The Stick is Mightier than the Conch

Mossflower by Brian Jacques
The Black Stallion Returns by Walter Farley
Freddy Goes to the North Pole by Walter R. Brooks

I've been given the stick by Glenn of Dare I Read? and I guess that means I'm stuck.....hello, is this thing on?

Before tackling the questions at hand I just wanted to bid farewell, after only two posts from the depths of my soul, to the Short and Sweet concept. In the future if I have barely a paragraph to contribute to a book then so be it. Also Dare I Read? is an original concept where the author focuses more on the story surrounding his book than the book itself. Summaries and critical reviews can be found just about anywhere for any published book. I'll just use Glenn's technique when the occasion calls for it.

The Stick: You're stuck inside Fahrenheit 451, which book do you want to be?

Delta of Venus or any set of stories by Anais Nin. Sex and Sensuality is best when it's forbidden plus if things have to be hot what's better hot than sex?

The Stick: Have you ever had a crush on a fictional character?

Don't believe a thing Tammy tells you about Ramona Geraldine Quimby. Besides, I was 9 years old.

The Stick: The last book you bought is:

Numbers 11 through 14 of the Mack Bolan Executioner series by Don Pendleton.

The Stick: The last book you read:

Completely? All the way through? The Tale of Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle by Beatrix Potter.

The Stick: What book are you currently reading?

Post Captain by Patrick O'Brian (which will be posted soon.)

The Stick: Five books you would take on a deserted island

Christ I hate these kind of questions. The Anarchist's Cookbook and I really don't know or care which else. Oh, I know...and four many-paged notebooks to finally get away from my chronic writer's block and work without interruptions.

The Stick: Who are you going to pass this stick too (3 persons) and why?

Tammy, because she's a questionaire/survey junkie, and probably no one else because the people I know tend to hate these things. Oh wait, I'll send my cousin the stick because she's always forwarding me wasteful little jokes, chain letters, inspirational stories and whatnot. Before Hotmail expanded and gave us all that space Î was constantly in danger of reaching my limit thanks to her.

So that's the stick, if you stumble upon this site you're required to comment or sign my guestbook and then consider yourself "sticked"

Before I sign out, Mossflower was exciting and compelling but suffered from the main villain being tortured by prophetic nightmares (ala Richard III) exactly as Cluny the Scourge was in Redwall. The Black Stallion Returns is better than the first book, and Freddy Goes to the North Pole was fine for what it was, lite writing for lite reading, but I had to laugh evilly over something: two orphans, brother and sister, are rescued from an abusive home. Spankings are so much a fact of life that they've grown accustomed to them. They spank each other for familiarity's sake for the first few days after salvation. From what I understand there's similar stories on certain newsgroups. If your Internet Provider is Integrity Online (or whatever that sham might be calling itself these days) you'll be blocked from searching them out yourself.

A Rabidly Historical Review

Old Yeller by Fred Gipson
The Story of Mankind by Hendrik van Loon

Old Yeller gets shot at the end.

"MERWYN!," you might scream, "why didn't you put SPOILER warnings up? You just ruined the book for everyone!"

Now hold on. First of all, the fact that Old Yeller gets shot at the end is a bit of cultural trivia that is known by most people even if they've never read the book or seen the movie. Secondly we're told so right up front, on the first page:

He made me so mad at first that I wanted to kill him. Then, later, when I had to kill him, it was like having to shoot some of my own folks.

But the whole story isn't about how Travis Coates ends up shooting his dog. It's a reminiscence, loosely based on family stories of Gipson's grandparents, of a fourteen year old boy's coming of age the year his father left on a cattle drive.

The men of Salt Licks, Texas, pooled their herds together to get the best price in Abilene. This was to acquire "cash money" which was sorely lacking in those years after The Civil War. Travis Coates is given the unenviable task of being the man of the family during his father's absence and he does it without complaint. Well, actually, there are a couple complaints: His five-year-old brother Arliss and an ugly stray dog that steals the last of the pork meat.

Travis would have been happy enough to kill the dog right then and there. Little Arliss wanted to keep him, however, and Mrs. Coates didn't see why not. The first few chapters give us examples of why Travis wants to get rid of Yeller but soon one complaint does something that shows him how important both of them are to him. (That right there is a poorly written sentence that would get slashed, crossed, circled and underlined in any English Class or Editor's office. Come to think of it so is this one.)

While Fred Gipson considered Old Yeller to be his best book most give that honor to Hound Dog Man which was written a couple years earlier. Gipson followed Old Yeller with the sequel Savage Sam which was critically applauded despite it's being too violent for younger readers. Todays' reader may have a problem with the portrayal of Indians in the books, especially Savage Sam. I personally don't see the need. I consider Dances with Wolves to be one of my favorite movies: That, along with plenty of shows and documentaries on The History Channel, give me more than my share of "white guilt". Being respectful of todays' Native Americans shouldn't require one to block out the fact that sometimes settlers were massacred.

There's nothing wrong with history being looked at from a different perspective. It's admirable to let all sides have their say. When we're told that "those who forget history are condemned to repeat it" we must remember that it applies to all aspects.

History is complex; the stories from any aspect are almost infinite. History books today cover every conceivable event and subject. One bit of History Trivia is that the first winner of The John Newbery Medal is a history book, The Story of Mankind, by the Dutch-American historian Hendrik Willem van Loon.

Hendrik covered the entire known historical story of the world in one book, writing and illustrating it in a manner easy for youngsters to grasp. (The Durants would do the exact opposite with their multi-book series, each chapter of van Loon equaling 500 pages, small type, of Durant.)

The Story of Mankind, having been written in 1921, is a bit dated. Not because it precedes The Atomic Age and The Space Race and Watergate and AIDS but because Hendrik made the assumption that not only were his readers going to be white but also of Dutch descent. He had originally written it for his children so it's possible he never got around to re-editing it for a broader audience.

van Loon's book, despite its simplicity, is loaded with insightful observation, such as:

Gaius Julius Octavianus Augustus was living in the palace of the Palitine hill, busily engaged upon the task of ruling his empire.

In a little village of distant Syria, Mary, the wife of Joseph the Carpenter, was tending her little boy, born in a stable of Bethlehem.

This is a strange world.

Before long, the palace and the stable were to meet in open combat.

And the stable was to emerge victorious.

Hendrik van Loon intended for The Story of Mankind to be updated frequently. Long after his death new editions with extra chapters are still being released. After 400 pages of Hendrik's style these extra pieces stick out like a sore thumb. When reading the book for this review (again) I read only as far as his original went. That left me nearly 200 pages of unread material but I was only interested in van Loon's take.

Anti-Lent

Cod: A Biography Of The Fish That Changed The World by Mark Kurlansky

I love seafood. I've eaten it for as long as I can remember. Clams, Mussels, Crab, Shrimp, Oysters, I love it all.

When I was younger I never cared for the fish portion that usually came with a platter. Often deeply breaded and fried I never got any enjoyable flavors out of it.

Slowly that changed over the years. Not counting Salmon and Tuna I originally thought that all fish tasted the same. As a teen I had halibut that had been marinated in teriyaki and loved it. I was able to have red snapper, sea bass, and halibut that wasn't altered by any strong sauce. I thought that perhaps it was cod I didn't like until one day I ate a dish that made me wanting more. Noting that I was also liking peppers and olives, two foods I hadn't cared for before, I figured my taste buds had matured.

Even with a newfound love for the taste of cod I didn't think it could be a valid subject for a history book. Mark Kurlansky proved me wrong. Not only is his book well researched it is well written, never mired in boring dates or names. His claim, that cod changed the World, is not hyperbole.

When cod is salted and dried it is practically 80% protein and can last indefinitely. Folks of the Middle Ages needed cheap food that would survive without refrigeration. Cod was the answer, and also answered the Catholics need for protein on Fridays and Lent.

The pursuit of cod was the backbone for John Cabot's exploration of the New World and those who followed him. Those who were able to establish fisheries became millionaires. The colonists made money in a triangle-trade between Africa and the Caribean. George III's attempts to tax or squelch that trade was a major bone of contention that led to the Revolution.

Students in the Pacific Northwest learn how Britain and America nearly went to war once over a pig and a potato field. Britain and Iceland actually did go to war, over fishing rights, three times and all in the 20th century.

Iceland depended on cod for their entire economy, it was only a small portion of England's. As all the nations depleted the stock and fish became more scarce Iceland was instrumental in the maritime nations having 200 miles of ocean be their territory. England opposed it, saying that the ocean should be open for anyone regardless of how close to another country's shore it was. England would sing a different tune later when Spain wanted to be admitted to the European Union's waters.

Cod is a hearty fish. It can survive more punishment than a salmon. It is disease resistant and has very few predators. Unfortunately one of its predators is man, whose greed knows no satiety. Long Lines and Bottom Trawlers have done their part to turn former breeding grounds into an ocean desert. When old fishing grounds run dry fishermen commonly blame outsiders. Instead of considering conservation methods and their own impact on the environment, they compensate for a small catch by using a bigger net.

William Hooper said, "The biggest problem we have is the fault of the Spanish." He was asked how it could all be the fault of the Spanish since they were newcomers and the catch had been declining for forty years. Hooper thought a minute and then added, "Yes, the Scots used to overfish."

I love the taste of cod and other fish too. As much as it dismays me I would be willing to give it up, a sort of Anti-Lent, in order to allow the stock to replenish itself. Unfortunately Man and Nature might take the decision out of my hands.

In January 1994, a new minister, Brian Tobin, announced an extension of the moratorium. All the Atlantic cod fisheries in Canada were to be closed except for one in southwestern Nova Scotia, and strict quotas were placed on other ground species. Canadian cod was not yet biologically extinct, but it was commercially extinct - so rare that it could no longer be considered commercially viable. Just three years short of the 500-year anniversary of the reports of Cabot's men scooping up cod in baskets, it was over. Fishermen had caught them all.

That was 11 years ago, and it hasn't gotten better.

Short and Sweet #2

Longarm by Tabor Evans.

Custis Long is defined by his surname. Not only is his name Long, but so is his height and his, ahem, size. As a United States Marshall he is literally the Long Arm of the Law.

Longarm never wastes a step, breath or word. He doesn't waste time worrying or complaining about what he can't control. He's given a job and he does it.

When reviewing The Executioner books I originally planned on keeping a running tab of kills, but circumstances in the first book made that impossible. For Longarm's series I was going to tabulate his women, but circumstances in the first book kept that from happening. You'll just have to find a copy yourself to see what I'm talking about.

In this first book Longarm is sent to Crooked Lance to bring back Cotton Younger, suspected of knowing the whereabouts of Frank and Jesse James. He's hampered by other lawmen staking their claim to him and the town's vigilante committee holding out for the top bidder.

When another lawman succeeds in sneaking off with the prisoner it appears that Longarm's assignment is done, but here's a bit of a spoiler: Custis Long never quits until an assignment is complete.

The Executioner #1

War Against The Mafia by Don Pendleton

You say that a good cause will even sanctify war! I tell you, it is the good war that sanctifies every cause!
Friedrich Nietzsche

Friedrich Nietzsche has been maligned for most of the twentieth century. Often believed to be an inspiration for the Nazi party he was in fact an Anti-Nationalist who was also against Anti-Semitism. His sister, who didn't share his view, published selective portions of his writings deceptively to further her own agenda. He is also hated for having coined the phrase "God is Dead" even though that was his disgusted observation on Europe's rampant nihilism at the time and not a personal theocratic view.

Nietzsche, who was against Christianity (along with any public organization), wrote his philosophical take using Zarathustra (Zoroaster) metaphorically. The irony is that most of Christianity's core ideals, the idea of Good and Evil, the idea of a Paradise for the dead, the idea of a deity born of a virgin, the idea of monotheism, and the idea of a Trinity got their start in the Zoroastrianism of Babylonia.

Friedrich believed that Man wasn't complete, that from Animal to Man one could eventually evolve to Ubermensch which has been translated as Overman or Superman. An Overman was Master of himself and Servant to nobody. Neither was he a servant to Society, its morals or its values. Nietzsche's idea of Good and Evil are different from what we take it to be. "Evil" is anything that fights Society's norms and as such could be "Good" in some circumstances.

Sgt. Mack Bolan, star of Don Pendleton's phenomenal Executioner series and its many spin-offs, is a man doing good through evil. He got his nickname in the jungles of Vietnam from his calculated tally of terminations. The official count was at 95 (many of them top-ranked Viet Cong officers) when Bolan was rushed home to bury his family.

His fourteen year old brother told him what was kept from the police: Sam Bolan had borrowed money from a loan shark after a mild heart attack kept him from work for awhile. His lighter work load didn't pay him enough to keep up with the payments which resulted in harrassments and assaults that steadily increased. Sixteen year old Cindy Bolan tried to intervene and was talked into prostitution as a quick way to settle the debt. Johnny Bolan learned of his sister's work and couldn't think of anything other than telling their father, hoping he'd stop her. Sam Bolan's reaction was to shoot the family and then himself.

Mack Bolan learned that the loan company was tied to the Mafia. He also learned that the police weren't going to do squat; Mafia convictions were nearly impossible and Sam Bolan was clearly the killer. Mack didn't see the point in fighting an enemy on the other side of the planet when there were enemies at home.

In Vietnam Sgt. Bolan was an executioner, sent on missions to kill specific people. He was often close enough to hear them breathing, to see the pain and fear in their eyes when they knew they were dying. He did that 95 times, not miles away from a launch pad or aircraft, not in the heat of battle when Right and Wrong doesn't exist and all one thinks about is living another minute, but close enough for a conversation.

His Vietnam life became his Pittsfield life. His killings were often messy. His pity for those who begged was non-existent. Society could not condone his cold-blooded taking of human lives without benefit of trial but in Mack Bolan's philosophy, in the increasing public sentiment, and in the unofficial sanction of the police force, he was fighting the good fight.

He was Superman, literally fighting for Truth, Justice and The American Way. He was Superman, seemingly invincible (surviving a bullet in the shoulder.) He was Superman, the Man of Steel, son of Sam Bolan who spent his life in the Steel Industry; The Man of Steel, nicknamed Iron-Man Bolan by one of his few friends.

He had no delusions of living a long life, expecting every day to be his last, but War Against The Mafia ends with Bolan driving across the country to track down a plastic surgeon buddy from Vietnam, expecting it to be his last mile and planning on it being bloody to the end. Ten years after Don Pendleton's death Mack Bolan hasn't ended his final mile.

What Was I Thinking?

Kristy's Great Idea by Ann M. Martin
Double Love by Francine Pascal

Sometimes I just have no excuse.

I mean, a professional book reviewer actually gets paid to read something they think is a crappy waste of time. Even then it's usually a recent book, not something published twenty years before.

So how did I end up reading The Baby-Sitter's Club and Sweet Valley High for this blog that doesn't have many readers yet?

I've read girlish books before like Ramona Quimby, Laura Ingalls Wilder and Alice in Wonderland but until now I hadn't purposefully acquired copies of something quite obviously mass-produced for young girls until now.

I've known both series existed but hadn't even been remotely curious as to what they were all about. But a year and a half ago I met Tammy and everything's changed. It's not that she and her sister are huge fans, I don't want anyone getting the wrong idea about them. They read the books back when they were supposed to, when they were preteens, and now they like to occasionally get their hands on a copy, snark on what they're reading and laugh about the odd moments they remember.

I may have seen a copy lying around but it was in a clothes hamper where the majority of them would be found. A clothes hamper located in the bathroom, which is somewhat fitting since that's the most appropriate situation for a grown man to read Sweet Valley. If that first book represents the entire series then a room associated with shit is a proper library location.

The Baby-Sitter's Club isn't as aggravating as Sweet Valley High. It's lite writing and lite reading. As one might discern from the Series Title it revolves around a group of girls united in their common job. They pool their resources and advertise their services; a parent only needs to call one phone number to find a baby-sitter.

Kristy, who's sweet to her little brother but a bit of a spoiled little witch about her Mother's serious boyfriend, came up with the idea after her Mom had to call down her entire list of sitters to find someone at the last minute. Also in the club is Mary Ann whose Dad refuses to let her grow up since her Mom's been dead for years, Klaudia who's arty and considers herself more mature than the others, and Stacey who just moved to Stonybrook from New York City because, get this, she's got Diabetes. It's been too hard dealing with it in NYC so now she lives in the small town and tries to hide her secret. I realize kids are cruel but I can't buy that New Yorkers couldn't handle diabetes in 1986. I'm sure there had been an ABC Afterschool Special or something.

The only recurring story is Kristy's dislike of Watson and her attempts at figuring out why Stacey acts the way she does. A few more babysitting stories are there as well and anyone who's ever babysat will relate.

Other than wondering why I'm reading it when I'm a 32 year old guy without even a daughter to justify my action I don't have a bad thing to say about Kristy's Great Idea. I won't be as nice over Double Love which kicks off the Sweet Valley High series. Granted I grew up in Olympia, Washington and not Beverly Hills but I detected so much bullshit in just this first book I'm surprised roses weren't growing from between the pages. Frats and Sororities in High School? If that is in fact the way things are done there...then they can have it.

This book preceeded Beverly Hills 90210 by half a decade but that's what it reminded me of. It had twins, rich parents, rich neighbors, rich schoolmates, class distinction, criminal connivance, "bad boys", lower class girls and I wouldn't be surprised to find that Francine Pascal is a pseudonym for Aaron Spelling.

What grated on my patience worst was Elizabeth. She's the good twin who's often mistreated by her social-climbing ditz of an identical sister Jessica. All Jessi has to do is turn on the crocodile tears or even suggest thinking it and Elizabeth forgives all. After all she can't stay mad at Jessi.

WHY NOT?

If I was in Elizabeth's high heels I'd rake my nails across Jessica's face. And if I was their older brother Steven I'd shove Jessi down the stairs with a push of my hand. She suspected who his new girlfriend was and worried about what it would do to their family's social standing. Give me a break.

For the final verdict I say that The Baby-Sitter's Club is the more believable series while Sweet Valley High is more compelling. If you just need some lite reading to pass the time you could do worse than the babysitters, and if you're running low on toilet paper reach into the clothes hamper for Jessica Wakefield.

Ripping off the Shirt? How Cliché!

Master and Commander
by Patrick O'Brian

I had already read The Unknown Shore a few times when I finally got around to tackling the first of the Aubrey-Maturin books. I jumped into it without watching that Russell Crowe movie first.

It's the story of Captain Jack Aubrey (although he's not really a Captain, he's just called Captain. He's actually Master and Commander) and his good friend Dr. Stephen Maturin. Only he's not actually a Doctor but a Surgeon...or was it the other way around?

Aubrey has been given command of his first ship (although it's not really a...you get it by now) and spends the novel patrolling the Mediterranean in search of enemy vessels to capture. To the victor go the spoils.

This book, published 11 years after The Unknown Shore, is not as easy to get through but that's not to mean that it's difficult or impossible. My one complaint from the other book, that my lack of nautical knowledge limits my grasp of the story, applies here also, as well as my lack of early 19th Century European politics, business practices, Naval Law and Military chain of command.

O'Brian jumps right into things, expecting the reader to know what the Hell's going on. If I had spent my entire life on ships and reading the dusty histories, annals, maps, logs and almanacs of the Aubrey period I'd be in a better position to review this book. But you know what? It doesn't matter, the story is that good!

There's just something about the cadence and lingo of British speech that can make it hilarious whether one knows what's being said or not.

I'm looking forward to reading the next book. Hopefully as the series goes along I'll have a better grasp at what's being said and done. And now, in spite of myself, I kinda sorta wanna see the movie.

Short and Sweet #1

While I will continue to strive to post reviews chock full of content I would also like to acknowledge books that I've liked, yet which I don't at the time have enough words about to fill a novel with.

Redwall by Brian Jacques
The Black Stallion by Walter Farley
Freddy Goes to Florida by Walter R. Brooks

It should be no surprise to anyone that I love to read. I prefer fiction but don't limit myself to any particular genre. Even YA and Children's books find themselves on my coffee table.

Another thing I'm a fan of is series. Epics, Pulp, Serials, it doesn't matter.

Recently I read three books for young readers which were the beginning of three respected series. The first was Redwall, a fantasy of woodland creatures.

The woodlanders of Mossflower woods live a Pastoral life under the care and protection of the brothers of Redwall Abbey. The hero, the young novice Matthias, dreams of the days of old when Martin the Warrior protected the Abbey. His dream becomes a nightmare, a real nightmare, when Cluny the Scourge and his army (long believed to be a myth) arrive on the scene.

Abbot Mortimer has lived his entire life as a healer and pacifist. His resignation of the fact that they must kill in order to survive shows a depth not often seen in children's books (not counting Harry Potter)

Besides exhibiting military skill Matthias is also required to solve riddles and follow quests to obtain the legendary sword used by Martin ages ago. But did Martin and the sword really exist? And even then, would the sword have survived all these ages without disappearing?

Redwall is sometimes gruesome and cold-blooded but such realism shouldn't be shielded from young readers.

Following Redwall I read a realistic animal story, The Black Stallion. I hadn't read it since I was 9 but I've watched the movie a bazillion times. I already know I love the movie, I wasn't surprised to find that, as usual, the book was much better.

Some differences from the movie include Alec's age (he's seventeen in the book, much younger on film) and his father doesn't die on the shipwreck. Alec and The Black survive a shipwreck off the Africa coast by helping each other. (Alec opened the stall door, The Black swam and carried Alec.) Alec eats seaweed to survive and gathers enough to keep the stallion fed. When Alec is rescued he insists on the Black coming with him.

Alec's neighbor in New York is Henry Daley who raced in his younger days and is happy to provide stable space. The racing bug bites him and Alec and they train The Black for the track. When the two fastest horses in America meet to determine which one's the best, Henry and Alec know the stallion would beat them both, but will they be able to race him without any papers?

Finally I went back to fantasy animals with Freddy Goes to Florida. Originally titled To and Again the title was changed in the 50s after Freddy starred in many sequels. Freddy's part in this first story was minor.

Unlike Redwall which focused on depth and realism the Freddy books are just straight up lite stories. In this first one the animals take a hint from the birds and travel South for the Winter. A few stay behind so that Farmer Bean isn't greatly inconvenienced and the rest go on a road trip.

Sometimes they have to escape unscrupulous men who want to use them on their own farms, but they also meet many who've read about their adventures and who offer assistance, including The President of the United States.

Their actual time in Florida isn't covered much, it's the trip To and Fro which is covered. The Action isn't gravely intense and younger readers should get through the chapters easily.

Future books in these three series will be covered under the Short and Sweet title. Master and Commander and Cod: A Biography will be given the full treatment soon.

Sangria Inmaculati

The final pre-posted (on Satanosphere) review. Originals coming soon.

Nearly ten years ago Interview with the Vampire hit theaters mesmerizing some and boring others. Many of the disappointed had been expecting the standard bats and stakes and flaming crucifixes. They were uncomfortable with the focus on dialogue and the homoeroticism.

Those who liked the movie saw Tom Cruise's final performance as anything but Tom Cruise. They saw costumes and lighting, heard music and became enmeshed in this tale that brought them into the lives of three vampires. While the movie didn't lack in action or blood it's main purpose was to give life to the main characters.

Some of us hadn't already read the book but rushed to get it after the movie. The film had been mostly faithful to the original, and after reading it we learned some extra facts that didn't make the final cut and had some confusions answered. Sometimes Anne Rice (or Louis, depending on your point of view) takes forever to get to a point but all in all it's an excellent read.

More than most books of fiction, Interview with the Vampire is a deeply personal story for Anne Rice. Prior to writing it Anne lost her daughter at age five to leukemia. The pain and despair of watching a child that young, your child, contract an illness and die of it is unimaginable. The extremities of all emotions runs roughshod during a trial such as this. Like most parents tortured with this Anne must have questioned God's motives in allowing this to happen. She must have questioned what the purpose of her daughter's brief existence was, and ultimately she must have questioned if her daughter was in fact in a better place after she passed.

The character of Claudia, age five in the book but aged to ten in the movie and played to excellence by Kirstin Dunst, represents Rice's daughter. Louis, the vampire giving the story of his life to the interviewer, is Anne herself. It's simple enough to give an outline or synopsis of the story. Fact is, most people reading this will have seen the movie already, and those who've had a mind to will have read the book as well. I want to focus more on what a vampire is according to this book. I won't be including facets of White Wolf's Masquerade or standard vampire myth's not included in Interview.

A vampire is an animated dead body with a functioning mind. It contains no bodily fluids save for blood after it's fed. A vampire has no sex drive and would not be able to perform anyways. It can not eat or drink except for blood. (doing so would cause severe pain as its mortal innards have atrophied.)

A vampire is immortal from disease and most violence. The heat of the sun is intense enough to kill it. Complete destruction of the body (fire or dismemberment) is the only other valid method of death. Poisoned, drugged or alcohol-laden blood will have effect on a vampire. Injuries suffered heal on their own while a vampire sleeps. Stakes through the heart merely hurts a vampire (and one does not want to incur a vampire's wrath.) Holy Water and Crucifixes have no power. A vampire's own perogative may include a distaste for garlic but it's power otherwise holds no sway.

Vampire's do not turn into bats or wolves. They do not dissipate into mist. What they have is superhuman strength and speed. Their quickness is such that humans don't see them at top speed. Some older vampires have mastered a form of mental domination over lesser vampires and mortals.

Vampires must feed, and when they're hungry the urge for sustenance may overpower all reason. The price for their immortality is the drinking of blood which almost always means taking a human life. Most vampires upon being turned experience a detachment that allows them their feedings without remorse. For some reason our narrator Louis retained his humanity and most of the story focuses on his guilt and his quest to seek answers.

The man who sired him, Lestat (as I've said earlier, Tom Cruise's last great performance), already detached is unable to understand Louis' wish to limit himself to animal blood. He rightfully tells him that he'll never experience true happiness except when he feeds. The ecstacy a vampire feels during feeding is thousands of times that of the greatest sex which should more than make up for the physiological emasculation. In trying to explain it to him Lestat has one of the best lines of the book for explaining who they are:

Evil is a point of view...We are immortal. And what we have before us are the rich feasts that consciense cannot appreciate and mortal men cannot know without regret. God kills, and so shall we; indiscriminately He takes the richest and the poorest, and so shall we; for no creatures under God are as we are, none so like Him as ourselves, dark angels not confined to the stinking limits of hell but wandering His earth and all its kingdoms. I want a child tonight. I am like a mother...I want a child!

The arguments presented by the vampires throughout the book would make for some great theological debates, provided experts in theology would be willing to speak on hypothetical vampyric issues. If a Being's only source of satiation and survival is the drinking of human blood, how can he be called evil for taking this action? A man-eating lion in Africa, grizzly bear in America or great white shark of the Sea isn't thought of as evil on those rare occasions a human is killed. Of course action is taken to prevent these feasts from happening and to remove those creatures which have acquired the taste, but to call them evil?

Louis had been given a choice between death and immortality, knowing full well what would be required of him. Louis may be right in thinking himself evil, especially after he killed and fed from a priest on the altar. One of the few bits of history concerning Lestat informs us that he didn't have a choice in his conversion (a more thorough explanation isn't given in this first book.) And the child Claudia wasn't given any choice as well, and would have been taken advantage of regardless as she was five years old, starving and feverish.

To label Claudia as anything is difficult. Since vampires never age Claudia lived her first century confined to her pixie-like physique. She gained the knowledge and wisdom of many years yet found it difficult to be taken seriously by Louis and Lestat. Having been young when she was turned she has no remembrance of her mortal life, and her detachment is as pure as it can get, not tainted by the morals of her previous life. She enjoys the kill more than Lestat if that's possible.

A great portion of the book concerns Louis' wish to know more about their kind and to find the reason for their existence. His search takes him and Claudia on the Grand Tour of Europe with an extended stop in Paris where they finally find other vampires. Not only are they not welcomed but Claudia is killed in retaliation for a crime which Louis' mind reasons is the penalty they all should suffer. Louis' last vision of his "daughter" is of her vague shape in ashes, encircled by the charred remains of a woman Louis had reluctantly sired to be her mother. It is Anne Rice's final look at her young daughter, whose body cursed her and who died anything but peacefully. The ashen statue falling to pieces and blowing in the wind is her life blowing like chaff in the wind.

Louis is convinced there is no God and no afterworld, and as such is more convinced that life is only what we make of it during the short time we're here, and to rob anyone else of it is the only sin there is.

While the character of Louis is representative of Anne Rice trying to come to terms with the meaning of her daughter's life, it's interesting to note that she considers Lestat "her baby" and made him the focus of the sequels. Lestat is also bar none her public's favorite character. Anne has sometimes been vague in her answers, but it's any person's right to change their view on things after living life a bit. One bit of information given in the first sequel The Vampire Lestat appears on first glance to be an inconsistancy. It's now known that this tidbit (minor as it is) is Louis lying during his interview. Perhaps Anne is telling us that while her gloomy feelings were genuine, not to take everything she's said as the absolute Gospel Truth.

The original Planet of the Apes

First Published on Satanosphere

Most people are aware that the Earth is not flat. Even though Plato and other scholars 300 years before the Common Era proved it was round many people believed the flat-world myth well past the 16th Century.

Another Geological debate involves the inside of our spherical planet. Common consensus believes our inner world to be an increasingly hot ball of magma culminating in a solid core of iron. Not too long ago the opposition believed Terra to be hollow. Taking that common belief Edgar Rice Burroughs sat down at his desk and penned At The Earth's Core, filling the fictional world of Pellucidar with living prehistoric relics, stone age humans, humanoid simians and a reptile race who are master over all.

In a style repeated in the first Tarzan novel ERB narrates the tale as it was told to him by another. This technique absolves Burroughs of any responsibility for proof. It's told to him by David Innes, who has returned to the surface somewhere in the middle of Arabia after spending ten years underground.

For a story to span a decade one might expect the author to split it into a trilogy which would later be sold in combined form such as Tolkien or John dos Pasos' famous epics. This is unnecessary for any story concerning Pellucidar since time does not exist there. A brief description of it's geological state is required to explain.

500 miles into the Earth's crust one breaks through the surface of this inner land. There is no horizon since the distance curves upward. If you were to look straight up you'd only see a sky, but thousands of miles above you would be mountains and settlements or perhaps even an ocean "hanging upside-down"

The Earth's molten core hangs suspended in the middle of the planet shedding it's perpetual light all around. Since "the sun" never moves and it never becomes night there is no time. Inhabitants sleep when they get tired. David Innes left on an adventure early in the novel and was gone for months. He returned to find his companion Abner Perry working on his studies, being awake during Innes' entire absence and believing that only a few hours had passed.

The proportion of land to sea is approximately reversed to that of the outer surface creating a unique situation where a larger world is contained inside a smaller one. The humans which inhabit this land comprise many tribes and races. The ones we're introduced to in the first novel resemble Caucasians and American Indians. Unfortunately Edgar, whose racial sensitivity has been touched on before, has the creatures described in this excerpt as his only African-Pellucidaric representatives:

They were to all appearances strikingly similar in aspect to the Negro of Africa. Their skins were very black, and their features much like those of the more pronounced Negroid type except that the head receded more rapidly above the eyes, leaving little or no forehead. Their arms were rather longer and their legs shorter in proportion to the torso than in man, and later I noticed that their great toes protruded at right angles from their feet--because of their arboreal habits, I presume. Behind them trailed long, slender tails which they used in climbing quite as much as they did either their hands or feet.

Oh, God bless it.

In a nutshell, Innes and Perry accidentally reach Pellucidar during a mining expedition where they're captured by Gorilla-like men called Sagoths and taken to be slaves of the reptilian Mahars. Blah Blah Blah Action Action Action and David prepares to return to the surface with his new wife Dian to bring back materials to aid the humans in their fight for freedom. At the last minute Hooja the Sly One double-crosses him and we end with Innes preparing to return beneath the surface to rescue his wife. Burroughs does not know if David successfully returned or if he was killed by Arabs. (It's never explained why their lives are in danger by the Arabs...perhaps David Innes drank from someones well. Perhaps he looks Turkish. It's never explained.) A search the following year for the campground is fruitless due to the shifting sands.

Presumably Innes made it back because Edgar wrote six more Pellucidar novels. Like the Tarzan books these are pulp that have been pre-chewed for easy digestion but so what? These were the kind of stories I lived on when I was a kid and I still like them. The illogistics of science-fictional worlds and the preponderance of scientific proof rendering these stories impossible means nothing.

Menarche Twa

Originally published on Satanosphere. Non-SOS reviews coming soon.

If you don't count John Saul, Dean Koontz, Clive Barker or H.P. Lovecraft then the undisputed King of Horror is obviously Stephen. The man behind such spine-tingling monster stories as Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption has been so prolific that Saturday Night Live once did a skit where he was typing two separate novels on separate typewriters with each hand while trying to train his feet as well.

King was a low-paid starving teacher in the early 70s when he threw away the manuscript for Carrie. His wife Tabitha rescued it from the waste bin and after reading it encouraged Stephen to get it published. History defines the rest.

Supposedly the topic of the book is a young teenager's discovery of telekinetic powers and the armaggedon-like judgement she pronounces on her classmates after a particularly heinous and cold-blooded (literally) practical joke. All that is there, but that's not the freaky part. For a man entering the field of Horror Novels Stephen King picked a surefire subject to scare the bejesus out of men: Menstruation. This Lunar blood was cruelly force-fed the male readership after tantalizing them with a jailbait school shower scene.

The story is told from numerous points of view after the fact. We know that a tragedy destroyed the Senior class of a small town in Maine, that Carietta White was somehow responsible, and that survivors insist there were supernatural happenings. Most of the book is "excerpts" from other publications on the event, juxtaposed with King's third-person narration that sometimes points out the inaccuracies of the chroniclers and answers questions "we'll never know the answer too."

The story takes place in the late 70s with the other publications being printed in the early 80s. It's always risky for fiction to take place in a future not so far away. One need only to look at Space: 1999, 2001: A Space Odyssey or read the Mission Earth series of L. Ron Hubbard to see for themselves. Fortunately this didn't horribly date the story as the only anachronism shows Bob Dylan being described as a famous rock poet of the 60s when most publications would either not bother explaining who he is or would give him a more lionized status.

Most critics refer to this book as one of Stephen King's more juvenile efforts while acknowledging that it was his first and that his writing matured. I, however, find this to be among my favorite King works for the simple fact that it's only 252 pages. He may be the King of Horror, but Stephen oftentimes types way too many words. More than one novel has exceeded 1000 pages. There will be too much description, too much character development, too many side plots and more stream-of-conscious meandering than necessary. A big deal was made when King's "masterpiece" The Stand was reissued with over 400 pages restored. What that succeeded in doing was taking a promising story with a strong start that would eventually convert into a bullshit Heaven vs. Hell war with a cheap Deus ex Machina ending and bloat it with empty caloric filler. The new epilogue was the only addition worth having. I can't fault King or his publishers for releasing it, after all when money can be sniffed in the wind only a fool wouldn't follow his nose, but I had a new respect for editors afterword.

The actual plot of Carrie starts when the heroine, a social outcast and daughter to a raving lunatic Christian, ends up on her inaugeral rag at the end of Gym. Having been sheltered from reality her whole life Carrie believes she is hemorrhaging and the situation isn't helped when the rest of the class, like sharks on the scent, go for the kill with taunts while peppering her with plugs and pads. One participant isn't as mean as the rest and honestly feels remorse for her actions. She plans a way to make amends for Carrie with the help of her boyfriend but everything ends up ruined by the end.

It was made into a great movie directed by Brian de Palma (any movie that opens with a naked Sissy Spacek is classified as great, even if it does have John Travolta in it.) It's fitting that a movie that explores the cruelties of cliques would inspire someone to hypocritically hold a ruler to his dinky while passing judgement on other dick waggers. Perhaps if he had been born without the Y chromosome he'd have been chanting "Plug it Up, Plug it Up" with the rest.

The Victorian Mollirama

Originally posted on the Sphere

Biographies can be exciting. From Alexander the Great to Abraham Lincoln to Andy Warhol there's many interesting lives out there to read about.

Biographies of authors on the other hand won't always keep one's attention. How interesting is it to read about someone sitting at their typewriter and answering letters? Of course there are exceptions; Ernest Hemingway and Ezra Pound for one, but Lewis Carroll? In the hands of a capable storyteller Carroll's life could be interestingly told in 150 pages or less, but Morton N. Cohen's 1995 Lewis Carroll - A Biography is a whopping 542 pages of dates and names and little more.

In his defense, Cohen has had more access to Charles Lutwidge Dodgeson's private papers than anyone else. He is Professor Emeritus at New York's City University and has published numerous works on Carroll. His writing style unfortunately does not flow well which is unfortunate because, even if Carroll's life itself wasn't interesting, the mechanisms of his mind are. He was a brilliant mathematician ahead of his time. He was also a stammerer (an affliction suffered by his siblings as well, possibly due to their parents being first cousins) who was most comfortable in the presence of children. More specifically, young girls.

Carroll was an avid photographer for thirty years, and among his hundreds of pictures were scores of prepubescent girls sans habillement. This, along with the fact that it's commonly believed he proposed, at age 31, to the 11 year old Alice Liddell has many viewing Dodgeson as a filthy pedophile. It's possible that's an accurate description. It should be noted however that in Victorian times it was common for women to be married in their teens, often as young as twelve which was the legal age of consent at the time. It was also common for husbands to be twenty years older or more, as they had already established themselves and their money. As for the pictures, Charles refused to sell or give or even to show them to anyone other than the children's parents, and when he gave up photography in his fifties destroyed all his nude negatives and encouraged the subjects to do the same. Only four have survived: three of them can be argued as being art, with the poses not being remotely sexual. The fourth, of a very young Evelyn Hatch, is a full frontal reclining nude.

Rumors, whisperings and disapprovals about Charles' photography existed during these years but there is no evidence that he did anything (else) inappropriate towards his young friends.

His alleged proposal to Alice Liddell (the inspiration for Alice in Wonderland) caused a rift in the relationship between Dodgeson and the Liddell's that never recovered. It was believed that some pages removed from one of Charles' diaries after his death focused on this event. After the publication of Cohen's biography these pages were found and invalidated the Marriage-Proposal belief. Other papers which came to light proved that Carroll had many courtships with adult women. (He never married and is believed to have died a virgin.)

Regardless of this new evidence it is still fact that Charles had deep feelings for Alice Liddell. He never would have had a chance, Alice's mother Lorina was a social-climber who had her daughters' rise in society mapped out before they were born. Even though Dodgeson was a world famous author and would become exceedingly rich he was just too common. Lorina Liddell succeeded in finding husbands for her girls whose stations suited her well, but not before getting some of it thrown back in her face. Lord Salisbury's son Robert Cecil wrote his Mother once:

Mrs. Liddell has had the impudence to ask me to dinner. I don't know the old hag and don't want to and so have refused rather shortly.

There's enough on Carroll to have an interesting read on, but this biography is too mixed up for me to recommend. Single paragraphs jump from one year to the next, backwards and forwards, and three-fourths of it is excerpts from letters and such. Finishing this book was such an ordeal that I had to take a break from reading anything to keep from going crazy.

Where can you find Pleasure, Search the World for Treasure?

Originally published on Satanosphere

Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World had the audacity to be nominated for Best Picture by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences against that other colonated masterpiece Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King. Thankfully it lost.

Whether the movie was actually worthy of being nominated or not is a debate for another time. I have not seen it yet, and having a strong dislike of Russell Crowe I won't be seeing it anytime soon.

Abhorring Russell Crowe, however, does not keep me from looking into the respected series of books from which the movie was adapted.

The late Patrick O'Brian wrote twenty books in the Aubrey/Maturin series before passing away in 2000. While nautical fans across the Atlantic were thrilled for nearly half a century, America wasn't able to get a taste until the 1990s.

Charmed and Mesmerized by O'Brians skill of cadence, British regionalism and pre-Napoleonic Naval cant fans were hungry for more and curious to look into his other sea-faring works outside of the series.

Those reading The Unknown Shore after already having a taste of Aubrey/Maturin are pleasantly surprised to find a somewhat rough draft of the two heros in the form of Jack Byron (Aubrey) and Tobias Barrow (Maturin). Toby had been raised Spartan as an experiment by Mr. Elwes: His entire life was Latin and Greek with Science and Medicine. The fine arts were to follow, but human nature being what it is the experiment failed. Toby Barrow is unbelievably naive in the ways of the world, he knows nothing of social graces (which at least serves him in that he knows little to nothing of embarrassment) and the house could burn to ashes around him without any acknowledgment so long as a new species of caterpillar can be observed. His seeming lack of natural emotion, contrasted with the character of his best friend Byron, makes me think of the relationship between another Captain and his Science Officer: Kirk and Spock.

The Unknown Shore follows these two as Tobias goes on his first maritime adventure in 1740. The Wager is part of a convoy secretly sailing around Cape Horn to engage the Spanish in Battle. The ship sees more than its fair share of action and humor before even coming in sight of the New World. O'Brian's style lends mirth to situations that wouldn't automatically call for a laugh. It's the UK phenomenon where arguing is hilarious and cursing is side-splitting fun provided a Cockney or Scottish accent is used.

The one major factor that inhibits a full appreciation for this story is my lack of understanding for basic naval terms. I don't know a jib from a quartermast from a square knot from a poop deck, and I'd dare say many other readers don't either. For all the different ships mentioned and described, my Mind's Eye provides only one stock image regardless of how many numbers of sails or rows of guns are given. During the action sequences during hurricanes and chases, when I'm told that the men are hoisting the foresail or turning the yard arms they may as well be swabbing the deck for the good it does me. Fortunately Patrick O'Brian's pace keeps it from becoming tedious or laborious and the many other sequences more than makes up for it.

That is, until the ship wreck off the unexplored coast of Antarctic Chile. The few chapters devoted to this tends to drag. In a way I could defend this change in style as being symbolic to the plight of the men. They run out of supplies, they run out of food. They drop dead like flies. When they can finally have a boat ready to row towards freedom, they use all their strength on little to no food only to have to give up at the end of the day (after barely surviving yet another storm) and return to where they started. Over the months their bodies waste away and their wits become nearly non-existent. Only when the few survivors miraculously return to Christian Civilization does the original pace and humor return (lending credence to my suggestion that it was purposeful).

If you tend to laugh at Monty Python or The Young Ones or Ab/Fab even when you have no idea what it is they're saying then this may be the book for you. Even if you're the type who won't bother with a book that bores you (referring specifically to the shipwrecked portion) it's worth it alone for the chapter where they cross the Tropic of Cancer and bleed the sailors per custom.

Blood, blood in the scuppers, blood tinging the sea, blood all over the deck, blood everywhere, blood under the tropical sun. Buckets of blood. There had been four buckets full, to be exact, carefully filled and set aside until the next should be brimming and ready to join them...

There had been the usual number of faintings, and a carpenter's mate called Mitchel, perhaps the most savage and vicious man aboard, had chosen to pass away into, upon and among the buckets that Mr Eliot and Tobias had preserved, for philosophical purposes: this accounted for the shocking appearance of the deck and for the look of vexation upon the surgeons' faces...

Tobias took the larboard man, Mr Eliot the other; the patient sat and presented his arm, the surgeon turned a handkerchief tight about it, picked a vein and lanced it, while the loblolly-boy held a basin. Mr Eliot used a large horse-fleam, Tobias a thin lancet; but there was no difference in the grave, detached zeal of their appoach. Jack wondered at it: there was something inhumanly authoritative about the way Tobias seized an arm, considered it and then with the utmost equanimity cut into the living flesh.

Bloody brilliant, which is why I'll be looking into other books from O'Brian in the future.

Ted Bundy was a Republican

Originally published on Satanosphere last March.

He was a Psychiatric Major, a Crisis Clinic Counselor, a Law Student. He worked for Republican Governor Dan Evans.

He was a Burglar. A Kidnapper. A Rapist. A Pedophile. A Serial Killer. A Necrophiliac.

And Theodore Robert Bundy was also that Satanospherian favorite...A POET?

It makes me feel blue
Taking food from the animals in the zoo
Porkchops tonight
Jews are uptight
I gave mine away
It still has a tail
And as for dessert
The cook, that old flirt
Surprised us with mellow
Peach jello.

One could say that for crap like that alone Bundy deserved to die. The man was charismatic. He was charming, and women fell all over themselves for him. He seemed to have everything going for him.

But as we all know, the real man was a monster. Convicted of three murders and four assaults he is believed to be responsible for a minimum of 38 deaths with most believing the number should be higher.

He was illegitimately conceived and birthed in 1948. His mother had to disappear to a home for wayward unwed mothers. She left him behind for three months while her options were debated. Finally, Eleanor Louise decided to bring her son home. He was raised believing his mother was actually his older sister and that his grandparents were his parents. His Grandfather, who Ted went to the grave claiming he had nothing but pleasant, nostalgiac memories of, was an abusive, alcoholic sumbitch who ruled his home with fear and often tortured cats to death.

At age 4 Ted and his "older sister" relocated across the country to Tacoma, where she married and had four more kids.

Ted grew up, was a paper boy, and may have, at age 12, killed a 9 year old neighbor girl whose body was never found.

In college Ted had a girlfriend who came from a rich California family. He thought the relationship was more serious than she did, and eventually they broke up. She cited that Ted seemed directionless in life. Ted insisted it was because he was below her class. Over the next few years he applied himself and became exactly the kind of man she would marry. Their relationship was rekindled, and no sooner was the engagement announced when he dropped her like yesterdays trash, effectively sticking it back to her for the "hurt" she "caused" him years before. It should be noted that many of Bundy's victims resembled this first love.

Women started disappearing, sometimes with blood left behind. July 14th, 1974 was an especially unsatiated day for Bundy as he succeeded in conning two women, four hours apart, to "assist him" at Lake Sammamish Park. Neither Janice Ott or Denise Naslund were seen alive again.

Bone and skull fragments were eventually found. Ott and Naslund, along with other victims Roberta Parks, Lynda Ann Healy and Susan Rancourt were partially found. But by this time Ted had relocated to Utah where the same thing was happening there and in Colorado.

Ted Bundy's luck changed when he failed in his attempt to kidnap and murder Carol DaRonch. She succeeded in breaking free from him and would later be instrumental in identifying him. Later that night Ted succeeded in getting Debby Kent into his Tan VW. She has never been found.

On August 16, 1975, Ted was strolling his VW around a neighborhood. A patrolling officer who was familiar with the cars from that neighorhood attempted to get a read on his license number, but Ted sped off. After a short chase he pulled over. Burglary tools were found in his car, and bit by bit Bundy was connected to the DaRonch assault. It didn't take long to connect him to the Utah and Colorado murders as well.

Bundy was found guilty of the DaRonch assault and sentenced to one-to-fifteen with parole. He stayed in the same jail with Gary Gilmore (of The Executioner's Song) who would be the first man executed since the reinstatement of Capital Punishment.

Evidence was found that linked Ted to the Utah and Colorado killings and he was transferred to a Colorado jail to await charges.

Aspen was already a circus with the Claudine Longet trial. (I can't think of that fiasco without remembering that Chevy Chase and Jane Curtain were the announcers for the Claudine Longet Invitational Ski Tournament.) Bundy became part of the circus when he escaped from the courtroom, jumping from a second story window. He eluded police for over a week before being recaptured. Precautions were taken to prevent this from happening again, but half a year later he did it again, this time crawling through the ceiling, stealing clothes from the jailor himself in his bedroom, and by the time anyone knew he was gone it was nearly 24 hours later, with Ted in Chicago. Again, Ted the camera whore would be overshadowed: James Earl Ray had escaped from jail that same week.

He made his way to Florida where he killed three more people including 12 year old Kimberly Leach and assaulted many more. This time he was caught for good. He insisted on representing himself in trial, and his demeanor and outrageousness did much to speed up his death sentence.

----------

Back in 1973 Ted Bundy was working at a Seattle Crisis clinic, convincing callers not to commit suicide. A co-worker who became his friend was a former policewoman and middle-aged newly-single mother of four named Ann Rule. She had made chump change over the years writing articles for True Detective and had many trusted friends and confidants on the Police Force. When the "Ted" murders (named such since witnesses saw some of the victims leave with a man in an arm-sling calling himself Ted) occured Ann was given a contract to write a book about them. Her friend Bundy was well aware of this.

When Ted had moved to Utah and gotten into trouble, Ann still hadn't put two and two together. She thought her nice friend had just gotten into some trouble which would be over and done as soon as he payed his debt back to society. It was bit by bit that she slowly realized this man she thought she knew would become one of the most notorious serial killers ever.

It was a publishing dream, a situation crime writers never find themselves in and one which could be passed off as a Hollywood invention. Not surprisingly it also took a terrible toll on Ann Rule emotionally as she had to come to terms with herself on who Bundy really was. Her book, The Stranger Beside Me, successfully includes her story without letting it overshadow the rest. It has been updated more than once: in 1986, in 1989 after Bundy was executed, and in 2000 to mark the twentieth anniversary of the first edition. It's interesting to see Ann's attitude toward Bundy change as the years pass. In her original ending she accepts that Ted is a killer and accepts that he deserves the Death Penalty. Understandably it takes years for this kind of reality to fully sink in. She originally thinks of Ted as someone who could have been helped. After his 11th hour confessions (which didn't yield many new bodies but which proved once and for all that he wasn't merely a suspect) Ann Rule accepted that Ted Bundy was a monster who manipulated women, including herself, for his own gain. She accepted that he was unredeemable. She accepted that the electric chair was the only acceptable destiny for this "charming" man she used to work late into the night with.

...at about midnight that date in an alleyway behind...the sorority and fraternity houses, it would have been 45th - 46th...47th?...In the back of the houses, across the alley and across the other side of the block there was a Congregational Church there, I believe...I was moving up the alley...handling a briefcase and some crutches. This young woman [Georgian Hawkins] walked down...She stopped for a moment and she kept on walking down the alley toward me. About halfway down the block, I encountered her. And asked her to help me carry the briefcase. Which she did - and we walked back up the alley, across the street, turned right on the sidewalk...

...

Basically - when we reached the car, what happened was I knocked her unconscious with the crowbar -

...

And then there were some handcuffs there, along with the crowbar. And I handcuffed her and put her in the...passenger side of the car and drove away.

She was unconscious, but she was very much alive.

Ted continued his confession, saying how and where he killed her and what he did with her body and his evidence. Ann Rule doesn't go into everything that was said, but other sources show that Bundy would return to where the bodies were before they decomposed completely, dolled them up with make-up, and got all necrophiliac.

Throughout the years Eleanor Louise Bundy defended her son's good name against all the horrible accusations. With Ted's confessions her world completely fell. Ted Bundy had destroyed many lives, not just the ones he killed but their families as well. Rose Naslund in particular never recovered, keeping her daughter's room and possessions exactly the way they were until her own death in 2000. She had waited years for the county to release her daughters bones for burial, but instead they were cremated and tossed away with the other victims.

Ted didn't just destroy the lives of his victims' families, he did the same to his own mother.

----------

Ted Bundy was a smart man. One example of his ability to use his brain was when he got married. His strongest supporter during his trials and appeals was Carole Ann Boone. She had gone through the paperwork to get them a marriage license, and Judge Wallace Jopling even okayed Bundy's blood test as required in Florida. However, the County Director of Corrections swore up and down he would never allow a wedding in his jail.

Bundy had already been convicted and sentenced to death in the Chi Omega sorority murders, and had just been found guilty of Kimberly Leach's murder. During sentencing for that crime Ted acted as his own attorney and called Carole Ann to the witness stand. A Notary Public was in attendance, watching the trial, the marriage license in his possession.

In the middle of the testimony Ted asked "Will you marry me?"

"Yes"

Then I do hereby marry you."

According to Florida law they were now legally husband and wife. They would pull another fast one years later and conceive a daughter. This story illustrates the potential that Bundy had, and all that he could have been, had he not been driven to lie and kill.

----------

Ted Bundy links

Crime Library's story on Ted.

Bundy's interview with Dr. James Dobson. Dobson hosts Focus on the Family on Christian airwaves and is probably best known for Dare to Discipline where he uses the Bible to justify spanking. (While I personally think more parents need to smack their little brats and keep them in line, I don't use religion as my reasoning.) Ted Bundy outright lies to Dobson, claiming access to pornography at an early age caused his homocidal tendencies. It was Ted's way of saying the problem wasn't his fault, and The Christian Right's way to have some ammo for their cause.

Some stupid shit comparing Bundy's life with the rise of Israel.

Bundy, after his execution.

January 24, 1989

Scene: Olympia High School, World History, Period 1

Teacher: What's the big news this morning?

Entire Class: BUNDY!!!

Me: Shocking, ain't it?

Renascence Review

Originally published on Satanosphere as Poetry Review: No Samples Blockquoted

In 1992 or 93 I spent hours inside Browsers Bookstore in Olympia, as I usually did. There wasn't anything new in the Drama section, and I already had everything written by Kipling, Plath and Poe from the Poetry section. (There wasn't any Robert Frost available, I wouldn't have his definitive collection for almost a decade.)

I found a play called Two Slatterns and a King by Edna St. Vincent Millay and couldn't put it down. The inside cover told me I could have it for $2, but when I brought it to the counter the college girl working the register said I looked at the wrong spot and that it was actually $20. I wanted it, but not that badly.

So instead I went to the Fireside Bookstore under the Urban Onion and ordered her Collected Works.

The trouble with reading an entire collection from a poet is...well, imagine listening to every last recorded work of your favorite singer in one sitting. The more prolific artists have enough songs to last for days on end without a break. It's always preferable to go an album at a time, assuming that the album as a whole is any good. Many times it's a song or two that you like. The same can be said of a book containing over 1500 poems, many of them forgetable.

There is, however, the kind of album where you can listen to the entire thing at once and enjoy the experience, yet be bored or indifferent to many songs in the middle should they have been played singly. Small collections of poetry, usually published in their first run, is capable of this. Edna St. Vincent Millay's first collection Renascence and Other Poems succeeds in 17 poems and 6 sonnets.

Millay was born in Saucyave's state of Maine in 1892, one of three sisters. Her Mother kicked the Old Man out of the house before the turn of the century and raised her girls alone, stressing self-sufficiency and an education in music and literature.

At age 20 she submitted Renascence to a contest and came in fourth place. It's subsequent publication in The Lyric Year brought her recognition and a scholarship to Vassar. When she graduated at age 25 Renascence and Other Poems was published.

So what is it about this maiden collection I like? Hell, I don't know. It's like Art: I don't know shit about it, I just know what I like. The first three poems (Renascence, Interim and The Suicide) are the longest and pretty much the only ones I liked on their own. They focus on our insignificance in respect to the grand scheme of the universe with thoughts on how to deal with it. The rest speak of roses and Winter and God and other such Vassar crap.

She moved to Greenwich, lived as a Bohemian, won the Pulitzer at 31, married into an open relationship (good plan, seeing as how she was bi), and died at 58...being found on her staircase with a glass of wine.

What good is all this? Well...I suppose one could impress the kids at college with this. Perhaps put on an air of pretentiousness (fitting that she should be an ivy-league New Englander.) I must say Millay is more palatable than Plath (Who, with Cut and Daddy as her only great works, is the most over-blown suicide in literature.)

I like it, okay? At least I'm not posting Sonnets.

Jungle Love Indeed

The following was originally posted on Satanosphere last February. There may be a few inside jokes.

The logistics of starting an online book club proved impossible to one relying on instantaneous results or the hard work of others. I have chosen therefore to read on my own and share therefrom the observations formulated during my venture.

The diverse Satanosphere community shares disparate reading lists: Some learn from Alice Walker and Anne Rice while others rush through Philip K. Dick while yet others bask in Shakespeare. I know of at least one of you who has sampled Chaucer. To inaugerate the first of many book studies I shall boil these books together until the pages are a mesh of pulp, for it is from the pulpiest of pulp fictions I shall discuss today: Jungle Tales of Tarzan

Edgar Rice Burroughs was born in the final quarter of the 19th Century and after being kicked out of school cow-punched with his brothers on their Idaho Ranch. He joined up with the army for a spell but was bored as there never seemed to be any renegade Indians to send back to the Reservation.

In the first decade of the 20th Century, having a family to feed, Edgar submitted a story for serialization. It was accepted and the publishers wanted more. That first story would become Princess of Mars and launch a series that would be second only to another of Edgar's creations. Before the final installment of the initial serial Burroughs had finished his third novel: Tarzan of the Apes.

Most are familiar with the loin-clothed Tarzan who swings on jungle vines and makes the Johnny Weismuller - Carol Burnett yell. Some will even remember the cartoon with the annoying monkey who couldn't hold a candle to the spacemonkey Gleek. The original Tarzan was born to Lord John and Lady Alice Clayton after they were shipwrecked in Equatorial Africa. While still an infant he was orphaned yet found sustenance from Kala, a she-ape who had recently lost her own balu. At first this ugly hairless white ape seemed destined for an early demise. He didn't develop nearly as fast as his cousins for one thing. His advanced human brain and the primordial development of his muscles changed that for the better. He also frequented the bungalow where the skeletal remains of those he didn't know were his parents lay. With the aid of picture books and elementary primers Tarzan had taught himself to read and write English (a situation which enabled him to leave a legible message when white intruders arrived years later, even though he couldn't understand the spoken word.)

The 6th book in the series, Jungle Tales of Tarzan, takes place in his final teen years when he already knew how to read and was far more advanced than his simian cousins, yet before the introduction of Europeans and his return to his rightful place as Lord Greystoke.

Before continuing I wish to reiterate that this book is pulp. It is as pulp as pulp can be. Yet the first book from which the series germinated was well-written and included in the First Edition Library along with such classics as Grapes of Wrath, For Whom The Bell Tolls, and Catch-22. That is for another day.

The story begins with that SOS favorite: Beastiality. The young ape Teeka stretches herself luxuriously into a most alluring picture of young, feminine loveliness. Tarzan was going to make her his mate, but Taug had other plans. Tarzan's former playmate had his eyes on Teeka also, and the two bulls were ready to rumble in the jungle. Physically Tarzan was at a great disadvantage but his brains and trusty knife (procured from his parents' stash) always proved an equalizer and beyond. The fight barely commenced before Sheeta the panther attempted to make Teeka his dinner and Tarzan's plans were abruptly switched to dispatching him. With the aid of a grass rope the big cat was stopped in its attempt. Notwithstanding Tarzan's bravery and might, Teeka found Taug the more appealing mate.

Tarzan's realization that he is MAN and not APE is the theme that binds the otherwise stand-alone chapters together. He spends long hours studying the ways of some tribesmen who've built a village nearby. Tarzan hates them with every fiber of his being ever since one of them killed Kala with an arrow. He kills them without mercy and constantly finds ways to bait and terrorize them. Yet he learns something of the ways of man from them and had utilized their ways more than once to his own advantage.

Edgar Rice Burroughs' portrayal of Africans is an unfortunate one, yet altogether standard for the time it was written. The tribesmen are prone to outrageous tattooing and cosmetic mutilation. They are stupid and superstitious, wasteful and cruel. They are cannibals who file their teeth to eat the flesh of men better. Some observations of Burroughs on their race include:

Her child was a boy of ten, lithe, straight and, for a black, handsome.

Being a boy, and a native African, he had, of course, climbed into trees many times before this.

...and for the first time there entered his dull, negroid mind a vague desire to emulate his savage foster parent.

And my personal favorite:

In imagination he was wanting, and imagination is but another name for super-intelligence. Imagination it is which builds bridges, and cities, and empires. The beasts know it not, the blacks only a little, while to one in a hundred thousand of earth's dominant race it is given as a gift from heaven that man may not perish from the earth.

Okay, then.

Tarzan's tortures of the tribesmen make it difficult for the modern reader to accept him. He delights in tying Africans to stakes and hearing their screams while lions or hyenas rend them flesh from bone. Interspersed throughout is a reminder that the blood of British Nobility flows though Tarzan's veins which gives him a sense (primordial as it may be) of honor. It seems cut and dried that Burroughs is a racist with offensive thougths and beliefs. But could it be that Edgar Rice Burroughs is being purposefully over-the-top to make a statement against British Aristocracy, Imperialism, and the White Man's Burden?

Burroughs was part of the American frontier, a representative of a group of people who first romanticized the idea of the individual. The idea of nobility held little appeal to men of the wild west. A less than appealing portrayal of Tarzan's distant cousin in England is briefly given afterall.

Furthering my question is numerous scenes from the book focusing on Tarzan's inner struggle on who he is as a MAN and in his quest to understand what GOD is, as it's the one word from his many books he's having trouble understanding. His constant learning on those two subjects always involves an act of mercy towards a tribal member, even while he still loaths their very existence. Burroughs even makes a point of informing us the tribe relocated to their current settlement after fleeing the cruelties of the Belgians in the Congo under King Leopold.

But probably not: it's probably all coincidental. Burroughs was probably clueless enough to share his colorful descriptions of African Cannibals to civilized African-Americans without realizing the hurt or anger he would cause.

By the time the book ends Tarzan realizes he is greater than any ape. (The apes of the Tarzan series are not chimpanzee, orangutan or gorilla. They are a non-existent breed which walks upright more often than the knuckle-crawling gorillas.) He is on his way to becoming Lord of the Jungle. He understands GOD as the invisible feeling which stays his hand on certain occasions. He fights at the side of a warrior merely because he was about to be killed under unsporting circumstances and feels the first speck of acceptance towards his mortal enemy. The civilization bred into him is showing itself, in its own primordial way.