Drinking with Comics - Relaunch Special #1

... and we're back! New location. Just two of the guys who started it (for now - although the third original member, who was actually my original partner on this venture, was in town from NY for the show, so that was awesome). Adobe's newest update nearly fucking killed me editing this one; apparently the export to H264 file format now drops audio, which is something you don't find out until after the three hours it takes render a forty-nine minute session with extensive color correction work and numerous other plug-ins. It took me five fucking days, but I found a work around and from here out, it will hopefully be smooth sailing. Because we plan on doing more of these.

A lot more.

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Song:



My cousin has turned me into a card-carrying Kevin Morby fan, and this is one of the songs on his latest album, Oh My God, that I can't seem to live without these last couple weeks.

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Reading:

Currently, I'm held spellbound by David Cronenberg's debut novel, Consumed. When I saw Cronenberg speak at Beyondfest in 2018, he talked about originally wanting to be an author. It makes sense that his storytelling skills would translate from film to prose; the book definitely feels cinematic, to say the least. ~106 pages in and Consumed is excellent, and also bordering on the most disturbing thing I've read since Naked Lunch.

The fact that Cronenberg is writing/directing an adaptation of this for Netflix makes me both extremely excited and horribly afraid.


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Playlist:

David Bowie - Black Star
Lingua Ignota - Caligula
Kevin Morby - Oh My God
The National - High Violet
Angel Olsen - All Mirrors
David Bowie - Hunky Dory
David Bowie - Outside
Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross - Watchmen Vol. 3
Godflesh - Pure

Card:

A warning to recognize losing oneself in delusion. I actually think this applies to a facet of introspection I've had of late; until last night, it's been almost a good solid two weeks of little to no writing. A lot of that was editing the episode of DwC. Some of it, however, was a combination of fatigue and laziness. I'd come home from work exhausted, lay down and turn on a flick. Fine when that's a one-off, but when that happens several days in a row, I begin to make a habit of it. I come home from work and, tired or not, want to smoke up and watch something. There's filling the well, and there's abandoning the Art for consumption's sake. Escaping my work for the sake of falling into the fantasy of a movie, when reiterated over and over, begins to dissolve the creative inertia I've spent so much time building. This is a good reminder to put the Art first, and the fantasy second.

Peter V. Brett's The Warded Man

What can I say, I'm a gluttonous reader. I read constantly, and while I am always looking for new authors to love (and when I find them I love the hell out of them and espouse their virtues to everyone that will listen) I do not woo easily. Since starting work at the bookstore I have become what I commonly refer to as a Fiction/Lit snob.

I love fiction, but mostly the kind of stuff that does not end up in a genre section.

I didn't mean for this to happen. Quite the contrary. I've always loved the idea of Science Fiction, Fantasy and especially Horror. Unfortunately though a lot of the stuff that ends up in those sections is written specifically to be in those sections. Target Market. So over the last couple years I've augmented my bouts of quantum physics and the Occult with David Foster Wallace, Alex Garland, Irvine Welsh, Chuck Palahniuk and more and more what I find in the Fiction/Lit section. I always buy the new China Mieville the day it comes out, and some customers have introduced me to authors such as Glenn Cook, but SciFi/Fantasy always seems so far away. And I was just about to begin re-reading Martin Amis' brilliant London Fields (for the first time in 10 years) the other day when into my store walked Peter V. Brett and his agent.

I didn't know Mr. Brett's work. When he came in and asked to sign copies of his new book I had no idea what The Desert Spear was at first. Then he asked the magic question and a conversation began between us.

Mr. Brett: "Do you read fantasy?"

Me: "Actually, I hate most fantasy."

Now, this is my knee-jerk response. I wasn't doing it to wind the man up, I just cannot mask the intolerance I hold for all of those wannabe Tolkiens that fill that damn section with all manner of the derivations of Tolkien's frankly over-rated formula. What formula, you ask?

1 Part dragons
1 Part Knights
1 Part Orcs/Giants/Elves
1 Part Chivalry

You get the idea.

No fucking thank you. And the whole Medieval thing... it's fine if it's sincere but somehow it always just feels like what is expected. And maybe that's my biggest beef with these genres - a lot of the authors working within them seem to write to the expectations of the genre fans. Like metal heads afraid to lose the double-bass kick drum or actually sing instead of screech and howl, genre writers can follow a formula and be safe because there's enough people who can't stop trying to relive the way they felt when they first read Tolkien.

Well, I am happy to say that as much of an arsehead as I may have come off as to Mr. Brett and his agent, he didn't give up on me. He told me his stuff was fantasy, apocalyptic to an end, but also not what I would call Tolkien-esque.

"In my books the end of the world is caused by demons."

Demons... I have to admit, he had me. This seemed like such a good idea. It has horrific potential, yet also a flair of the genre pomp. The struggles of the remaining few in a world otherwise dead, fighting to survive, forced back into the old ways, not remembering the age of science and progress. Sort of like Stephen King's Dark Tower series, which I read growing up and LOVE.

Mr. Brett and his agent were in a hurry, on their way to a con out of the states, but something about him really piqued my interest. Number one both were damn nice guys, and number two, as readers of this blog and more specifically my chud.com Opinionated Bastard blog will no doubt know, despite appearances I am not a pessimist. I'm always looking to Love something new. On their way out Mr. Brett handed me a copy of his first novel, The Warded Man (turns out once I saw the cover I remembered I'd sold all three of the HC's of The Desert Spear several days before and was waiting for a replenishment shipment) and as soon as I went to lunch I cracked that fucker open and you know what?

It's really, really good. Really.

Mr. Brett's world is dark and dangerous; feudal and tainted by humanity's desperate attempts to survive. It's hardworking and occasionally joyful but most of all it is difficult. Difficult because every night when the sun goes down demons rise from the bowels of the land and massacre every living thing they can get their talons on. And this isn't just a scenic setting. Nope. Mr. Brett uses the harsh realities of this world to shape some really well-written and memorable characters (Arlen!!!) and 160 pages in I LOVE THIS BOOK!!!

Sorry Martin Amis, Keith Talent and the boys will have to wait...

Richard Kadrey

This is what I am currently reading. Great book. I'm pretty hard on anything Sci fi or horror and this is definitely a cross-breeding of the two. However, its more of that Clive Barker horror, or maybe even old Vertigo. There is a certain logic that pervades the elements of supernatural that make it more than what we call sci fi these days* and because it deals with the Infernal Realms and demons and such (although in a less Christian more hierarchical sort of way) it automatically makes me think horror. So far though, not horrific per se, and that is not a dis. Kadrey is a very descriptive writer, and his dialogue is magnetic, even if I get the impression sometimes his characters are being just a skosh too cute for their own good (which is not a failing on Kadrey's part – main character Spyder sometimes just talks too much, which Butcher Bird even spends a great deal of time telling him. Character development on this level is excellent and fun to read, even if you occasionally want to smack the character.

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* Which if we're being honest is a completely different animal than Science Fiction, but that's a discussion for another day