Patrick’s Comments (group member since Mar 09, 2009)

Patrick’s comments from the fiction files redux group.

I don't know about that. Sometimes like in The Girl Who Played with Fire that I am currently reading, showed political parties afflications in coffee mugs and it gives me an atomosphere of being in Sweden so I think details are important like that. It really put the reader into the scene. As well as shows the globalization of America products like Mcdonald or 7 Elevens.

Maybe the police major should legalize just weeds so nobody would show up for the war on drugs and war for drug dealing turfs and so forth.

Bonita wrote: "Patrick wrote: "Have anyone seen the paper construction film called 'The Refinery's Fire.' In it, all the film shows was dozen of gray squares and then one of them changed into a red circle, and wa..."

I am not sure how to get it on You Tube. That short film was brillant and really summed up the theme that inspired my idea of epic dystopia story.

I never thought of it that way but I think they drink coffee often because of high job stresses and numbing boredom of the job. I tend to drink four to eight cups of coffee while working as a data processing staff to get my eyes to stay open all the way instead of half closed. I almost got fired from falling asleep on the job so I have to drink coffee often.

You should read John Ajvide LIndqvist, Let the Right One In. It is very very dark and nasty vampire book!

Yes, I read the Girl With the Dragon Tattoo and it does read like a journalist wrote it. I am not sure about the traslation affecting his work, it reads like a investitative jouralism to me with a bit of personal life thrown in. But like the titles in Swedish. Have you read Let the Right One In by another Swedish writer? It is a superior vampire novel with honest viewpoints of the working class in the so called progressive Sweden.

Have anyone seen the paper construction film called 'The Refinery's Fire.' In it, all the film shows was dozen of gray squares and then one of them changed into a red circle, and was rolling around freely, and then another square changed into the circle and then the squares closed in and tore the first circle into pieces and then the other red circle was closed in by the gray squares and then the red circle was pressured to change back into the gray square. I thought it is a very artistic film and really defines group behavior and the Tartulas (s.p. I know) theory or what the Deaf calls 'Crab in bucket of crabs theory.' The Lottery's theme is similar to that I think.

It is difficult for me to critique the behavior of the general population after reading William R. Forstchen's novel about electromagnetic pulse that happens if a nuclear bomb blew up in the atomosphere called 'One Second After.' I think back then when the story The Lottery was written, the town had to depend on one another for survival. Most of the food available was from farms and ranches, not from corporations or factories and any town back then had to depend on postal services, delivery trucks to grocery stores, various farmlands, education by rote and memorization, the only moving equipment were mechanical, there was no internet, no computer systems back then that you can order at the click of the mouse.

It seems that the collective spirit of the town was necessary because we need businesses like the coal company and the postal services for job employments. And if you don't really contribute to the town's need, then you're out. As Matt said, life and nature ain't fair.

That's why I always believe that justice isn't only blind, it is also deaf, cognitive impeded, mentally ill and is addicted to crack.

I always thought it was a general statement on human nature, how we don't really look out for those who are unlucky or had to struggle through life. There was no 'but for the grace of God...' It could include economic, physical handicap, accident, and any situation that Hutchinson cry out about, 'It isn't fair, it isn't right!' I could not help but think that if Hutchinson was not chosen, she would have been like the others, beaming or sighing in relief. This story depresses me but it is to me, true of human nature.

Not sure if it is ironic to have the former Corey Haim's scabs covered face in the column next to the Laura Miller's article that discusses Reality Hunger.

However I remember a different kind of hunger in readers and writers that Tom Wolfe spoke of in Hooking Up, the Zora realism which I think is more essentail to the novel or/and other narrative writing forms rather than the so called 'samplings' of hip hop music being brought over to the novel form. I still call that activity 'being lazy', 'being a complete and an utter douchebag', and basically 'stealing.' and often compare it to college students who downloads obscure essays and reword them slightly to pass their courses.

Yeeea-yuhh! Keep a light hopeful heart but expect the worst?! What the hell does she know? Ooo, you just got burned, lady! :)

Annnnd why else would you masturbate under the desk if not for internet porn?

Yeah that's true. I guess it is difficult to discuss that because some people posted that ebook can be used for publicity since it is cheaper to distribute for free and if the reader likes it, he or she might end up buying the printed copies while the downside is that it might make the clerk/employees jobs more obsolated.

Yeah...so my response is why worry about ebooks making things obsolate if those employees and managers lose the jobs they don't give a shit about in the first place. I bet they would start caring about their positions once the checks are about to stop. Like Blake wrote, "The tigers of wrath are wiser teachers than the horses of instruction." :)

I don't have a personal beef with the clerks/employees, they're usually powerless but they still could take actions like talk to the buyers that Matt mentioned to save the printed version. If they acted on their interests and showed the managers that they can sell books they liked to sell, it could start something. THey are the face to face contact with the customers and are the service industry.

Well yeah...but the employees and the clerks are usually the front lines of book buying and selling, so I am sure any good companies would listen to them once in a while. The least they can do is to at least talk to the manager of the store and see where it goes regarding their authors that they like.

Maybe the clerks and the employees of the bookstores need to change their approaches by encouraging more P.O.D. writers to try sell works that the employees notice and like because as far as I see from Border or Barnes and Nobles they would march in lockstop to sell James Patterson and Stephanie Myer's lastest novel by the numbers. While it is tempting to numbly sell novels that make money, perhaps the readers or the writers can use a little bit more passions from the book dealerships. In other words, sometimes you just gotta adjust!

Good posts everyone. At first I was kind of bored by reading it, the disjointed sentences and the rush of words kept my attention to wandering. I think it is a hearing person's kind of a story where you have to listen to the cadence and the rhythemns of the narrator's voice. I will try again and read it out loud to myself later on and thanks Ben for that fine post on your favorite short story.

I have not read it in a long time but agree with you that the ending of the first paragraph about walk alone was one of the most haunting and beautiful sentence and I liked how the ending reinforces that concept because it was about the fear of being alone and being an outcast rather than the haunting of the house. I do feel sympathy for Eleanor, (if that's the woman who wanna just make friends with the other guests instead of being a sister of someone), and if she causes trouble, she probably did it because she was looking for attention and was lonely.

Yeah, exactly! Thanks for that great post, Shelby.