do with pandas, then “Bonk” is the book for you. This past October, Roach published her fourth piece, titled “Packing for Mars.” I haven’t read it yet, but it promises to teach me more about ejecting bodily fluids in zero gravity than I ever wanted to know. I can’t wait.
As October drew to a close, I thought I’d take one last crack at Halloween related reading material. With such chapter titles as ‘Soul in a Dunce Cap‘ and ‘Chaffin vs. The Dead Guy in the Overcoat,’ “Spook” seemed an appropriate and intriguing choice. Roach starts the book out with a vow to remain as open-minded as possible while questing for the human soul. A skeptic and non-believer by nature, she seems to want nothing more than to be proven wrong through real, hard evidence of life after death. Of course, even before I read the first page, I knew her search would be fruitless. Considering this book came out five years ago, and barring a world-wide government conspiracy, I think it likely we would have all seen the Barbara Walters special by now if Roach really had communicated with those in the great beyond.
Still, no one can deny, just as with all her other books, she flung herself mercilessly into this project. Mary Roach is the sort of researcher that college professors have sexy dreams about. She interviewed doctors testing cardiac patients for out of body experiences. She poured over 19th century journals on the various ridiculous attempts to measure the soul, including the infamous study of dying patients claiming we all lose 21 grams of body weight upon the moment of expiration. To better understand the subtle art of psychic mediums, she attended an actual class on it, subjecting herself to all sorts of scorn and hilarity at the hands of her fellow pupils. I honestly know the feeling. At childhood slumber parties, deranged though my imagination was, I simply could not believe that some spirit would take the time to painstakingly spell out the names of all the cute boys in our fourth grade class on a Ouija board. What I would always feel was not disbelief, but disappointment. My gut told me that spirits were real, but they likely had better things to do than hang around a pack of tweens.
Maybe it’s because I’d like to believe all those weirdos from the 1920s really were shooting ectoplasm out of their mouth during seances and not just soggy cheesecloth, but I admit to feeling that same disappointment while reading certain chapters of “Spook.” Mary Roach chose to focus on a lot of nutty characters in her attempt to find proof of life after death. Does that mean the idea itself is nutty? Perhaps. Or perhaps all the ghosts were too busy hanging around slumber parties to tell Madame Roach what she wanted to know. Therefore, if we never successfully prove the existence of an afterlife, we know who to blame.
Teenage girls.
Sunday, October 31, 2010
I Repeat, Bieber Cannot Win
Today is Halloween, the one night each year we willingly force ourselves into terrifying situations, be that by spending a night in haunted house, or watching Linda Blair projectile vomit pea soup onto handsome Greek priests, or in my case, capering about West Hollywood in search of a drag queen that looks like Lady Gaga.
Yet, even H.P. Lovecraft, in the darkest, most grotesque ends of his imagination could not foresee the true Halloween horror I would face on this year’s holiday: Justin Bieber.
Oh, you rancid diabolical fiend with your moppet hair and your dimply cheeks! Van Helsing himself would have quaked in fear upon spying the teeming hordes of young female zombies beating down doors and trampling innocents peasants to follow his siren song.
The day began like any other; sleeping in too late after spending an evening dressed as Hester Prynne for a friend’s Halloween party. I dragged my exhausted corpse out of bed to grab some delicious though nutritionally questionable lunch, and then head on over to the local Barnes and Noble, my sweet refuge of fiction and chai tea, to get some writing done.
Not today, Steinho! Not today! The doors to sanctuary were barred, because some higher mind than yours truly thought it would be the most excellent of ideas to have Justin Bieber sign his new book at my Barnes and Noble on Halloween. Are you kidding me? A Bieber singing in a bookstore? Bieber has no place in a bookstore! Everyone knows that today’s teen girls can’t read, and if they can, they read Twilight, which in my one hundred percent honest opinion isn’t reading at all. It’s tossing your brain into a blender and then teleporting your feminist powers back to the 1950s, where women vacuumed in pearls and got sexually harassed by Sean Connery.
I don’t know what is more horrifying, being kicked out of my own local bookstore because of a teen pop star, or that the woman at the top of the escalator asked to see my Bieber wrist band. Do I look like someone who supports the Bieber cult, Madame? Young though I may appear, I would have hoped that the dark circles of dehydration under my eyes and my constant scowling at other young people would have developed a certain aura of bitterness about my personage.
You know, I never hated on Bieber before. I was a tween once, with posters of New Kids on the Block papering my walls. I get it. Bieber is adorable. Bieber lays golden eggs. Bieber will one day be adopted by Oprah and together they will bring a long awaited era of peace and tranquility to our violent world. But after having a security guard gesture wildly at me, shouting I must immediately vacate the science fiction and fantasy section lest dire action be taken, I’m feeling less than friendly towards the little scamp. There were helicopters circling The Grove. Helicopters. Are you telling me that those helicopters had nothing better to do than protect Bieber’s safety? Is Bieber’s safety really a national crisis? Maybe it’s because of that one concert where somebody threw a bottle at his head. The helicopter pilots must’ve been off that night.
Back to my initial question. What is this floppy haired Muppet-come-to-life even doing in a bookstore in the first place? The short answer is that Bieber has a book. Bieber’s book is most eloquently titled “Justin Bieber: First Step 2 Forever: My Story.” Is this a joke? Did one of my childhood enemies become a zillionaire mad scientist with the two goals of both destroying the English language and torturing me? Let me interject that this is further proof text messages are making us all illiterate. The book is meant to be a tell all, but considering the kid is only sixteen years old, how much is there to tell? And what does that title even mean? Maybe we should wait a couple more decades before we start throwing around words like forever. Or perhaps the title is a subtle hint to the Dorian Gray-esque painting Bieber keeps in his attic to suck up all the evil and horrors he commits on a daily basis. I know your secrets, Bieber. I’m on to you!
Stand strong, fellow academics. Even Bieber’s fame will pass someday. He will grow old and tired. His non-threatening youthful gyrations shall no longer tempt the masses. When that days comes, I’ll be ready.
Bieber cannot win. The fate of the universe depends upon it, and this time, it’s personal.
Yet, even H.P. Lovecraft, in the darkest, most grotesque ends of his imagination could not foresee the true Halloween horror I would face on this year’s holiday: Justin Bieber.
Oh, you rancid diabolical fiend with your moppet hair and your dimply cheeks! Van Helsing himself would have quaked in fear upon spying the teeming hordes of young female zombies beating down doors and trampling innocents peasants to follow his siren song.
The day began like any other; sleeping in too late after spending an evening dressed as Hester Prynne for a friend’s Halloween party. I dragged my exhausted corpse out of bed to grab some delicious though nutritionally questionable lunch, and then head on over to the local Barnes and Noble, my sweet refuge of fiction and chai tea, to get some writing done.
Not today, Steinho! Not today! The doors to sanctuary were barred, because some higher mind than yours truly thought it would be the most excellent of ideas to have Justin Bieber sign his new book at my Barnes and Noble on Halloween. Are you kidding me? A Bieber singing in a bookstore? Bieber has no place in a bookstore! Everyone knows that today’s teen girls can’t read, and if they can, they read Twilight, which in my one hundred percent honest opinion isn’t reading at all. It’s tossing your brain into a blender and then teleporting your feminist powers back to the 1950s, where women vacuumed in pearls and got sexually harassed by Sean Connery.
I don’t know what is more horrifying, being kicked out of my own local bookstore because of a teen pop star, or that the woman at the top of the escalator asked to see my Bieber wrist band. Do I look like someone who supports the Bieber cult, Madame? Young though I may appear, I would have hoped that the dark circles of dehydration under my eyes and my constant scowling at other young people would have developed a certain aura of bitterness about my personage.
You know, I never hated on Bieber before. I was a tween once, with posters of New Kids on the Block papering my walls. I get it. Bieber is adorable. Bieber lays golden eggs. Bieber will one day be adopted by Oprah and together they will bring a long awaited era of peace and tranquility to our violent world. But after having a security guard gesture wildly at me, shouting I must immediately vacate the science fiction and fantasy section lest dire action be taken, I’m feeling less than friendly towards the little scamp. There were helicopters circling The Grove. Helicopters. Are you telling me that those helicopters had nothing better to do than protect Bieber’s safety? Is Bieber’s safety really a national crisis? Maybe it’s because of that one concert where somebody threw a bottle at his head. The helicopter pilots must’ve been off that night.
Back to my initial question. What is this floppy haired Muppet-come-to-life even doing in a bookstore in the first place? The short answer is that Bieber has a book. Bieber’s book is most eloquently titled “Justin Bieber: First Step 2 Forever: My Story.” Is this a joke? Did one of my childhood enemies become a zillionaire mad scientist with the two goals of both destroying the English language and torturing me? Let me interject that this is further proof text messages are making us all illiterate. The book is meant to be a tell all, but considering the kid is only sixteen years old, how much is there to tell? And what does that title even mean? Maybe we should wait a couple more decades before we start throwing around words like forever. Or perhaps the title is a subtle hint to the Dorian Gray-esque painting Bieber keeps in his attic to suck up all the evil and horrors he commits on a daily basis. I know your secrets, Bieber. I’m on to you!
Stand strong, fellow academics. Even Bieber’s fame will pass someday. He will grow old and tired. His non-threatening youthful gyrations shall no longer tempt the masses. When that days comes, I’ll be ready.
Bieber cannot win. The fate of the universe depends upon it, and this time, it’s personal.
Monday, October 25, 2010
Steampunk! Now with 40% More Robot Monarchs!
On the off chance you one day find yourself trapped inside a steampunk novel, it is always best to be prepared for what lies ahead. It might help to know exactly what the deuce steampunk is.
Surely you know what steampunk is! Surely! These days you can’t throw a rock without hitting a nerd wearing goggles and yammering on about his pocket watch that turns into a laser gun, because he simply must get back to his airship before Queen Victoria‘s robot army comes after him.. I think it’s safe to say that steampunk has thoroughly infiltrated all aspects of life. Not just the world of books, and movies and entertainment, but life. People decorate their homes with steampunk interior design. Couples get married with steampunk wedding cakes. If you haven’t heard of steampunk, you better have just gotten out of a time machine from the year 1812, which would sort of make you steampunk yourself, and therefore I forgive you.
For all of you who may or may not come from a time when it was perfectly acceptable for women to wear giant birdcages under their skirts, let me catch you up to speed on the wondrous miracle that is the steampunk subgenre. Put in simplest terms, it is science fiction set in Victorian times where steam is the main source of machine power, hence the name.
Pardon me, while I geek out for a moment. Some cite the 1980s as the birth of steampunk, the red headed stepchild of science fiction. I’d argue, however, that its roots run far deeper. Likely they were unaware of it at the time, but such delightful gentleman such as H.G. Wells and every science fiction nerd’s best friend, Jules Verne, gave the world their first dose of Victorian sci-fi. To be fair, these men weren’t setting their stories in this time period out of nostalgia, but simply because that was the era in which they lived and wrote, which makes them extremely farsighted and original, and me extremely jealous. Credit must also be given to one K.W. Jeter, the author who first officially coined the term steampunk to describe his own work. Whether or not you’ve ever heard of him, it can’t be denied that Jeter gave name to a phenomenon that has since exploded all over pop culture like a zombie brain when jabbed with an old fashioned steampunk laser cane.
What also cannot be denied is how I would sell black market orphan organs if it meant a magical portal to a steampunk dimension would open up and suck me in. In case you’re with me when that happens, here are a few tips to recognizing the brave new world you’ve tumbled in to. Is there a man having amorous relations with a robot lady? Are there airships? Not planes, but honest to goodness dirigibles, usually piloted by sky pirates. Is the heroine wearing a bustle but also shooting some sort of futuristic weaponry, possibly powered by steam or robotics or both? Is Queen Victoria present, and has her life been extended even longer by some infernal contraption involving a plethora of cogs and gears and futuristic science? I swear to you, in every steampunk novel, Queen Victoria is now 100 years old and part cyborg. Nothing hit’s the genre home quite like the most proper British woman ever to live being turned into the Terminator.
To illustrate my point, let’s consider a few of my favorite steampunk novels.
“The Affinity Bridge” by George Mann. Think Mulder and Scully in the 1890s. On their first case together, they investigate an airship crash, full of zombie plague victims, driven by mechanical pilots with human brains.
“The Glass Books of the Dream Eaters” by Gordon Dahlquist. Celeste Temple, a plucky but well-mannered British lass chases after some mad scientists who brainwashed her fiancée into dumping her using a curious blue ore from Eastern Europe. She karate chops her way to the truth, ever striving to maintain a sense of respectability. More than once, Celeste escapes danger on an airship.
“The Edge Chronicles” by Paul Stewart and Chris Riddell. Mistakenly classified as young adult novels in my opinion, these books make Harry Potter’s adventures look about as dangerous as a Nancy Drew mystery. Set in a floating college, young academics study the weather while sky pirates hunt for a supernatural substance that keeps their city aloft. Airships, airships, airships.
There are a veritable surplus of fantasy and sci-fi subgenres. Cyberpunk. Alternative histories. Space operas. Why has steam punk stuck in a way others haven’t? I’d answer that it’s the perfect genre for the nerd who doesn’t like to make choices. Consider the popularity of “Star Wars,” which is itself a genre blend. Jedi 'knights' fight with swords, only instead of boring metal blades, they're made of lasers. There are queens and courtly politics, sage old wizards and diabolical sorcerers. What is Luke Skywalker but an Arthurian space man, come to face off in a battle of father versus son? Listen, I took a Comparative literature class in college. Trust me, it’s all in there. With subgenres, we get to have our “Lord of the Rings” set in a galaxy far, far away. With steampunk, you get to wear a top hat and monocle and live on the moon. Two words. Robot butlers.
Surely you know what steampunk is! Surely! These days you can’t throw a rock without hitting a nerd wearing goggles and yammering on about his pocket watch that turns into a laser gun, because he simply must get back to his airship before Queen Victoria‘s robot army comes after him.. I think it’s safe to say that steampunk has thoroughly infiltrated all aspects of life. Not just the world of books, and movies and entertainment, but life. People decorate their homes with steampunk interior design. Couples get married with steampunk wedding cakes. If you haven’t heard of steampunk, you better have just gotten out of a time machine from the year 1812, which would sort of make you steampunk yourself, and therefore I forgive you.
For all of you who may or may not come from a time when it was perfectly acceptable for women to wear giant birdcages under their skirts, let me catch you up to speed on the wondrous miracle that is the steampunk subgenre. Put in simplest terms, it is science fiction set in Victorian times where steam is the main source of machine power, hence the name.
Pardon me, while I geek out for a moment. Some cite the 1980s as the birth of steampunk, the red headed stepchild of science fiction. I’d argue, however, that its roots run far deeper. Likely they were unaware of it at the time, but such delightful gentleman such as H.G. Wells and every science fiction nerd’s best friend, Jules Verne, gave the world their first dose of Victorian sci-fi. To be fair, these men weren’t setting their stories in this time period out of nostalgia, but simply because that was the era in which they lived and wrote, which makes them extremely farsighted and original, and me extremely jealous. Credit must also be given to one K.W. Jeter, the author who first officially coined the term steampunk to describe his own work. Whether or not you’ve ever heard of him, it can’t be denied that Jeter gave name to a phenomenon that has since exploded all over pop culture like a zombie brain when jabbed with an old fashioned steampunk laser cane.
What also cannot be denied is how I would sell black market orphan organs if it meant a magical portal to a steampunk dimension would open up and suck me in. In case you’re with me when that happens, here are a few tips to recognizing the brave new world you’ve tumbled in to. Is there a man having amorous relations with a robot lady? Are there airships? Not planes, but honest to goodness dirigibles, usually piloted by sky pirates. Is the heroine wearing a bustle but also shooting some sort of futuristic weaponry, possibly powered by steam or robotics or both? Is Queen Victoria present, and has her life been extended even longer by some infernal contraption involving a plethora of cogs and gears and futuristic science? I swear to you, in every steampunk novel, Queen Victoria is now 100 years old and part cyborg. Nothing hit’s the genre home quite like the most proper British woman ever to live being turned into the Terminator.
To illustrate my point, let’s consider a few of my favorite steampunk novels.
“The Affinity Bridge” by George Mann. Think Mulder and Scully in the 1890s. On their first case together, they investigate an airship crash, full of zombie plague victims, driven by mechanical pilots with human brains.
“The Glass Books of the Dream Eaters” by Gordon Dahlquist. Celeste Temple, a plucky but well-mannered British lass chases after some mad scientists who brainwashed her fiancée into dumping her using a curious blue ore from Eastern Europe. She karate chops her way to the truth, ever striving to maintain a sense of respectability. More than once, Celeste escapes danger on an airship.
“The Edge Chronicles” by Paul Stewart and Chris Riddell. Mistakenly classified as young adult novels in my opinion, these books make Harry Potter’s adventures look about as dangerous as a Nancy Drew mystery. Set in a floating college, young academics study the weather while sky pirates hunt for a supernatural substance that keeps their city aloft. Airships, airships, airships.
There are a veritable surplus of fantasy and sci-fi subgenres. Cyberpunk. Alternative histories. Space operas. Why has steam punk stuck in a way others haven’t? I’d answer that it’s the perfect genre for the nerd who doesn’t like to make choices. Consider the popularity of “Star Wars,” which is itself a genre blend. Jedi 'knights' fight with swords, only instead of boring metal blades, they're made of lasers. There are queens and courtly politics, sage old wizards and diabolical sorcerers. What is Luke Skywalker but an Arthurian space man, come to face off in a battle of father versus son? Listen, I took a Comparative literature class in college. Trust me, it’s all in there. With subgenres, we get to have our “Lord of the Rings” set in a galaxy far, far away. With steampunk, you get to wear a top hat and monocle and live on the moon. Two words. Robot butlers.
Monday, October 18, 2010
Spoiler Alert! The Shark Eats People!
Dear Blogomatopoeia,
Now that the summer is over and there is no chance of me swimming in the ocean anytime soon, I decided to read the book, “Jaws” by Peter Benchley.
How many people actually know that “Jaws” is based off of a book? Well it is, movie goers! Your precious 1975, first ‘blockbuster’ movie ever, was based off a book! With paper and pages and nothing visual about it! Okay, that’s a lie. Within the first few pages, Benchley describes a woman getting attacked by the shark in such a graphically visual way, I almost threw up in the middle of Chipotle. I really, really need to stop reading horror novels at meal times.
In the great tapestry that is my writing education, I have heard over and over again that crusty adage of “hooking the reader” in the first few pages. Well, Mr. Benchley had me by page two, when he described the horror the first victim felt at reaching down to feel her wounded foot. Only, there was no foot left. The foot was gone. The shark, or “the fish” as Benchley refers to it throughout the entire text, had eaten it. There was something both creepy and ironic at this decision to demean the shark down to simply a fish, as if it was someone’s overfed pet, or something on a menu right between the chicken dishes and the pasta. You know, if all fish were like Jaws, I doubt we’d be worrying about people killing them for food. Let that be a lesson to you sharks! It’s you or us! Somebody’s eating somebody tonight and I don’t taste very good covered in lemon butter sauce!
No, no. I would never eat a shark. I think they’re misunderstood and misrepresented and I like animals and we should take care of our planet so please don’t get mad at me environmentalists!
Moving on. I’m not going to get into an analytical discussion comparing book and movie. That’s not what Steinho does. Steinho is all about gut reactions, and right now my gut is telling me to finish this blog post and get myself over to the Thai restaurant before my stomach’s volatile acids start devouring organs for nourishment. Just like Jaws did! See how I brought that back full circle?
There were so many elements that surprised me when reading the book. How about the fact that in the book, Hooper has an affair with Ellen Brody. Or how about how Brody himself is not an outsider. See, that’s why Ellen has the affair. She took a huge social plunge marrying dear, local man Martin Brody, and so when rich, sassy, shark-obsessed Matt Hooper comes along, she yearns for playing tennis and fancy dinner parties. Fortunately, Hooper dies in his little shark cage. Overall, it’s safe to say none of the characters are as lovable in the book. They’re all kind of jerks. Even our dear hero, Brody, comes off as a passive, whiney, fool who allows himself to get pushed around by the local government. Did I mention the mafia is also involved? Yes, that’s the real reason they can’t close the beaches. They mayor owes the mafia money. I can’t believe my drunken screenplay idea of Mafia vs. Shark was already stolen by Peter Benchley seven years before I was born. How dare he!?!
Going back to my gut, what I personally felt the book was lacking was a whole lot of shark eating people. The shark ate a total of five people in the book, and you only got to see three of them happen. In fact, there is a whole middle section of the book that the shark is not in at all. This is the part where Ellen throws a dinner party, has an affair, and various townspeople complain to Brody. Also, several newspaper people act obnoxious and Brody does a lot of lamenting. There’s a secret selectman meeting and some mysterious mafia dude breaks the neck of Brody’s cat. But no shark. Just a whole lot of talking about it.
Am I saying that in this one case, the adaptation is better than the original? The movie better than the book? Please! Everyone knows books are always better and anyone who disagrees is a ninny! However, I might be tempted to say that Spielberg, screenwriter Carl Gottlieb and Benchley made some excellent decisions in adapting the book into a film. In books, people can talk all they want. They can do nothing but talk and stare at each other, and if the writer is skilled enough, you’ll be on the edge of your seat. In the movies, you need a little something extra. Like Quint spitting up blood as he slides into the shark’s gullet. I love that part!
There is a reason “Jaws” was such a hit in 1975 and continues to be so thirty-five years later. That reason is crappy 1970s animatronics. If the shark hadn’t malfunctioned, Spielberg would have kept it in the film more, and it would have ended up looking a hot, cheesy mess. All those thrilling scenes where you know the shark is lurking nearby, but you can‘t tell where, would now have a giant robot fish in the middle of it. Have you ever been to the ride at Universal Studios? If you have, then you know how not frightening that thing looks. And if you haven’t been to Universal Studios, just picture the little kids from the “It’s a Small World” ride and try to pretend you’re afraid of them. Okay, that actually might be scarier.
Now that I think about it, Peter Benchley knew exactly what he was doing. It was excruciating reading through that middle section, not knowing when they were going to go out into the water again, not knowing when the next person was going to get killed. All while the characters were slowly gabbing on at each other and being miserable, you could never forget that in just a few pages, somebody was going to dive into the water and come out a limbless pulp.
Besides, only a man who knew about real horror would write a sex scene for a character played by Richard Dreyfuss.
Now that the summer is over and there is no chance of me swimming in the ocean anytime soon, I decided to read the book, “Jaws” by Peter Benchley.
How many people actually know that “Jaws” is based off of a book? Well it is, movie goers! Your precious 1975, first ‘blockbuster’ movie ever, was based off a book! With paper and pages and nothing visual about it! Okay, that’s a lie. Within the first few pages, Benchley describes a woman getting attacked by the shark in such a graphically visual way, I almost threw up in the middle of Chipotle. I really, really need to stop reading horror novels at meal times.
In the great tapestry that is my writing education, I have heard over and over again that crusty adage of “hooking the reader” in the first few pages. Well, Mr. Benchley had me by page two, when he described the horror the first victim felt at reaching down to feel her wounded foot. Only, there was no foot left. The foot was gone. The shark, or “the fish” as Benchley refers to it throughout the entire text, had eaten it. There was something both creepy and ironic at this decision to demean the shark down to simply a fish, as if it was someone’s overfed pet, or something on a menu right between the chicken dishes and the pasta. You know, if all fish were like Jaws, I doubt we’d be worrying about people killing them for food. Let that be a lesson to you sharks! It’s you or us! Somebody’s eating somebody tonight and I don’t taste very good covered in lemon butter sauce!
No, no. I would never eat a shark. I think they’re misunderstood and misrepresented and I like animals and we should take care of our planet so please don’t get mad at me environmentalists!
Moving on. I’m not going to get into an analytical discussion comparing book and movie. That’s not what Steinho does. Steinho is all about gut reactions, and right now my gut is telling me to finish this blog post and get myself over to the Thai restaurant before my stomach’s volatile acids start devouring organs for nourishment. Just like Jaws did! See how I brought that back full circle?
There were so many elements that surprised me when reading the book. How about the fact that in the book, Hooper has an affair with Ellen Brody. Or how about how Brody himself is not an outsider. See, that’s why Ellen has the affair. She took a huge social plunge marrying dear, local man Martin Brody, and so when rich, sassy, shark-obsessed Matt Hooper comes along, she yearns for playing tennis and fancy dinner parties. Fortunately, Hooper dies in his little shark cage. Overall, it’s safe to say none of the characters are as lovable in the book. They’re all kind of jerks. Even our dear hero, Brody, comes off as a passive, whiney, fool who allows himself to get pushed around by the local government. Did I mention the mafia is also involved? Yes, that’s the real reason they can’t close the beaches. They mayor owes the mafia money. I can’t believe my drunken screenplay idea of Mafia vs. Shark was already stolen by Peter Benchley seven years before I was born. How dare he!?!
Going back to my gut, what I personally felt the book was lacking was a whole lot of shark eating people. The shark ate a total of five people in the book, and you only got to see three of them happen. In fact, there is a whole middle section of the book that the shark is not in at all. This is the part where Ellen throws a dinner party, has an affair, and various townspeople complain to Brody. Also, several newspaper people act obnoxious and Brody does a lot of lamenting. There’s a secret selectman meeting and some mysterious mafia dude breaks the neck of Brody’s cat. But no shark. Just a whole lot of talking about it.
Am I saying that in this one case, the adaptation is better than the original? The movie better than the book? Please! Everyone knows books are always better and anyone who disagrees is a ninny! However, I might be tempted to say that Spielberg, screenwriter Carl Gottlieb and Benchley made some excellent decisions in adapting the book into a film. In books, people can talk all they want. They can do nothing but talk and stare at each other, and if the writer is skilled enough, you’ll be on the edge of your seat. In the movies, you need a little something extra. Like Quint spitting up blood as he slides into the shark’s gullet. I love that part!
There is a reason “Jaws” was such a hit in 1975 and continues to be so thirty-five years later. That reason is crappy 1970s animatronics. If the shark hadn’t malfunctioned, Spielberg would have kept it in the film more, and it would have ended up looking a hot, cheesy mess. All those thrilling scenes where you know the shark is lurking nearby, but you can‘t tell where, would now have a giant robot fish in the middle of it. Have you ever been to the ride at Universal Studios? If you have, then you know how not frightening that thing looks. And if you haven’t been to Universal Studios, just picture the little kids from the “It’s a Small World” ride and try to pretend you’re afraid of them. Okay, that actually might be scarier.
Now that I think about it, Peter Benchley knew exactly what he was doing. It was excruciating reading through that middle section, not knowing when they were going to go out into the water again, not knowing when the next person was going to get killed. All while the characters were slowly gabbing on at each other and being miserable, you could never forget that in just a few pages, somebody was going to dive into the water and come out a limbless pulp.
Besides, only a man who knew about real horror would write a sex scene for a character played by Richard Dreyfuss.
Saturday, October 9, 2010
Stop Apologizing, Take Your Copy of The Giving Tree and Go
Note to self: Having spent over a year and a half working at a large chain book store, NEVER EVER read another horror novel where the workers at a large chain book store are driven insane and then eaten by British swamp monsters.
I honestly can’t even tell you if this book sucked or not, because I was too busy suffering from post traumatic stress syndrome. At this point, I’m not even positive I read a book at all. Any moment, I might wake up to find the past year some sort of blissful dream, because I’ve merely passed out from exhaustion in the break room at the Barnes and Noble in Marina del Rey. If that’s true, I hope that the part about the mud monsters coming to kill the bookstore employee is also, because man, I really don’t want to get yelled at by customers ever again.
Let’s take a step out of Steinho’s Wacky World of Reading-Induced Nightmares for a moment, shall we? The novel that caused me such mental distress is called “The Overnight,” by British horror author, Ramsey Campbell. Now, this chap seems to have authored quite a few novels in his day, clearly a sign of substantial success. Therefore, either his books are well-written, or entertaining enough to somebody that his publisher kept throwing sacks of cash his way. “The Overnight” discusses that age old quandary: What happens when you build a huge, corporate retail establishment on top of a British fen steeped in evilness. If it were the dark ages, we’d all turn on our fellow villagers and brain them with whatever farming implement we had handy. In the modern world, as Campbell sets up in “The Overnight,” hoes and pitchforks are replaced with emotional barbs and psychological warfare. The cast of characters, who I personally felt were all obnoxious twits, begin simply by bickering with each other. Accusations fly about who messed up who’s section of books, and who isn’t really carrying their weight in terms of work load. By the end, personal vendettas bubble up and turn into physical confrontation. Imagine “Lord of the Flies” set in your local Borders.
The text had a poetic, darkly whimsical style, further exaggerated by Campbell’s decision to write the story in present tense. The result was a fifty-fifty cocktail, partly pretty description and partly pretty pretentious. For example, he describes one bookseller wandering the parking lot, searching for the security guard, saying “His shadow smears itself across the whitish door like another example of vandalism as he reaches for the metal handle.” Smearing a shadow sounds like a messy job. I feel like I should be citing these pages with a proper bibliography and start talking about how Campbell’s use of the vandalism metaphor suggests a belief that the true monsters in today’s society are the misguided, urban youth, and since a shadow is something we all possess, we must acknowledge that potential darkness within ourselves.
Or it could just be a creepy scene about a guy in an empty security guard booth.
Going back to my initial point. What freaked me out the most about “The Overnight” had nothing to do with Campbell’s endless blathering about creepy fog, though I will say, there were more than a few chill-inducing scenes. If I can come up with any criticism, it’s that there was too much of the people as monsters to each other vs. actual mud monsters suffocating terrified booksellers with their slimy, malleable bodies. Now I’m going to contradict myself by saying that the parts that affected me the most though, were those that specifically focused on the stress of regular, old retail life. For example, I cannot tell you how many times I wanted to seriously cry when I returned to the children’s section after break, only to find that a single, tiny unsupervised and evil toddler had managed to destroy my entire area in fifteen minutes. Fifteen minutes. These children are like demigods of destruction and entropy. When Madeleine, the children’s lead in “The Overnight” returns to find her section trashed, only there’s no one in the store but the other employees, what is she to think, but that someone is trying to mess with her? Then to read her anguish, and desperation and sorrow, and for the other characters (all horrible human beings) to simply tell her, ‘Oh! You must not have done as good a job tidying as you thought. You’re just tired and missed a few disorganized shelves,’ well that made me want to cry a little, too.
Then there was the store manager in “The Overnight.” Dear managers who I worked under, thank you for not being as insane and obsessed as this character. Thank you for being human beings with souls! To start with, this fellow’s name is Woody, and while all the other characters are native Brits, Woody is American, which I suppose was Campbell‘s way of explaining his insane capitalist drive. Woody goes around telling everyone to smile and keep working after one of their crew has been run down by a phantom child in a stolen car. When he finds another girl, choked to death after being trapped in an elevator, he carries her body off, not because he cares about her, but because he needs to start cleaning up for when the customers arrive. Of course, it’s the running theme of the book that the evil swampland they work upon is what causes everyone’s darkest inner thoughts to spill over into reality. This makes most of the employees grow antagonistic towards each other, but it just turns Woody into even more of a sales-obsessed, villainous corporate zombie. His condescending tone and constant mocking of workers he feels are performing less than perfectly made me want to go inside the book and harpoon him in the face. The fact that he alone doesn’t get murdered by the mud people is the most disappointing twist ending since M. Night Shyamalan’s “The Village.” Now that, Ramsey Campbell, is just plain monstrous.
I honestly can’t even tell you if this book sucked or not, because I was too busy suffering from post traumatic stress syndrome. At this point, I’m not even positive I read a book at all. Any moment, I might wake up to find the past year some sort of blissful dream, because I’ve merely passed out from exhaustion in the break room at the Barnes and Noble in Marina del Rey. If that’s true, I hope that the part about the mud monsters coming to kill the bookstore employee is also, because man, I really don’t want to get yelled at by customers ever again.
Let’s take a step out of Steinho’s Wacky World of Reading-Induced Nightmares for a moment, shall we? The novel that caused me such mental distress is called “The Overnight,” by British horror author, Ramsey Campbell. Now, this chap seems to have authored quite a few novels in his day, clearly a sign of substantial success. Therefore, either his books are well-written, or entertaining enough to somebody that his publisher kept throwing sacks of cash his way. “The Overnight” discusses that age old quandary: What happens when you build a huge, corporate retail establishment on top of a British fen steeped in evilness. If it were the dark ages, we’d all turn on our fellow villagers and brain them with whatever farming implement we had handy. In the modern world, as Campbell sets up in “The Overnight,” hoes and pitchforks are replaced with emotional barbs and psychological warfare. The cast of characters, who I personally felt were all obnoxious twits, begin simply by bickering with each other. Accusations fly about who messed up who’s section of books, and who isn’t really carrying their weight in terms of work load. By the end, personal vendettas bubble up and turn into physical confrontation. Imagine “Lord of the Flies” set in your local Borders.
The text had a poetic, darkly whimsical style, further exaggerated by Campbell’s decision to write the story in present tense. The result was a fifty-fifty cocktail, partly pretty description and partly pretty pretentious. For example, he describes one bookseller wandering the parking lot, searching for the security guard, saying “His shadow smears itself across the whitish door like another example of vandalism as he reaches for the metal handle.” Smearing a shadow sounds like a messy job. I feel like I should be citing these pages with a proper bibliography and start talking about how Campbell’s use of the vandalism metaphor suggests a belief that the true monsters in today’s society are the misguided, urban youth, and since a shadow is something we all possess, we must acknowledge that potential darkness within ourselves.
Or it could just be a creepy scene about a guy in an empty security guard booth.
Going back to my initial point. What freaked me out the most about “The Overnight” had nothing to do with Campbell’s endless blathering about creepy fog, though I will say, there were more than a few chill-inducing scenes. If I can come up with any criticism, it’s that there was too much of the people as monsters to each other vs. actual mud monsters suffocating terrified booksellers with their slimy, malleable bodies. Now I’m going to contradict myself by saying that the parts that affected me the most though, were those that specifically focused on the stress of regular, old retail life. For example, I cannot tell you how many times I wanted to seriously cry when I returned to the children’s section after break, only to find that a single, tiny unsupervised and evil toddler had managed to destroy my entire area in fifteen minutes. Fifteen minutes. These children are like demigods of destruction and entropy. When Madeleine, the children’s lead in “The Overnight” returns to find her section trashed, only there’s no one in the store but the other employees, what is she to think, but that someone is trying to mess with her? Then to read her anguish, and desperation and sorrow, and for the other characters (all horrible human beings) to simply tell her, ‘Oh! You must not have done as good a job tidying as you thought. You’re just tired and missed a few disorganized shelves,’ well that made me want to cry a little, too.
Then there was the store manager in “The Overnight.” Dear managers who I worked under, thank you for not being as insane and obsessed as this character. Thank you for being human beings with souls! To start with, this fellow’s name is Woody, and while all the other characters are native Brits, Woody is American, which I suppose was Campbell‘s way of explaining his insane capitalist drive. Woody goes around telling everyone to smile and keep working after one of their crew has been run down by a phantom child in a stolen car. When he finds another girl, choked to death after being trapped in an elevator, he carries her body off, not because he cares about her, but because he needs to start cleaning up for when the customers arrive. Of course, it’s the running theme of the book that the evil swampland they work upon is what causes everyone’s darkest inner thoughts to spill over into reality. This makes most of the employees grow antagonistic towards each other, but it just turns Woody into even more of a sales-obsessed, villainous corporate zombie. His condescending tone and constant mocking of workers he feels are performing less than perfectly made me want to go inside the book and harpoon him in the face. The fact that he alone doesn’t get murdered by the mud people is the most disappointing twist ending since M. Night Shyamalan’s “The Village.” Now that, Ramsey Campbell, is just plain monstrous.
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