A week or so ago I was feeling down in the dumps. Old. Kind of depressed. So I decided to take a walk in one of my favorite places: The library.
Like most of you, I'm sure, I always loved libraries. From my earliest years I adored the walls of books, the smell of them, the feeling of being surrounded by literature, knowledge, and information. And all of it is free. All you have to do is provide proof of residence to be able to borrow all sorts of materials. Art, film, literature. You don't even need to prove who you are to use the facilities in most of them.
Libraries are my favorite charity too. Some might think that supporting the library isn't as important as disease research, hunger, homelessness, but I would disagree. Libraries literally saved my life in my youth. Times when I had nowhere to turn, no one I could go to, I always had the library to go to for peace and sanity.
So anyway, I went there. I was thinking about re-reading some books that I loved years ago. But the thing is, I haven't spent a whole lot of time in libraries for the last decade. The reasons for that are numerous. The frantic life of a parent being one and the demands of a more-than full time job is another. Then there is the lure of the Internet and all of the small press books that have dominated my reading time. I had lost sight of the simple joy of spending time wandering through the books, picking up one here or there, knowing that I could take a chance on reading it without any cost.
And mostly, on that recent day, I wanted to spend time with old friends. Old friends being the books I loved in the 1980's. A time when my money was almost always short and the library was one of the only ways I could read.
I entered the hallowed building and climbed the stairs to the fiction section. What I found made me even more depressed than before.
It's the oldest story in the world. It's always been this way and it always will be this way. Out with the old and in with the new. It has to be that way, but that does not mean that I have to like it.
So many treasured books have gone from the shelves. So many classics, masterpieces even, gone. And a lot of just plain good books. Out with the old and in with the new. Books that shaped modern horror fiction are quickly being forgotten.
Take Charles Grant for instance. His novels, short stories, his anthologies. They have had an immeasurable influence on the genre. I don't believe that it's too much of a stretch to say that Charles Grant has had as much impact on the genre as Stephen King has. What writers have not been influenced, directly or indirectly, by Grant? None, I say. I read at least a half a dozen of Grant's books from the very same library that I was at. Yet almost all of them have been discarded. And why not? It's not as if anyone were checking them out any more. What's worse is, there are literally no Charles Grant books currently in print. God, the man sold so many books back in the day. Back when readers craved atmosphere and mood. How many young horror fans read him today? Precious few is my bet.
Then there is Ray Russell. How many know his name? I borrowed Ray Russell's Incubus from that library, as well as some of his other Gothic works. Gone. Ray Russell was as important as, say, Richard Matheson to the field. As an editor for Playboy he was responsible for getting short stories by genre writers like Charles Beaumont, Jack Finney, Bradbury, Matheson, Bloch and many, many others. His short story, Sardonicus, was called "perhaps the finest example of the modern gothic ever written" by Stephen King.
So many others. T.E.D. Klein's The Ceremonies. The early and mid-period books of John Farris. Chet Williamson. Ramsey Campbell's Incarnate and Obsession. F. Paul Wilson's The Keep. Even the early works of big league writers like King and Straub are among the missing.
And I haven't even mentioned all of the great science fiction writers from the golden age that are being forgotten. Guys (and women) that made their livings writing the stuff that made SF great. They poured their blood and guts on the page just as surely as the horror writers did, and most of them delved into the world of fright in their careers.
I know that it's easy to obtain these works secondhand. Amazon.com Marketplace, Ebay and Abebooks.com make it easier than ever to find nearly any book you might be seeking. But that gets expensive too. Paying five to ten dollars (when you add in the shipping fees) or more for books that you might want to read or reread adds up fast. And who has room for them all? It's so much nicer to be able to walk in a library and grab the titles you want and then take them back later.
I suppose I sound like an old fogey that decries all the new trash coming out and preaching about the days when real writers were writing horror. I'm not saying that we should ignore the stars of today. I love to read Keene and Lee and Gonzalez and a hell of a lot of the modern practitioners of horror fiction. I am saying that all readers in the genre should mine the fields of the past. And especially those that wish to break into the field as writers need to read the classics. I'm not necessarily talking about Poe and Stoker and Lovecraft (though I do recommend reading them), but you all should try writers like Joseph Payne Brennan. Manly Wade Wellman. Les Daniels. Michael McDowell. Henry Kuttner. Elizabeth Engstrom. Dig up copies of amazing books like Lowland Rider, by Chet Williamson. The Rats Trilogy by James Herbert. George R.R. Martin's Fevre Dream (and The Armagedden Rag). K.W. Jeter's The Night Man. Marc Laidlaw's The Orchid Eater. C. Eric Higgs' The Happy Man. Whitley Strieber's The Night Church. Charles Grant's The Pet. Thomas F. Monteleone's Night Train. John Coyne's The Piercing. T.M. Wright's A Manhattan Ghost Story. The list is long and rich.
One of the worst things about growing older is watching the things you love disappear. It's not as bad with music or movies. A reader is a rarer sort of bird.
It didn't seem as bad when I was young. In the 70's a lot of the materials on the bookstore racks were reprints of pulp fiction. Doc Savage was huge and so was Conan. Science Fiction from the Golden Age was selling like gangbusters. Now it seems as though few young readers care about the past.
It's not all dire news. Heinlein and Lovecraft and Bradbury and Dick continue to be discovered by successive generations. Richard Matheson has continued to get the respect he deserves from Hollywood. Then there are the specialty presses that bring the literary wonders of the past to us in beautiful editions.
One of the best is Hafner Press, which publishes deluxe editions of classic by Jack Williamson, Leigh Brackett and Edmond Hamilton. Hamilton's horror stories are collected in The Vampire Master and Other Tales of Horror. Wildside Press reprints gems from the pulp era. Paizo Publishing, a company that does a lot of gaming media, puts out some deliciously cool Sword and Planet fiction. Ash-Tree Press delivers a ton of vintage works of supernatural fiction, by writers that even a lot of so-called scholars haven't even heard of. NESFA Press has published dozens of beautiful, affordable retrospectives of classic science fiction and fantasy. A new company called Rocket Ride Books has published a damned nice trade paperback of John W. Campbell's Who Goes There?, with an Introduction and a movie treatment by William F. Nolan, as well as the first-ever audio presentation of the influential novella.
The stuff from the 80's is still to be found too. Library sales are one of the best ways to find the treasures, especially is you (like me) prefer to read hardcovers. And the used bookstores still have a lot of the wonderful paperback originals. Yeah, I know, most of the cool used bookstores are gone too.
Don't discount thrift stores, where I've made dozens of great purchases. You can go many times and find nothing, but there have been occasions where I've found whole collections at them. It's kind of sad to see a whole bunch of books with the same name inscribed in them, knowing that the owner might have passed away.
Still and all, it's not that bad being a veteran reader of the genre. You can read the new materials with the knowledge of hundreds of books from the past as perspective. Opening a beloved old books is like embracing a dear old friend. And if you're lucky, young readers will give you respect and maybe you'll even get asked to pen a column for a major magazine.
I just passed the last small video store in my area. That I know of anyway. There was a Going Out of Business Sale sign in the window. Honestly, I don't know how they made it this long. Every time I passed there it was either empty or nearly empty. I personally hadn't been in there in months. Years, actually. I was sick of getting damaged DVDs from them. Even if they did exchange it or refund my money. Who wants to get home and start watching a movie only to have it crap out somewhere during its running time?
There's still some Blockbusters around, but I haven't liked that corporation in many, many years. I hear they're hurting too. Good.
It's sad to me to see the video stores go. I spent a substantial amount of time in them in the 80's. Shoot, in the 90's too. But I think I was most enraptured in the 1980's, when home video was new and still something unique.
I remember when there was only a few places around to rent movies. They were always crowded. This was when VCRs were still pretty expensive. Then in the course of a few short years, video stores were everywhere. The Videotape Revolution was in full effect and everyone was renting movies, buying blank tapes, and there were movie parties going on everywhere.
It seemed like there were video stores on every corner and just about every convenience store rented them too. Some of the little Mom and Pop shops had more eclectic stuff. But you'd never know what you'd find. Going into a new video store was always an exciting thing. There was always the chance that you'd find some movie that you had been searching for. There was no easy way to find out what was and what was not available on tape. Not like today with Amazon.com and IMDb to answer all of your questions.
Video stores were more than just places to rent your entertainment. They became social centers for some of us. It wasn't hard to find like-minded people and talk about the movies you liked. And you'd see the same faces hovering over the New Releases section like sharks in a feeding frenzy.
It seems impossibly long ago now. A place to meet strangers and talk about movies. Now we can find a thousand places on the Internet to babble all day and night about movies, but it's not the same. I never saw a flame war in a video store nor did I see any trollish behavior. There were some old-fashioned assholes here and there, but even that was rare. People were there for the love of movies.
By the time the 90's rolled around, things had died down to a point. Sure, people still rented movies and the stores were still doing good business. But the frenzy had waned. The newness of home video had worn off and people, ever fickle, were looking for something new. And they found it.
Video games weren't a new thing by then, but they were rapidly becoming more sophisticated. The younger people still liked movies, but more were becoming video game junkies. Why simply watch a movie when you could interact with the events on the screen? It was sexier and more exciting.
Maybe it isn't any better to be a movie geek than a video game junkie, but to me it always was and it always will be. I never picked up the gaming obsession and I'm glad that I haven't. I spend far too much time at this computer as it is without the addiction that I see people have with games.
DVD was a blow to the video stores. Collecting became affordable and who wanted to take back a movie when there were hours of content on a disc? To a lesser extent than the VHS heyday, movie fans became DVD enthusiasts. I was a member and rabid message board participant at the very first website that was devoted to horror DVD. But a lot of us fund that we were blowing tons of money on discs that we really wouldn't be watching very much.
Not that spending far too much money was a new thing in regard to home video. I wish I had the money I blew on rentals and blank tapes. I bought hundreds and they all became garbage.
The final, devastating blow to the video stores was Netflix, I think. And movie downloading (both legal and otherwise) continues to be a driving force in the industry.
I know that there are still movie rental stores, cool ones, especially in bigger cities. But it's not like it was. They've became the exception rather than the rule. Most of us either have Blockbuster, which I hate, or nothing at all.
The video store, such a vital part not only of my life, but of our culture, is dead. Rest in peace.
The Economy and Horror
It's scary out there. People are losing their jobs, their homes. It seems like government spending is reaching terrifying proportions. Home equities and retirement plans are looking shaky. It's time for most of us to cut back on the luxuries.
I'm lucky. I'm not quite sure that my job is 100% recession proof, but we're busy as hell at work and things are looking good for the future.
A lot of people have a bleaker view of their futures.
I was listening to the radio one morning this week and the lady DJ was advising listeners on how to cut their spending. The topic of reading came up and she said to use the library and to buy books used. It's sound advice and I've been forced by necessity to do it.
But the writers need to survive too. I'm not suggesting that those that are unemployed to spend their precious resources on new books, but most of us can at least afford to buy new paperbacks.
We need our writers and they need us. I literally consider book buying to be as important to me as my monthly bills. I have to have the new titles by my favorite writers and as long as I'm gainfully employed I'll continue to buy them.
It's nice to say that we need to support the local booksellers and I try to do so. But no one can find fault in a reader using Amazon and other discount retailers. Nor can we blame them from buying their Leisure books at WalMart. I don't enjoy supporting the corporations, but the main thing is that the writers get their royalties.
It sucks, but for better or worse the rules of distributors are changing. It's no longer mandatory to buy your books from the local bookseller. Get it online if that is what makes it easier on your bank account.
And electronic fiction is a big option too. It's not for me and it never will be, but for those of you that like it, bless you. It's sales that make the genre stronger.
You can change your habits too. Maybe spend fewer nights drinking beer and more with a book. You can buy a paperback with the cost of a twelve-pack. Instead of greasy, nasty lunches at fast food dumps, brown bag and save money (and your heart).
And I'm not saying that we shouldn't use the library. I do all the time. We'd be fools not to. I'm just suggesting that we mix it up and that we don't forget that the writers have bills too. I'd hate to see my own favorites give it up and go to work at factories.
It's a little different with movies. History tells us that movie ticket sales thrive in dire economic times. People like to escape and movies are a reasonably priced way to do it. My advice is to see the first show of the day, which are generally less crowded and much cheaper than evening shows.
For those facing the terrifying prospect of unemployment and foreclosure, my heart goes out to you and your loved ones.
Michele Lee's Rot
Thursday, July 23, 2009
Don't get me wrong: I used to love zombies. I was reading about them and watching movies about them when most of today's fans were on the tit. But I hate it when so many try to milk a genre to death. Too many zombie books, too many zombie movies.
But my job here (unpaid as it is) is to read and review what's happening in horror fiction. I dump a lot of this stuff on my poor, suffering partner, Andy, but I figured I'd jump on the grenade for this one.
And I'm sort of glad that I did.
In the world of Rot, zombies are created by a certain few with the power to do so. Loved ones that cannot bear to lose their dear departed can bring the dead back to a kind of life. But when they are no longer wanted they are taken to a place called Silver Springs Specialty Care Community. For a price your living dead can be watched and monitored as they slowly rot away from any resemblance to humanity. There is a lot to recommend about Michele Lee's Rot. The author genuinely tries to bring human emotion and originality to her work. And she mainly succeeds at this. Rot is much better than the average thing of its kind I've tried to read. I give her major points for it.
Unfortunately there are some things about Rot that don't work. One, the first person narrator is a hard boiled war vet and supposed no-nonsense security head for Silver Springs. The voice didn't jibe with the type for me. I never got the feeling that I was in the hands of such a character. Two, this guy helps some zombies in a quest for truth and freedom, but they way they do it defies all logic and credibility.
I would have liked Rot to have been at least twice as long, with more attention to detail and a little more of a deliberate pace.
Still, the mystery in Rot is engaging and the conclusion is reasonably poignant. I can't recommend Rot without reservation, but zombie enthusiasts will want to check it out. And I won't discount Michele Lee and her writing, despite my dissatisfaction with certain elements of Rot. This novella shows talent that still needs to be honed and polished.
Thursday, July 16, 2009
This is my favorite comedy in recent years. I held off for a long time after hating many so-called comedy films, but after seeing what Judd Apatow was doing with things like Freaks and Geeks, I took a chance.
And I loved it. So many modern comedies seem like I'm supposed to be laughing at mentally retarded people. Like Napoleon Dynamite. Or I'm supposed to enjoy watching some fucking assholes and get enjoyment out of it. The 40-Year-Old Virgin is genuinely funny, plus it has heart and characters that I like and would enjoy hanging out with.
I like the whole gang: The slick player, the hard-around-the-edge sarcastic party monster, the eternally bitter heartbroken guy and of course the genuinely decent man who never developed the confidence to effectively talk to women.
It's a long movie, especially in the uncut form, but I never want it to end. It's like a long party and I love the way the virgin learns about life and living from his new friends. And also how they learn critical things from him in return.
This is one of the few comedies where I agree with most people. Everyone seems to like it. Bring it up and most will say something like, "I love the hair waxing scene, haha, har har, ho ho". And it [i] is[/i] funny. But I get tired of that scene. I more enjoy the parts where the guys are hanging out, shooting the shit and getting to know one another.
I like Knocked Up too, but not as much. I didn't much care for Knocked Up when I first saw it, but I've come to appreciate the whole Apatow crowd. And the couple in Knocked Up aren't exactly likable in the beginning. They too learn and grow from each other and become fuller, better people.
I had The 40-Year-Old Virgin on the other night. Not really watching it, but more of a background movie while I did stuff around the house. I stopped and sat through some of my favorite scenes though, which are plentiful.
I really, REALLY, can't wait for Funny People. I tell some friends and people I work with that and they act surprised. I hate Adam Sandler! But it's not who acts in a movie, but who wrote it. I've become a huge Judd Apatow fan, despite some of the terrible movies he produces. He knows what the masses like in a comedy and if those other movies I hate help finance thoughtful ones like The 40-Year-Old Virgin and Knocked Up, I don't begrudge them.
Happy Birthday, Robert A. Heinlein
Tuesday, July 07, 2009
If he were still alive, he'd be 102. Robert Anson Heinlein was born on July 7th, 1907. It seems like he should be 102, doesn't it? It would be apt for Heinlein to live as long as Lazarus Long.
Heinlein was my first favorite writer. After moving up from things like Doc Savage books, I discovered Heinlein's books for young people, starting with Have Space Suit, Will Travel. I still adore that book with all my heart. I love them all, but my favorites are it and Farmer in the Sky, Starman Jones, Time for the Stars and Space Cadet.
As I matured I moved on to Heinlein's more mature books. Stranger in a Strange Land was heady stuff for my preteen sensibilities, but I loved it. Time Enough For Love was my favorite of the later books. And then there were his early books like The Puppet Masters and The Door Into Summer. Both of these are so beautifully written.
The short stories! Who can forget such masterpieces as The Man Who Sold The Moon, Requiem, The Long Watch, "It's Great To Be Back!", Logic of Empire, Misfit and so many others? I haven't kept up with modern science fiction, but I don't care how good the writers are. None will ever top RAH in my mind. His writing was so personal, so intimate. It felt like I knew him personally and that he was a mentor to me. More than a mentor, a father figure. I learned so much from Heinlein's work. Things that have helped me survive and to maintain what decency I have.
His books, his legacy, shall remain with me always. And I'm gratified that new generations continue to discover him and his work continues to instigate controversy.
By the way, Heinlein's books have had countless printings, but the cover images I've used here are the ones from the editions I originally read. Just seeing them makes me feel like a starstruck kid again. His powerful imagination, his wisdom, his wit and his vision will remain inspirational to me until the day I join him.
Starred Review: Vanilla Ride: A Hap and Leonard Novel by Joe R. Lansdale
For all you Hap and Leonard fans. Bless your little weird hearts.
Who you calling weird, Lansdale?
If that's true, there's a lot of weird people out there. The Hap and Leonard books are among the most universally loved pieces of fiction I've ever known about. I've turned a lot of people on to them and every one has loved them. Every single individual. Even those that either don't read or barely read. They love Hap and Leonard.
I got on board early and I bought Savage Season immediately upon its publication. I was already a huge fan and had been since the first book I read by Joe, which was The Drive-In. I was later blown away by other Lansdale works like The Magic Wagon, Act of Love, Dead in the West and especially Cold in July. But Savage Season was special. Its lead characters captured my heart and it became an instant favorite.
Luckily for Joe's readers, Savage Season was not the last time we would see Hap Collins and Leonard Pine. They returned in Mucho Mojo and again in The Two-Bear Mambo. Over the course of eleven years six Hap and Leonard novels were published. The ones I named as well as Bad Chili, Rumble Tumble and Captains Outrageous. And they also made an appearance or two in short stories.
Then there was a hiatus in which there were no novels coming out about the baddest pair of Texas ne'er do wells since Augustus McCrea and Woodrow Call. Captains Outrageous was released in 2001 and the fans had to wait a long eight years before Hap and Leonard resurfaced. Which they just have, in a new novel called Vanilla Ride. A new novel and a new publisher. Now Joe is putting out books with the prestigious Alfred A. Knopf Publishing House and it's a suitable home for his awesome skills.
The first question interested parties are likely to ask is, was Vanilla Ride the wait? My answer is, what do you think? Vanilla Ride is everything that Hap and Leonard fans love about the series. It's funny as hell, there's breathtaking action, there's mood and careful attention to the details of the locations in the book. And as always with Lansdale, the characters rise above the simple stereotypes that might at first seem obvious.
The best things is that there is as much introspection and, dare I say it, philosophy in Vanilla Ride as there is violence and bawdy humor. Which is to say there is a great deal of it. The first person narration is always by Hap Collins, who constantly questions his own motives and impulses while his wisecracking exterior masks his inner turmoil.
This one is as tough and hard as any and Hap and Leonard face their deadliest (and sexiest) opponent yet in the enigmatic and beguiling Vanilla Ride.
Joe R. Lansdale has made a habit of bringing past characters back into his stories, much to the delight of his readers. Longtime Lansdale fans will be overjoyed to learn that Jim Bob Luke makes an extended appearance. And this reader holds out hope that we'll get to see Vanilla Ride again.
Hap and Leonard are officially back and it's up to the readers to help ensure that the series will continue. Publishing is a business like any other. If the books make money, more will probably come. Skip the library and don't wait for the paperback with this one. I don't want to wait eight more years for another ripping Hap and Leonard adventure.
