Chili Powder

Zola Book Club

Eleven quotes from L'Assommoir, Chapters 6 and 7, coming to a Hallmark card near you:

From his open mouth he breathed fumes of alcohol like the smell from old casks of brandy just broached.  This meeting with a woman in a dark corner was beginning to make him saucy...

There were two women having a rare scrap as I was coming out of the Grand Balcon. [...] Oh, what a set-to, I nearly died of laughing.  One had her nose half off, and the blood was dripping on to the ground...

Now I had a friend who had a tapeworm.  Oh, how fussy those creatures are!  It used to twist up her stomach if she didn't give it chicken. 

Madame Bijard lay in the middle of the floor, her skirts still sopping wet from the washhouse and sticking to her thighs, her hair clawed down, bleeding and groaning heavily with long drawn out ohs! and ahs! each time Bijard kicked her.

Why not peas and bacon?, said Virginie.  I could live on nothing but that.

Virginie having said she had kept off food for two days so as to have a nice empty space for the food, the outrageous Clemence capped it with a bigger whopper, saying she had cleared herself out by using an enema that morning, like the English.

The best thing about the peas was the bits of bacon, fried to a turn and stinking like horses' hooves.

The roast goose had discharged a jet of gravy from the gaping hole in its rear, which gave Boche a chance for a witticism: 'I'll sign on if someone will pee into my mouth like that!'

Balls to the upper classes!

Men loved pinching her because they could do it all over the place and never come across a bone.

Clemence had ended by displaying everything she'd got, and had been sick all down one of the muslin curtains and completely ruined it.  The men did at least go out into the street to do it; Lorilleux and Poisson, when their stomachs were heaving, had got as far as the cooked meat shop.  Good breeding will always out. 

Zola Book Club

Chapter Five: in which Coupeau tries to frolic with the ladies among heaps of poopy laundry.

This chapter has the best scene of the book to date.  (I haven't read the book in a week and I whipped out this chapter on the airplane last week so I'm a little hazy on the plot at the moment.)  Gervaise's shop, a gnarly laundry, opens and she hires a couple ladies to wash clothes with her and she gets business very quick.  They have tons of clothes piled up in the shop, huge barrels and bowls of boiling starchy water, and no ventilation at all.

Remember that scene from All Women Have Curves when they are sewing and the girl talks all the ladies into taking off their blouses and bonding and being all curvy and sweaty?  That scene was jacked from this chapter, except where in the movie it was liberating here in the hands of Zola it's about as emancipating as panhandling.  So Clemence busts out her boobs.  The dirty linen, the nappies soaked in urine, the 'dishcloths stiff with greasy washing-up water', the 'socks in holes and rotting with sweat' -- the overpowering smell these and the hot water and the boobs everywhere, Gervaise gets high on human stench and Zola lets us know that 'her first bouts of laziness dated from this moment'.  Not good.

Then, PopoZao! -- in walks Coupeau, butt-wasted with a black eye and a cobweb on his face.  Somebody named Stick of Celery kicked his ass.  He chills while the ladies clean other people's filthy undies, in which Clemence sticks her fingers through the worn holes and makes jokes about the stiff fabric.  This makes Coupeau horny and he tries to make out with Gervaise but he falls into a pile of petticoats.  Gervaise says you get none so he checks out Clemence instead, because she's got a 'bloody good pair of flippers'.  She can't handle it, and he calls her stuck-up then passes out on dirty laundry.

Gervaise doesn't care about Coupeau anymore, because she's got eyes for Goujet, the guy who gave her the money for the shop.  He's a nailmaker, and he's got mad muscles now.  So three years go by, and Coupeau sauces more, and Gervaise holds it down in her responsible job, and she pines for the muscular, generous, sensitive Goujet.  I don't know why; he never once compliments her pair of flippers. 

Zola Book Club

L'Assommoir, Chapters 3 and 4. 

Chapter 3:  When we last saw Gervaise she had been browbeaten into marriage by her unstable horndog suitor, Coupeau.  Chapter 3 is all about that wedding. 

Gervaise decides she doesn't want a 'slap-up marriage' because she's a modest girl.  Coupeau agrees but doesn't have a cent so he bums 50 francs from his boss and uses this for the arrangements, ring, etc. 

So they all have to WALK everywhere on wedding day.  The wedding party walks from the town hall to the church.  The old ladies groan, the men want to drink.  Then they walk to the Moulin d'Argent (pub) and have wine and ham, which Coupeau pays for.  (I won't detail it all for you but suffice it to say that Coupeau, who doesn't have jack, just bleeds money all chapter long.  You definitely get the vibe that dude's a loose nut who will unravel Gervaise's tightly wound life and destroy her by novel's end...we hope!)

After the pub they had planned to walk to eat some real food but it pours rain.  They chill in the pub, eat more ham, drink more wine.  The old ladies groan, the men want to eat.  They've got to do something so they decide to walk to the Louvre.  Party!  Catty women and hungry drunks in the Louvre, gotta love it.

On the way there the women notice Gervaise's limp and on her wedding day they bestow her with a charming nickname, Clip-Clop. 

They do the Louvre, then rest from all that walking by sitting under a bridge for a while.  (Now that is just awesome, to chill 'neath an underpass on your wedding day.  That's how you know your life is about to really start SUCKING.)  Clip-Clop is teased more, then it's back to the pub where it's dinner time. 

Nutshell version:  Cold vermicelli soup, loud sucking noises.  Meat pies, red wine, arguing.  Rabbit stew, Coupeau makes joke about the rabbit meowing.  (He's AWESOME.  Total K-Fed)  Roast scraggy fowls, burnt.  Piles of dirty plates.  Arguing about Bonaparte, romantic.  Pudding with overcooked egg whites.  Too much brandy consumed!  Too many loaves eaten!  Not enough money.  Catfight, Madame Boche throws a carafe at her husband, who is feeling Madame Lerat's fat butt.  Let's dine and dash!

At the hotel a drunk guy blesses Gervaise's wedding day with the kind words: "When you're dead it's for a long long time."  That's mad warm fuzzies.      

Chapter 4:  They hunker down for four years, work like hell, pay off wedding debt, send off her older son Claude to board with an old man -- and once Claude's gone they save money in no time!  (Zola's good at reducing children to their essential nature: money pits.)  They buy some furniture, move into the building where Coupeau's bitchy sister and family live.  Oooo how they dislike Clip-Clop.

Oh!  and Clip-Clop's eight months pregnant.  She goes into labor while ironing curtains at work.  She rams fists into her mouth and finishes the curtains.  Then walks home with spasming contractions and decides that before having the baby she must make her man his dinner.  Coupeau would be lost without his dinner.  She peels potatoes and browns mutton cutlets while yelling out in labor pains.  She stirs the gravy while shifting from foot to foot, blinded with pain.  She sets the table, puts the wine bottle in the center of the table, then drops down and gives birth on the kitchen floor.  When Coupeau gets home she is humiliated because she can't remember putting salt in his potatoes!  Pshh...some women.

Nana, the baby, grows up to be a toddler, they save more cash (600 francs!) and Gervaise wants to open a shop in a cute storefront she found.  Coupeau's cool with it, just don't eff up his potatoes, but JUST when things are looking alright Gervaise and Nana visit Coupeau at a worksite and Coupeau falls off a roof and 'hits the road with the dull thud of a bundle of washing' right in front of mother and daughter.  Booyaa!

Coupeau's out of work and Gervaise may as well burn those savings because they're so gone. 

Coupeau actually gets better after a couple of months though, before the money's completely gone, but Clip-Clop the old softy doesn't think he's completely healed yet so she slips francs into his pockets and he whiles away the day with wine and ham in the pub.  But no spirits though.  He promises no spirits, only wine, because you can't get drunk on wine.  (nice Coupeau side note: a guy Goujet offers to teach him how to read whie he's down and out but Coupeau refuses because 'reading makes you thin'.  Popozao!)   

Goujet the neighbor also takes pity on the family (because he wants some of Gervaise's browned muttons I'm thinking) so he loans them 500 francs.  Gervaise rents the storefront and all seems well!  Bliss.  Sweet bliss.

Zola Book Club

Good morning and congratulations on joining the Zola book club with me.  I'm on my third Zola novel now and have declared him my favorite author, especially now that James Frey is the new Vanilla Ice (Frey, Frey, Baby...).

Nietzsche called Zola 'the delight in stinking', and not only is it true, I take delight in his delight in stinking.  The French naturalist author powered through dozens of novels about abject poverty, prostitution, murder, starvation -- and his novels often feature children to boot!  A total bonus. 

We'll be reading L'Assommoir together, which is about a woman (Gervaise, no connection to the guy from Survivor) and her descent into filth and decay.  Right now things are pretty good for Gervaise, comparitively speaking.  In the first chapter her man, a drunk, made her pawn some of her clothes, then used the money for cab fare to run out on Gervaise and her two kids.  Gervaise found this out when she was at the laundromat, using her last sous to clean her kid's knickers, and another woman was laughing at Gervaise.  Turns out Gervaise's man used to get with this lady AND her sister, so Gervaise and this lady get in an awful fight in the laundromat.  Not like a yelling girlfight, like a Kill Bill girlfight.  Gervaise wins.

We're wrapping up chapter two now, when a clean-cut neighbor guy with a steady job has just talked Gervaise into marriage.  Gervaise has a job now.  We find out she had her first kid at fourteen, nothing wrong with that.  Neither of them drink (that's sure to change).  He wants sex REAL bad, it's all he can talk about.  She is charmed, but still declines.  He starts showing up at her door in the middle of the night, crying and wanting it.  The late-night visits scare Gervaise's children.  She is further charmed.  She relents and agrees to marriage.  How's THAT for courtship?  And to think I paid for all those dates back in the day...    

Chapter three to come.  Will Gervaise sell her kids for food?  Will this guy pimp her out to absinthe drinkers?  Will she lose her job and live on the streets?  It's a shame there was no crack rock when Zola was alive. 

(Other Zola novels read to date are Therese Raquin and Germinal.  TR is an earlier work if I'm not mistaken, but Germinal is a mature novel, featuring dead kids and starvation galore.  And coal!) 

We have to share our yummy catch now

James now bears the mark of the beast, the ochre O.

This must be what it feels like for a close-knit pack of cheetahs, maybe cheetah friends and cheetah family, to have felled a delicious gazelle and patiently sit over it, nibbling at its guts and talking about how savory gazelle lungs are these days...and then to look up across the steppe and see a gigantic horde of hyenas, voracious daytime TV-viewing hyenas hungering for our gazelle parts, and maybe for a free honda civic giveaway as well.

Oprah stole our gazelle.

Bang Your Head

Despite having the silliest title and the gamiest cover in town, this book is rokken with Dokken.  The things I've learned (and I'm only up to Poison)!

Do you know which guitar shredder once, while in a fine restaurant with Ozzy, took a wine cork to the restroom, stuck it in his bum, took it back to the table, and had the waiter sniff it?  Free wine for Zakk Wylde!  (And yes in 8th grade I spelled my name with two K's but that's not important right now so shuddup.)

And do you know which uber-creepy Satanic dark lord of punk and metal in fact lived with his Maw and Paw until the ripe old evil age of 32?  Well, sacrifice my goat!  It's Glenn Danzig!

How about which band installed secret cameras in the bunks of the tour bus and broadcasted all their groupie exploits to the front of the tour bus, where band members, journalists, and drivers alike could all watch and cheer on their favorite team?  That would be these aforementioned winners, Dokken!   

And what would say if I told you that at precisely the same time Spinal Tap was released, there was not one but TWO metal Stonehenges out there in the world?  It's a beautiful thing.  (The first is an Aerosmith album but the second is none other than circa-1984 Black Sabbath [just when they were really hitting their stride], and they actually had a dwarf dressed like a devil dancing around too.  That's just very metal.)

Which metal nun simulated a Korean sex show atop a table filled with Sony execs, climaxing his show with a pee into a carafe (that was subsequently taken from their table and served at a neighboring table)?  That would be none other than Sister Ozzy.

And which lead singer bragged nonstop about his alleged 14-inch penis, "just like his dad's"?  Phil Anselmo from Pantera!  Here he is, showing the audience how big his dad's is.

More to come!  Rock out with your you know what out, just like Phil's dad.

zack

One sitting

Lately, I haven't read many books.  I have to chose very carefully, because once I get into a book, I will read the book and blow off everything else in my life - my family, my laundry, my housecleaning, my dinner... All gets shoved aside so I can finish my book.  I rarely read a book over a week, usually I finish it within a day or 2, but usually in a day. I can't read books regularly or I would find myself tossed out in the cold, with only dirty laundry to keep me warm. 

So, my point is, I picked up My Friend Leonard yesterday after Zack finished. And I didn't put it down until I finished it - I didn't even go to the bathroom or get myself a drink of water. I had one glass of water that I rationed out over the hours that I sat on the couch,  reading the book. Zack and Marcel napped, I read. When Zack woke from his nap, I was near the end, and I was crying. What an emotional ride to experience in just a few hours! For the next hour, I cried whenever I thought of the ending.

So, that's my recommendation! It is very different from A Million Little Pieces in many ways, but also similar. Less angry, but still angry. Less violent, but still pretty freaky. Very sad and very inspiring in a strange way.

Jennifer

DisneyWar

Review of DisneyWar at chili ex libris.

zack

Brothel

My review of Brothel: Mustang Ranch and Its Women has been posted at chili ex libris.

zack

My Friend Leonard is in my grubby mitts

My Friend Leonard came today!  It's been nice knowing you guys; I'm crawling back up to the attic now to read the book to end all books for the next eon.  Bliss baby bliss.  Vegas baby Vegas.

zack

Finna Ship

My copy of My Friend Leonard is finna ship.  Amazon sez:

Shipping estimate: June 15, 2005
Delivery estimate: June 18, 2005 - June 21, 2005

If anyone lives in Menlo Park James Frey will be signing at Kepler's on June 30.

Once I'm done with the book I'm gonna use it to start my own wee blog about reading, Chili Ex Libris.  Not much to look at yet. 

zack 

1001 Movies

I've been reading DisneyWar for a week, and while it's a very good book it is also somewhat depressing to be an adult now and to read the catty executive goings-on behind the Disney of my youth.  I'm up to 1995 now, after Katzenberg was fired and Ovitz hired on as president.  It's getting bad, very bad, so bad in fact that I actually left it at work for the weekend to take a couple days off from reading about business.  Instead I spent the day yesterday reading 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die.

This book is a great resource, something to flip through while adding movies to the Netflix queue.  It covers 1902-2003, and many of my favorite movies are in here.  Having a giant book like this around has inspired me to try and write my top 10 movies of all time, in no order:

1. Happiness (1998).  Pretty much my favorite movie ever.  This one's actually hindered my friend-making efforts in more than one movie small talk conversation.  I love it.
2. Boogie Nights (1997).  A Gonzales classic.  So many lines from this movie are in Jen's and my everyday speech with each other it's not even funny. 
3. Pelle the Conqueror (1987).  Miserable Swedish immigrants trying to find jobs and food.  Starving muddy children.  Abusive conditions.  Yes yes yes.
4. Requiem For A Dream (2000).  I can remember us watching this for the first time and totally completely being devastated.  Guts ripped out and fascinated by it all.  I have the utmost of respect for every single aspect of this movie's creative development: Selby's writing, Aronofsky's technological developments in the music and filming, the beautiful and desperate acting.  It messes me up good every time.
5. Hannah and Her Sisters (1986).  Far and away my favorite Woody Allen.  The holiday panoramas of the families converging are wonderful, so rich in detail.  Annie Hall and Manhattan are more romantic, but this one is far more layered, realistic, and also desperate in its trap of cultured middle age.
6. Romper Stomper (1992).  I am the biggest Russell Crowe fan on earth, and this is my all-time favorite Crowe movie.  When it came out in Austin, 1993, I saw it a couple nights in a row at Dobie theatre (thanks for coming with, Bryan!).  Once it came out on VHS I recorded it on audio tape and listened to it in my headphones.
7. Wild at Heart (1990).  I think I overindulged on this one at an early age and it ended up stunting my growth.  Growth of what I don't know, because I don't have it.  But I'm much, much happier this way, believe me.
8. Zentropa (1991).  Lucked out in seeing this at the Inwood Theatre in Dallas while 16.  I had no idea what I was getting into.  They shouldn't leave the Lars Von Trier out where minors can reach it.  There may be regulations around this loophole now, but I'm glad I got on early.  "Lars Von Trier on Lars Von Trier" is a great book on directing too. 
9. Kids (1995).  A moment of silence for Casper the Dopest Ghost...
10. Fitzcarraldo (1982).  CRAZINESS!  I've only seen this once and will probably never watch it again, but not for issues of quality.  It's such a watershed event of commitment to craft that it has changed my perspective on dedication.  Herzog and Kinski rock my world. 

We might have to buy this book.  I'm hoping Jen will do a list too. 

zack   

Literary Quotations - "Good and Bad Writing"

Nothing we write, if we hope to be any good, will ever turn out as we first thought.  - Lillian Hellman

Literary Quotations - "Good and Bad Writing"

A good novel tells us the truth about its hero; but a bad novel tells us the truth about its author.  - GK Chesterton

Literary Quotations - "Gustave Flaubert"

My deplorable mania for analysis exhausts me.  I doubt everything, even my doubt.  - Gustave Flaubert

Literary Quotations - "Fiction"

Fiction, imaginative work that is, is not dropped like a pebble upon the ground, as science maybe; fiction is like a spider's web, attached ever so slightly perhaps, but still attached to life at all four corners.  Often the attachment is scarely perceptible.  - Virginia Woolf

Literary Quotations - "Fiction"

Fiction is to the grown man what play is to the child; it is there that he changes the atmosphere and tenor of his life.  - Robert Louis Stevenson

Marcel's Literacy Goes Off

Marcel Beane is dominating!  Today he and I have the day off, and he's finished his 10th book, which means he can choose from the beloved Krispy Kreme, Gattitown, or a movie.  So he and I are a couple of hours away from going to see Madagascar. 

The kid is unstoppable.  Check out these books:  Hop On Pop, Peg and Ted, The Race (can't find on Amazon due to common title.  A search for 'The Race children's' brings up I'm Chocolate, You're Vanilla, which might be good but doesn't exactly fit the bill right now), Hot Dog (twice, which counts around here), A Funny Man, Splish Splash, The Pup Speaks Up, Mouse's Hide-And-Seek Words, and No Kisses, Please! (one of Mar's favorites).   

The wee man rules.  Even though Tim Duncan's missed free throws cost them the game.  Which doesn't have anything to do with Marcel, I just wanted to get that in. 

zack 

Jane's Addiction biography

Has anybody had a chance to read Whores, the new Jane's Addiction oral biography, yet?  It came out this month and the doormice at the public library aren't in any rush to stock it. 

The first time I heard Ocean Size I was maybe 14, and I remember making a decision with the firmest conviction possible:  I'm not going back.  Wherever I was, I'm going far far away from there.  I want to go only to a place where people create things that large and that intense. 

And long story short just under four years later I was working the graveyard shift at Ken's Donuts, which was pretty much like working with Jane's Addiction.  Those who were around back then can corroborate that.

Oh!  While I'm on the subject, Bryan I drove past our old dorm last week and it's GONE.  Torn down completely.  But the memories live on.  Peaches, The Contessa Bear, Mingo Ming Time, fun with water guns, that time you almost killed me in the shower...good times.

zack 

Literary Quotation - 'Characters'

I draw from life -- but I always pulp my acquaintance before serving them up.  You would never recognize a pig in a sausage.  - Frances Trollope

Literary Quotation - 'Description'

You must describe your women in such a way that the reader feels your tie is off and your waistcoat open.  Women and nature both.  Let yourself go.  - Anton Chekhov

Literary Quotations - "Imagination"

The imagination is a kind of electronic machine that takes account of all possible combinations and chooses the ones that are appropriate to a particular purpose, or are simply the most interesting, pleasing, or amusing.  - Italo Calvino

Literary Quotation - 'Drugs'

If you ever get that depressed unable-to-concentrate feeling, try taking Benzedrine Tablets, but not too many.  - W.H. Auden

Literary Quotation - 'Effort'

Novelists do not write as birds sing, by the push of nature.  It is part of the job that there should be much routine and some daily stuff on the level of carpentry.  - William Golding

Literary Quotation - 'Ending'

If you are going to make a book end badly, it must end badly from the beginning. - Robert Louis Stevenson

Literary Quotation - 'Erotic Writing'

Porn is altogether pragmatic.  It exists to stimulate and satisfy an appetite just the way cookery books do, except the porn reader always has his ingredients to hand.  - Irma Kurtz

Literary Quotation - 'Feeling'

This weekend I checked the Oxford Dictionary of Literary Quotations out of the library.  As you can expect it is a great resource.  I'll post a bunch here as I discover them!

No tears in the writer, no tears in the reader.  No surprise for the writer, no surprise for the reader.  -Robert Frost 

Tasty Baby Belly Buttons

I read Tasty Baby Belly Buttons to Marcel yesterday afternoon over ham sandwiches.  This is a fun retelling of a Japanese folk tale, and it has great watercolor illustrations, very busy scenes with plenty of detail for Mar to scrutinize.  He and I both enjoy the Japanese aesthetic very much.  I'd love to vacation there one day with my family. 

zack

Father/Son Wager

Not long after Marcel first began reading Hop On Pop he and I made a friendly wager.  Not a wager proper, because I was not betting against him; more like a I Bet You Won't, I Bet I Will type wager.  Anyway it was a lazy Texas Saturday afternoon.  Jennifer was cooking; I was reading; and Marcel was playing in the backyard.  He seemed a bit morose for no good reason, maybe because no one would play with him -- so like any good dad I put my book down and lobbed forth an offer: "Hey Mar, you find a roly poly I'll eat it." 

Which he did.  And which I did.  Roly Polys have a coarse crunch, what with that exoskeleton, and not much of an immediate taste -- just enough to fool me into thinking that Roly Poly eating would be all show -- but then the aftertaste kicked in, acrid and poisonous on the back of the tongue, where habanero peppers can be tasted.  Roly Polys are disgusting!  And Marcel said the guts on my tongue, which I showed him, were yellow and shiny. 

But he got a kick out of it and lost his funk.  And while caught up in the moment, I told him that as soon as he finishes Hop On Pop I'll eat THREE of those bad boys, all at once.  I thought This kid's the prince of selective hearing (I being the king), he'll forget about this by bedtime. 

So yesterday he of course finishes the book and last night he and I are out there overturning rocks, looking for Roly Poly nests.  He hadn't forgotten.  He even turned off POKEMON to go find Roly Polys, man -- and you don't understand to him Pikachu is like the Second Coming.  But we can't find any of them anywhere.  Ants galore, big fat ones, but no Roly Polys.  Poor Jen's hollering at us from inside that dinner -- REAL dinner -- is ready so strange boys please come back inside and eat.  Well just then Mar finds a centipede.  A real nice healthy one, all legs intact, and he gives me this crazy 4 year old Col. Kurtz look and I just know I'm about to eat me some 'pede.   

We bargain that one 'pede is equal to 3 Roly Polys, and we take our new friend to the dinner table -- where our saner 1/3 has made real food.  I spoon him up, which Marcel documents for posterity -- and it looks awful, so awful that I'm doing these ill burps just from watching him, which Marcel loves.  I considered knocking him back whole but that would be cheating.  So I eased the spoon on in and dumped him on my tongue, where he walked around until I moved him to my teeth.  And then fearing more of the oily Roly Poly flavor I gave him a good hearty, gut-squishing crunch. 

And it was delicious!  Really!  An immediate zest filled the front of my mouth, much like chewing on the leaf of the spearmint.  Centipedes are very minty!  So much so that I now think the flavor of mint itself is merely an approximation of centipede flavor.  It filled my mouth with its leggy bouquet, and then faded.  No aftertaste.  Clean and vaguely floral, yet sans perfume. 

I got off SO easy, young Kurtz.  And to all I highly recommend the centipede as a summertime treat, perhaps as garnish for your Salingeresque Tom Collins highball in the comfort of your own chaise lounge.  I told Jen I wouldn't be surprised if 'pedes don't soon become endangered because they're so yum.  I'll pick one up and eat it anytime now.

emeril   

Hop On Pop

Massive shoutouts to Marcel Beane, who finished Hop On Pop this morning!  He finished the entire book, all by himself, over the past couple of weeks.  He read some with Jen, some with me, and a bit by himself.  But he did the whole thing -- I did do Constantinople and Timbuktu in the end, but I think that's part of the Hop On Pop experience, right? 

When he finished I had him flip back through the book and see for himself how much he'd read -- he was just amazed and very proud of himself.  He rocks.  Next up is Splish Splash. 

He dominates.

zack

Empire Falls

I spent the weekend in the town of Empire Falls, Maine.  Upon finishing the book last night my eyes stung and my back was sore.  Russo, while at times hedging too close to Victor Hugo omniscience - the kind of exposition that can bring a plot to its knees midchapter - has succeeded in creating some miserable, miserable people here, and in very believable situations too.

I understand an Empire Falls film is being made, for HBO?  It'll be flashback heavy, that's for sure. 

Empire Falls was very good; it made me want to eat bacon and arm wrestle.

zack

       

No Sleep 'Til My Friend Leonard!

Ladies and gentlemen, we have one month until the release of My Friend Leonard.  ONE MONTH!  One month until we can again document the suffering and growth of my man James. 

Anybody out there NOT yet read A Million Little Pieces?  Get it; read it; roll it in cupcake nubbins.  Love it.  Feel it.  Lick it.  Baste it.  Parboil it.  Al Dente it. 

James, please come back to Austin!  You so rocked.

zack

My Friend Leonard book review, Publishers Weekly 03.28.05

PW recently reviewed My Friend Leonard (which comes out in a month and 1/2: June16th).  It's given a starred review, which is a very good, if understated, thing.

Frey achieves another stylistic coup as he develops a narrative thread begun in 2003's "A Million Little Pieces".  He chronicles his journey out of the terrifying darkness of addiction, and the friend he meets along the way, Leonard.  A gangster, raconteur and mentor, Leonard was introduced in "Pieces" as one of Frey's new rehab friends.  Here, he pushes Frey out into the world, pampering him one moment, giving him tough love the next.  As in "Pieces", Frey's style throughout is loose, untraditional yet perfectly crafted [...]

There's something mesmerizing about the endless tumble of words, the nonstop spilling out of Frey's troubles and triumphs.  In the hands of a less capable writer, all of this cool, tight narration might numb the reader and distance the experience.  Instead, the book packs a full-body emotional wallop.  Frey's eye is keen for detail: the inside of a county lockup; the flat, gray Chicago winter; an out-of-control Super Bowl party in Los Angeles; the grind of living day to day -- all come alive in his sparse, powerful prose.  At its core, this is an examination of a friendship.  Frey's extraordinary relationship with Leonard is alive, a flesh-and-blood bond forged in the agony of rehab and sustained through honesty and trust.   

zack

First Sentence of My Friend Leonard

On my first day in jail, a three hundred pound man named Porterhouse hit me in the back of the head with a metal tray.

And there we have it, the first sentence of James Frey's soon-to-be-released 2nd book My Friend Leonard.  (Big thanks to Poets & Writers magazine.)  For those of you born in a barn or just joining us, My Friend Leonard is the most anticipated book release of 2005 (Harry who?).  There is still time for the uninitiated to read A Million Little Pieces before his new book comes out, so please do!  It's the scary memoir with the hand covered in cupcake nubbins on its cover.

Plot description of Leonard, a bit heavy on the PR-speak:

Perhaps the most unconventional and literally breathtaking father-son story you'll ever read, My Friend Leonard pulls you immediately and deeply into a relationship as unusual as it is inspiring.

The father figure is Leonard, the high-living, recovering coke addict "West Coast Director of a large Italian-American finance firm" (read: mobster) who helped to keep James Frey clean in A Million Little Pieces. The son is, of course, James, damaged perhaps beyond repair by years of crack and alcohol addiction-and by more than a few cruel tricks of fate.

James embarks on his post-rehab existence in Chicago emotionally devastated, broke, and afraid to get close to other people. But then Leonard comes back into his life, and everything changes. Leonard offers his "son" lucrative-if illegal and slightly dangerous-employment. He teaches James to enjoy life, sober, for the first time. He instructs him in the art of "living boldly," pushes him to pursue his passion for writing, and provides a watchful and supportive veil of protection under which James can get his life together. Both Leonard's and James's careers flourish . . . but then Leonard vanishes. When the reasons behind his mysterious absence are revealed, the book opens up in unexpected emotional ways.

You the man James.

zack

On Bullshit

I've been seeing some of these Princeton University Press treatises off and on since I worked at UT, and I finally picked one up.  On Bullshit is an easy little read -- you'll finish it before your venti -- about deception and manipulation in everyday speech and behavior.  Its author, an ivy league philosopher, succinctly compares and evaluates lying, humbug, and bullshit, tracking the etymology of bull and bullshit through the examples of both found in the OED (which I used while working at the university and now miss very much).  It's about the size of an index card and only 60 pages or so.  Treatises like this are great casual segways into philosophy, proving that we are all linguists.  No shit.

zack 

The Glass Castle

I am freaking out about how awesome The Glass Castle is. 

(Now, I also read something recently about a psychology experiment called Lost In The Mall, which seemed to prove that people have a tendency to create or 'suddenly remember' lost memories that corroroborate their own self-image as a survivor.  It is for that reason I resist making wholesale comparisons between parts of this book and of my own childhood, but I do think there's some truth to this feeling, that at times I was maybe a little lost in the mall with these folks.) 

I'm on page 91 now, hoping to finish it either tonight or tomorrow.  Right now I'm averaging one genuine jaw-drop response per 3 pages, so about 30 times so far this evening.   I've got a few bats in the family myself, so it's escapist for me to read an account like this, an account of what it's really like to have a crazy family. 

She's too quick to distance herself from her old life with the book's Park Avenue preface, so that narratively even the densest reader knows where she now stands (and what pumps she's standing in) -- but I'm betting that's the only way she could coax the old cobwebby stories out from their shells at all.  Also, the dust jacket plugs her as 'a regular contributor to msnbc.com' -- well she is, but she's the gossip columnist.  I'm not hating -- I have Page Six bookmarked on my PC up at work -- but just call a spade a spade already.  I don't like it when people package themselves in shi-shi misleading fashions, particularly on family-exposing memoirs.    

And does anybody else think the book's cover is looking a little like Chloe Sevigny in Brown Bunny?  Not that I've seen Brown Bunny yet, but her work and Vincent Gallo's work get props around here, so hey, the book has THAT going for it too.  That's just win-win.

Amazon and other sites are positioning this book as a summer book, but it's really a weekender, if that.  A very good read, honest but not cathartic.  I think she's doing her best, though.

zack            

Slush Pile

This is a great essay currently being passed around the internet about ways to deal with the slush pile and get your novel noticed.  Anyone who's got a manuscript being bandied about, or who will have one in bandiment soon, should take a look at this.

Download on_the_survival_of_rats_in_the_slush_pile.pdf

zack

My Friend Leonard: Cover

So by my count we have another 73 days before the release of My Friend Leonard, give or take a few days.  Here is the cover, which I boosted from Amazon.com  -- click on it for a nice, large wallpaperable size. 

There's nothing new on the WWW just yet about Mr. Frey, but I anticipate a nice lil' flurry of articles soon enough -- puff pieces and sidebars in EW, maybe Details, etc. -- but SOMETHING, something with some new pictures preferably. 

Google has a nice feature now, that offers X amount of images at the top of a web search result screen.  Google yields 297 images from a 'James Frey' search, and many of them are as remarkable as they are soothing to the eye (see below).  Frey is a Zelig's Zelig, it seems. 

To me the very best part of A Million Little Pieces was when Leonard had the standoff in the rain with James, threatening to beat the hell out of him if he tried to leave.  Leonard made the book, because without him James would not have survived. 

I think Leonard was a sounding board for James' wonderful/awful attitude, and he somehow proved that you don't have to become a sugarcoated 12-step addict in order to be sober.  You don't even have to dig things that are legal.  You just have to kick and survive and be a man about it.

To me it seemed James respected Leonard because Leonard could not only withstand James' force but he saw it coming.  They also both had a yen for the con, which you never plan for but when it happens it's undeniable. 

I absolutely cannot wait for My Friend Leonard.  They are such good men.  Criminals and gangsters, but we all have our pasts. 

For those of you who have not yet read A Million Little Pieces, you have 73 days to do so.  Or however long it is until June 16.

zack

Frank

Marcel and I spent a good chunk of the morning reading The Frank Book by Jim Woodring.  I'd insert a caveat here and say it's not really a children's book, despite appearances -- but I'm not sure it's an adult's book either.  I think it's just out there, honestly.  And it's wonderful.  There's almost no words at all in all the work, just extremely odd series of pictures telling some story, I'm not sure what. 

It's a little allegorical?  Kinda?  I have no idea, but I know I love looking at it with Marcel.  There's a cast of characters in the stories, all of whom Marcel has given names of his own.  The fellow at right is Manhog, whom Marcel calls Human Pig.  He spends a lot of time peeking into windows, being sad, and hurting himself.  Human Pig is our favorite.

These guys Marcel has named Paper Bag Cat and Binocular Cat.  There's also Eyeball Swimming Pool, Skeleton Skateboard, Blue Moon Head Guy, and I'm sure I'm forgetting others.  He has names for all the weird fish that dwell in Eyeball Swimming Pool.

Parents far and wide should keep a copy of The Frank Book on the bookshelf for rainy mornings like the one we had today.  Frank even trumps Spongebob. 

Aren't kids fun?

zack   

Searching for My Friend Leonard

I preordered my copy of My Friend Leonard on Amazon.com this weekend.  It's still due out June 16.  Material about the book is rare as of yet; web searches for him and his writing still primarily yield old links from back in 2003.  Today's image search on Google for My Friend Leonard gave me this, for example:

Sigh.  Anyway, now that I'm just waiting for the book's release I thought I would branch out and link to some of the other James Frey projects, like his movie stuff.  Here's the imdb.com link to his 1998 screenplay Kissing A Fool. 

Also, a quick dig around imdb.com shows that Laurence Dunmore has signed on to direct the film version of A Million Little Pieces, and that James Frey has also written the screenplay for that one.  Dunmore recently directed The Libertine, starring Johnny Depp, 'Malkovich Malkovich', and Samantha Morton -- which sounds pretty good, kinda seedy and Sadist. 

This is from Stephen Jeffreys' own account of his original play The Libertine, for which he also wrote the screenplay:

My play The Libertine is about John Wilmot, second Earl of Rochester, who was the leading figure at the court of Charles II. Rochester is now recognized as one of the major poets of the 17th century, but in his own lifetime his career as a womanizer, drinker, atheist, pornographer and rebel gained him more attention than his serious writing. He died of alcohol and syphilis at the age of 33 after making a late conversion to Christianity.

Dunmore and Frey's film version of A Million Little Pieces is due out in 2006.  Please hurry, My Friend Leonard.

zack

 

The Great and Terrible Veep

Thus far Jen and I have followed an unwritten rule to stay away from politics on Chili Powder.  It's cumbersome and divisive, and I also don't know enough about it to fill a single paragraph.  Today I'll stray from this rule just a bit to plug a wonderful new book I'm finishing up: John Nichols' DICK: The Man Who Is President.

I have been on the hunt for a Cheney biography for years; just ask poor Jen.  My dilemma is that I am fascinated with Dick Cheney.  I completely love the guy, just as I believe he is dark and awful.  Jen once told me of a Jungian archetype "The Great and Terrible Mother" -- well, I think Dick Cheney fits as "The Great and Terrible Veep". 

I openly root for the guy at every Cheney viewing I can get, which are few -- and thus of a high value to me (During the lone VP debate [why just one?], I wished he would open his giant snake jaw and eat his opponent whole.  I root for him like I root for all the villians in Marcel's cartoons.  I think Cheney is proof of God's existence, because evil like his has to have a Grace from which to fall.) .  I hate everything he says, and I fear the result of everything he is involved in. 

He is a condensed form of the whole Nietzschean Will To Power thing.  If you dropped Jack Welch, Adolf Hitler, Henry Ford, Charles Manson, and Richard Nixon into a vat and boiled them down, the resultant sap would be Dick Cheney.  I just love the guy.  I get all Jodie Foster about him.

zack   

Weekend Update

So I have been slacking on the wine reviews. We consumed at least 3 bottles of white wine since my last review, and I have not had the time or energy to comment. I think it is because they were all just "O.K." (probably since I haven't spent over 9 dollars on any of them....). I can't remember any of the names of the wines,  but I remember one (Chenin-Blanc) had a very strong flavor, like gasoline, at first- then turned into a somewhat pleasant flavor in my mouth, while my throat burned for about 30 minutes.  One glass and I was asleep on the couch. Another one was probably not as good as I thought at the time, but when you are drinking wine while discussing life's drama, or after a long day of driving to and from Waco, any wine tastes good.  So that's that, and when I find one that I like again, I will post it.

Now to movies:

The Shape of Things- I actually got this movie from the library yesterday. I am a fan of 2 of Neil Labute's other movies "Your Friends and Neighbors" and "In the Company of Men" and figured it sounded interesting, and would probably be another brutal one. I'm not sure why this movie didn't affect me like the other two, perhaps it was the acting, or the fact that I figured out the "twist" early in the movie. Or maybe it was because it still seemed like a play, and not a movie. Perhaps the movie is better suited for the theater....

Vanity Fair- I was looking forward to this one, after seeing Monsoon Wedding, and loving how colorful and touching the movie was. Oh, and Dubey and the marigolds....Anyway, It was also very beautiful, but I just didn't get Becky Sharp. Perhaps I should read the book..?

The Venus Beauty Institute - Vénus beauté (institut)- Cute, strange, movie.

Hey, and I read this week:

Drop City- I grabbed this book off the library shelf because I thought the "Drop City" was an interesting title. I saw the cover, a circle of unclothed hippies laying face down in a field, and I was like- oops, I don't think I'm interested in this, I had my fill of strange hippie behavior when we had HBO.  But I read the description, and it it looked interesting. I found this synopsis about Drop City on Salon.com  "A group of stoned, free-loving hippies set up a commune in backwoods Alaska -- and discover that Nature is a lot crueler than they dreamed." sums it up- but there is much more, of course. I flew through this book in 2 days. At first I thought that living in a commune, with the philosophy of LATWIDNO (Land Access to Which Is Denied No One) seemed like a pretty cool thing to be a part of. About halfway in to the book I realized that I'd rather have a job, buy a house, go to the doctor, and buy my food at the grocery store down the street instead of trapping a bear.

Pretty cool book - got another one out by T.C Boyle yesterday, Riven Rock.

Jennifer

pam can bat! can sam?

How could I forget?!  Marcel finished his 6th book tonight!  Big Beane is running things, reading "Pam can bat.  Can Sam?  Sam can!  Pam can hop.  Can Sam?  Sam can!"

The dude reigns supreme.  Go Marcel Beane.  Tomorrow Mrs. T will give him books 7-12, and we'll be doing more of the same.  He just beams once he nails a word for the first time.  Jenny and I haven't doted this much since he started using the toilet.

One day he's gonna kill me for posting that.

zack

My Friend Leonard - 2

Riverhead has pushed the release date for My Friend Leonard back until June 16!  Curses.  The release date was May 19 the last time I checked.

This sucks.  That's a full 'nother month of waiting for this book.  What's up with this, James?  I know there's others who feel the same way I do about this phenomenal man who's out there writing phenomenal books; I see the results of your Google searches for his new book ending up here, like Theresa - hi Theresa!  Sorry I haven't emailed you yet.  As to all the other James Frey lurkers, please leave a comment!  If you care enough about Frey's writing to Google his unreleased book -- as I do -- chances are good we have something in common...and chances are also good that what we have in common is very special to us and very interesting. 

In any case, this waiting SUCKS!!!...but thanks for taking the time to sit yer butt down and write more about your friend Leonard, James Frey.  We're waiting.

zack   

My Friend Leonard

I have got to break it down.  My main man James Frey's new book My Friend Leonard is coming May 19th. 

There will be no pre-ordering of Harry Potter books in this house.  Only books by the man, James Frey.  A Million Little Pieces jacked me up so bad I had to leave work one day and just come home and deal with it and finish the book. 

So what is that then...105 days until My Friend Leonard comes out?  I'm counting them down.  My friend Teresa and I heard him read from A Million Little Pieces one night, and he was so special and nervous and clearly pained by his own book. 

I feel like that guy in that awful diamond ring black & white commercial for Zales or something, who yells "I LOVE THIS WOMAN!" and scares all the pigeons away.  I can never even fully express how I feel about Frey's writing, I get all torn, I feel like that jackass in the commercial, I feel like standing in the Barnes and Noble and yelling "I LOVE THIS BOOK!" 

But I can't go out like that.  James Frey and his friend Leonard would not be having it either. 

Everybody read James Frey.  Just like that:  Read James Frey.

zack         

Saturday With the Gonz; Candyfreak

Family Saturdays are rites of passage that at their best can be relaxing even as you collectively shuttle about from appt. to appt.  Today was one such day for us.  Marcel's kung fu was so cool!  I'm glad I finally got to see it and meet Sifu Paul.  My son's cat stance is cooler than your son's cat stance.

Mar had a birthday party to attend after kung fu, which gave Jen and me a chance to catch up with many of our parent friends.  Mar's schoolmates have killer parents, great conversationalists with interesting lives.  We love our little pre-k community...and when our little pre-k community also involves CAKE, I turn into a regular Oscar Wilde out there, chatting it up with Jenny's mom, Eeshann's mom, moms from the adjacent party.

Jen got new glasses today, and they look great, very smart and sexy.  Very interesting and rectalgular...um, which is the way I typo 'rectangular' when I'm on crack.  Like right now.

Actually right now I'm basking in the glow of the book I started to read today:  Candyfreak.  Do not walk to the booksto'.  Do not run to the booksto'.  Haul massive buttocks to the booksto', flee in the direction of the booksto' as if you were being chased by an eight-year old, coke-addled Drew Barrymore starting fires with her mind!  Everyone in my life MUST read Candyfreak by Steve Almond. 

A sample passage:

Down on the third floor, wafer production was in full swing and I immediately experienced that overwhelming olfactory blast known as Halloween Smell; a free-floating bouquet of sugar, cocoa butter, and flavorings. [...] The paste was rolled into thin sheets and punched into the desired shape.  This punching happened very quickly.  (So quickly that it occurred to me - in one of those moments of morbid speculation that besets me when I'm overstimulated - that I could have slipped my hand under one of the mechanized pistons and wound up with Necco stigmata.)

Another topic discussed in the book is the ICS, the Initial Candy Supplier, in one's life.  Jen's ICS is her grandmother's house.  I have an ICS tie: Killer memories of buying Lik-m-aid and Whatchamacallits at the neighborhood 7/11, and equally killer memories of devouring my aunt Kathy's fudge at Christmas time.  I would palm giant smudgy handfuls of the fudge, stuff them in my pockets, do whatever it took to have it all to myself.  I was not a glutton; my cousins were.  What I was was the fudge equivalent of Martin Luther nailing up the 95 Theses in the dead of night, a fudge pariah  If my family had killed me for my many thefts, I would've been a fudge martyr.

Tomorrow Marcel and I are seeing the new Ice Cube disaster, err, movie:  Are We There Yet?  I'm actually kinda lil' bit sorta in a way looking forward to seeing it.  But then, I also actually LIKE my dentist; I walked the ENTIRE 2004 3M half-marathon on a destroyed knee; and on three occasions in my early 20s I put out cigarettes on my own body.  So yeah, you could say I've got a high tolerance for this type of torture.  (And we won't mention the genuine parental angst involved in seeing a bad PG movie starring the main lyricist for NWA's phemonenal Straight Outta' Compton.  Once upon a time I would've been grounded by my parents for listening to Cube; now I'm taking my son to a Sunday Ice Cube matinee.  "...cause when I got my sawed-off, bodies are hauled off..." indeed...sigh.)

zack

Comic Books from 70s and 80s

Rehearsal let out early tonight (read: We broke Geoff's one and only chair so I left so he could mourn.), and now I have little to do around the house besides antagonize my wife.  And lo, she has gone to bed now to get away from me, so I sit and type alone.  Lo.

So a little white wine down the gullet and some staring at the wall, and here they come, like clockwork...the comic book characters I grew up with.  Some are funnier than others, though.  I found a few pictures online:

All respect due to the Secret Wars.  I was still 6, almost 7, when this 12-issue limited series came out: 1982.  The Secret Wars lasted for a whole year, and they ruled; the Beyonder kidnaps all the A- list bad guys and good guys (and a few B-listers thrown in there too) in the Marvel Universe, transports them to a world he created, and makes them fight for his own amusement.  Yeah, it sounds corny, but at least they knew how they got on that planet and why they were there.  Can you say the same about your life?  The best issue is the last one, where Dr Doom wills all the heroes back into life by doubting himself and leaking his power (which he stole) out into the heroes.  Omnipotence is a terrible burden.

Incredible Hulk 181 is the 1st appearance of Wolverine; technically 180 is because Wolverine pounces on Hulk (like this cover) in the last frame of the issue.  Oh well.  Man, the story is bad, but Wolverine's egg-shaped hat with real whiskers is worth the price of admission.  I think he was Weapon X then, too.  The Canadian government killing machine drone with no identity.  I hate it when that happens.

The Dazzler was a singer who could absorb the energy from sound, convert it into light, and um, 'dazzle' people.  I remember in the books they always made a big deal about how she lit her own shows - there were always some word balloons in the side of the frame where some couple in the nightclub is like "Groovy light show, Duane."  "Yeah I told you she was the most."  Later she ditched the Farrah Fawcett hair and roller skates and became an X-Man.  Which sucked.

Comics don't get more 70s than Power Man and Iron Fist.  Brilliant, brilliant 70s action.  At first I didn't know which one was which; I assumed the green one was Power Man because his fists glowed and emitted some pink smoke.  It turns out that was Iron Fist.  This comic always had the 'gritty, urban drama' edge to it - because its protagonist was black, of course.  These two would chase down weed dealers and pimps mostly, and the issues would always try to be real edgy - like once they tore the door off of the heroin 'shooting gallery', there sits Power Man's junkie sister saying "Yo Luke, wanna try a spike?" or something bad like that.  Power Man's whole family was always in the series, and they were all strung out hookers and stuff.  Even his dad.

For more fun comic book covers check out Gweeb.com.  He's got tons of 70s covers - but warning, he also likes Asian girls, as the popups attest.

zack 

   

Dorothy Parker's theatre reviews

The night before Nocturne I again stayed up too late, this time reading Dorothy Parker's fabled theatre reviews.  I have read her poems and, as she herself said, they are very dated.  The reviews, however, are surely every bit as frightening as the day she wrote them.  Which was somewhere between 1918-1920 in Vanity Fair.

I'd like to quote a few of them here, as they are terrifying - and, Catholic at heart, I like to be punished:

of John Drinkwater's play Abraham Lincoln:

"This play holds the season's record, thus far, with a run of four evening performances and one matinee.  By an odd coincidence, it ran just five performances too many."

of A.A. Milne's play Give Me Yesterday:

"Its hero is caused, by a novel device, to fall asleep and a-dream; and thus he is given yesterday.  Me, I should have given him twenty years to life."

of George Bernard Shaw's Getting Married:

"I regret to say that during the first act of this, I, for what I hope