It Was Already Broke When I Got Here

Installment #20: Of Books, More Books, and "We Interrupt Our Irregularly-Scheduled Column to Talk About ... Ah, Mmm, Well ... Books!"

noreply@blogger.com (Gary) — Tue, 19 Dec 2006 16:58:00 +0000

Ah, the holidays are upon us and the end of the year is nigh; everywhere you go, the sound of Christmas music fills the air like the anguished shrieks of the damned echoing from the bowels of hell, shoppers wander the malls with glassy-eyed stares that make them indistinguishable from the rotting zombies in Romero's Dawn of the Dead, and all around there is a feeling of DEAR GOD KILL ME NOW AND GET IT OVER WITH!

Yes, the holidays are upon us like a drug-crazed mugger who's just jumped from the alley behind you to throw an arm across your throat and press the business end of a semi-automatic against your temple, demanding that you hand all of it over right now if you want to live to see dinner.

Bubbling over with warmth, this Season of Giving will soon surrender to thoughts of the New Year, and come 11:55 p.m. on December 31, New Year's Resolutions will be contaminating the atmosphere like the stench of that last bit of Thanksgiving turkey you forgot was in the back of the fridge until someone accidentally pulled off the plastic wrap, and these heartfelt resolutions will be delivered in the same dedicated, committed, unwavering tone of voice usually reserved for "Of course I'll call you later -- have you seen my underwear?"

And I, filled with the holiday spirit (as I always am this time of year), have decided to contribute to the Joy of the Season by doing something that everyone -- it seems -- except me has been doing for years: offering up my list of the Best Books of 2006.

A few words of explanation and some ground rules, first:

People send books to me all the time, be it for review, as a gift, or to read for award consideration, and while I am always happy to receive the gift of the written word, my schedule (both writing and work-related) is such that I end every year in the red, reading-wise; I rarely have the chance to read every book that comes my way throughout the previous 11 months. But that's okay; I feel a little bit like that character from Chet Willimason's wonderful novella "The House of Fear" who believes that, as long as he goes to bed every night without having finished the book he's currently reading, he won't die in his sleep, because the unread pages of the book will protect him.

So, if you read this and find a particular book or books you've read omitted, please don't e-mail me and ask, "How could you leave (insert title here) off the list?" This list will contain only those standout books that I have read.

(Parenthetical pause: I qualify that because, on certain message boards I frequent, there are readers and reviewers who are listing novels like Joe Hill's Heart-Shaped Box and Dan Simmons's The Terror as among the best novels they've read this year, which isn't playing fair. While I've no doubt that both of these novels will be superb, neither one is scheduled to be released until the first part of 2007; these folks have read Advance Reader's Copies of the novels. Ain't gonna do that here, which leads us out of the parenthetical aside and makes a smooth transition to:)

The books listed here will be only those published in 2006. I will not be recapping the plots of each book because, A) If you've read any of these, then you already know what happened in them, and, B) If you haven't read any of these, then I refuse to spoiI anything for you: consider these mini-reviews an attempt to whet your appetite.

I am also not restricting the list to a "Top 10" or a "Baker's Dozen" or anything like that; the list will be as long or as short as it needs to be. I have the stack of books right beside me, didn't bother to count how many there are, and, frankly, don't really care. 2006 was a damned good year for genre books, overall (I'm talking in quality, not necessarily in sales or popularity), and looking at the stack now, I'm grateful to have been among the above-ground folks so my life could be enriched by having read these.

With that out of the way -- and in no particular order -- here is my list of the Best Books of 2006:

NOVELS:
The Pressure of Darkness by Harry Shannon: Not only is this a first-rate thriller, a first-rate mystery, and a first-rate action-adventure, it is, hands-down, the best horror novel Shannon has yet written. One of the things I've come to admire about Harry Shannon's work is that it's among the most muscular and unpretentious being written in any field, and Shannon heartily embraces Gary's Golden Rule of Writing Good Fiction: Forget Genre. Shannon will use any element necessary in order to tell his story the way the story demands to be told, so it's no surprise that The Pressure of Darkness blurs nearly every genre line you can name. At a hefty 440 pages, it reads like a book half that length.

Ghost Road Blues by Jonathan Maberry: Everything you've heard about this impressive first novel is true; it's haunting, lyrical (God, is it lyrical), suspenseful and scary (the two are not the same thing), and, most of all, deeply humane in the depiction of its characters. This is the first book in a trilogy from Maberry, and I for one can't see the release of the second book soon enough. The atmosphere throughout this wonderful novel (which can hold its own alongside the Silver John tales of Manly Wade Wellman) is so rich and textured you can almost feel it with your fingertips.

The Nightmare Frontier by Stephen Mark Rainey: Hurt my widdle bwain trying to figure out something better to say about this novel than I said in my blurb for it and failed miserably, so I'll just repeat myself: "Remember what it was like to read a horror novel that actually made you sweat with dread and your hand shake ever-so-slightly as you turned the page? Remember what it was like to feel your heart thud against your chest as the plight of the characters became your own? Remember what it was like to have a story cast a spell over you rather than ram everything down your throat? If so, you've reason to rejoice; if not, then you need to discover what that's like. In either case, Mark Rainey's The Nightmare Frontier delivers the goods. This is the Good, Real Stuff. From its powerful opening in the jungles of Vietnam to its nerve-wracking finale, this novel never releases its grip on the reader's nerves, brains, and heart." Rainey is Old-School (Like Huigh Cave and Robert Bloch, thank God) and nowhere is his craft more refined than this novel. Get it, get it now.

Bloodstone by Nate Kenyon: Kenyon's debut novel has been compared (not without justification) to the early works of Stephen King, in that it deals with a malevolent force that all but consumes a small town populated with the usual array of small-town characters; think It but on a smaller and more intensely-focused scale. The one quibble I have with this novel is that -- unlike many debut horror novels -- it actually needed to be a bit longer. There are times when Kenyon seems to packing a little too much into his 354-page narrative, but his writing style is so clean, his confidence in his story so strong, and his overall narrative arc so compelling, that in the end, my quibble is actually a compliment: it's better to leave the reader wanting more than to leave the reader feeling his or her time has been wasted. Your time will most definitely not be wasted with Kenyon's excellent debut.

The Keeper by Sarah Langan: Horror as social commentary the way it ought to be done, with the agenda hidden in the background and illustrated by the actions of the characters rather than in long-winded didactic speeches. While I felt that the overall story arc wasn't as strong as it could have been, Langan's exquisite prose more than makes up for any perceived shortcomings in its plotting. Along with Mayberry's Ghost Road Blues, this novel overflows with prose so effortlessly lyrical there are passages where the words threaten to shimmer right off the page. Langan also understands that, in the end, it's the cumulative effect of building terror that remains with the reader, rather than the quick shock; she also knows the difference between genuine human tragedy and the merely tragic, and her fine debut packs quite an emotional punch because of it.

Forever Will You Suffer by Gary Frank: Even if I hadn't found Frank's central character immensely likable, even if I hadn't found the story gripping, and even if I hadn't found his writing style strong and assured throughout, I would still put this book on the list because Frank pulls off a remarkable balancing act with this novel; he combines dread, tragedy, pathos, and fall-on-the-floor-laughing humor so well that you not only don't know where this story is going to go from one chapter to the next, you often can't predict where it's going to go within a single scene. The book switches gears so fast you sometimes feel like you're in the last 3 laps of the Indy 500, but never once does it hit any bumps. I admired the hell out of that; that the rest of the book had me laughing, holding my breath, and even fighting a lump in the throat once or twice (something that's not easy to do to me), was just the trophy at the end of the race (to play out the less-than-subtle racing metaphor).

Again by Sharon Cullars: If you're one of these folks who have avoided reading so-called "Paranormal Romance" novels because you think all they are is bodice-rippers with ghosts, no single book could more prove you wrong than Cullars's luminous, eloquent debut novel. Reading like a collaboration between Toni Morrison and Jack Finney, Again announces the arrival of a fresh, distinct voice, telling a story that is romantic, sensual (in the dictionary sense of the word), frightening, genuinely erotic, heartbreaking and, ultimately, life-affirming, with a final line that is pitch-perfect -- as is the rest of this lovely, heartfelt, deeply affecting novel.

Eyes Everywhere by Matthew Warner: Yes, I have a certain bias when it comes to this novel, I'll admit it -- but consider: if I had not thought so highly of this dazzling psychological horror story and its unflinching depiction of an Everyman's rapid and tragic descent into paranoid schizophrenia, I wouldn't have agreed to write the Aftwerword for it, would I? Light-years beyond Warner's debut novel, The Organ Donor in both plotting and execution (i.e. the quality of both the macro- and microwriting) -- and I say this as one who thoroughly enjoyed The Organ Donor.

Headstone City and The Dead Letters by Tom Piccirilli: Yeah, two superb novels in the same year. I considered not including either one because I have now decided that I hate Piccirilli -- no one should be this consistently excellent. I then realized that he's much bigger than I am, knows where I live, and could tie knots in my spine without breaking a sweat; so, here they are. Not only is each novel a fine reading experience in its own right, but if you read them in the order they were published (which is the same order in which they are listed here), you'll note the further evolution of Piccirilli as a story-teller; while both novels contain supernatural elements, those elements become increasingly downplayed as you move from one novel to the next; to the point where, in The Dead Letters, they're peripheral in the story yet essential to it. Piccirilli has been reaching the height of his power for the last few years; with these two stunning novels, he's even closer to the summit. The world will shake when he gets there, so hang on.

Lisey's Story by Stephen King: Like Bag of Bones (to which this novel serves as the companion piece), Hearts in Atlantis, The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon and From A Buick 8, King's Constant Readers are divided about this one; I have no such quibbles. When King puts his heart and soul into something, he can be devastating, and Lisey's Story is one of the most unflinching explorations of grief, love, and unachieved potential you'll ever read. The "secret language" of marriage that is grappled with throughout this book has made more than a few readers grit their teeth, if not abandon the book altogether. Their loss. This is, in my opinion, King's finest achievemnt as a novelist, genre be damned.

Pandora Drive by Tim Waggoner: Though much less serious in its intent and execution than Waggoner's previous Leisure novel, Like Death, Pandora Drive is nonetheless further proof that Waggoner, intentionally or not, has picked up at the torch where Clive Barker placed it before he took a left turn into fantasy. Often wildly over-the-top (especially in an exhilarating, funny, shocking, and endlessly creative 115-page set piece right smack in the middle of the book) but never succumbing to the outright ridiculous, Waggoner's second Leisure novel is marred only by a less-than-satisfying conclusion, but not so much that it taints the rest of the story that has come before. If you go into this expecting a serious and terrifying horror novel, you won't make to the halfway point; if you go in knowing that Waggoner has turned the surreal comedy dial all the way to 11, then you're in for one hell of a ride. Just don't be eating anything once you hit the midway point.

The Conqueror Worms by Brian Keene: Good old-fashioned, gross-out, breakneck-paced, gross-out, fun, gross-out, pulp horror, period, delivered by the writer who's arguably revitalized the extreme horror sub-genre. You'll think twice about what you use for bait when fishing season comes around. Did I mention gross-out?

Breeding Ground by Sarah Pinborough: Following on the heels of her wonderful debut The Hidden and its follow-up, The Reckoning, Sarah Pinborough has fast become my favorite new horror writer. Now, more than ever, I am convinced that Pinborough was not born, but rather created in a lab by some literary-minded scientist who decided to combine the DNA of Jane Austen, Shirley Jackson, and Angela Carter. Breeding Ground contains the same eloquent, richly dense prose as The Hidden while building upon the flair Pinborough displayed for the dreadful and shocking with The Reckoning. Imagine Rosemary's Baby as a 3-way collaboration between the hosts of Pinborough's DNA and you'll have some small idea of the scope and subject of this terrific, often electrifying novel.

COLLECTIONS
Four Octobers by Rick Hautala: The flap copy for this quartet of novellas from Hautala (who some of you may know as A.J. Matthews) would have you believe that the four tales are "...loosely connected..." Well, sure, if all you look at are the physical locales and the element of some characters making peripheral appearances from tale to tale, but look closer and you'll see that more connects them than just people and places: there is a palpable sense of overwhelming loss that permeates every story, so that "loosely" thing? Not so much. This beautiful edition from CD Publications boasts a gorgeous cover and interior artwork from the redoubtable Glenn Chadbourne, and collects 2 of Hautala's most accomplished novellas -- "Miss Henry's Bottles" (a personal favorite of mine) and "Cold River" -- as well as 2 brand-new works, "Tin Can Telephone" (reminiscent -- and deserving to be mentioned in the same breath as many works -- of Ray Bradbury) and "Blood Ledge". The result is one of the year's finest single-author collections, and further proof that Hautala is much, much more than just "...that other author from Maine."

Thundershowers at Dusk by Christopher Conlon: As with Eyes Everwhere, I have to confess to a certain bias; Chris asked me to read this collection in manuscript form with an eye toward providing a cover blurb. After I finished reading it, I told him, "No, I won't do a blurb -- I want to write the Introduction!" So I did. Conlon is best known as an award-winning poet and anthology editor (the most recent anthology being the excellent Poe's Lighthouse from CD Publications), but he's also a stellar writer of fiction -- he just doesn't write it all that often, which is a real loss for readers. Thundershowers at Dusk is a hands-down brilliant collection from first page to last, every story is a winner, and it contains one of the finest novellas I have ever read in any genre, period, "The Unfinished Music". As rich and rewarding a collection as you'll ever read. (And I will add here, for any publishers who happed to read this, that Conlon is now shopping around a stunning first novel entitled Midnight on Mourn Street that is going to bring a lot of sales and accolades to whichever publisher is smart enough to snatch it up.) I maintain that Conlon is a better writer now than I could ever hope to be, and Thundershowers at Dusk more than proves it. Hence my deep-rooted resentment of him.

American Morons by Glenn Hirshberg: Paul Miller's Earthling Publications gets the Hat-Trick Award this year for having published 3 exceptional books in 2006, the first being this collection, Hirshberg's follow-up to The Two Sams. While I greatly admired the first collection, American Morons surpasses it on several levels, mostly because Hirshberg's writing has become even more focused and polished; he's going to be a major force in the field in the next few years, and while his writing has more in common with that of Steven Millhauser than Stephen King, it is nonetheless some of the most nerve-wracking and unapologetically literary work being produced in the field. All of the stories are winners, but the book is worth its price for "Safety Clowns" and "Devil's Smile".

The Tenant by Roland Topor: A million thanks to Millipede Press for putting this short novel back into print, along with 4 rarely-seen short stories and Topor's own artwork (which reminded me of the surreal work of Heinrich Kley). It's an utterly gorgeous book, boasting an intelligent and articulate Introduction from Thomas Ligotti ... but mostly, there is The Tenant, which remains today just as terrifying, eloquent, and compelling as it was when originally released in 1965. The 4 shorts accompanying it are equally impressive, resulting in a genuine must-have collection.

The Collected Stories by Amy Hempel: Hempel, in case you've not read her work, is one of the finest short story writers of the last 25 years, and this omnibus assembles all 4 of her collections, including the hard-to-find At the Gates of the Animal Kingdom. With the exception of the jaw-dropping novella "Tumble Home", most of her stories run less than 10 pages in length, and stand as a testament to what a skilled writer can do in a very limited amount of time. This collection contains one of my all-time favorite short stories, "In the Cemetery Where Al Jolson is Buried". If all so-called "literary" fiction were as exquisite as Hempel's, the world would be a better place.

The Ocean and All Its Devices by William Browning Spencer: It's been 10 years since Spencer's last collection, The Return of Count Electric and Other Stories left readers screaming for more, and Spencer delivers in a big way with this follow-up. For my money, Spencer;s work -- be it in short stories or novel form -- has always read like a head-on collision between John Cheever and Donald Barthelme; which is to say, it's rooted both in the humane and the surreal. The title story is both tragic and nightmarish, containing some of the most chilling imagery you'll encounter. Spencer doesn't write nearly enough, so grab this superb collection and keep it near to bide your time until he releases his next book.

NOVELLAS
World of Hurt by Brian Hodge: The 2nd Earthling book to appear on this list, this nerve-shattering and heartbreaking novella showcases Hodge at the top of his form, taking a tired old storyline (a character who is revivded from the dead, only to discover that something has followed him or her back into the corporeal world) and infusing it with a heavy doses of intelligence, emotional realism, and existential (in the dictionary sense of the word) terror. The most emotionally challenging and richly-rewarding a novella of the year, Hodge's prose has never been more eloquent, his storytelling never more powerful and affecting.

Mama's Boy by Fran Friel: It's almost impossible to discuss this nasty little story without giving away or hinting at its many twists and turns, so you're just going to have to settle for this: This blackest of black comedies, ingeniously structured, will leave you thinking that Norman Bates maybe wasn't all that bad a fellow. An impressive and memorable debut, and deliciously wicked to the core.

Bloodstained Oz by Christopher Golden and James A. Moore: When I first saw that Golden and Moore had collaborated on a novella, I thought it was a mis-print. How could these 2 writers -- who, in my eyes, anyway -- are polar opposites in so many ways, possibly write something together that wasn't going to read like 2 clashing styles meeting in the literary equivalent of a car crash? The answer? Bloodstained Oz, easily the nastiest work on this list (sorry, Fran), and one guaranteed to forever ruin the Judy Garland film you've come to know and love. The voice employed here in a singular one, smooth and assured; the pacing is a wonder to behold; and the story itself is, well ... oddly inspiring, in a twisted sort of way. A bloody winner, this, and Earthling's 3rd book to make this list.

The Colour Out of Darkness by John Pelan: I have a confession to make: most Lovecraft-inspired stories make me cringe, and Lovecraft pastiches make me despair, because more often than not, they bring out the worst in writers. Luckily, John Pelan's Cemetery Dance novella is an exception. Eschewing a lot of the usual trappings of the Cthulhu Mythos, Pelan adds more than a few original spins to the Lovecraft canon while never resorting to tired imitation of Lovecraft's style. Another winner.

The Bad Season by Dennis Latham: This lean and mean entry would make a great double feature with Jonathan Maberry's Ghost Road Blues, as both rely heavily on folklore and how it manifests itself -- with terrifying consequences -- in the modern world. Latham's prose makes Hemingway's look wordy and purple. A fast, hard, unnerving ride from first page to last.

SPECIAL CATEGORY
For the best on-going series of books. This was a no-brainer: Gauntlet Press's The Twilight Zone Scripts of Rod Serling: Now at #3 in the series of 9 volumes (#4 will be released in March, 2007), this series of books is a must-have if you're a Serling and/or Zone freak like me. These beautifully-designed oversized books may be a little pricey for the casual reader, but they're worth every cent. Containing not the text of the scripts but reproductions of the scripts themselves (hence the size of the books), each volume is signed by Carol Serling, features Appreciations by some of the biggest writers in the business, as well as photographs from the episodes and behind the scenes, and -- and this is the biggie -- reproductions of Serling's hand-written notes on the scripts. Copies purchased directly from Gauntlet also include a chapbook with alternate versions of scenes from the broadcast shows. Each volume is a treasure chest, and invaluable to admirers of Serling and/or Zone.

And that brings us to the end of my list for 2006. I realize that the absence of an ANTHOLOGY category may seem a bit puzzling to you, but the truth is most of the anthologies I read this year also happened to have stories by me in them, so it seemed a little self-serving to list them. I'd like to say to apologize to all the wonderful editors who saw fit to purchase and publish my stories in their anthologies this year, and hope all of you will understand why I decided to forego the ANTHOLOGY category this time round.

Thanks for taking the time to endure yet another list. If you haven't read some of the books mentioned here, I hope you'll seek them out; there's a lot of great stuff here, and gives me a lot of hope for what we'll see in the year to come.

Until then....

Installment #19: Of Fond Memories, AGIOs, and "Oh, My God, What Died In Here?"

noreply@blogger.com (Gary) — Wed, 22 Nov 2006 21:55:00 +0000

Okay, it's the day before Thanksgiving, 2006, the Holiday Season is upon us, and as is my habit this time of year (being the cheerful and ever-so-happy fellow I am), my mind turns to thoughts of loss and death ... only this time it makes me smile.

Stay with me, this won't be depressing, I swear.

In an introduction I once wrote for a collection of Elizabeth Massie's short stories (Shadow Dreams), I made the following comments concerning the often flippant and careless use of the word "Art":

"There is, in my opinion, not one writer, actor, painter, sculptor, dancer, director, musician, what-have-you living today who has the right to call him- or herself an artist: to loudly declare, 'I'm creating a piece of art!' is to invite pretension and arrogant high-mindedness; it is to proclaim to anyone who cares to listen that you’re so cocksure your work will have a profound impact on everyone who encounters it that they should feel privileged to encounter it.

"Art is not something that can be consciously created; it has to occur. Usually it's a happy accident. Timing, luck, happenstance, a person's mood at the time, all of these come into play -- and the creator's underlying intent is always secondary. Always. No exceptions. Period.

"It's more than just 'liking' a piece of work, it's experiencing a complete, pure, and total communion with the work; for one second -- maybe longer if you're blessed -- you are submerged in the emotions summoned up by the piece and the world is reduced to only your burning core and what this work does to it, gives to it, asking for nothing in return, and what, finally, this communion means to the rest of your life: You come away from the work more than you were before. Art lingers as a ghost called emotional resonance, and from that moment on you, not the creator, have the right to call this something a 'work of art.'"

Looking at it now, perhaps that mini-rant is a bit high-minded and hoity-toity itsownself (especially considering the context in which it's about to be applied, which I warn you is in questionable taste), but at its center it remains something I fervently believe: Art cannot be created, it has to occur ... so the next time you hear someone defending the context of their work whilst brandishing the "... because I am an artists" shield, do me a favor and smack the living shit out of them.

Moving on.

A little less than 2 years ago, a very dear friend of mine -- one of those rare friends you have from childhood who remains close to you throughout the rest of your life, even if you lose contact for years at a time -- passed away suddenly. It was a tremendous shock and a heartbreaking blow to anyone who knew him, because he was one of the most gracious, good-natured, and outright kindest people I have ever known. Some of my fondest memories of childhood and early teen-aged years (like there's really a difference when you Get Right Down To It) feature him in a major role. (Those of you who've read my non-fictin book Fear In A Handful Of Dust: Horror As A Way Of Life will know that the word "fondest" is not used lightly by me ... childhood (for me), not a great time; not a lot of laughs; not a lot of material that's gonna make my Highlight Reel anytime soon. Once again, moving on ...)

For the moment, we are back in early 1973: The Sonny and Cher Comedy Hour and The Patridge Family are at the top of the TV ratings, Bananafish, Rolling Stone, National Lampoon and Melody Maker are the only magazines the Utterly Groovy read,
The Joy of Sex is topping the bestseller list, Shaft and Superfly (both films featuring incredible, award-winning scores by, respectively, Isaac Hayes and the late, great Curtis Mayfield) have ushered in the era of the so-called "Blaxploitation" flick, and The Sting is fast becoming one of the greatest Hollywood blockbuster movies of all time and has everyone refusing to tell their friends about the surprise ending.

A small group of friends -- 5 guys, myself included -- are continually spending our weekends hanging out in someone's basement room because the Girls We Were Madly In Love With have yet to realize how Utterly Groovy we were. Sometimes we read comic books; sometimes we worked on Aurora monster models; sometimes we flipped through Famous Monsters of Filmland magazine (or Creepy, Eerie or Vampirella because most of our parents thought they were wicked and evil and would warp us for life -- in my case, they did, but my folks were Fairly Hip, if not Utterly Groovy, and had no problems with my monster magazine collection, knowing that monster were My bag, man) ... but mostly we hung out in various of our basements because that's where the central and most important piece of our Kid Hardware was located: the holy record player.

Yup -- mostly we listened to records, always accompanying the best songs with our various air instruments (except for the Air Bass -- ever notice how no one ever plays the Air Bass? Seriously -- when was the last time someone in an air band said, "Hey, man, I wanna play the bass because the bass player gets all the girls."? There may be a lesson here. Think on it and get back to me). And, of course, being 12 years old, we'd decided that we were all going to form the World's Greatest Rock Band and be big, big stars, so that Girls We Were Madly In Love With would come to concerts and see us in all our Rock Glory, realize how foolish they'd been in refusing our affection, and throw themselves at our feet, begging for our eternal love.

Ahem ....

If you were around back then -- that is, if you're now staring down the barrel of middle age as I am -- then you'll recall that the album that every Utterly Groovy person had in their collection and on their turntable was Deep Purple's Machine Head; none of us were any exception. (A bit of trivia here: when "Smoke on the Water" was originally released as a single from MH, it all but tanked here in the states; it wasn't until the live version from Made in Japan was released as a single that it became the monster hit we all know and claim to loathe. Remember this the next time you play Trivial Pursuit.)

In truth, none of us had any idea what the hell we were going to do with our lives, so Rock Stardom seemed the most obvious choice -- forget that, between the 5 of us, not a one could play any instrument worth a damn, unless you count the armpit as a muscial instrument, in which case we could have formed the world's first and greatest armit orchestra. (There's an image for you ....)

But it was Johnny, my now-late friend (miss you, buddy; miss you every damn day) who one night, in the basement of his house, provided what was for me one of the earliest examples of what can happen to a person when art occurs.

Understand that Johnny, like me, did not come from a well-to-do family; his folks worked factory jobs just like mine; there wasn't a lot of money for allowances, so you had to save for weeks -- if not months -- if you wanted to buy a model kit or a record album (which cost you a whopping 3 or 4 bucks back then); he wore old clothes that were not in fashion; he wasn't particularly articulate (we were 12 -- all of us sounded like idiots when we talked for more than 4 minutes at a time); and -- and this was the killer for his social life at the time -- he was a bit too tall and bit too fat for his age. (That fat later turned to muscle and made him unstoppable on the football field; I remember with great joy the sight of many a fullback deciding to plow into Johnny's mid-section head-first, freezing in their tracks once they'd slammed into his gut, and then dropping to the ground like a bird that's just flown into a window.)

On this particular night in 1973 we'd exhausted all our usual time-killers and were just sort of sitting around wondering whteher or not if the Girls We Were Madly In Love With were going to magically come knocking at the door to keep us company (they didn't), when Johnny made the announcement: "Hey, I wanna show you guys something."

Now, we'd all pooled our money that night and bought a couple of pizzas and an 8-pack of bottled Coke-a-Cola, then Johnny's mom had insisted on making popcorn for us; despite being stuffed the to eyeballs, some of us had eaten a little of the popcorn (Johnny consumed most of it). We were all stuffed and sleepy, so whatever in the hell it was he had to show us had better be pretty Utterly Groovy.

Johnny opened -- I kid you not -- a can of cold beans and ate precisely one-third of it, then finished off the last of his bottle of Coke, and crossed the room to his Chair.

I use upper-case for Chair because no one -- no one -- but Johnny was ever allowed to sit in this thing; you weren't even allowed to park your ass on one of its arms, lest Johnny come barreling across the room like some freight train from Hell and push you into a wall (for which he'd later apologize, and then give you one of his comic books so you wouldn't stay made at him).

Now, I have to tell you about this Chair.

In all the history of chairs, there has never been an uglier, sadder, more rickety, patched-together, malevolent, taped-up, uncomfortable-looking, and potentially dangerous monstrosity than this thing that lived in Johnny's basement; I mean, this was the kind of chair that would cause every other chair in the world to cross the street were they to see it heading in their direction; had such a thing as chair Most Wanted posters existed, this Chair would have been Public Enemy #1; it was the Captain Ahab of chairs; the Frankenstein's Monster of chairs; it was the Chair that other chairs warned their children against at night so they would behave.

Not an attractive piece of furniture, is what I'm saying. Covered in what we used to call "banana-skin" (now referred to as "pleather"), it had countless springs sticking out from the seat that were covered in duct tape; stuffing spilled out of its back like the innards from some victim in a Romero zombie flick; one leg was held together with chicken wire; the left arm was covered in red banana-skin (the rest of it was an ungodly shade of green); and -- perhaps its most horrifying characteristic -- the seat appeared to sometimes breathe of its own accord after Johnny rose from it: for several minutes on end, the seat would expand and then contract, making low but nonetheless terrifying hissing sounds, bubbling and undulating like some evil experiemental fluid in a mad scientist's laboratory. Many of us were convinced the thing was alive; possessed even. It attacked us in our nightmares. Came after our family members. Made us eat our vegetables. Forced us to sit in it and watch Hee-Haw or The Lawrence Welk Show.

This was the terror which Johnny began to approach on this night in question.

One more aside, and then I'll reveal the remarkable thing that occurred a minute after Johnny sat down in the Chair from Hell.

Johnny had an unfortunate biological quirk during childhood that he often could not control; he had a tendency to suffer AGIOs -- Audible Gastro-Intenstinal Occurrences ... popularly know by the layperson as farts. And Johnny's farts were, well ... loud. And sometimes frightening. Think Godzilla's roar in a lower register and you'll have some idea of how these things sounded. I've heard foghorns that sound like a newborn chick's peeps compared to these things.

We're back in the basement now, and Johnny is approaching the Chair. He sits. Looks at us and smiles. Shifts his weight around a little, moves one of his legs a little to the side, and then puts a finger to his mouth to tell the rest of us to be quiet, please.

"I've been practicing this for a couple of weeks," he said.

Then he closed his eyes, shifted the position of his behind a fraction to the left, took a deep breath, and did one of the most remarkable things I have ever witnessed.

He farted the opening riff of "Smoke on the Water", all 12 notes, on-key.

It was not only miraculous to hear, but to see, as well. He reddened with effort and concentration; a small vein bulged in the center of his forehead; his face, neck, and arms became almost instantaneously lacquered in perspiration; he would partially raise one cheek while shifting a leg, then lower that cheek as he raised the other, sometimes using one of his hands to press in on a certain area of his abdomen; he twisted his features with each note, biting down on his lip, closing one eye, flaring his nostrils ... a sick walrus in the midst of an agonizing breach birth would have been more appeaing to look at.

But none of us cared. We were witness to something extraodinary in the annals of kid mythology. No human being had ever done anything like this before. Perhaps no human being would ever do this again in the remainder of world history. I wondered if perhaps we should kneel and make the Sign of the Cross to acknowledge the sanctity of the moment. And pray that he wouldn't accidentally shit his pants. (Soiled underwear has a way of taking some the oomph out of a miracle.)

Still, Johnny continued with the second bar of the opening:

Bwap-bwap-bworf, bwap-bwap-bworf-BWOOOORF, bwap-bwap-bworf, bwap-bworf ....

When it was over, we all stood there, nailed to the spot in a kind of twisted awe.

And, yes, the odor was enormous, which explained the tears in our eyes. But the loss of air in our lungs was a small price to pay.

When the moment of awe and near-suffocation passed, we broke into loud cheers and applause, crowding around Johnny, slapping him on the back, wiping his brow, rubbing his shoulders, and basically acting like a bunch of trainers at ringside after a championship fight. So loud were the accolades we were bestowing on Johnny that his sister came down to see what the hubbub was all about; no sooner had she hit the bottom step and taken in a breath than she cowered back, exclaiming, "Oh, my God -- what died in here?"

There was no way to make her understand the inexplicable, astounding, epoch-marking event that had just occurred; mere words could not do it justice. All we were capable of was staring at her little brother in open-mouthed (and pinched-nosed) wonder. He had done something no human being in our experience had ever done before.

(I feel it only appropriate to add this bit of trivia for your further edification: there was a man who had, in fact done this before. Le Petomane was the stage name of the French professional farter and entertainer Joseph Pujol (June 1, 1857 - 1945). He was famous for his remarkable control of the abdominal muscles, which enabled him to break wind at will. His stage name combines the French verb peter, "to fart" with the -mane, "maniac" suffix, found in words like toxicomane. In English, a translation might yield "the fart maniac". His profession can also be referred to as a "Flatulist" or a "Fartiste.") (By the way, I lifted that bit of information, word-for-word, from the Wikipedia entry about him; after all, why try to improve upon perfection?)

That night became legend very quickly, and within a few weeks, we would have parties where Johnny and his unique, amazing talent would be the high point of the festivities. Even the Girls We Were Madly In Love With began to attend these gatherings, and Johnny never failed to deliver the anticipated finale.

But he always had to be in the Chair, the one and only Chair, which we carried to and from the various parties with the greatest of care and reverence, as if it were a Van Gogh painting, or a Da Vinci sculpture, or Ann-Margret's breasts.

And Johnny always prepared for the big event the same way: pizza, Coke, popcorn, and one-third of a can of cold beans, consumed in that order, in precise quantities, at pre-determined times so that it would all settle into him in the same way before each performance. He always moved the same way, always lifted this cheek or that at the right moment, clenched and unclenched so as to maintain the right pitch ... it was Utterly Groovy, ya dig?

Johnny's gone now, dead of a heart attack at age 45, and not a day goes by that I don't miss him, or recall how, every time we saw each other, one of us would bring up the Chair Concerts, as they came to be called. He died watching a football game, sitting in the Chair, eating pizza, after a too-short but rich and happy life wherein he met and married wonderful and beautiful woman, made dozens -- if not hundreds -- of friends, worked at a job he loved, always had a kind word for you, a smile on his face, a joke to tell, or a great-big, rib-bruising bear hug at the ready should you need one to brighten your day.

The Chair, by the way, is still in his family, and no one sits in it. It is proudly displayed, and even children -- nieces, nephews, cousins -- who never met Johnny, know the story about the Chair Concerts, how Uncle Johnny could fart "Smoke on the Water" perfectly every time ... providing he could properly prepare. It is a story that will be passed on from generation to generation, and there will always be, eternally, the Chair as proof.

So how does this story of farting apply to the subject of art? (And, yes, it has crossed my mind more than once that "fart" and "art" rhyme, which in I find oddly appropriate for this particular column.)

This story applies to the subject because, whether we're willing to admit it or not, every person we know possesses some gift that they bestow upon the world; a skilled auto mechanic; a detail-oriented brick-layer; an expert toolmaker; even the proficient janitor -- all contribute something of the aesthetic to everyday life, something that impacts you and adds to or enhances your existence. Okay, maybe a well-tuned engine isn't exactly on the same level as a Kurosawa's greatest films, but that doesn't mean that it doesn't have deep and abiding value; doctor or doorman, composer or custodian, sculptor or sales clerk, everyone possesses some skill or talent that makes them unique among the carbon-based life-forms we pass every day. What they do on an everyday basis may not obviously be an occurence of art as I described it at the start of this column, but bear in mind that the definition was more than a bit insular: occurences of art are all around us, we just have to be willing to see them for what they are, regardless of how mundane or trivial they may appear on the surface.

Have you ever seen the film Babette's Feast? It's not about a woman who prepares a meal for a bunch of people; it's about the creation of a moment of art that can never be repeated, but makes such an impact on those who experience it that it will live on in their hearts and memories forever.

Kind of like Johnny's farts. As crude as it may seem. I know in my heart that long after I am gone, people will still be talking about Johnny's farts while my books and stories will be, if I'm lucky, a minor footnote in some genre textbook gathering dust on a dim shelf somewhere.

But you know what? That's okay. Because for the rest of my life, I will have readers who appreciate what I do, and I am thankful for that. I am thankful that I knew Johnny, that I knew my parents, that I knew my uncles, that I knew the too-numerous amounts of people who are no longer part of this world.

If this sounds like something of a pep-talk, that's because it is; not just for you, but for myself, as well. It's too easy to give into grief and sadness and despair -- believe it or not, as dark and depressing as my work gets, that is one of the core points I try to get across with it.

So, tomorrow, when you're sitting with your family and friends and (hopefully) enjoying one another's companionship, be grateful that you have people in your life who care about you and respect what you do and are pleased to be in your company. (I say this as someone who remains constantly baffled and humbled that anyone is glad to see him.)

Enjoy your family, your friends, your meal, and your memories.

Just -- and trust me on this -- don't try to entertain everyone afterward by farting the opening of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony, or everyone might be put off that pumpkin pie for desert.

Until next time ....

Installment #18: Of What's There, What You Thought Was There, and "I Know Damn Well I Read That!"

noreply@blogger.com (Gary) — Tue, 01 Aug 2006 22:44:00 +0000

For the first time in my you-should-pardon-the-expression professional career, a single work of mine has garnered the most outstanding notices I've ever received. My forthcoming novel from Cemetery Dance Publications, Prodigal Blues has been getting nothing short of rave reviews since the ARCs were shipped (ARC, in case you're not familiar with the term, is pub-speak for Advance Reading Copy).

No one -- and I mean no one -- has had anything even remotely bad to say about it. (Now watch; just because I've tempted Fate by saying that, the pans will start coming in non-stop. Yes, I'm an optimistic sort.)

Here are a small handful of some reviews:

"Expert storyteller Gary Braunbeck outdoes himself with Prodigal Blues, a haunting, unsettling, eerie and beautiful novel about the hazards of childhood in the face of overwhelming real-life horrors. Here is a tender, heart-felt, unflinching exploration into shattered lives that will leave the reader disturbed, enlightened, and with a real need to hug loved ones. Braunbeck is one of those rare writers whose work can actually teach it audience a vast, human lesson."

-- Tom Piccirilli, author of The Dead Letters and Headstone City

"A toe-tapping tale of terror ... Prodigal Blues is good enough that you might feel scarred after reading it. But in the end, it is that good. And it is really the first non-supernatural novel by Braunbeck, but one hopes not the last. As ever, Cemetery Dance puts together a wonderful hardcover novel. Deena Warner's illustrations are plentiful, dark and suggestive. They ratchet up the level of disturbance and move the story but are tastefully rendered. Braunbeck's been hitting the paperback racks with his novels of the supernatural, but there's real potential for him to eke his way into the mainstream without ever really becoming mainstream. No Braubeck is definitely not mainstream fiction. He's more like the big, solid rock that sits in the middle of the river. Always there. Always strong."

-- The Agony Column

"Prodigal Blues is a disturbing novel. It deals with the most vicious forms of abuse and molestation of the young. To describe in detail the bare bones of what transpires to several youths in this novel would be excruciating. And Gary does not flinch one bit from the horrors in it. Yet he imbues the story with such tenderness that it is impossible to not feel a sense of joy. Prodigal Blues demonstrates humankind's obstinate ability to maintain dignity, compassion, and even a sense of wit in even the most dire circumstances."

-- Horrordrive-In.com

I'm not listing these to toot my own horn or to gloat (okay, maybe I want to gloat a little -- after all, I want all of you to buy it), but there's been a recurring theme to all the reviews that bothers me a little bit.

Understand that I am in no way dissing the reviewers who have thus far been incredibly complimentary of the novel (you wait your whole professional career for reviews like these, and I remain continually stunned by the reactions the novel's been getting), but at least half of these reviews describe sequences that, uh, um ...well ... aren't in the novel.

The story, briefly, concerns a man who, while on a road trip, is kidnapped by a group of children who have been physically mutilated by a man known to them only as "Grendel" who, throughout the novel, is never far behind them. They kidnap him because, in almost every case, their faces have been mutilated beyond recognition, and they fear that their families will no longer recognize them; hence, they need someone with a "normal face" to act as their go-between.

There's a lot more to the story than what I've described above, but the above is all you need to know for the sake of this column -- that, and one other thing, which is admittedly a peripheral point, but one I feel compelled to make:

In horror fiction (as in, sickeningly, real life) children are easy targets. Even the laziest and sloppiest of writers can generate a certain amount of dread and suspense by putting a child in danger, simply because all of us who possess an iota of compassion will automatically feel protective of a child, even a fictional one. But if one chooses to do this, one must be cautious of a few things: 1) The child has to be more than a mere symbol or literary construct; he or she must be a fully fleshed-out, three-dimensional human being -- and that includes any annoying flaws in their personality; 2) Said child must also be depicted as not completely clueless of their situation; otherwise this could lead to their surrendering to the role of victim, which could very well harm not only the integrity of the narrative but hurt reader sympathy, as well; and, 3) The depiction of any cruelty against said child must be both justified in order for the story to maintain its integrity and depicted with a deft hand -- that is to say, it must be as swift and brief as possible.

Okay, with that mini-rant out of the way, I'm going to jump around for a few paragraphs, so stay with me.

I once had the pleasure of spending fifteen minutes at a bar with the late, great Robert Bloch talking about movies, fiction, and peoples' misconceptions about what they both see and read.

Bloch told me -- as he did many other fans over the decades -- that he still had people come up to him and complain about how bloody and violent they found the shower scene in Hitchcock's film version of Psycho. ("Thank God I didn't have her sitting on the toilet," Bloch always said.)

People complained about Janet Leigh's nudity and how seeing her naughty bits so offended their sensibilities; they complained about the excessive amounts of blood; and they complained, consistently, about the violence of seeing the knife plunge into Ms. Leigh's body over and over.

Uh-huh, okay, right.

Go back and watch Psycho and pay particular attention to the shower sequence. Hitchcock -- aided greatly by the work of the brilliant film editor George Tomasini -- pulled off a dark magic trick that to my mind has yet to be equaled in American film: they made you believe you were seeing things that weren't actually depicted.

You do not see Janet Leigh's naughty bits. You do not see blood spalttering all over everything. And you most definitely do not ever, even once, see the knife plunge into Ms. Leigh's body. But the sequence is so brilliantly photographed and edited that viewers were -- and some still are -- left with the impression that, dammit, they saw all of that.

(Another good example is the justifiably famous "hobbling" scene from the film version of Stephen King's Misery; you see Annie smash Paul's left foot for all of 2 seconds, just long enough for your to shout "Ouch!", but you never see her do the right foot -- you hear it, and you see Paul writhing and screaming, and that remains enough for viewers to insist they saw her smash both ankles.)

I find that I am in a similar situation when it comes to the reviews for Prodigal Blues. (And, no, I'm not trying to compare my work to that of King, Bloch, or Hitchcock, we clear on that? Good.)

What's happened is this: at least half the reviews have warned readers that the novel contains scenes of (to quote from one) "...graphic child abuse and torture..."

Sounds like another fun, light-hearted, gay-spirited, slapstick comedic romp for which I am so well-known, doesn't it? A little something to make Jack Ketchum's The Girl Next Door seem like a Neil Simon laugh-fest. (And as an aside, if you want to read a supreme example of how savagery directed against children can be used as an integral part of a story, then steel yourself and read that groundbreaking, heartbreaking masterwork from Ketchum.)

There's just one thing -- with the sole exception of a single brief image the narrator glimpses on a digital computer file, the novel contains no depictions of abuse or torture of children. Zero. Nada. Don't worry about coming across it, 'cause it ain't there. Trust me, I wrote the thing, I'd remember.

Every instance of abuse and/or torture suffered by the group of children is conveyed -- again, with the exception of that single image, which takes up all of 2 lines in the book -- through dialogue, through the children relating their experiences to the narrator.

Yet one reviewer to whom I spoke after his review was posted said to me, "I know damn well I read that!" I asked him to pick up the ARC and flip through it and read to me any graphically-depicted scene of totrture and/or abuse.

After a minute or two of his flipping around and muttering under his breath, he finally sighed and said, "Well, shit! I thought I read that."

He then offered to go back and amend his review, which I said was unnecessary, because he (and the others) had proven an important point to me -- one that I wanted to prove mostly to myself; that if one exercises the utmost care when dealing with a delicate and controversial subject, one can make a reader believe that they've read something that isn't actually in the book.

It's a wonderful thing when a reader's imagination can fill in the blanks you as a writer deliberately create, because nearly every single time that happens, said reader can summon up images and events infinitely more disturbing and horrifying than anything you could describe in excruciating detail.

Which, to reiterate, I do not do in Prodigal Blues.

I know that lately I've been talking about this novel to the point where you may be sick of hearing about it, but it's a work of which I am supremely proud.

Until next time ....

Installment #17: Of Nalo Hopkinson, Readers' Perception, and "It Ain't Necessarily So."

noreply@blogger.com (Gary) — Wed, 26 Jul 2006 18:07:00 +0000

My wife Lucy and I are lucky in that we can call award-winning writer Nalo Hopkinson our friend. Nalo, in case you're not familiar with her work, has been nominated for the Nebula, the Hugo, the Locus Award, and the World Fantasy Award. In 1999, she won the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer. She's one helluva story-teller, and a damned nice (not to mention smart, compassionate, and sexy) person.

She has told me on more than one occasion that, based on what she's read about my work, it sounds fascinating to her, and she wishes she could read some of it ... but she avoids reading horror because she finds it too disturbing. (Which I can understand, but in Nalo's case this statement creates something of a mystifying contradiction: if you have a chance to read her amazing short story collection Skin Folk, you're going to encounter a quartet of horror stories that are out-and-out screamers; one of which, "Snake", will sear its way into your nightmares for a very long time. But I digress.)

Nalo is not the first person to tell me or Lucy that they've not read my work because they find horror too disturbing. It occurred to me -- Mensa material that I am -- that the reason for this is simple: I am so closely associated with horror (I'm the freakin' president of the Horror Writers' Association, fer chrissakes!...at least for a few more months) that many people automatically assume that everything I write is horrific.

To quote the great song from Porgy and Bess: "It ain't necessarily so."

Sometimes readers' (or, in this case, potential readers') perception of your work can work against you. I have written in the fields of mystery, fantasy science fiction, science fantasy, western, romance, so-called "literary", mainstream, and even -- if I understand the definition correctly -- slipstream.

So I have decided -- as a courtesy to those of you who have avoided reading my work because you share Nalo's concerns (and in a blatant attempt to garner more readers, being a needy sort) -- to offer here a list of my works that are most definitely not horror. Sure, some of the stories that follow are dark, and may not deal with the cheeriest of subject matter, but none of them are, in my opinion, horror in either the traditional sense or the popular perception of what constitutes the field. I'm going to start by listing and briefly discussing a half-dozen of non-horror stories, and then follow with a complete list of my non-horror stories.

1) "I Never Spent the Money": This is as straightforward a mainstrem story as I've ever written, a simple tale of two men who strike up a conversation in a bar. One is on the road because he's depressed that his divorce is about to become final in a few days; the other -- a much older man -- has just walked out of a nursing home and is readying himself to go across the street and rob the bank located there. It's a story about shattered hopes, wistfulness, and, ultimately, self-redemption. It has appeared on this web site, as well as in my collection Things left Behind and Graveyard People: The Collected Cedar Hill Stories, Volume 1. (Parenthetical pause: to save time and column space, you need only pop over to my Bibliography section to track down the stories and where they've appeared.)

2) "Aisle of Plenty": Another mainstream piece, this one my contribution to the series of post-9/11 fiction that, for a while (understandably so) almost became a genre unto itself. This one concerns itself, on the surface, anyway, with a series of near-tragic events that befall a Pakistani man (who's recently become an official US citizen) when he goes to a department store to buy a gift for some family members. Mistaken for an Iranian, an Iraqi, and a Saudi by the various customers and employees of the store, his simple, thoughtful errand quickly turns into a nightmare of prejudice and mistaken identity.

3) "At Eternity's Gate": A fantasy tale that concerns itself with a young woman, an artist who's dying in hospice, and her encounters during her seizures with Vincent Van Gogh, who is attempting to complete an unfinished painting through her.

4) "One Brown Mouse": The only outright science-fantasy story I've ever written, this one concerning a widower's discovery that the death of his wife was a "quantum accident" that various beings -- some of the extraterrestrial -- are trying to correct. I walked on air for a week when Ellen Datlow, in that year's edition of The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror, called it "...a remarkable story...".

5) "Danaid Night": A short-short that was written as an anniversary gift for a couple of friends. A semi-surreal piece that was written as my nod to Borges. It is also the most unapologetically romantic story I've ever written.

6) "Matthew in the Morning": A sort-of mystery story set during the battle of Cold Harbor during the Civil War, a study of how war can corrupt even the best and most innocent of souls, yet have a certain sort of dignity and glory emerge. One of my personal favorite non-horror stories.

Now, here's the list -- a bit long -- of all my non-horror stories, including the genres in which they can be classified (and remembers, go to my Bibliography section to track down where these pieces have appeared):

"After the Elepant Ballet" (Fantasy)
"Adhumbia" (Mystery/Suspense)
"Afterthoughts" (Fantasy)
"A Leg Up, or The Constant Tin Soldier (Gonzo Version)" (Fantasy, and a shameless tribute to William Goldman's The Princess Bride)
"All the Unlived Moments" (Science Fiction)
"The Ballad of the Side-Street Wizard" (Fantasy)
"Bright Be the Face" (Fantasy or Slipstream, depending on how you define the latter)
"Captain Jim's Drunken Dream" (Fantasy -- and, yes, I stole the title from the great James Taylor song)
"The Cat's-Paw Affair" (Mystery)
"Consolation Prize" (Fantasy)
"The Envelopes, Please" (Mystery)
"Fisherman's Delight" (Fantasy)
"From Among the Stars" (Fantasy)
The Hand Which Graces" (Fantasy, inspired by the work of Rod Serling)
"In the Direction of Summers Coming" (Fantasy or Slipstream)
"In the Lowlands" (Mystery -- my personal favorite of all my Cat Crimes stories)
"I Suppose This Makes Me Sancho" (Mystery)
"Just Like Mom Used to Make" (Mystery)
"Kite People" (Slipstream)
"Mail-Order Annie" (Western, the title taken from a Harry Chapin song)
News From the Long Mountains" (Fantasy)
"Palimpsest Day" (Science Fiction)
"Point of Contraction" (Science Fiction)
"The Rabbit Within" (Fantasy -- another personal favorite of mine)
"Rami Temporalis" (Fantasy/Fabulist)
"Redemption, Inc." (Fantasy)
Resurrection Joe" (Mystery/Suspense)
"Rights of Memory" (Fantasy)
"Silver Thread, Hammer Ring" (Slipstream)
"Small Song" (Fantasy/Slipstream...I've never really been able to nail down where this one belongs)
"A Song for No One's Mourning" (Fantasy)
"That, and the Rain" (Fantasy)

... I'm sure I'm overlooking a few stories, but for those of you who've been hesitant to read my work because you're adverse to horror, I think the above-listed tales will have something that will appeal to you.

I don't read in any single genre, nor do I write in any single genre; nothing worthwhile can be created in a vacuum, regardless of what field in which you toil.

So while I will always be proud to be thought of as a horror writer, I think it important for potential readers to know there's more to my work than a single genre label.

I hope you find something on that list to enjoy.

And thanks for giving my work a chance, Nalo.

Installment #16: Of Subtext, Subtlety, and Coming In After The Fact

noreply@blogger.com (Gary) — Mon, 19 Sep 2005 23:15:00 +0000

A word of warning: If you're not a writer, this particular installment may well bore you into a coma, so non-writers should read it only if they're suffering from insomnia. Never say I'm not looking out for your health and well-being.

I'm kind of a snob when it comes to fiction -- horror or otherwise -- and don't mind admitting it. This gets me into a lot of trouble when it comes to reading for pleasure, something I have less and less time for these days. I often make the mistake of applying (sometimes consciously, mostly not) my own storytelling standards to the work of those I read, and that's just silly (as well as being a habit I am fighting to break); if everyone wrote the same kind of stuff I do, and wrote it the same way I do, "variety" would be the stuff of fairy tales. And everyone would be depressed and grumpy all the time.

But every once in a while I start to ask questions about the fiction being produced in the horror field, simply because I'm still stubborn enough to want to see the field expand beyond its popular definition.

Take, for instance, a certain type of story, one that I have come to call the After-the-Fact story. I have not seen many After-the-Fact stories written in the horror genre; mostly, they've stayed in the neighborhood of you-should-pardon-the-expression literary fiction. So, why haven't we seen more of this type of story in horror?

After-the-Fact stories are tricky little bastards, because the main action of the story has already happened before the first sentence. After-the-Fact stories do not employ flashback, nor do they resort to the obvious mechanism of having a character offer a quick recap of what happened before the reader came into it; no, in these stories, you're presented with a situation that, nine times out of ten, is in no way connected to what actually happened; you have to piece together the events by what is said and done by the characters. They're a little like walking into a room just after someone's had an argument or gotten a piece of bad news; even though you know something's just happened, no one will tell you what it was, so you have to figure it out for yourself by observing the effect it's had on those around you: you have to pay attention to the detritus, because that's all you've got to go on.

A classic example is John Cheever's story "The Swimmer". On the surface, it's about nothing more than some rich guy in suburbia who's spending a Sunday afternoon running from neighbor's house to neighbor's house to use their swimming pools. "I'm swimming my way home," he tells his friends and neighbors, all of whom laugh and remark on what a card he is as they go about mixing their martinis and discussing events at the country club. Occasionally someone remarks, in passing, " ... he's looking better, don't you think ..." or ... I'm really surprised to see him out like this, after, well ..." Then the main character comes over to them and that line of conversation is dropped. This goes on for a while, each successive neighbor becoming more surprised and anxious at seeing him, offering more whispered comments when he's out of earshot -- " ... didn't realize he was back ..." etc. -- until it becomes obvious that something fairly awful has happened to this guy sometime before the story began, and though Cheever never once directly states what happened, everything you need to know is there.

The first time I read "The Swimmer", its sudden shocker of an ending seemed to come out of left field, so I went back and re-read the story, much more slowly than the first time, and realized that Cheever had, indeed, dropped a ton of clues; unfortunately, the majority of them were hidden in the detritus, given only through subtext.

Raymond Chandler (creator of Philip Marlowe, the hero of such classic novels as The Big Sleep and The Little Sister) once gave the best example of what constitutes subtext that I've ever encountered (and I am liberally paraphrasing here):

A man and woman, both middle-aged, are waiting for an elevator. It arrives, and the man helps the woman get on. For the first several floors they are alone, watching the blinking lights. They do not speak and stand well apart from each other. The woman wears a very nice dress. The man wears a suit, tie, and hat. The elevator stops -- not their floor -- and a young woman gets on; she smiles at both the man and the woman, who smile at her in return. The man removes his hat. The ride continues in silence. The elevator stops, the girls gets off, the man puts his hat back on. A few floors later, the man and woman get off and walk together toward a door at the end of the corridor.

It was usually at this point that Chandler would ask the listener: "What's written on that door?"

So I'll put the question to you: what words are written on that door which our middle-aged couple are heading toward?

How the hell am I supposed to know? some of you may cry. No one in that freakin' elevator said word one to anyone else, and on the basis of all the nothing that happened during that boring, boring, boring ride, I'm supposed to guess what it says on that stupid door?

Yes, you are.

Because an awful lot happened during that elevator ride: 1) The man and woman never spoke to each other, even while they were alone; 2) They also made it a point to stand well apart from each other even though the man helped her get on; 3) When the young woman got on, the man, obviously out of respect and courtesy, removed his hat; 4) Once the young woman disembarked, he put the hat back on; and, 5) The man and woman got off on the same floor, and are heading toward that door together.

Still say nothing happened and that you have no clues to go on?

Detritus. Subtext. The unspoken information that is conveyed to a reader through a character's behavior, actions, speech, or lack thereof. In acting, it's referred to as "nuance". It's subtle, but its implications are quite direct if you care enough to pay attention.

That is, in my opinion, what the horror field has lost over the last few decades: a willingness on the part of both writers and readers to (respectively) employ and appreciate the quieter, more delicate, and less obvious details of character and scene that can make fiction so much richer and rewarding.

Last chance; take a guess what it says on that door.

Try: Marriage Counselor.

That was an After-the-Fact story; tricky little bastard, wasn't it?

There's usually very little action in these stories; nothing much seems to happen at the core -- it's on the periphery that you have to watch out for yourself.

A handful of other After-the-Fact stories you'd do well to search out and read include Ernest Hemingway's "A Clean, Well-Lighted Place"; Eudora Welty's "A Worn Path"; Raymond Carver's "What Do You Do In San Francisco?", "Popular Mechanics", and "Why, Honey?" (these latter two being arguably horror stories); Carson McCullers's "A Tree, A Rock, A Cloud"; Michael Chabon's "House Hunting"; John O'Hara's brilliant "Neighbors" (a horror story if ever there was one); and a personal favorite of mine, Russell Banks's "Captions" -- perhaps in its way the most extreme After-the-Fact story I've yet encountered --wherein Banks details the agonizing disintegration of a married couple's existence through captions taken from newspapers or written underneath pictures in photo albums.

You've undoubtedly noticed that the above list contains no horror writers. There is a reason for this: not many have attempted an After-the-Fact story. Maybe it's because the structure of this type of story seems to self-consciously "literary" to them; maybe it's because horror readers have become far too accustomed to having everything spoon-fed to them and don't think they should have to work a little while reading a story, and so horror writers just automatically assume that All Must Be Revealed as quickly and in as simplistic of terms as possible. I don't know, I'm guessing here. But I've been going through my books searching for at least six examples of a successful After-the-Fact story in the horror field, and here's what I came up with:

"Sitting in the Corner, Whimpering Quietly," by Dennis Etchison
"Petey" by T.E.D. Klein
"Red" by Richard Christian Matheson
"Snow Day" by Elizabeth Massie
"Taking Down the Tree" by Steve Rasnic Tem
"Gone" by Jack Ketchum

... and that was it (even with this small a list, Klein's, Matheson's, Ketchum's, and Tem's stories almost offered too many concrete hints to qualify).

I thought perhaps Peter Straub's "Bar Talk", "The Veteran", or "A Short Guide To the City" (all from his magnificent collection Houses Without Doors) could be used to beef up the list, but that would have been stacking the deck (pardon my mixed metaphors); Straub's work is the result of an exceptionally well-read literary background, so of course the sensibilities of his work are informed from countless sources, resulting in fiction that is challenging in its approach to structure and subtext -- no more so than in the "Interlude" fictions sprinkled throughout Houses.

So no Straub; it wouldn't be playing fair on my part. Same goes for Stewart O'Nan, whose wonderful collection In The Walled City contains not one, but two After-the-Fact stories, "Calling" and "Finding Amy". (I exclude O'Nan because, though he does sometimes dabble in the horror field, he is not primarily a horror writer.)

So I came up with six stories, four of which (though superb) just barely made it onto the list. I'm sure there are other After-the-Fact horror stories out there that I missed, but my guess is, not that many.

Horror may be trying to outgrow its popular definition, but it's still suffering from a case of arrested literary adolescence -- and I'm not one who apologizes for using the term "literary" when talking about horror. It can be among our most literary forms of storytelling; emphasis on can be; we still need to take chances, even if we fall flat on our faces in the attempt.

I had never attempted this particular type of story for fear of making myself look pretentious or foolish, but I figured that if I'm going to gripe about horror writers not taking chances, then I damned well ought to be willing to call my own bluff. But the thing is, this kind of story is difficult as hell; it's difficult to read, difficult to figure out, and you-bet-your-ass difficult to write; After-the-Fact stories are tricky little bastards.

Sometime later this year (or early next), an anthology entitled Corpse Blossoms is going to be released, and it's going to contain my attempt at an After-the-Fact story, a piece called "Need". If and when you read this story, I ask that you pay attention to what happens in the elevator (metaphorically speaking). Study the detritus. And don't think for a moment that what's being said by the characters has a damn thing to do with what happened before you came in. Whether or not I've succeeded with "Need" is not for me to say, but I do hope that you find the story worth your reading time and your consideration ...

... after the fact, of course.

Since I'm not really playing fair this time -- after all, it's going to be months before the story in question comes out -- I'd like to ask all of you to help me see if we can't expand that list of six given above. If you can find any other After-the-Fact stories in the horror field (remember the criteria), point me in their direction, and I'll do a follow-up to this column in a month or so.

Until then, stay tuned ....

Installment #15: Of Reviews, Fragile Egos, And "He Sure Went Ape-Shit", Part Four

noreply@blogger.com (Gary) — Thu, 11 Aug 2005 22:10:00 +0000

Since the last time, I have received nearly two dozen e-mails from people asking for a "preview" of this particular installment; Brian Keene received sixteen e-mails on the day the last installment posted, most of them of the "What the hell are you and Braunbeck fighting about?" variety.

It is to laugh. Sincerely. I mention Brian in reference to the Ron Horsley/Shocklines Affair, and everyone automatically assumes that he and I are going at each other's throats. More than a few of these e-mails expressed concerned that I was either going to point fingers and name names or -- at the other end of the spectrum -- tell people what they want to hear.

We'll be getting to all of this shortly.

As I said in the last installment, one of the things that prompted me to bring up this subject after so long a time is that, in the past five weeks, I have encountered no fewer than seventeen instances on-line of published writers attacking their negative reviews. I say "attacking" rather than "responding to" because in every single case, the writers have wound up throwing hissy fits, nearly all of which have ended with something along the lines of "...you ought to try writing a novel sometime and see how easy it is, then see how you'd respond to a review like the one you gave me."

Wah-wah-wah. Get over yourselves.

I'm not talking about the kind of reviews wherein the reviewer gives careful consideration to the writer's work, its intent, its overall effectiveness, craftsmanship, etc., and ends on a negative note ("I cannot recommend this book.").

No, I'm talking about the kind of review (and I use that term in its broadest possible application) that says, "Man, this book sucked. This guy can't write his way out of wet paper sack. I'm never going to read him again, and am going to tell all my friends to avoid his work. At least I don't have to buy any toilet paper for a while now."

These, for the most part, are the types of "reviews" that I have seen writers attacking lately. With a passion.

And it's embarrassing as hell. I have no doubt that many -- if not all -- of these writers think they are making a strong point by putting the reviewers in their place, but as far as I'm concerned, all they're doing is giving people the impression that the reviewer hit some kind of nerve with them; after all, if the review has no merit whatsoever, why would anyone bothering responding to it? But since the writer did respond, then the review must have some grain of truth to it, no matter how ineloquently expressed. Right?

Once more, with feeling: Wah-wah-wah. Get over yourselves. Not everyone is going to love every single thing you write, and some folks are going to be less than kind when expressing that opinion. Besdies -- shouldn't you be working on the new book or story, not wasting your time defending yourself to someone who's going to take your response as a backhanded validation of thier point?

At this point, I'd like to ask that you pop over to the Guestbook area of my web site. Scroll down until you come to post made by vince on July 7, 2005 (you maybe should scroll down a little farther, as well). Basically, Vince (a wonderful guy who's been a regular here for a long time) thought that Brian Keen's The Rising (direct quote here) "...sucked." There's a little more discussion about this, and then, if you'll scroll back up, you'll find the following post from Brian Keene:

"Hey Vince--sorry to hear that THE RISING and CITY OF THE DEAD didn't work for you. Perhaps TERMINAL will be more your cup o' tea (it has characters and no zombies). But anybody that jams to Golden Earring is okay in my book. ;)"

That, my friends, is how you respond to negative reviews -- if you choose to respond at all. As a result of Brian's gracious reply, he sold 2 copies of Terminal to folks who otherwise would not have bothered. Brian did not get on there and say, "Yeah, well, you didn't spend 7 months writing and revising it, you didn't lose sleep over plot problems, and you don't have to worry about how you're going to make your next house payment if the book doesn't do well, so you know what? Suck on this...."

But responses like that from writers have been popping up with alarming frequency lately, and there's no good goddamn reason for it. Maybe this sort of thing has been going on for a long time and I've only recently become aware of it, but aware of it I am, and sickened by it, as well.

And when did I become so (arguably) over-sensitized to this?

During the Infamous Ron Horsely/From the Borderlands/Shocklines Affair.

For those of you who might not be familiar with The Shocklines Discussion Board, it was established by Matt Schwartz -- one of the premiere on-line booksellers of horror fiction, and quite possibly the most infectiously cheerful human beings you'll ever meet -- a few years ago as a way for Matt's customers to directly interact with those writers whose work they were buying. Curious about what T.M. Wright's next novel will be? Then go on Shocklines and ask him. Want to know why Jim Moore decided to split his latest novel into three separate volumes? Ask him on the board.

This was, and remains, a pretty damned smart marketing strategy on Matt's part -- and make no mistake, marketing was one of the primary reasons Matt decided to host the board; if his customers had a place where they could communicate with the writers whose work he was selling, then it's all good for everyone invloved: his customers get the pleasure of interacting with their favorite writers, Matt sells more books, and the writers always have a place to go to hear what's on readers' minds (and to get an ego boost when one is needed -- you will not find a more friendly, enthusiastic, and vocal group of fans than those who haunt this board, and more than a few of the published writers you have read have stopped in for some much-needed kind words from readers when the work sometimes get the better of them). People can talk about damn near anything they want, so long as it doesn't become personal or discourteous. (And Matt will make this call if needed; it's his right. He pays for the web space, he monitors the board, and everyone is there because of his money, time, and effort. It's his virtual home -- like this web page is mine -- and in Matt's house (as in mine) there will be courtesy.)

A little over a year ago, just after Warner Books released the anthology From the Borderlands in paperback, a guy by the name of Ron Horsley posted an utterly scathing review of it on the Shocklines discussion board. Ron liked some of the stories in the collection, but mostly he didn't. A lot. A lot.

It was, in actuality, only half a review of the book itself; the other half was a merciless criticism of Tom and Elizabeth Monteleone's editorial process, which Ron found to be unfocused and overly self-congratulatory.

In short, it was an almost wholly negative review that was in places a bit mean-spirited (not nearly as mean-spirited as his reviews would soon become, but we'll get to that). The review was bad, yes, but not so much that Matt considered it to be offensive or discourteous -- Matt, in fact, welcomes conflicting opinions on the board, as they often lead to interesting and in-depth discussion.

Well, even if you weren't party to the debacle that followed Ron's review, you can probably guess what happened: the backlash was instantaneous and overwhelmingly defensive. Everyone thought -- to put it mildly -- that Ron's review was unnecessarily harsh, but (and this is the part that was consistently overlooked after the initial explosion) almost no one who responded to this addressed any of Ron's points; they instead went after Ron himself. He was an "asshole", a "jerk", and "...probably some wanna-be writer who got rejected by Tom and Elizabeth." The theorizing about why he did it and what kind of writer and human being he was continued ... and yet only a small handful of people -- mostly writers who had a story in the collection -- made reference to his criticisms of the work itself.

(An aside: Tom Monteleone -- never one to shrink from a good fight -- recognized the review for what it was, and did not bite. Instead, in typically classy fashion, he chimed in once with: "I can see some of the points he's trying to make. I don't agree, but I can understand how someone might see it that way. We should just move on." If only that had happened....)

Well, Ron was quick to respond to every comment made, and as the thread went on (and on...and on...) the posts between him and those who jumped into the fray grew increasingly more vicious, defensive, spiteful, and, at last, personal. It quickly became no longer about the review, but about one-upmanship, who was going to get the last word, the best zinger.

It was pathetic and embarrassing and childish and beneath the intelligence and dignity of everyone who chose to remain involved. (And please spare me the defense of, "Well, he started it." Yeah, he did, but people could have chosen to not continue it, could have taken Tom's sage advice and moved on, but they didn't. Once a gauntlet has been picked up, it doesn't really matter a damn who threw it down.)

Ron then went on to shoot himself in the foot when he replied that, yes, he had submitted to Borderlands and, yes, his story had been rejected. Well, that just went over like gangbusters, because now everyone had even more reason to dismiss his opinions as sour grapes. The focus shifted completely from the content of his review to the reviewer himself, and it got ugly in a hurry on both sides. Ron posted reviews of The Rising, House of Blood, Possessions and several other books in rapid succession, the mean-spiritedness of which increased geometrically with the rancor directed his way on the board. A scathing review from Ron was met by infuriated responses, back and forth, until it all became so personal and offensive that Matt started locking threads and, ultimately, banned Ron from the board.

But it didn't remain on the board. It spilled over onto Ron's own mesage board, as well as those of several other writers, not to mention countless e-mails that flew fast and furious between people, the contents of which became more and more personal. I'm not going to discuss this aspect of the event because I deliberately stayed away from it -- even those few times Ron tried to bring it up in person with me. And I did this because none of it should have happened in the first place. Why?

Because Ron posted a review that was obviously designed to get the response it did. Had peoples' reaction been like that Brian Keene gave to Vince in my Guestbook, none of the ugliness that ensued would have happened. But the bait was thrown out, and it was taken, and what followed, followed. (An aside: Brian Keen's initial response to Ron's review was not unlike that he offered to Vince. It was not until Brian felt that his friends were being unjstifiably attacked that he got deeper into it, but enough of this already; methinks you've got a good idea of what went down.)

And I didn't say a damned thing.

I didn't say anything because, A) I had a story in From the Borderlands that made Ron's very short "pass" list (with reservations on his part), and knew that anything I said woyuld have been seen as defending Ron because he gave my story a thumbs-up; B) I knew most of the people who were taking part in the argument; and, C) Ron was -- and remains -- a close friend of mine. To step in and say anything would have been seen as choosing sides, and I refuse to be pulled into any fight that I had nothing to do with. I'm gonna be dead soon enough, and I've got better things to spend my anger and passion on than a flame war with delusions of granduer.

But then it started coming back on me and my wife. And it's still coming back on us. I started getting e-mails, and then phone calls, from people telling me that I had to "...do something to control" Ron or it was going to hurt my career.

Huh?

Lemme get this straight: here's a guy who all of you think is an asshole, whose opinions you find meaningless and worthless, and who -- in the words of one writer whose book Ron was particularly harsh on -- "...should not be taken seriously, nor should anyone who associates with him..." -- this is the same guy who's going to damage my career and credibility because I'm friends with him?

I put this question to Matt Warner when he called me with his concerns, and Matt told me -- as a friend -- that there were: "...a lot of people who're taking your silence as tacit approval of what Ron's doing. They think because you're not saying anything, that you agree with him."

Well, it turns out that Brian Keene was one of those people who assumed that my silence was tacit agreement with -- and approval of -- what Ron was saying. "Kinda figured you didn't care for the old Broiler anymore," was what he said. ("Broiler", by the way, is my nickname for Brian.)

If you have been reading this carefully, then you're going to realize that nowhere in this installment have I taken a side on this issue -- except, of course, my own and that of my wife.

For those of you who made the same assumption that Brian did (and he and I remain friends, as do Ron and I), I say to you now the same thing I said to Broiler:

You should have asked me.

But thus far, only Brian Keene has had the good sense to do so -- directly ask me -- after I said that.

Which is why he is the only person who knows what I thought and still think about the whole unfortunate mess. He was concerned enough about our friendship -- not his ego -- to ask me, because he knows that friends can both strongly agree and/or strongly disagree on something and still remain friends.

I wish other friends had paid me this courtesy.

Here is where I definitely take a side.

My wife and I live in Columbus, Ohio. This part of Ohio is all but overflowing with science fiction, fantasy, horror, and dark fantasy writers, many of whom live less than an hour from our front door. Off the top of my head, I'd say there are at least half a dozen writers who live nearby, many of whom Lucy and I used to see socially at least once a month. We thought of them as friends.

Well, take a wild guess as to how many of them we've seen socially since the Ron/Shocklines debacle.

Zero. No get-togethers, no phone calls, and e-mails only when it has to do with business.

Had it only been one or two of them, I would not have given it a second thought -- after all, we're all busy writing, and that has to come before most things in life, save health and family.

But it wasn't just a few of them -- it was all of them, and at the same time. You needn't be Einstein or Hawking to discern the connection. (There is one fellow who both Lucy and I don't include in this group because we know how damned busy he is, and always has been, but for the most part, we've run out of excuses for the rest of them.)

For my part, I can live with it; in one form or another, I've spent most of my time alone for most of my life, I'm used to not hanging out with folks, so the lack of an active social life isn't exactly a stake through my heart.

This has, however, deeply, deeply hurt Lucy, and that I cannot -- nor will I -- live with. Lucy used to be a web-page designer -- and a pretty good one, to boot.

But here's the thing: since the Shocklines debacle, she has lost every one of her clients, a couple of whom at least had the balls to tell her it was because "...everyone knows you're friends with Ron..." and they didn't want it coming back on them. (I'll remind you that Ron is the asshole whose opinions carry no weight whatsoever, nobody takes him seriously, his views are worthless, etc.) She has also had potential clients decide to not use her services for the same reason.

Not only that, but as the war escalated onto other boards and blogs, some folks felt compelled to seek out some of Ron's on-line writing so they could tear it up the same way he tore into Borderlands. Some of his stories had been published in Dark Planet , a web-zine that had been running for several years, edited by Lucy (long before she permitted me to be her hubby). It wasn't enough for these folks to just attack Ron's work that appeared there, no; they had to attack and insult the zine itself, as well as Lucy herself and her efforts at editing and maintaining it. Even when I pointed this out to one group, no apology followed; instead, what I got was: "Yeah, well, it's a lame title for a 'zine, and Ron's stuff sucked, so it doesn't say much about her abilities as an editor that she published it." (That she also published work by Kelly Link, Nalo Hopkinson, Brian Hopkins, and several other award-winning writers was never mentioned, nor that some pieces originally published in Dark Planet went on to be reprinted in The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror. Doesn't say much about her abilities as an editor, my ass.)

At the same time "Ron-Gate" was happening, an anthology was being put together that was only recently released (nope, not gonna tell you which one). I saw this anthology, and wondered aloud why I hadn't been invited to submit something for consideration -- the type of stuff I write would have been perfect for this book. So I asked the editor -- a person I've never worked with and now never will. This person's response? You guessed it: "Everyone knows you're friends with Horsley, and I didn't want that affecting sales."

But the icing on the cake for all of this was applied a few weeks ago when I came across a brief thread on another discussion board about my forthcoming Leisure novel, Keepers.

Quick backstory: at the request of editor Don D'Auria, I did a major re-write on Keepers (it orginally appeared in my CD-Rom collection, Sorties, Cathexes, and Personal Effects); I wound up cutting something like 35, 000 words from it and replacing them with nearly 45, 000 new ones. At its core, it's still the same story, but much of it is very different from its original version.

Anyhoo ... I wound up getting seriously blocked on the new opening sequence. Well, enter Ron one afternoon with a brief story about a funny air-freshener he saw hanging from the rear-view mirror of another car and -- viola! -- the new opening sequence reveals itself to me, whole-cloth.

So I dedicated the book to Ron. Told a handful of people about it, and why.

So here's this discussion thread, wherein one person says: "He's dedicated it to Ron Horsley. I'm sure as shit not gonna waste money on any book dedicated that that asshole."

This followed by several posts of agreement; so at least seven people I know of aren't going to be buying the book because I dedicated it to Ron. Talk about guilt by association....

So, here you have two people -- my wife and myself (mostly my wife, goddammit) -- who had nothing to do with what happened at Shocklines, but who, now, have been hurt both professionally and personally because they chose to stay out of it, and it's easier for people to make wrongheaded assumptions about their reasons than do the intelligent thing and ask them.

And all because a handful of people could not handle a bad review that was all-too obviously designed to make tempers flare.

Don't call me or send me e-mails detailing all the personal stuff that happened after Ron's first series of reviews. I am talking solely about his reviews and the initial reactions they solicited on the board. Even more specifically, I am talking about his review of From the Borderlands that began all of it -- and should have ended it right then and there, had not everyone been so willing to take the bait.

If I sound angry, it's because I am. I am angry that my wife has lost all her web-page clients since then (and all within the first week); I am angry that some editor passed me over for an invite not because my work wasn't what he was looking for (my stuff would have been right at home in this book, and he knows it) but because I knew someone who was an object of controversy at the time; I am angry that there are writers out there who assume that the Shocklines board -- as wonderful a place as it is -- represents the attitudes and opinions of the horror field as whole, which it most certainly does not; I am angry that people Lucy and I thought were our friends just assumed that I was siding with Ron because I refused to get invloved in what was and remains an ultimately childish display of tempers; I am angry that people were not only quick to assume my views, but then speak of it to others as if they had some sort of inside information; and I am utterly disgusted that since all of this happened, more and more writers are taking to the web to attack their bad reviews as if it actually proves something other than their complete lack or professionalism, thick skin, and a spine.

My wife has felt diminished and lonely and sad because of what has been directed her way since all this happened, and if it were in my power to assemble everyone who made her feel this way so that I could go down the line with a baseball bat and break all their kneecaps, I would do so without a moment's hesitation. Because you may think that by doing what you did, you proved that you could take a stand against those who attack others' work, but all you've accomplished is to show what weak and pitiful cowards you really are. You hurt my wife's feelings for no reason other than you couldn't hurt Ron's, and so felt compelled to make someone suffer your wrath so you could go to sleep feeling self-righteous and secure in your sycophantic place. How easy it is to side with the majority, even if you know or suspect that the majority may be just as much to blame for things going sour as those the majority accuses of instigating the trouble.

Dress it up in all the bullshit justification you want, but the truth is this: she did nothing to deserve this treatment. (And by the way, neither did I.)

You should have asked.

But you didn't. And so you will never know.

You know what? The above statement isn't completely fair. I decided to write this installment so I could clear the air, and that's what I'm going to do, so here goes:

Did I approve of what Ron did? What the hell does it matter? He's an adult, just like everyone else who got involved, no one needs my permission or approval. For the record: I wish he hadn't done it (I told him that to his face) because it hurt his career. If you're nice, it's viewed as a weakness, and peoples' memories are short; if you piss them off, they will be cursing your name on their deathbeds.

Did I agree with anything he said in his initial series of reviews? Some of what he said, yes. He did make some salient points, but the manner in which he made them too often overshadowed -- and arguably negated -- their validity; it became not so much about the opinions he was expressing as it did how they were being expressed. (This also have I said to him face to face.)

About which books/novels/stories that he reviewed did you agree with him? That's my business and mine alone.

Do I think he is entirely to blame for what happened? No, I do not, and if you've been reading this installment carefully, you know why.

Do you think anything good came out of this? Yes, I do. Every time Ron posted a review, that particular book and its author were a hot topic of conversation, and several people said ourtright that they went out and bought the book so they could read it and offer an informaed opinion about why Ron was wrong. Several writers garnered themselves new readers and additional book sales because of the controversy. Like the old saying goes, there's no such thing as bad publicity.

So, actually, you're defending him, aren't you? You haven't been reading this very carefully, have you? I'm not defending him, nor am I distancing myself from him; he is my friend, as is Brian Keene, as are several of the people who were invloved in this unfortunate incident. If a friendship can't survive a strong disagreement, then it wasn't much of a friendship to begin with.

Then why bring all of this up? Because my wife has been insulted, ostracized, and deeply hurt as a result, and it's been going on for a year now, and it's going to stop, because the people who have done this to her have subtracted enough joy from her life; I'm also bringing it up because I am, A) sick and tired of seeing supposedly professional writers acting like a bunch of shrieking infants every time they get a bad review, and, B) everyone else allowing them to get away with behavior that would be right at home on a playground during 6th-grade recess but has no place in the world of professional publishing.

Which brings me back to my original point: If you are a writer who feels compelled to publicly defend your work against bad reviews, all you wind up proving is that you have too fragile an ego to be in this business in the first place. And if your anger and passion is channeled into anything other than your work and making this world a better place for those you love and care about, then it is wasted effort. Period.

That's it for this installment. From the looks of things, the Fuzzy Bunny Squad may be returning -- with reinforcements -- next time. Come back at the end of the month and see for yourselves.

In the meantime, I won't be looking for any party invitations to come my way.

Until then, stay tuned....

Installment #14: Of Reviews, Fragile Egos, and "He Sure Went Ape-Shit", Part Three

noreply@blogger.com (Gary) — Wed, 20 Jul 2005 16:58:00 +0000

Because the last installment ended by presenting you with a Catch-22-type situation, I want to recap a couple of thing that we've covered up to this point:

1) Reviews can be useful tools in helping a reader decide whether not they want to read a particular book.

2) Reviewers should not be made to feel that they must hold back certain information about the story (a.ka. ***SPOILERS***) if that information plays a key role in supporting their thesis.

3) But readers, for the most part, don't want any ***SPOILERS*** contained in those reviews.

Where doth the twain meet here?

There are a couple of things that you can do to avoid this quagmire: you can read the work in question first, before you even so much as glance at a review, thus removing the ***SPOILER*** element from the equation, or you can employ a trick I've learned over the years: if the reviewer in question knows their stuff, if they adhere to the ideal structure of a review (see Part One of this column for an illustration of that structure), then you can read only the first two and last two paragraphs of the review in order to know what their overall opinion was. Then bookmark or set aside that review so you can come back and read it in its entirety after you've read the work in question for yourself.

To illustrate this pont, I once again direct you to Nick Mamatas's review of In the Midnight Museum. Nick knows his stuff, and because he does, you can read only the first two and last two paragraphs and have a clear understanding of his thesis. G'head.

See what I mean? We've now solved the problem: you've read enough of the review to know Nick's opinion, and Nick doesn't have to worry about someone throwing a hissy fit because his review contained ***SPOILERS***. You can read the novella, then go back and read the review in its entirety to see if you agree with his points. Everybody wins.

Except... (Knew that was coming, didn't you?)

Except there's a strong possibility that a lot of readers don't want to put in that kind of effort. Some have actual lives and better things to do with their time (a concept most writers I know cannot grasp). Some just don't have that kind of patience. Some don't want to waste time reading reviews that could be spent reading the book itself. And some may just be lazy and expect reviewers to put in ***SPOILER*** warnings.

So what's that leave?

Blurbs.

If you're not familar with that term, a "blurb" is a brief piece of text wherein the virtues of a particular book or writer are turned all the way up to 11 in order to give potential readers the prose equivalent of a sound bite. Both of my Leisure novels, In Silent Graves and the forthcoming Keepers, feature on their front covers a blurb taken from Publishers Weekly: "Braunbeck's fiction stirs the mind as it chills the marrow."

This is a perfect blurb; it's concise, it gets your attention, and it gives you a sense of what my work is about without revealing anything specific about the work. It's also a "general" blurb -- one that comments on my overall body of work rather than a specific book.

That blurb, by the way, was taken from the PW review of my first short story collection, Things Left Behind. Now, because it's a "general" blurb, its appearing on the cover of these novels is not taking it out of context; it is being used to give readers an idea of what they can expect from my work in general.

Now, flip over Graves and you will find on the back cover a handful of blurbs taken from reviews of the book itself. Open the cover and you'll find a full page of them that tout both the novel and my work in general. Taken individually, each one is (hopefully) enticing; taken as a whole, they're designed to make the hesitant reader decide in favor of purchasing and reading the book. (This why they're called "marketing tools.")

None of the blurbs were taken out of context (I'll get to that shortly), and I think they make for an intriguing sort-of introduction. Which is why I am a firm believer that a handful of strong blurbs can be just as effective as the same number of positive reviews; they're shorter, they're direct, and they reveal nothing ***SPOILER***-like about the work in question. This, to my mind, makes them a good alternative for potential readers who don't want to chance having a review give away too much of the story.

Not all blurbs are culled from reviews; sometimes -- okay, probably half the time or more -- a writer will contact other writers and ask them if they would be willing to read something with an eye toward providing a blurb. I have gotten several wonderful quotes this way, and have also provided them for other writers. (I don't always do this; in the past 4 years I have been asked to read several novels for which, in the end, I couldn't in good conscience provide a blurb because, well...I didn't like them.)

Let me quickly address a few misconceptions about writers providing blurbs for other writers:

1) Yes, a lot of the time these writers know or are at least acquainted with one another -- but that in no way means that a good blurb will be guaranteed.

2) I can't speak for others, but I myself do read, from first page to last, each and every book I am asked to blurb. (There seems to be a rather cynical belief that writers don't bother reading their buddies' books before giving them a blurb -- while I don't doubt that this happens every so often, it is most assuredly not the norm.)

3) Yes, any writer providing a blurb is aware that it's going to be used to entice a reader to buy this particular book, and will slant their blurb to that end -- but bear in mind that is because they like and believe in the book to begin with, so its integrity needn't be called into question.

This is not to say that things can't go wrong here, as well. If a book is saturated with too many blurbs, one gets the feeling that the publisher is overcompensating and perhaps trying to sell you a bill of goods. The first book in the new Dean Koontz Frankenstein series has ten pages of blurbs inside. That's overkill, because the sheer amount of them robs each individual blurb of its effectiveness. You're so numbed by the time you reach the end of the damned things you almost don't feel like reading the book -- which turns out to be quite a lot of good, old-fashioned fun. But because it starts off by pummeling you with page after page of rave blurbs (almost none of which refer to the book itself), you go in with the creeping feeling that someone is trying to convince you a sow's ear is actually a silk purse.

My own personal cutoff point is two pages or a dozen blurbs (whichever comes first); after that, I ignore them. With blurbs, less is defnitely more. (The ideal for me, by the way, is a single page containing somewhere between five and ten concise, tantalizing quotes.)

I am very careful to make certain that none of the blurbs used for my books are taken out of context -- I don't want readers to feel that these quotes have been employed to mislead them, and I don't want reviewers to feel that I've misrepresented their theses by "doctoring" their comments.

F'rinstance: if you go back to Nick's review of Museum, you'll find -- as I did -- that there are some choice lines that could easily be pulled out and used as blurbs, the most obvious being "...entertaining and gripping..." taken from the 3rd paragraph. But I won't do that, because, while excerpting that trio of words does not (technically) misquote Nick, it would constitute a misrepresentation of the review's overall tone and conclusions -- hence, taking them out of context. So no blurb from Nick Mamatas for me.

So what it boils down to is that strong blurbs can serve as the middle ground for readers who want some sense of what to expect from a book but don't want to chance having anything "spoiled" for them ... and reviewers can write whatever they damned well please without fear of being accused of "spoiling" anything.

I still think the best solution is to read the book first, but if that's not possible for whatever reason, then go the first-two-last-two paragraph route when reading a review; if that doesn't appeal or work for you, then turn to the blurbs. Beyond those three options ... I got nothing.

Two weeks from now, I'm going to publish the final part of this four-part column, and I fully expect to have a lot of people upset with me afterward, because I'm going to talk about a trend that I've been seeing more and more of lately, one that I find both infuriating and embarrassing: that of writers attacking reviewers who give their work negative reviews. Sometimes these attacks come in the form of a snide line or two from a particualr writer's blog, and sometimes they appear as long posts in discussion threads on message boards. While I don't doubt that this situation has existed for a while, I first became aware of it during a prolonged and ugly flame war that began on the Shocklines message board a little over a year ago when a friend of mine by the name of Ron Horsley posted a scathing review of From the Borderlands.

What ensued from there was a debacle of near-legendary proportions, one that I chose to stay out of, foolishly believing that my silence would be seen as, simply, objective nuetrality. (It also left me keenly aware of the trend I mentioned above, one that is not restricted to Shocklines or any single discussion board or blog.)

I'd hoped my silence would be seen and respected as impartiality; such was not the case, as it turns out. And as a result, both myself and my wife have been dealing with several personal -- and sometimes professional -- repercussions. I was bound and determined to not get involved with it or to ever comment on it publicly or privately, but a series of e-mails last week between myself and Brian Keene made it clear that I'm going to have to talk about it whether I want to or not.

And it's not gonna be pretty, so don't say you weren't warned.

See you in two weeks.

Until then, stay tuned....