Jacob Bryce's Blog, page 2

The Approaching Sophomore

Yesterday I was able to announce to the world that the very wonderful Blue Deco Publishing have accepted Tales of Timeless Springs into their catalog.

Author photos have been taken. Cover art is underway. Final edits are being done. Pants are being shat. Excitement is all around. It's very much the publication process.

Stay tuned, Readers. Updates and details are coming.

J.S. versus B.D.S.

It's been a rather eventful couple of weeks on Bryce Land, which have been getting in the way of certain websites receiving their blog posts, but eh, what are you going to do? The Outhouse, Tongue Huggers, and Tales of Timeless Springs have all been getting their due when I'm not at the desk job, but as I've said before, when a new video game enters my life, writing kind of slows down a bit.


This has been happening.

I've also been giving the nonfiction stuff more attention for the simple fact that I've been trying to push my career outside of novels in the direction of writing as well. I enjoy my current job and I'm very interested in the opportunities that it's laying in path, but just as I'm trying to launch Bryce David Salazar's career, I'm also trying to launch that other guy's career. Which is a bit weird considering we're the same person and neither name is technically a pseudonym, because sometimes Catholic Mexicans want to make sure to fill the entire line on the birth certificate. But it does feel like duel careers and I sometimes wonder if maybe I should try molding the two together, you know? Why not gently put a pillow over the other guy's head as he sleeps and wait for him to take the long nap, and then change everything he's written to "by Bryce David Salazar" to make it clear we're one person?
I mean, it's not exactly a secret so I don't know why I should bother with the metaphorical homicide. Just read the bio given to me at The Outhouse:
JACOB SAILORJacob Sailor? More like Jacob Seamen, amirite? Anyway... Jacob Sailor is the author of She Sees Metaphors (written as Bryce David Salazar) and co-host of the podcast We Write Weird Shit. You can find out more about him at www.BryceDavidSalazar.com.
Pretty simple to understand. No real drama involved. (Although because of the name Salazar, I am waiting for the day to come in which I am accused of cultural appropriation. Because if there's one thing a certain demo of white people in the great nation of the USA love to do, it's inform me that I am not actually of Mexican descent. Doesn't matter that my mother is Mexican. I don't check off enough boxes for my heritage to count, and they would know. They took Spanish classes and their rich parents paid for them to visit Mexico. So it would be in everyone's best interests if I stop offending their liberal sensibilities and stop announcing that you can trace my lineage back to Mexico. Which is all I'm really doing, however they seem to believe I have zero idea just how white I actually am. I'll step off the soap box now.)
So anyways, yes, this is where I'm at in life. Trying to make a writing career out of two separate names that all tie together because #CatholicMexicans exist. 
Also, here's a lovely, lovely quote photo from Jon James to promote She Sees Metaphors.
I like his coat.
Fuck, I'm out of coffee. Gotta run.

Guess Who's Back? Back Again? Bryce Is Back. Tell a Friend.

It's been a while, hasn't it? Apologies, life has a way of growing selfish and demanding one's full attention. But that's okay, things are calming down. And in this calm, I present to you..
Ta-Da!
I am published once again! And this time through a legit publisher, not just me going through Createspace. Which is still legit, but it's not... I don't know. It's just nice to have my name under a publishing house's label. After the whole crazy journey this novel has gone through, it felt incredible to hold it in my hands again. And the new design is absolutely incredible.
So what else is new? I dunno.

Anyone who has worked in the Capital City's neighboring college town can tell you that when you work there in the summer, you're going to face some financial strain. So I took the liberty of getting a second job so that when the time came I would still be up shit creek, but I would have a paddle. It hasn't been fun. Working six to seven days a week to just have enough money to pay your bills and eat while the more privileged in our society struggle to understand that level of exhaustion when you say you need a break is...
Difficult

But there have been some wonderful moments. The hippy and I have settled into our new home, a beautiful house with three bedrooms and a lawn big enough to attract some attention when I forget to mow it. I've found a job in my degree field (Communications) that allows me to put these skills to use. I call myself a Bakery Administrative Assistant, but if it's easier you may call me a secretary. 

You wish. ;)
I've also been writing comic book reviews for The Outhouse. It's been a wonderful experience and I look forward to continuing to write reviews for them, in exchange for a little bit of money and a lot of free comic books to read. You will find me in their list of staff profiles. Just look for Jacob Sailor, which if you didn't already know, is the rest of my rather long name.

Still a thing.
Jon and I still fuck around with the podcast, and have been outlining a story for the much, much delayed second season. I'll take some blame for it. Two jobs, a writing gig and an internship make it difficult to record a podcast. Oh, yes, speaking of...

I'm basically Peggy Olson.
I've written copy for several flavors of hot sauce from Tongue Huggers, a delicious brand of hot sauce that my brother keeps bugging me to share with him. You can learn about them here.

And that's about it for now. I just wrapped up a thirteen day stretch of work, which occurred fresh off the heels of one day off to separate it from the sixteen day stretch that proceeded it. I'm tired. I'm ready for this weekend. The hippy and I have both days off and will be spending the time together at a wedding and watching Trigun, which both of us are watching now for the first time.

Better late than never.
And so with that, I leave you now, Reader. Trigun and season two of Narcos ain't gonna watch themselves, ya know?

Me gusta.

Temporarily Unpublished

Readers, She Sees Metaphors is no longer available to purchase on Createspace, Kindle, or the Nook. The reason for this is very exciting. I'll bring you more details as they come, but Blue Deco Publishing has accepted the manuscript into its arms and very soon will be releasing it under its own label! 

This is, without a doubt, the most exciting thing that has happened with She Sees Metaphors in a long time. This entire novel has gone through quite the journey, from it's various incarnations and drafts over the years, to it's brief time with a small Texas publisher (you know, the one that didn't read it, accepted it, then dropped it), to self-publication, and now on to a whole new publisher. 
I am completely overwhelmed with gratitude at this moment. Not just to Blue Deco Publishing for accepting my wee little novel, but also to everyone that has supported me over the years, came to readings, and purchased the novel in its independent format. I can't wait to share this new experience with all of you as I take the next step in my career as an author.
In the meantime, I'm currently working on We Write Weird Shit: The Book! with Jon James, gearing up more special episodes, and, of course, prepping myself for season two. And, perhaps craziest of all, I'm deep in the process of adding additional material to Tales of Timeless Springs, which will take it from a novella to a full fledged novel. 
It's a good year, folks. Again, thank you all so much and I'll see you soon!

A Little Taste of Timeless Springs, and Other Things

Okay-

Tales of Timeless Springs is currently in the hands of two wonderful grammar lovers that are sweeping the 100 page novella anthology thing for typos and whatnot. And while the cover and my final sweeps through the book are still pending, I thought I'd offer a tiny little taste of what's to come. Which, I suppose, is fairly generous considering that one of the stores is due to appear in Random Transmissions and another has been submitted to a journal. But there's nothing here so fuck it, why not give you a little taste? I'm excited to bring this little bastard into the world. One reader has said my writing has only improved, and another that he couldn't decide if he liked it more because the story or the writing is better. Both of these are from people who care less about my feelings than the hippy's cat.

Uno has probably figured out 100 different ways to kill me,
but hasn't out of respect for the hippy.

But before we get to the whole sample thing, UPDATES:

I'm doing a thing.
I am appearing at the Michigan Authors on the Grand Aual Event on Saturday, April 14th. I'll have a table set up with copies of She Sees Metaphors and I'll be giving a reading at 2:30. The event takes place in DeWitt and should be a rocking good time, so I totally think that you should come on out and see me and some other local authors. 



Who are these guys? 
The latest episode of We Write Weird Shit is up and this is the last one that Jon or I will be reading from our work for the foreseeable future. We've got our own shit to work on for the time being, BUT we've got three episodes featuring guest authors coming. First off, we'll have a story by Justin Day of Random Transmissions fame. After that will be Robert Goyette, the man behind The Powder Burns (whose music we use as our intro for WWWS). And finally, we'll have a story from Cody Lee, a god-king of nerd culture and all around love man. (I'm not sure if Cody has work out there at the moment, however I am super stoked to see his work.)

And that's all for now! Stay tuned for more updates and, as promised...

Here's a sample from Tales of Timeless Springs!



The disgusting shit heel patron was thrown out of the bar and into the streets of shattered concrete, where Mother Nature, the greedy whore, had begun sending her saplings and roots to break out and start covering the city of Timeless Springs in her life. The shit heel picked himself up with a throbbing pace, and the spirits he’d consumed the early afternoon hours nauseated his bloated gut. The bartender stood behind him, watching, waiting to see what he’d do, if danything. It crossed the shit heel’s mind to turn around and reclaim his dignity with a few blows to the bartender’s head, and mid turn he lost his balance and fell to the ground, blood and sick trailing from his face like a punctured carton. Satisfied, the bartender, Jon Bull, headed back inside.
In this part of town, calling the sad sight of a man outside a shit heel was calling the kettle black. They renamed this neighborhood Junk some years back, on account of the manner in which its residents and business owners lived their lives, like a heard of junkies some farmer gathered into a pen to keep away from the rest of the economy forwarding townies to hopefully kill themselves off. Even if they didn’t, they still brought something to the tax man’s table, so at least they had some semblance of value.
Jon Bull was the least black of all the pots in his bar, but he fit in as seamlessly as any other that walked into his place, the Echo Tavern. Bull was the oldest tough guy in the city, or so they said. He was gentler now, at least to anyone who didn’t disrespect him in his bar. But in his day he was as violent and vicious as an ocean storm, and rumor had it even the worst of the gang heads wouldn’t cross him. The law was enough to worry about.
At the counter were three men, all nearly as drunk as the shit heel outside, but none so drunk that they’d give in to their stupidity and allow themselves to say something disrespectful to Old Bull. The air in the Echo Tavern was heavy with depression. Selby Jer, an old widower who never could get over the loss of his claimed, let his head hang low as there wasn’t much life in him to keep it up.
“Been two weeks,” Selby Jer said. “Feels like two minutes.”
Selby’s story, a definite tale of woe, didn’t end with the passing of his missus. She’d been long gone, buried in the earth and turned to dirt before Old Bull knew Selby by his first name. It most recently came to its next chapter of misery with the disappearance of his son, Cart, just nine years of age and all pitiful old Selby had to keep him going every morning.
“It’s a damn shame, Selby,” Owski, a young dealer who liked Selby enough to pass pushing his product on him, like he always did to the poor sobs with their tales of misery and need to just end it all. Not that it didn’t cross his mind, but like a monogamous man who allows himself to just consider a night with the working girl, he stayed faithful. “I’m sorry, friend. I mean it. No man should have to go through what you’ve been going through.”
“Another?” Old Bull said. He stopped charging Selby a while ago, once the spirits had their grip on him but wouldn’t let the misery out, keeping that possessing ghost within.
Selby made a gesture that might have been a yes, but no one could say for certain. His head lulled around as though some wind or wave only available to him pushed his head around. Bull capped the bottle and set it aside. He wouldn’t keep filling Selby up when he was hardly there anymore.
“If you want, you can take some of mine,” the third man, Logger said.
Logger was a bloated old drunk, with a violent bark and a bite to match. He sqt quietly to the side, looking at Selby Jer as a man that brought this misery on himself. When Selby, Owski, and Bull spoke of their empathy for Cart being one of a long line of young boys that disappeared over the years, a sad truth that haunted Timeless Springs longer than it should, with not even one violator sent to the labor camps or the noose in punishment. Sooner or later a boy always went missing and the cops gave up and filed the complaint away with others dating back so long there were rumors some of them dated before the city separated from the world. Not that it mattered, to Selby. He just missed his boy.
“Hey Owski,” Bull said, “take him home, will ya? Watch over him?”
Bull slid a small envelope Owski didn’t have to open to know it contained more than enough for him to make up for the losses he’d suffer that night for not dealing. True, he could take the money and leave Selby on his own, but Owski wasn’t stupid enough to take money from Old Bull and break the contract. There were better ways to get in deep water, better ways to end up like those poor boys no one found.
Owski took Selby and lifted him, and the two slowly shuffled towards the door and out into Junk, where the night would be quiet and uneventful for the two of them. Once they left, Bull returned to his place behind the counter, just him and Logger. There was room to argue that the two most violent men in the city were sitting across from each other that evening. In the spirit of the night, Bull poured Logger a drink.
“On the house,” Bull said.
Logger raised his eyebrow in surprise. He nodded with entitlement and hadn’t bothered to say thanks, which Bull wouldn’t forget. He felt the same way towards Logger as the shit heel he threw out earlier, but Logger always paid for his drinks and as long as he didn’t offend Bull, his money was good at the Echo Tavern.
Logger looked at Bull with the vacant stare of an alcoholic and shook his head while he drank his on-the-house liquor.
“I didn’t realize a whore’s life meant so much to the rich.”
Bull, who had been looking at a faded, torn around the edges, poster of some woman from before the city was on its own broke his focus and looked at Logger, ready to listen to some story about how hard it was being a man with no faults like Logger, who had so many legal problems that are to blame for his house and family falling apart.
“What’re you talking about, Logger?”
The drunk set some coins on the bar top, and Bull took them. He refilled Logger’s drink, which lasted five seconds. Logger set the glass down with the failing control of a man in rage who would rather hurl the glass at the thought of what he’s got to say.
“My options are work in labor for life, or provide a kid for Peg Pik’s brothel to raise as payment for the one I sent to the eight.”
Bull looked at Logger a long time, gripping the rag he wiped the counter with as though he meant to choke the life from it. He took a breath.
“What you go and kill a girl for?” Bull asked. Bull had more than his share of bodies buried all around the city. None of them women or under sixteen, when boys are men and girls are women in Timeless Springs. Logger didn’t know, but his life was on trial and he was giving his defense.
“Damn it, man. I don’t know. I just went to the mistress house, a little drunk, on some rexes, looking to blow off some steam. My claimed has been driving me crazy, nagging to take care of the kids more like it ain’t her job to do that. I’m the one out here every day, earning a paycheck. She’s the one who gets to stay home all day. If it bothers her so much, I’ll trade.”
“Being a mother to six and on your own most of the day isn’t easy.” Bull knew this. He thought of his mother sisters and brothers, all gone. It was just him now. He’d be the period to his family’s statement, something all too common with the population winding down and one third of the city just empty houses and lots.
“Whatever man, it’s easier than working all day.”
Logger held up his empty glass and slapped more coins on the table. Bull refilled the glass, but set the coins to the side of the register instead of putting them in the till.
“So what’s your claimed have to say about this?” Bull asked.“She says she’s not having a child just so it can be raised into a mistress. That this is all my problem. Damn filthy bitch of a woman. But…” Logger took a drink and smiled and then laughed as though recalling the best joke in the city. “I told her, ‘you think you have a choice?’ I’m not working in labor and she sure as hell ain’t moving in with her mother. Not with my kids. My kids, Bull.”
Bull looked and saw the door was still unlocked. He set the bottle of spirits in front of Logger and told him have at it. Again, the gesture met with a deserving nod. Bull owed Logger this. He drank straight from the bottle, not noticing Bull locked the door and closed the curtain, turning the glass door from a window into their sick as shit world to a well-kept secret.
“I got a year to make this right or I’m going to be a slave,” Logger said. “It’s one kid, Bull. Not like it’s that hard on her, I mean, expecting women got it made in Timeless Springs, am I right? They get fresh food delivered and money just for having a kid on the way. I told her it’d be like a vacation, you know?”
Logger looked at the bottle and saw that it’s near its end. He held it up on display to Bull, behind him now.
“You gonna get me another one of these, Bull?”
Bull took the bottle and before Logger could finish saying Bull knows how to treat a man with respect, Bull drove the heavy end of the glass onto the top of Logger’s skull. Logger stumbled from his stool but held his own regaining balance faster than Bull expected, assuming Logger survived the blow, which Bull did to many men that never got up.
“You swine. You filthy…”

Logger grabbed the top of a bar stool and swung it hard and fast, four wooden legs going straight into Bull’s head. The bartender held an arm up and felt the sharp burn of impact, the legs broke at his touch and fell to splinters. Bull, having watched old films with fighters, when the city still had means to show films, held his big fists in front of his face, ready to protect himself and finish the job he started.
Copyright © 2014 by Jacob Sailor. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this sample or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. 

Ugh, Where Are We?

It's been a whirlwind of shit and honey these last few months, and now that the storm has settled down, I'm not surprised that March is already walking out the door and April is already starting to rear its stupid head.

Things were kind crazy. I took a job as a General Manager at a fast casual chain last December, and while the money was pretty cool, just about everything else involved with the job was terrible. And I can't stress that enough. Holy fuck nut, that placed sucked on so many levels. I made the hippy promise me to never to another management gig, not in this town anyways. When it all got to be too much, I did  the only thing I could do: I crawled back to my last boss and asked him for my job back.

So it's all okay now. I'm back to where I was, and even working a little job at a used record/ dvd/ video game shop to boot. Life is alright. I'm still broke but between cutting down on my expenses, the release of the second edition of She Sees Metaphors (so soon, so very soon), and being oh so close to finishing Tales of Timeless Springs, I'm pretty happy.

We Write Weird Shit is about to wrap up its first season, which also blows my mind. It feels like Jon and I just started, but it turns out no, no we did not. We record episode thirteen pretty soon, which means we've been doing this podcast thing for probably closer to fifteen weeks. There's currently talk of releasing the short stories we wrote in a collection, which I think would be a nice little treat to wrap up the season. Sort of a gift to ourselves, as well as something to boost the Amazon author pages.

Oh, here's a fun little fact: One of the stories that make up Tales of Timeless Springs is going to appear in in episode 9 of Random Transmissions. I am super fucking stoked about this. Justin K. Day, the creator of the podcast, has put together something very special. It's a great way to hear stories from new authors, and the world he's created within the podcast is wonderful. It's dark, creepy, and I'm oh so very curious as to where everything is going. So with that, I invite you to click the link and have a listen. I promise, you won't regret it.

And... that's about it. There are some other potential publishing options coming up, but I'm going to keep quiet on those until the ink dries. So for now, take it easy.

Got that whole Tales of Timeless Springs stuff figured out...

So when it comes to Tales of Timeless Springs, I feel like my whole life is a mess and I don't know what I'm doing. That was until earlier this afternoon when it all hit me...


Take a note of inspiration from the series that started it all.
Growing up I loved Goosebumps. It was my shit. That was what I wanted to do as a little nine year old writer.

Figuring out Tales of Timeless Springs has been a chore. I've been working on it casually for a few years. It was basically my affair project to go to when She Sees Metaphors was driving me nuts. And now that She Sees Metaphors is all set (mostly, more on that in a sec), ToTS has become my focus. But there's so much that I wanted to do with the world that I created and it was driving me nuts. And then I thought about Goosebumps and Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark and Fear Street, and I realized I can do that. 
So how's this going to work?


Yup.
I'm going to make things simple and just release each book (which will typically be either a collection of stories or a novella, all of which will take place in the city of Timeless Springs) on Kindle. Eventually I'll release an anthology in print, but for now, they're just going to come out as ebooks, one or two a year. Timeless Springs will be my getaway stories while I work on the bigger books, which brings me to my next topic...
We ain't done yet.

She Sees Metaphors is going to have a second edition! It's going to be nifty, too. There'll be an author intro, a sample from Tales of Timeless Springs, and I fixed the typos that so many people were generous enough to point out to me. And once this new edition is all set, I plan to start bugging the shit out of some local bookstores until they put it on their shelves. Because community.
So yeah, plenty of Tales of Timeless Springs to come. And I can finally get started on my second novel, which I'll talk about later. 

Suck it, Winesburg!

So about that Timeless Springs story. Well...


I'm working on it.

If you listened to the latest episode of the podcast We Write Weird Shit (which I co-host with the F. Scott Fitzgerald of Bizarro fiction, Jon "jonjames" James) you'll have heard that I am actually working not only on the revisions and edits for Tales of Timeless Springs, but I am also adding some more material to it.

"Why?" you ask, every so eager to know because you can't stand another minute of this life without a copy of my sophomore effort to be on your shelf.

The long and short of it is that I've had this nagging feeling that the book wasn't really done ever since I finished it. Something felt like it was missing. After talking to one of my editors, who I paid tribute and gave mad exposure to in the We Write Weird Shit episode All Hail The King, I figured it out.

It's this one.
The first draft of Tales of Timeless Springs was actually a fourteen thousand word novelette about a group of kids trying to escape the city. And since second drafts are usually completely different from the first when I write them, the story I have now centers on those kids as adults and a cast of other characters that live in the city of Timeless Springs. 

But I couldn't let that original story go. It stuck with me and I figured that I could always put out a second Timeless Springs book later on. And then I figured why not just include the story? It's relatively short so it can be rewritten and fixed into the current story's continuity pretty easily. And it can be done within the deadline I have set for the release of the book, which is late summer. So what the hell? Why not?

And so that's where the book is now. I'm rewriting one section, the novelette, and working on the penultimate round of edits on the other section, which is a series of connected short stories that tell a larger narrative. 

And last but not least, I'm also working with an artist to help me put out an illustrated sample from Tales of Timeless Springs, much like I did with She Sees Metaphors. So soon I should be giving you guys a nice little taste of what's to come.

So yeah, in the meantime, be sure to check out We Write Weird Shit and enjoy the weird ass tales that Jon and I do our best to entertain you with on a weekly basis.

Cheers!

-BDS

The Old Man - We Write Weird Shit S01E01

Episode 1 is here! In this episode, Jon reads Jake's story about a haunted music box in a restaurant, as suggested by Leslie. We also discuss Uwe Boll's Nazi Gold.

Next week Jake will be reading Jon's story about trying to renovate a home while being propositioned by the house's deceased residents, as recommended by Alex, titled Extreme Ghost Orgy Home Makeover.

Links mentioned in this episode:

http://www.brycedavidsalazar.com/

http://www.jonjameswrites.com/

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2...

https://smile.amazon.com/gp/registry/...

https://uweboll.wordpress.com/2007/06...

https://www.facebook.com/Fiction440/

The Old Man (C) Jacob Sailor 2016

A Year In Literature

So here's a nice and safe little blog which is guaranteed not to upset some of the anonymous little shits who unliked me simply because of my last two blogs (which I figured weren't really that controversial, but apparently I was wrong). 

With twenty-fifteen coming to its conclusion I thought I'd jot down the titles of all that I've read this year with a mini-review. I really went for quantity over quality this, as most of the books I read, while good, weren't too impressive. Still, there were a few gems and so without further ado, I present to you:

A YEAR IN LITERATURE

The Sex Lives of Siamese Twins, Irvine Welsh: Almost amazing. The ending was weak but leading up to it was a hilarious and vulgar romp.

Junkie, William S. Burroughs: Love me some junkie literature. 

The Scarlet Gospels, Clive Barker: While not amazingly written it remains in the top three novels I read this year. Pinhead v Harry D'Amour. What more do you need? Besides Abarat IV...

Luther: The Calling, Neil Cross: Were I not such a huge fan of BBC's Luther I probably wouldn't have read this, but I'm glad I did and will probably start to follow Cross in the future.

Black Chalk, Christopher J. Yates: My favorite second this year and hands down one of the few books I wish I had written. It was a delightful mystery that unfolded so perfectly it was impossible to set down.

Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki, Haruki Murakami: Meh.

Mr. Mercedes, Stephen King: 400 page incest joke.

Let's Explore Diabetes With Owls, David Sedaris: Sedaris is my spirit animal, but this is not his best. 

Chew: Chicken Tenders/ Blood Puddin': Chew is hands down one of the greatest comics to have ever been written and I love this series so hard.

The Killing Lessons, Saul Black (Glen Duncan): Glen Duncan is one of my favorite authors, and I think it's cool that he attempted a thriller, but I do miss the true to form, non-commercial Glen Duncan.

The Fountain, Darren Aronofsky: My brother picked up the graphic novel of the Aronofsky's most underrated film and I found this to be just as incredible as the movie.

Fabels: Legends in Exile/ Animal Farm: I started reading the Fabel series after getting a massive gaming hardon for The Wolf Among Us. The comics are fun but TellTale has 'em beat. I preferred the interactive setting of the game to the comics.

Dark Places, Gillian Flynn: Difficult in the middle with an awful twist, but I still enjoyed it. No Sharp Objects though.

The Grownup, Gillian Flynn: Awful twist ending to an otherwise perfect short story. I kind of wish Flynn didn't run with twists and kept the plot straightforward. She has no problem locking a reader in so twists kind of stump the flow of it.

The Sunset Limited, Cormac McCarthy: Perfection. Just as amazing as the first time I read it.

Queer, William S. Burroughs: It's no Junkie, which is maybe why I wasn't feeling it. Very bland.

Never Come Morning, Nelson Algren: This wins my favorite for the year and wraps up the year in literature for me. I so badly wished I could write this novel, but there's no imitating Algren's voice or style, as much as I wanted to. It's a love story and so heartbreaking that I tossed the book after finishing it, I was crushed so badly. I have some of Algren's other work on my shelves and I am beyond excited to read them. Hemingway was right. Don't read him if you can't take a punch.

DIVORCED BOOKS: 

These are the books I started or had been trying to finish and just said fuck it to because there was no hope or point in even trying.

Purity, Jonathan Franzen: I so badly want to like Franzen  because he's a great writer. But he writes such awful fucking books that I just can't. Once the lead male went down on the lead female and used that as a blackmailing secret to match the one he gave her, which was him committing a murder, I put it on my shelf with Freedom and The Corrections and decided Franzen can get fucked.

The Heart Goes Last, Margaret Atwood: The ending that I was so afraid of and yet wanted so badly turned out to be a fake out plot point in the middle of the book and I walked away. I was so mad. The Handmaid's Tale this is not.

1Q84, Haruki Murakami: Murakami wrote two of my all time favorite novels (The Wind-up Bird Chronicles and Hardboiled Wonderland and The End of the Word) but for some reason everything else I've tried of his is just one massive let down. 1Q84 is a fine example of a long novel that should have been 500 pages shorter. I would probably have loved this book if it didn't drag to the point where I didn't give a shit and was not going to go through 300 more pages of characters sitting around.