Mark Yoshimoto Nemcoff's Blog, page 26

Transistor Rodeo Now Available for Kindle and Nook!

I'm thrilled to announce that my latest novel, TRANSISTOR RODEO is now available for Kindle and Nook!

  

Bigger than the Super Bowl and World Cup combined! TRANSISTOR RODEO, the world's first all-robot rodeo travels to Hollywood, making its grand debut in a televised spectacle seen around the globe. But when a city-wide power failure causes a massive blackout in L.A, dozens of robot cowboys and android animals–including a life-size mechanical T-Rex–escape into the night!

Now it's up to Cal Carpenter, a washed-up former rodeo star and his young son, Dean to round up all the runaway robots before something very terrible happens. But when Cal and Dean get separated in the middle of a blacked-out city far from home and the robots' behavior takes a sinister turn, one dad has very little time to save both his boy and the entire city of Los Angeles.

Author's Note: Transistor Rodeo is a heartfelt adventure about a dad trying to do what's best for his son while redeeming the mess he's made of his life. At it's core, it's a book about what it takes to "be a man." If you love pulse-pounding action, if you love robots and especially if you love the idea of a robot T-Rex wrecking the city of L.A. you're going to absolutely love this book. This is a book that I think every dad and son should read together.

This Just In: Transistor Rodeo has been OPTIONED!

I've been holding back this news for the last week while a few things got sorted out and I got permission to at least say something, but today I'm happy to announce that my robots-run-amok, all-ages, action-adventure novel "Transistor Rodeo" has been optioned by a successful and experienced producer/director who instantly saw what an amazing movie this would make. That's all I'm allowed to say about it at the moment.

No, there won't be any popping of champagne tonight. As I learned a long time ago, an option is not a guarantee that a movie will be made, nor is it even a guarantee that anything will even happen. I've been down this road before. I've optioned several screenplays before that never went past the development stage. It's heartbreaking. The frustration over watching your optioned properties go nowhere is what soured me on Hollywood years ago and made me flee for the artistic safe-haven of new media.

An option is a first baby-step toward potentially getting a movie made. It's an agreement between the creator and someone who hopefully has the vision, courage and fortitude (and connections) to inspire more and more people of influence to get involved in the project. There's a lot of work to be done in order to develop Transistor Rodeo into a pitch to be presented to those people of influence… and possibly even reshaping the storyline. All I know is that I'm very proud of the version of the story told in the book and whatever the collaboration process holds will only make for yet another adventure.

It'll probably be a while before anything else happens. I have no control of the timetable at this point. But I will keep you posted if there's anything I can report!

Stay tuned…

 

Rant: Child Beauty Pageants

I'm sure you'd be shocked (shocked, I tell you!) that there are a few things in this world that make bile rise into my throat fast enough to hit speeds capable of breaking the sound barrier.

First: the "My Child is an Honor Student" bumper sticker. Look, I'm very happy for you Mama Bear, but in this day and age, if you're just a random stranger sitting in your minivan in front of me at the drive-thru at Wendy's, how can I tell those alleged good grades were achieved by honest means? Look, I'm not saying someone got that sticker thanks to blow jobs and payola but given how many kids these days look up to the Kardashians, I'm not ruling anything out.

But even more annoying to me, absolutely grating on my nerves, are three little words that when used together in a sentence, make me choke on the vomit in my own mouth in quantities that would make Mama Cass blush. And no, those three words aren't "The Jersey Shore" or "Born This Way"

No, I am talking about Child Beauty Pageants.

I'll go to go out on a limb here and guess you know about the kind of ridiculous spectacle I'm talking about. Since the 1960s, children ranging from the tender ages of six months to twelve years have gathered in musty hotel ballrooms across the USA to model sportswear, evening attire and perform dance and talent routines all in the name of being judged for their looks, poise and perfection.

And in said pageants it is not unusual to see children with highlighted or bleached hair or that some young contestants wear false teeth used to cap and mask missing front teeth or false eyelashes known as "flippers."

The last kid I ever saw with flippers was from Arkansas and had a brother and sister for parents, but I digress.

Entry fees for these competitions range from $10 to $200. Dresses can cost up to $5,000, with most averaging around $1,000.

Some call this child beauty pageant thing an industry. I'm thinking maybe a better word for it would be "racket."

It has been said that children are the quickest-growing segment of the beauty pageant market, with children's competitions attracting over 3 million kids per year.

All for what? In child beauty pageant terms what the judges are looking for is often referred to as, "The complete package." So what you end up with is every mother trying to shape their children into an ideal of beauty. Pardon me, but there's something a bit too Mein Kampf about that for my comfort. Every girl strives to look like a living doll. So what? You know who else was a living doll? That's right, Chucky. You know what beauty pageant children and Chucky both have in common. Both want to steal your heart. It's just that Chucky does it with a meat cleaver and beauty pageant toddlers do it with dimples.

As far as it being a so-called talent competition, let's just fess up and say what it really is: a cuteness competition. You can't even try to pull the cashmere over my eyeballs by saying it's a scholarship competition. Go ahead ask the tough questions like other "pageants" See how a four year old would solve the unrest in the middle east. I'm telling you, all their answers are total bullshit. Don't tell me you're going to get the Arabs and the Jews together for a tea party with Mr. Floppy Ears stuffed Teddy bear and your Barbies because that just plain makes you sound a complete idiot.

A talent competition? Puh-leeze. Most children that age don't really have a serious talent. Sorry, Sarah Jean but your voice doesn't sound like Beyonce—unless Beyonce happens to be pummeling a burlap sack full of cats with a large wooden mallet. Seriously, your version of "On the Good Ship Lollipop" was more butchered than a Christmas day ham.

And what do the toddlers really have to offer as a "talent?""Jessica, age 18 months, will be sorting blocks today for her talent and Michelle, age 2 will be showing us how she can walk up stairs by herself" What do babies do for the talent competition anyway? Go two hours without shitting themselves? Which, when you really think about it, is a talent that doesn't last forever.

Anybody knows that to develop a serious talent, you have to sacrifice hundreds, if not thousands of hours to dedicate yourself to one thing. That's not a childhood. Look at Michael Jackson. Sure he became rich and successful, but he also lived with a chimp and the skeleton of the elephant man in a circus called Neverland. Do you really want your kid that fucked up?

But who am I asking? The parents of these child beauty pageant contestants? Twisted weirdos foisting their own lost ambitions on their kids in order to live out some kind of perverse fantasy of princessdom?

Hell yes, I blame the parents. This is how fucked these parents are. I saw a clip from one child pageant reality show, Toddlers and Tiaras, which I believe translates from Latin to Pedophiles Buffet, and there was this one mom from Bumblefuck, Nowhwere who was taking her toddler for a pre-pageant spray on tan… Hold on, it gets better… at an automotive paint shop.

I stand corrected. This wasn't Bumblefuck, this was some remote shitstain of a village where driving up to Bumblefuck constitute" "going into town." The good people of Bumblefuck look at this woman's family and say "Dayum, those folks are hicks."

I know there are far too many people in this world so dangerously under-educated that they can't tell that the saying "Mold your children" is a figurative term. What you're supposed to be shaping is their insides but what you're doing is creating a dynamic in these kids lives where you are teaching these kids that its okay to value yourself in a very superficial way.

Is it your intention to make your kids think that the prettiest get the most prizes? I'm sorry, lady in your floral print Lane Bryant pantsuit but these are harsh life lesson best learned by your kids later on in high school.

I've read that many child beauty pageant organizers believe that it's a "harmless pastime that instils girls with confidence and self esteem."

Yeah, if you're the one who wins. If you're the little loser that didn't, well, blame your mommy. She's the one who probably gave you that ugly face.

The pageant "culture" may create girls who believe/learn that their only value is in their looks, perfect teeth, spray tans and gorgeous dresses. As they get older, beautiful swans sometimes turn into ugly ducklings. What's going to happen to their psyches when they get acne or braces or don't develop physically? Their looks may change, as they will through out life, and the girls will suffer conflicts about who they are, where they belong, and how they feel about themselves, even more so than most teenage girls. Most likely, someone's going to have to teach them to do what other girls who don't win beauty pageants do, learn to get by on their personality. Oh, the humanity.

The same sex parent is supposed to be a child's most influential role model. At around the ages of 4- 6, a child starts trying to figure out who they are and their place in the family and world. Children use their greatest role model, their same sex parent, to gage who they are and who they want to be in the world. Pageant mom are notorious for bullying, yelling, screaming, criticizing, all in the name of fun. My concern is how the child will feel about their role models later in life. Mother's may think this is a bonding activity, but it is potentially harmful to the mother-child relationship. This type of behavior by mothers does not show children they are unconditionally loved. It also shows girls that this type of behavior is okay.

One psychology professor who studied former young performers found that mothers who served as managers had a far less stable and positive relationship with their children. This same professor also happened to discover that the incidence of substance and alcohol abuse was higher among former kid performers.

Surprise. Surprise.

So it begs the question, how many these kids grow up hating their mothers or fathers? How many these girls end up as drug addict for runaways or end up living in the no wire hangers halfway house for former beauty child beauty pageant queens. To me it seems like borderline child abuse I say that because I've seen way too many clips on the soup of bodystocking clad four year olds doing a pole dance routine to Madonna's hit song "Borderline."

You think I'm kidding? You know the kind of shit that has been marketed to the Child Beauty Pageant demographic? Padded bras and pole dancing kits. I'm serious. Fuck it. Why not make pole dancing part of the talent competition. Given how many young women with low self esteem we're creating with this bullshit It'll give the girls at least a decade's head start on their eventual career as strippers.

And you'd think me, the guy who once petitioned the IOC to make vaginal ping pong ball shooting an Olympic event. (Summer, not Winter because I'm not a complete asshole) would be thrilled to have more strippers. No! Laws of supply and demand. You're going to have too many strippers, who are going to have to undercut each other to get any business. Hey, I'm all for cheap lap dances but it undermines the economic equilibrium and you end up with a shitty product.

I wouldn't be surprised if you dug through the paperwork and you found that these child beauty pageant networks were being funded by a coalition of psychologists who treat teenage girls for eating disorders and body dysmorphia. Investing in their future. Children haven't been this exploited since Upton Sinclair wrote "The Jungle".

I read an article where one event organizer was asked if child beauty pageants encouraged pedophilia. She dodged the answer saying… "well, that's always a concern."

A concern? Lady, you ever see these men who organize child beauty pageants. Some of them are just one well-trimmed beard away from a search warrant for the crawl space under their house, if you catch my drift. You can always tell the pedophiles in the audience. Those are the guys whose faces light up like a fat kid watching a stuffed crust pizza commercial.

Look, I'm not saying all men involved with childrens' beauty pageants are suspect but if you're a guy and your resume includes "Child Beauty Pageant Organizer" and "Shopping Mall Easter Bunny" I'm keeping my eye on you because I'd bet a hundred bucks at some point in your past you've had to go door to door introducing yourself to your neighbors because it was mandated by law.

And come on, I don't want to hear any bullshit about this being an unfair characterization of the sexual way some guys tend to view this kind of thing. There are guys out there who jack it to the JC Penny Back to School Catalog. Okay, granted there are guys out there who also jack it to the Hickory Farms catalog. (You could probably do some real business in certain demographics by selling that Beef Stick with a big blue vein running down the middle… and by "certain demographics," I'm talking about Nuns.

When you're a little kid, everybody's pretty and handsome and cool and pretty. Childhood is fleeting and the only time you're allowed to think everyone is beautiful and life is fair. I'm begging you, pageant moms, don't deny your children their innocence just because you were never picked to be prom queen. I really don't need to see a six year old wearing more eyeshadow than Tammy Faye Baker on Halloween. Little girls should grow up thinking they are beautiful because their parents tell them so, not because they were forced to parade around in front of a bunch of a people at the local VFW Hall.

What is this? Best in Show… Why not just take them in front of the judges and run them up and back on a leash?

Just remember, for every beauty queen, there's a room full of losers… which of course is the same dynamic as real life. But still, you know what's good for a toddler's self-esteem? Parental praise, not subjecting them to public humiliation and a path down life's cruel spiral where there an eating disorder with their name on it.

There's a time in a persons life where trying to be the best, or even trying to be really good at something is healthy. But not when you are five. When you're five, the only thing you should have mastered is going a whole day without involuntarily shitting yourself.

But for those pageant mommies out there who just aren't satisfied to let your kids be kids, tell you what. You want to make your child look like an adult? Give them a cigarette, some dark circles under their puffy eyes and a handful of bills they can't pay. That should do the fucking trick.

*****

This is the extended version of the rant first performed on the podcast episode: PCH: Keep Your Kids Out of Showbiz

Transistor Rodeo Cover

I'm proud to unveil the cover I designed for my upcoming book, TRANSISTOR RODEO. I really like the way it came out. TR is definitely one of the best books I've ever written and I can't wait to unveil it… very soon.

PCH: Autoerotic Asphyxiation

Here at PCH we tackle the hard topics. We discuss those things that you want to know about but don't know where to turn. We… oh, who am I kidding? We love talking about the stuff that will keep your earbuds buzzing. This week, get buzzed with a very frank discussion about female masturbation (stop giggling) and why women won't own up to it. Plus, a new twist on Sudoku called Bukkaku and lastly but not leastly, since we're on the subject of self-gratifaction, a big, fat MYN rant about Autoerotic Asphyxiation.

CLICK HERE TO SUBSCRIBE TO PCH  or

SUBSCRIBE TO PCH IN iTUNES 

C'mon and LIKE the MYN Books Facebook page - When it hits 1,000 Likes, one lucky follower will win a brand new Kindle or Nook

Visit Mark Yoshimoto Nemcoff's blog at Wordsushi.com

Listen to Mike Yusi's kickass music podcast: UC Radio

"Broken" from the album "The Kaviar Sessions" by Kevin Gilbert

"When You Give Your Love to Me" from the album Thud by Kevin Gilbert  

Yo Amazon, WTF?

 

I love Amazon. So many great things have happened in my writing career because of Amazon and having my books on Amazon. In fact as an indie writer and publisher, I depend upon Amazon.

Over the weekend, I noticed that my book, "Where's My F*cking Latte" had once again hit Amazon's top 100 bestsellers list in the category of Entertainment. But, to my chagrin I also noticed that the book was erroneously listed as "Currently Unavailable". I know it was just a temporary glitch. As you can see from the screenshot, the book at #90 "Mischief in Mudbug" was also listed as such… Oy.

I can assure you that "Where's My F*cking Latte" is available. 

Any bestseller list serves as an important method of discovery for authors to connect with new readers and I'd hate to think a small error like this caused anyone to hesitate from buying my book but as an indie, every purchase helps the cause. I'd like to think that anyone with two brain cells to rub together would at least realize that it would be impossible for a book that was "currently unavailable" to be on a bestseller list, right?

My guess is that it could have been something benign that had to do with getting the store ready for Amazon's Kindle Fire tablet, being announced tomorrow.

Killing My Boss Has Never Been Easier…

…to get onto your eBook reader!

KILLING MY BOSS, the anthology of twisted tales I co-wrote with the fiercely-talented Colin F. Barnes is now only 99 CENTS for a limited time over at Amazon and Barnes and Noble.

If you've ever had a boss you've really hated, you'll love KILLING MY BOSS–highly entertaining stories of revenge on the worst bosses you can imagine.

Pick up your copy of KILLING MY BOSS for your Kindle or Nook today.

 

PCH: Americans Sure Love to Eat

We like to stuff our faces here in America. Is there any doubt? Look around you. There is food or the reminder of food everywhere you turn in this country. I'm not going to get all preachy about the quality of that food but hey, let's at least admit that most of that food advertised to us or dangled in front of your watering chops is comfort food. And nowhere is that more evident than your local fairground…. So today, Mark and Mike talk about some of the terrifying eats you can expect to find at your county fair or state fair… and some of it may not only give you heartburn but possibly nightmares as well.

Then after Mark and Mike perform the PCH classic "Who's on Crack?" it's time for Mark's takedown of Competitive Eating… it's a PCH rant you won't want to miss.

Second show of the season. We're in full gear and trust me, hilarity does ensue.

Buckle up! Let's ride!

CLICK HERE TO SUBSCRIBE  or

SUBSCRIBE IN iTUNES 

C'mon and LIKE the MYN Books Facebook page - When it hits 1,000 Likes, one lucky follower will win a brand new Kindle or Nook

Find more books by Mark Yoshimoto Nemcoff at: Wordsushi.com

And you need to be listening to Mike Yusi's fantastic music podcast UC Radio

Speaking of music… on today's show:

"Treat Yer Teats" by the New Zealand Dairy Council

"All Bent Out of Shape" by MIKE VIOLA

"Don't Waste My Time" by Planet Killers featuring MUNK DUANE

 

Self Publishing Diary: Where's My F*cking Latte is Still a #1 Bestseller

I'm very proud to say that my book, "WHERE'S MY F*CKING LATTE: and Other Stories About Being an Assistant in Hollywood" is still riding atop the Amazon bestseller chart for: Kindle eBooks > Nonfiction > Arts & Entertainment > Television at #1 where it has been camped for the last couple of months. It's all thanks to you readers out there who love to hear about the truly unbelievable (and often quite repugnant) behavior of movers and shakers in Hollywood and what often goes on behind the scenes.

"Where's My F*cking Latte" has been on this chart for over 2 years, clawing its way from the bottom to the top. It's particularly satisfying because back in 2007, when I first wrote the book, my agent at the time sent it out to several mainstream publishers who turned it down only because they said there wasn't a market for books about "behind the scenes Hollywood" (Yes, they really said that… I'll give you a moment to shake your head). They said people in the middle of the country or overseas wouldn't care about this book. They said it's a book that would only sell on the coasts.

I can tell you that I've received emails from people from all over the world who have read and loved "Where's My F*cking Latte", people who have thought it was hilarious, salacious and jaw-dropping… and even better, I've sold many thousands of copies of this book without having to share proceeds or control with any publisher.

The lesson learned: You don't need a publisher to succeed and you certainly don't let the doubters derail your plans.

How to win $10,000 making a commercial promoting .tv domains

The good folks over at Verisign have asked me to help promote the .tv brand of domains. (Yeah, I don't know why either, but I guess it helps to have compromising photos of people.)

One of the first things I got to do as a .tv advocate is help them promote this contest they have where you can create your own 30 to 60 second commercial for .tv domains for a chance to win $10,000. So, I fired up the camera and created this:

My friend C.C. Chapman, called it a silly video (Hey, I resemble that remark!) and if you think you can whip up a commercial for why .TV is the domain to be, you really should enter it. You can find details about the contest over at Facebook.com/WatchDotTV

You can also find out more at @WatchDotTV and the official announcement is on their blog.

So get off your lazy butts, grab a camera and make a great commercial! You can do it!