Rachel Smith's Blog: Guinea Pigs and Books, page 81

I’m just going to pretend he’s playing that saxophone for Daryl Dixon.

Welcome to YA Megamix Summer the Return!! This summer I’m not even going to pretend that I will stick to the Point Horror/Thriller imprint, even though I love it so; instead, I’ll be sticking to my Year of the Ladies only reviewing books by women rules, which isn’t very hard. Just like last summer, the track listing will make one sixty minute mixtape – and I made the first one extra hard to duplicate unless you received Electric Six’s Mimicry and Memories project by shoving money at them like I did. Sorry? Anyway…

40. Graveyard Moon – Carol Gorman

Sax solo! Occasionally I read a book that has a scene that stands out so much that I can’t help but forget a large amount of what happened in the story. In the case of Graveyard Moon, that scene is Miles’ sax solo. I’m going to go ahead and retroactively claim that I named my character Miles (of Schad, Miles, and Hirsch the “dude” saying sort of Greek chorus in Dawn of the Interns, Day of the Robots, and the perpetually forthcoming Night of the Squirrels) after Miles in Graveyard Moon because of the sax solo. It does not really happen organically – Miles is not in the school band, he doesn’t frequent jazz clubs, and he is not Duke Silver, he’s the town outcast (of course) – it happens because Kelly the main character asks him if he played for Darryl, and then asks him to play for her. It is so bizarrely fantastic and ridiculous that I could barely stand reading about it. And that is what I have chosen to share from Graveyard Moon, the teenage murder mystery. Also, I really enjoy Carol Gorman’s writing. Damnit, sax solo, you’re killing me.

Murderface and Pickles demonstrate the ways to respond to an impromptu sax solo – hiding… or surprise.

Mixtape –

1.    “Tired Eyes” – The Black Angels

2.    “Stop, I’m Already Dead” – Deadboy & the Elephantmen

3.    “Superstition” – The Kills

4.    “Follow You Home” – The Creeps

5.    “Ritual Knife” – Uncle Acid & the Deadbeats

6.    “Easy Lover” – Electric Six

7.    “So Young” – Suede

8.    “Endless Night” – Graveyard

9.    “Doom and Gloom” – Electric Six

10.    “Chocolate Town” – Ween

11.    “Perennials” – Widowspeak

12.    “Taxidermy” – White Lies

13.    “Somewhere Else to Be” – VAST

14.    “Snakes Are Charmed” – Torche

15.    “Bad Reputation” – Thin Lizzy

16.    “Blood Red Blood” – The Ettes

Trapped in Paradise without Nicolas Cage.

62. The Changeling – Joy Williams

If anyone walks up to you in a bar and tells you they’re taking you to their island – don’t go. Even if they offer you cheese logs or to validate your stated love of clowns (Ahh!). You will end up drinking yourself into a stupor by the pool every day while children play around you and then have weird daydreams about stone rooms and wooden animals. It will be confusing.

I did not know what I was getting into with this book – there was no dust jacket to tell me that it’s not actually the novel version of that movie with George C. Scott. No dust jacket! I could have been warned! I still don’t really know what I think about the whole thing. Too many big bad wolves and syrupy delusions. Side note, my research into the George C. Scott version let me know there is no novelization of the film because the script is based on the screenwriter’s personal experience, which is unfortunate.

Thaddeus cannot be coaxed out by cheese logs. Also, he will not be drinking by your pool or becoming anyone’s de facto drunk babysitter. Ever.

A shuddering encounter

23. You’ll Like My Mother – Naomi A. Hintze

A pregnant girl in a tan tent dress on a bus travels to Always, Ohio to confront the mother in law who didn’t write her back after the death of her husband in Vietnam. What she finds is reminiscient of the 1998 Jessica Lange and Gwyneth Paltrow vehicle, Hush; give or take some blood poisoning in a cabin by the beach (if only we could all find solid, stable boyfriends by isolating ourselves in beach cabins and stabbing ourselves with fish hooks after being kicked out of college), a lumpy freshwater pearl, a feeble minded sister (oh, 1969, and your use of the words “feeble minded” and “monster” to describe people with developmental disorders), and some LSD. And Red the bus driver, filling in for his father. Melodrama played a big part in this story. It was a “A fine chiller diller,” according to the Columbus Dispatch, they would say that.

Ozymandias reacts to the reviews on the back of the book – “Throat-clutching suspense!” Don’t worry, Ozy, that’s just for 1969 audiences.

I took her to a supermarket, I don’t know why, But I had to start it somewhere …

1o. Misadventures – Sylvia Smith

There are a lot of things to consider about this book in a larger context. Reading it was a bit maddening for me because all the chapters were so short that I was compelled to keep reading but the story itself was so flat that I spent time wondering why I continued and what I was missing (I’ve loved all my time spent in London and I enjoy dry humor and I kept thinking I’ve lost the inner translator I picked up while I lived in England. 42.). I pretty much never give up on reading anything, I can think of one book that I gave up on reading and eventually I’ll suck it up and get through the rest of the church and flower descriptions in Anne Rice’s memoir… However, not unlike Gillian Flynn’s novels, I see it a bit differently in terms of what it accomplishes. It’s an everyday woman story and it is always going to be important to document life and culture from all perspectives – not just those of the very adventurous or very wealthy or very addicted (there are reality shows for those things), even if the execution bores you to tears.

Belvedere studied sculpture at St. Martin’s College.

I took her to a supermarket, I don���t know why, But I had to start it somewhere ���

1o. Misadventures ��� Sylvia Smith

There are a lot of things to consider about this book in a larger context. Reading it was a bit maddening for me because all the chapters were so short that I was compelled to keep reading but the story itself was so flat that I spent time wondering why I continued and what I was missing (I���ve loved all my time spent in London and I enjoy dry humor and I kept thinking I���ve lost the inner translator I picked up while I lived in England. 42.). I pretty much never give up on reading anything, I can think of one book that I gave up on reading and eventually I���ll suck it up and get through the rest of the church and flower descriptions in Anne Rice���s memoir��� However, not unlike Gillian Flynn���s novels, I see it a bit differently in terms of what it accomplishes. It���s an everyday woman story and it is always going to be important to document life and culture from all perspectives ��� not just those of the very adventurous or very wealthy or very addicted (there are reality shows for those things), even if the execution bores you to tears.

Belvedere studied sculpture at St. Martin���s College.

Behold! The sacred cow

18. In the Garden of Poisonous Flowers ��� Caitlin R. Kiernan

This novella was my introduction to Caitlin R. Kiernan. She���s been recommended to me before and I���ve now read a few of her books, although I haven���t read Threshold, the novel directly related to this novella. In the Garden of Poisonous Flowers read like a sketch for a possible novel to me, like she was experimenting with side characters instead of trying to tell a complete story. It is a novella, but that doesn���t mean that fragmented ideas are going to tell the story for you; it really reminded me of seeing Hellraiser for the first time ��� I was interested, but I couldn���t quite figure the story out (mostly why I���d want anyone to escape Pinhead), was the point that mistakes were made? That puzzles will ruin your life? Why would anyone want to marry Julia?

Kiernan seems very much like a writer who works with impressions, atmosphere, and feelings rather than making her characters full as life, which is fine, but not really my cup of tea as a reader anymore. That sort of writing does seem to work best in short form, as I found when I read Kiernan���s The Red Tree. I���m hoping that reading Threshold will help this novella become more of a complete story to me.

Pammy and Twiglet cuddle for comfort against the outside of Twiglet���s home, soft flannel sheep sheets and bits of Timothy hay caress the pads of their little feet, they look the same but they are not.

But I believe in peace…

6. The Waitress ��� Sinclair Smith

This was an odd one. There were a lot of jolts, for instance in one chapter there���s a piece of foreshadowing (and I could tell it was foreshadowing because Paula the main character was thinking that the story of the closed drive-in must not be that interesting, there���s no clearer way to indicate that a story will be important than to have a main character telling you it must not be) and then there���s a near-miss car accident. During the near-miss accident, main character Paula thinks that it���s great that she and the driver, Cookie, also a teenage girl, buckled up for safety, so there���s also some didacticism thrown in for good measure, not that there���s anything wrong with that. Main character Paula also says ���Good heavens,��� at one point and I���m pretty sure she made the motion of clutching pearls while she said it. Now, I know that slang changes over the years, so maybe in 1991 all the sixteen year olds said ���Good heavens��� in response to unfortunate things happening around them and Sinclair Smith was on the cutting edge and put that in her book published in 1992, but, it sounded very off, like a grandmother���s voice was coming out of a sixteen year old character and I don���t remember 1991 that way. I totally hung out at a high school while my mom took tickets at a variety of sporting events and I do not recall any teens saying ���Good heavens��� ��� I probably would have taken that back with me to elementary school to make me seem rad.

My favorite thing about this book was that the love interest was named Garth. I can only think of Dana Carvey in the eponymous role of Garth Algar, dressed-as-a-girl-bunny-Bugs Bunny enthusiast, in Wayne���s World (which came out the same year as this very book!). Garth didn���t hurl in this book, but I believe he should have. Because if you blow chunks and she comes back, she���s yours.

This is Horace. He���s standing in a shadowy, mysterious part of the couch. The Waitress is very blatant, very not-mysterious. Horace is an enigma wrapped in a riddle���and he never learned to read!

Would you rather the Slaughtered Lamb?

15. Someone at the Door ��� Richie Tankersley Cusick

One of my all-time favorite stories that includes hitchhiking and being stranded in the wilderness with a killer on the loose is An American Werewolf in London. The rest of the movie focuses on what happens as a result of the hitchhiking and escaped killer, of course, so this comparison is utterly valid because without that ride in the truck with the sheep nothing would have ever happened. My comparisons are always air-tight.

���Especially for Girls Presents: Someone at the Door��� has a similar set up ��� it has its own escaped lunatic, its own hitchhiker in the wilderness, and people in peril as a result of the escaped lunatic. It also has its own terrible boyfriend ��� Kurt (How in tarnation could you name a terrible boyfriend Kurt in 1994? Why? Oh wait, book Kurt is a rage-monster football player, like the one in Heathers, and not a suicidal rock icon, whatever.), an isolated house that���s both old and has one of those creepy past incidents, a very messy garage, and a dog named Bruce. Some typical Cusick-isms are on display here: there���s some histrionics (Hannah, geez, you���re a senior), shadows doing scary things, some yelling at the situation, and parents are out of town ��� in this case, they���re stranded by the gigantic and neverending snowstorm of doom! Speaking of the snowstorm of doom, at the time of my writing, it���s way below freezing with a negative temperature windchill ��� stupid winter.

Moving on in a way that winter rarely does, I enjoyed this story way more than I thought I was going to. For one thing, I refuse to open my door most of the time. My current dwelling came with a phantom doorbell ringer and since I refuse to participate in my own true crime novel (anymore), I won���t answer unless I am expecting someone or something. The phantom ringer seems to come at a variety of times, like 1:30 AM and 9:30 AM and 12:38 PM and seems to know exactly when I���m feeding Merricat her Critical Care, when I retire to read, and when I least need to be woken up. It���s creepy. I���ve started to assume that the person who lived here previously was a drug dealer and I feel like I may have mentioned this before ��� anyway, in the dead of winter when I don���t want to be creeped out, it seems like a bad idea to read a book about that exact thing happening���but I really liked it. It read extremely quickly, the characters acted in very consistent ways, and I totally dug the ending, it was very unusual for a YA book.

Fun fact: My copy of this was previously owned by ��� a different Rachel. Rachel T. I am Rachel S. Coincidence? Unlikely.

Mortemer and Belvedere lived in Iowa for one winter. It was a mild one, so there was no need for vigilance against escaped lunatics, but Mortemer was always a very vigilant pig.

If smiling is contagious, then we shall frown

5. Dark Places ��� Gillian Flynn

Gillian Flynn is very skilled when it comes to writing unlikeable narrators. I���ve read the three novels she���s put out so far and I honestly did not like any of the narrators. I didn���t enjoy things they had to say or appreciate their actions and I came away from all three novels thinking I didn���t like the books entirely because of the unpleasant reading experience. Having read all three two years ago, and having enjoyed the film version of Gone Girl more so than the book (which I guess I���ll discuss whenever I get around to reviewing it���), I feel differently about Gillian Flynn���s work now. I think that she���s done something that���s important and maybe it should have been clearer to me while I was reading ��� but I was, like, paying attention to the story. At least, in the case of Dark Places, I think she succeeded in doing something important and successful with an unlikeable narrator ��� adding another woman to the pile of unlikeable narrators. If you can think of a whole pile of unlikeable, truly unlikeable the whole way through – not just a later-redeemed shrew character, women narrators throughout the literary canon then good for you; I can���t, and as a person who fully embraces the idea of being ���gratuitously difficult��� (hat tip Shirley Jackson) and has done some reading and reader���s advisory, I wish I could.

On some level I wish I could ignore more easily, social conditioning tells me that when a woman is unlikeable, I should write her off, perhaps as, in the case of Dark Places, damaged goods���clearly she cannot be functional or successful in any way, because she isn���t ���nice��� or ���accommodating.��� When a male character is unlikeable, he���s supposed to be translated as a bit of a rascal or someone who ���gets things done��� and doesn���t have time for pleasantries ��� which is bullshit. Both genders are capable of pleasantries and being accommodating and also being absolutely terrible or functional. I think that it���s very important to continue to add understanding and thorough consideration to our culture���s concept of women and becoming more and more familiar with women who are not in any way likeable is an excellent contribution to have for Gillian Flynn (especially since her books have sold so well).

I found Libby Day to be a sad, bitter character who responded to the terrifying events of her youth in a sad, bitter way. She had a false ambivalence that she used as a barrier and she made no apologies for how she chose to deal with her situation. I in no way would expect anything different of her, and yet, still don���t like her and I had very little sympathy for her. She made her choices and some of them were creepy- although as a fan of pop culture and some darker materials I could also understand why she would both loathe and need the groups who analyzed every minute detail of the crime and asked her to come and speak at their basement-conventions. Everything that wasn���t from her perspective made me want to continue reading and get through the story to find out who was ultimately responsible and what really happened surrounding the murder of her family.

Danger, slightly grumpy before his true little-old-pig grumpiness set in. I have EOG (Early Onset Grumpiness), he may have caught it from me.

Why am I sticky?

74. Just Checking ��� Emily Colas

Guinea pigs and I have several things in common ��� we cannot produce our own vitamin C, we have hair rather than fur, and we are at our best with a consistent routine. I came to this book hoping for some kind of insight into whether or not my personal tics that have occasionally made me seem a bit too particular in situations where I���m apparently not supposed to be so concerned about whether I sit in the exact same chair every time or the fact that someone put some kind of drizzle all over the plate underneath my sandwich when I specifically ordered a sandwich because I didn���t want to use a fork and there shouldn���t be anything sticky underneath a sandwich for fuck���s sake and now I have to leave because my brain is short circuiting are actually OCD. I have decided that they are not, but not based on this book.

I���m basing my ���I don���t have full on OCD��� armchair-self-diagnosis mostly on the True Life episode about OCD, that one David Sedaris essay where he wants to lick the light switch and has to rock a certain number of times before he goes to sleep, and a mild viewing of an A&E show that I can���t remember the title of. I���ve decided I just have anxiety, which I do, about many things. Don���t drizzle underneath sandwiches. That seems like it should be obvious unless you���re trying to force someone into a meltdown ��� why would anyone want anything sticky on their hands from underneath the sandwich?! I have eczema, I do not choose things that will deliberately force me to be sticky. That one nearly caused a public scene, and I had no idea it was coming or would seem as bad as it did in person, so it is stuck in my mental craw forever.

Just Checking for me was not an insightful reading experience. It felt like a slice of life with no purpose, no through line, nothing beyond the robotic reciting of events. The praise on the jacket promised much more, but perhaps those reviewers had the same specific concerns that Colas did. I found her to be a mite on the insufferable side even though I have some similar concerns. Really the whole thing disappointed me, because there are so many dude memoirs where their issues are meant to be funny or relatable, and I ���just check��� and worry about things all the time, but I couldn���t find any common ground here.

Pammy had a lot of beautiful little habits like not eating the parsley until the stalks were placed by her mouth ��� damn those messy leaves! – and eating celery stalks in little rows like she���s doing in this picture; I believe these were the result of being a pig who perhaps received too many treats and became accustomed to a different level of personal service…not my fault at all.