Poppy Z. Brite's Blog, page 85

The Tragical Comedy or Comical Tragedy of "The Inanimate Tragedy"

(Or, The Time Chris and I Played the Fabulous 40 Watt Club)

With apologies to Neil and to Edward Gorey.

I don't think I've ever told y'all this story, and it always makes me laugh. Maybe it will cheer me up now.

When we first met, in 1989-90, Chris wasn't as focused as he is today, or at least he had many hobbies. One of them was what I guess you would have to call guerrilla theater. It was sometimes staged on the sidewalks outside various Athens, GA townie venues, sometimes made it into the ven...

R.I.P. Norman Hand

I've just learned that my favorite Saint ever*, Norman Hand, was found dead at his South Carolina home this morning. He was only 37. Football players may get rich, but the sport is so very hard on their bodies, especially for the great big guys. Big Norman was one of the biggest guys we ever had.

His heart was big too. Pro sports are often very homophobic. I once saw a TV talk show host ask Norman if he thought players' sexual "preference" could cause problems. Norman said, "No, I think it's t...

The Fabled Continent of South Africa

Louisiana Representative Charlie Melancon, whom I'd thought was slightly intelligent, had this to say about the BP oil spill:

"We're the United States, and I would have thought if this was going to happen, it would have been in maybe a South African continent or some third world country that just looked the other way or said, you know, if there's still such a thing -- and I'm sure there is -- kickbacks, that that would have happened there and not here in the United States."

I ... don't even hav...

OH FOR HEAVEN'S SAKE

The psychic detective just winged the wannabe vampire with a bullet. Luckily, the W.V. dropped by a doctor's office and got the wound stitched up in a jiffy with no bothersome questions asked. I'm almost on the edge of becoming a fan of this book's very badness.

[ETA: Forgive me for thinking there could be such a huge logical flaw in this wonderful book. It turns out he actually forced the doctor to treat him, then killed him, because he's A RUTHLESS MONSTER. But he didn't drink the doc's...

HENCE THE CULT WAS BORN

I keep wanting to type in great swaths of dialogue from this damn "thriller." It's that bad, y'all.

'[Living on blood:] seems pretty extreme."

"But only in the last stage of his resurrection."

"Resurrection? You've never mentioned that word."

"Didn't I? Perhaps it sounded too pretentious."

But it gets better:

"And like all gods, he'll be invisible to mortal man."

"Oh, for heaven's sake."

"I never said that it wasn't totally irrational."

OH FOR HEAVEN'S SAKE is right. But that's still not the truest gem...

Wannabe Vampires & Psychic Detectives

I'm reading a goddamn dumb drugstore thriller about some jerkoffs who think they are vampires and go around draining women's blood and leaving ornate golden goblets on their bodies. You know, ornate golden blood goblets, you see 'em all the time. Also, psychic detectives. I wouldn't have bought the book if I'd known about the vampire-wannabes or the psychics, and the latter are annoying me even more than the former. I'm all for a good story about psi talents, but when you inject them into mur...

Addendum: Another Fanboy Revelation

This is at least somewhat related to my earlier post, I guess. It's also related to Dark Tower IV: Wizard and Glass, though it doesn't contain any specific spoilers.

The pink ball? The Wizard's Glass? Maerlyn's Grapefruit, may it do ya?

1. It shows you the most prurient, disgusting, and/or cruel things people do.

2. It sucks some people in to the point where they starve and pee on themselves rather than leave it for a moment.

3. It archives the worst things you've ever done and preserves them for...

Fanfic: At The End of the Day

The Internet seems to be having one of its periodic cycles of wank about fanfic -- or maybe it's always there and I only notice it periodically -- so this would probably be a good time to mention that I used to be anti-fanfic (and personally squicked by the idea of people writing about my characters), but no longer am. I've seen people pointing out that my original feelings on the matter were rendered pretty hypocritical by the publication of Plastic Jesus, and they are right. I wrote Plastic...

Nashville

So my oldest friend (we met in fourth grade) lives and teaches law in Nashville. Once I made sure she and her wife were OK, I confess I got obsessed with the Gulf oil disaster and didn't realize how bad things had gotten there, for which I now feel guilty. I just watched a video of the flooding and its aftermath on my friend's Facebook page, though I knew the images would be familiar and hard to look at. I don't particularly want to embed it for reasons that will become apparent, but you can ...

Algul Siento

It's probably really only my thousandth-or-so reading, but I'm struck anew by the sheer banality of Algul Siento ("Blue Heaven"), where the Breakers live. The first time I read it, I found this a little anticlimactic. Now I believe it's deliberate and it works for me. The man in charge of destroying the Tower is a God-fearing former prison guard who has somehow convinced himself that he is doing the Lord's work by bringing about the end of all universes. King underlines this by having him kne...