In the mail, what I'm reading, first review of Satan is Real, Happy Thanksgiving from Uncle Bill

First, some bragging. It's been a very good week in my mailbox. I got my X-mas present from M.A. Littler: his film noir, The Road To Nod. I haven't seen it yet, but can't wait.

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Just as excited about the book, too. It is, as I understand it, an account of Harry Orchard and the Western Federation of Miners, particularly around Cripple Creek. Been meaning to hunt down a copy, as I kept seeing it cited in other books on the subject, and finally have.

One thing I've also been meaning to do for awhile now is say how much I enjoyed Choke Hold by Christa Faust. I finished it about a month ago (oddly enough while I was also reading DFW's Consider the Lobster, meaning I went from not knowing anything about the AVN Awards to knowing a whole lot). There's a whole lot going on, including some great commentary on the similarities between MMA and porn, which I won't ruin for you. There's also the best punchdrunk fighter since Mickey Rourke's Homeboy. If you want a taste of Ms. Faust's inestimable style and talent, she's got an excerpt of her forthcoming novel, Butch Fatale; Dyke Dick — Double D Double Cross, on her site here.

I don't think I've ever been quite as disappointed in a book as I was in Consider the Lobster, by the way. That was my first DFW, and I doubt there'll be another. For all that I've read about his brilliance, the essays were kind of banal. The best example I can think of is the interminable piece about his time with John McCain, which can be boiled down to a slight variation on the old saw, "if you don't vote, you can't bitch." Whether or not you agree with that line, it's a pretty flimsy foundation upon which to stack thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands of words. And most of the rest were just about as predictable. Likewise, maybe I'm missing something, but his much-vaunted linguistic play wore thin pretty quick. The first time "styptic" is used as an adjective unexpectedly it's striking; the second time it makes you realize that it didn't really make sense the first time either.

I also made it through exactly 75% of Malcolm Lowry's Under the Volcano according to my Kindle, but, man, I couldn't take any more. I was in love with the prose at the beginning, but felt like I was being suffocated under the flabby, alcoholic weight of the thing by the end. (Not that I'm opposed to alcohol or flab — except in prose.) I finally gave it up for Donald Ray Pollock's Knockemstiff, and that's been making me happier'n hell. As I kid, I actually lived up a holler about 30 miles on the Appalachian side of Pollock-country, and can attest that his characters are not entirely works of his imagination.

For some reason, I've been reading some mainstream American revolution stuff, too. I'm not sure why, except that it's around. I polished off 1776 on my Kindle, and now I'm listening to Founding Brothers during my commute. Most of it's exactly what you'd expect, but one factotum I really enjoyed was about the Hamilton/Burr duel. Turns out that when Hamilton provided the pistols — as the challenged, he got to choose the weapons — they were equipped with a secret set trigger that could drop the trigger pull weight from its norm of about 20 pounds to right around 1 pound. As anybody who has ever shot a handgun knows — and you can recall all my agonizing about the matter when configuring my carry gun — a 20 pound trigger pull would make it damn near impossible to shoot accurately. Of course, it didn't do Hamilton a whole hell of a lot of good, but it was nice to know he was prepared to cheat.

My wife also brought me home a copy of Speaking Ill of the Dead: Jerks in Colorado History. There really are great advantages to being married to a librarian. It ain't perfect — it's way too kind to Chivington, for one thing, and it inexplicably doesn't include William Byers — but it's a whole lot of fun. At least, if your idea of fun is short essays on murder and mayhem.

Thinking about reading, this James Sallis interview struck a chord with me. Especially what he calls "the forty-page syndrome," which sums up something that's always nagged at me about most genre books.

What I call the forty-page syndrome, where you're reading along, really getting into a novel, then the plot kicks in hard and all the coolest stuff – the textures, the messiness, the digressions – starts falling away. One doesn't have to champion the plotless and wandering in order to decry the privileging of "story" (patterns imposed from without) over substance (eliciting patterns from within the narrative and characters themselves).

Also, the first review of Satan is Real: The Ballad of the Louvin Brothers just came in from Publishers Weekly:

Kris Kristofferston, who was employed as a janitor when he met Charlie Louvin, writes in his foreword, "The legendary Louvin Brothers' hauntingly beautiful Appalachian blood-brothers harmony is truly one of the treasures of American music." Now Charlie Louvin, who died January 26, 2011, at age 83, has written an engaging and entertaining look back at his gospel and country music career with his brother, Ira. The two grew up picking cotton and coon hunting in Alabama, and music became their escape route from rural chores to radio fame. They were in their teens when they began singing on Chattanooga radio, a showcase that led to paying gigs. They moved on to making music in Memphis, and by 1955, when they finally got to the Grand Ole Opry, their record sales soared. Ira's heavy drinking and temper tantrums prompted Charlie to go solo; tragedy struck when Ira was killed in a 1965 auto accident. Packed with plenty of pictures, backstage gossip, and colorful anecdotes about the Louvins' encounters with the great and near great, this memoir has a raw honesty, genuine grit, common sense and smokin' down-home flavor that Louvin fans will relish. The fire-and-brimstone cover art and the book's title are both taken from the duo's 1959 gospel album, Satan Is Real.

I can't say how nice is to have that done with. Here's hoping the rest of them are half that kind.

Anyway, Thanksgiving, yep. And I'll post what I always post this time of year, the official Whitmer Thanksgiving prayer, via Uncle Bill.

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And speaking of lawmen, this has to be my favorite internet meme of all time.

That's it. I'll probably spend the long weekend reading and writing, with as little internet as possible, so I'll see you next week.