Writer Unboxed - The "Connect Kitty" Approves

As I dig back into writing another novel, and as I wonder (again) if I can pull off this project that I’ve been trying to complete for… a long time, I wanted to document what I think it takes to write a decent novel. I’m not specifically talking about the craft of writing a novel (even though that’s plenty important), but more about the general traits that allow me to complete any big crazy project like a novel. I came up with three specific things that are necessary (for me) to write and complete a book. For good or for bad, these are fuzzy things, definitely not in the realm of WRITE 7.25 MILLION WORDS A DAY! or WRITE EVERY DAY AT 4:15AM! or FOLLOW THE HERO’S JOURNEY PERFECTLY OR ELSE! Rather than spoil it, I’ll let the video speak for itself, because I think it works better if you see how I approached this exercise, rather than list those items here. If you were to come up with your own fuzzy secrets (or skills or traits or qualities or whatever!) to write and finish a book, what would be on your list? About Yuvi ZalkowYuvi Zalkow's first novel was reluctantly published in 2012 by MP Publishing. His forthcoming novel (I Only Cry with Emoticons) will be published by Red Hen Press in June of 2022. His stories and essays have been published in Glimmer Train, Narrative Magazine, Carve Magazine, The Daily Dot, Rosebud, The Poop Report, and others. He occasionally makes YouTube videos and apps for iPhones. Check out his website if you actually want to find out more. Web | More Posts [url={url}]View the full article[/url]

This month’s Kickass Women takes us to the silver boom town of Potosí, located in what is now Bolivia, in the 1600s. This city was riddled by crime, but two teenage girls, Ana Lezama de Urinza and Eustaquia de Sonza, took it on the task of cleaning it up. At the time, Potosí was adjacent to a massive silver mining operation owned and run by the Spanish colonizers. Most of the silver was sent by boat to Spain, although some was sent to Buenos Aires to enrich the Spanish there, and some was sent via trading ships to the Spanish East Indies. Pieces of eight, coins valued for international currency, were minted at Potosí from local silver. The area still holds one of the world’s largest silver deposits and is mined for silver and for tin. Back in the 1600s, the silver that so enriched the Spanish was mined by enslaved Indigenous people and other low-paid workers who were plagued by accidents, mercury poisoning, disease, and other hardships. The tiny town ballooned into a city holding over 200,000 people, including wealthy Spanish colonizers, business people from other countries, enslaved people from Africa, and Indigenous Andeans. Like most boomtowns, Potosí was known for gambling, drinking, and crime. Eustaquia was born into a wealthy Potosí family of Spanish aristocrats which adopted Ana, an impoverished, homeless orphan, when Ana was 12. The girls became great friends and, later, devoted lovers. They loved spying on Eustaquia’s brother’s fencing lessons, and were good enough at fencing that their parents allowed them to have their own lessons in swordsmanship, riding, and shooting. There are no historical portraits of the Valiant Ladies, but these female pirates have the same spirit of adventure The teens began sneaking out of the house in disguise and picking fights, which they always won. They then upgraded to superhero status, spending the next five years fighting crime (and also drinking and gambling and participating in bullfights, all while wearing men’s clothing). During this time period they earned the nickname ‘The Valiant Peruvian Ladies of Potosí.” Eventually Eustaquia’s father died and she inherited the estate and retired from her life of crime fighting. Ana lived with Eustaquia until Ana died from an injury sustained in a bullfight. Her devoted partner in combat and in love, Eustaquia, died soon after, due to what was said to be a broken heart. My sources were: History Naked: Valiant Ladies of Potosí Cultura Colectiva: Valiant Ladies of Potosí For a fun YA novel about these women, try Valiant Ladies by Melissa Grey ( A | BN | K | AB ). If you want to learn more about the exploitative practices that continue in present-day mining in Potosí, check out the documentary The Devil’s Miner. View the full article

It’s that time of the month! No, not that time. Whatcha Reading time! Sarah: I’m currently reading Thank you For Listening by Julia Whelan ( A | BN | K | AB ) – and I’m doing an interview with her for the podcast, too! Shana: I’m reading The Servant and the Gentleman by Annabelle Greene. ( A | BN | K | AB ) It’s a good reminder of why I like to give new-to-me authors a second chance. Because I hated the first book in the series and I love this one. Claudia: I’m reading The Dawn of Everything, ( A | BN | K | AB ) and it’s sort of an anti “Big History” book that chips away the prevalent, too-linear narrative of how we got to live in our complex societies (early humans became farmers and herders blah blah). It’s very interesting. Sneezy: I’m going through The Wave in the Mind by Ursula Le Guin. ( A | BN | K | AB ) It’s a collection of her talks and essays. The short pieces and her voice is very kind to my fried brain A | BN | K | ABA lot of yummy that you don’t need to remember linearly to enjoy more of. Plus if you forget the pieces you read earlier like me, you can enjoy them all over again for the first time Sarah: Y’all. The Monsters We Defy by Leslye Penelope is So Good so far. I’m about 25% in and it will be hard to stop reading when I have to Do Things. Creepy slow menace, folk magic, and historical fiction details aplenty. If this were optioned and made into a miniseries it would be sublime. Tara: My 10-year-old got me hooked on the Witch Hat Atelier manga series. I’m currently making grabby hands at my library, while I wait impatiently for book 9. Sarah: I LOVE IT. Tara: She was not impressed when I told her that there’s probably Qifrey/Olly fanfic and then proved myself right when she said it was impossible. Sarah: No fanfic pairing is ever impossible. The world contains multitudes. A | BN | K | AB It’s kind of comforting the more I think about it, you know? No matter how out there the pairing is, someone else has shipped it, too. Elyse: I just got my copies of Are You Sara by SC Lalli ( A | BN | K | AB ) and The Daughter of Doctor Moreau by Silvia Moreno-Garcia. ( A | BN | K | AB ) Not sure which I will start first Sarah: “…I don’t wanna work. I just wanna read all my books all day.” Lara: I’m in the midst of Mimi Matthews’ The Belle of Belgrave Square. So far, I’m charmed! So much better for me than the first book in the series. So, whatcha reading? Tell us below! View the full article

The transcript for Podcast 523. Summer Reading (and Shoe) Recs with Amanda has been posted! This podcast transcript was handcrafted with meticulous skill by Garlic Knitter. Many thanks. ❤ Click here to subscribe to The Podcast → View the full article

Justine Kurland, Georgia O’Keeffe, 2020. Courtesy of Higher Pictures Generation. After hearing the horrifying news about the attack on Salman Rushdie earlier today, I turned to the first book of his I’d read—or rather, the book he read, on audiocassette, to my family on long car journeys. “Just do one thing for me,” Haroun called to his father. “Just this one thing. Think of the happiest times you can remember. Think of the view of the Valley of Κ we saw when we came through the Tunnel of I. Think about your wedding day. Please.” —Emily Stokes, editor In her new book, SCUMB Manifesto, the photographer Justine Kurland takes scissors to her personal collection of 150 photo books. Paying homage to feminist collages and Valerie Solanas’s SCUM (Society for Cutting up Men) Manifesto, she dismembers and reconfigures photographs by the straight white men who have dominated the photography industry for decades. The result is a radical remaking of classic works that often exposes male photographers’ continuous fetishization of women’s bodies—Alfred Stieglitz’s obsession with Georgia O’Keeffe’s hands, or Lee Friedlander’s fixation on nudes. Against colorful backdrops, the disembodied hands and legs are striking and strange, compelling in their own right. —Clarissa Fragoso Pinheiro, intern Last week, I fell into a deep trance reading Mieko Kawakami’s newest novel, All The Lovers in the Night, translated from the Japanese by Sam Bett and David Boyd. The novel follows a copy editor plagued by anxieties, who drinks copious amounts of booze to cope. Kawakami creates masterful portraits of figures who isolate themselves from others in order to avoid rejection or uncomfortable conversations. These characters live in their minds but notice everything around them, in sensuous, strange, detailed prose. —Campbell Campbell, intern Read two short stories by Mieko Kawakami, translated by David Boyd, here on the Daily. I am reading Middlemarch for the first time, an experience which I had for some reason assumed would be a difficult slog but has in fact been one of the most pleasant aspects of my summer; no one told me it was a book about the consequences of having crushes. Over Fourth of July weekend, I left my copy outside and a surprise thunderstorm left its pages bloated and warped. I got another, which I lugged around on the subway in my messy tote bag, slowly ruining that one, too. Then, someone gave me miraculous thing: a set of little Middlemarches, or Liddlemarches—the novel divided into slim paperbacks book by book. Now I carry my little Middlemarches everywhere and show them off to anyone who will listen. —Sophie Haigney, web editor View the full article

Love at First Love at First by Kate Clayborn is $2.99! Clayborn is an autobuy author for some of the Bitchery. Catherine gave this one a B: Love at First is a beautiful book and worth the painful beginnings – but if you’re feeling fragile, too, maybe proceed with caution. A sparkling and tender novel from the acclaimed author of Love Lettering, full of bickering neighbors, surprise reunions, and the mysterious power of love that fans of Christina Lauren, Sarah Hogle, and Emily Henry will adore. Sixteen years ago, a teenaged Will Sterling saw—or rather, heard—the girl of his dreams. Standing beneath an apartment building balcony, he shared a perfect moment with a lovely, warm-voiced stranger. It’s a memory that’s never faded, though he’s put so much of his past behind him. Now an unexpected inheritance has brought Will back to that same address, where he plans to offload his new property and get back to his regular life as an overworked doctor. Instead, he encounters a woman, two balconies above, who’s uncannily familiar . . . No matter how surprised Nora Clarke is by her reaction to handsome, curious Will, or the whispered pre-dawn conversations they share, she won’t let his plans ruin her quirky, close-knit building. Bound by her loyalty to her adored grandmother, she sets out to foil his efforts with a little light sabotage. But beneath the surface of their feud is an undeniable connection. A balcony, a star-crossed couple, a fateful meeting—maybe it’s the kind of story that can’t work out in the end. Or maybe, it’s the perfect second chance . . . Add to Goodreads To-Read List → You can find ordering info for this book here. Undiscovered Undiscovered by Anna Hackett is 99c! This is the first book in the Treasure Hunter Security romantic suspense series. I’ve enjoyed Hackett’s other books and am intrigued by the setup. I believe Hackett’s books were also mentioned in yesterday’s Rec League comments. One former Navy SEAL. One dedicated archeologist. One secret map to a fabulous lost oasis. Finding undiscovered treasures is always daring, dangerous, and deadly. Perfect for the men of Treasure Hunter Security. Former Navy SEAL Declan Ward is haunted by the demons of his past and throws everything he has into his security business–Treasure Hunter Security. Dangerous archeological digs – no problem. Daring expeditions – sure thing. Museum security for invaluable exhibits – easy. But on a simple dig in the Egyptian desert, he collides with a stubborn, smart archeologist, Dr. Layne Rush, and together they get swept into a deadly treasure hunt for a mythical lost oasis. When an evil from his past reappears, Declan vows to do anything to protect Layne. Dr. Layne Rush is dedicated to building a successful career–a promise to the parents she lost far too young. But when her dig is plagued by strange accidents, targeted by a lethal black market antiquities ring, and artifacts are stolen, she is forced to turn to Treasure Hunter Security, and to the tough, sexy, and too-used-to-giving-orders Declan. Soon her organized dig morphs into a wild treasure hunt across the desert dunes. Danger is hunting them every step of the way, and Layne and Declan must find a way to work together…to not only find the treasure but to survive. Add to Goodreads To-Read List → You can find ordering info for this book here. Phoenix Unbound Phoenix Unbound by Grace Draven is $1.99 and a Kindle Daily Deal! I gave this one a C-, but I’d still recommend it with large caveats. 1) All of the trigger warnings. 2) It’s dense and the slow burn is quite slow. 3) There’s a magical infertility cure. Draven’s writing is always top notch and I did continue with the next book. A woman with power over fire and illusion and an enslaved son of a chieftain battle a corrupt empire in this powerful and deeply emotional romantic fantasy from the USA Todaybestselling author of Radiance. Every year, each village is required to send a young woman to the Empire’s capital–her fate to be burned alive for the entertainment of the masses. For the last five years, one small village’s tithe has been the same woman. Gilene’s sacrifice protects all the other young women of her village, and her secret to staying alive lies with the magic only she possesses. But this year is different. Azarion, the Empire’s most famous gladiator, has somehow seen through her illusion–and is set on blackmailing Gilene into using her abilities to help him escape his life of slavery. And unknown to Gilene, he also wants to reclaim the birthright of his clan. To protect her family and village, she will risk everything to return to the Empire–and burn once more. Add to Goodreads To-Read List → You can find ordering info for this book here. Crazy Rich Asians Crazy Rich Asians by Kevin Kwan is $2.99! I will admit that I haven’t read this one, or seen the movie, but both seem like a lot of fun. Anyone in comments do both? I’d love to hear how true to the book the movie is! When New Yorker Rachel Chu agrees to spend the summer in Singapore with her boyfriend, Nicholas Young, she envisions a humble family home and quality time with the man she hopes to marry. But Nick has failed to give his girlfriend a few key details. One, that his childhood home looks like a palace; two, that he grew up riding in more private planes than cars; and three, that he just happens to be the country’s most eligible bachelor. On Nick’s arm, Rachel may as well have a target on her back the second she steps off the plane, and soon, her relaxed vacation turns into an obstacle course of old money, new money, nosy relatives, and scheming social climbers. Add to Goodreads To-Read List → You can find ordering info for this book here. View the full article

Clarice Lispector. Courtesy of Paulo Gurgel Valente. In 1967, the Jornal do Brasil asked Clarice Lispector to write a Saturday newspaper column on any topic she wished. For nearly seven years, she wrote weekly, covering a wide range of topics—humans and animals, bad dinner parties, the daily activities of her two sons—but the subject matter was often besides the point. These genre-defying missives are defined by a lyricism and strangeness that readers of her fiction will recognize, though they are a thing apart in their brevity and interiority. Too Much of Life: The Complete Crônicas, which collects these columns and others Lispector wrote throughout her career, will be published in English by New Directions this September. As Lispector’s son, Paulo Gurgel Valente, has written, “Enjoy the columns, I know of nothing quite like them.” Today, the Review is publishing a selection of these crônicas, the second in a series. October 26, 1968 Bravado Z.M. felt life was slipping through her fingers. In her humility, she forgot that she herself was a source of life and creation. She went out very little, turned down any invitations. She wasn’t the kind of woman to notice when a man was interested in her unless he actually said so — ​then she would be surprised and welcome his interest. One afternoon — ​it was springtime, the first day of spring — ​she went to visit a female friend of hers who asked her bluntly: How could a grown woman like her be so very humble? How could she fail to notice that several men were in love with her? How could she not see that, out of respect for herself, she really ought to have an affair? She also said that she had once seen her enter a room full of acquaintances, none of whom were anywhere near as bright as her. And yet she had seen her almost creep in, as if she barely existed, like a doe with its head bowed. “You should walk with your head held high. You’re bound to suffer because you’re different, cosmically different, so just accept that the bourgeois life is not for you, and enter a room with your head held high.” “Go all alone into a room full of people?” “Yes. You don’t need to go with someone else, you’re fine on your own.” She remembered that, later that same day, there was to be a kind of cocktail party for the primary school teachers during their vacation. She remembered the new attitude she was supposed to adopt, and so didn’t arrange to go with one of her colleagues — ​she would risk going all alone. She put on a fairly new dress, but her courage failed her. Then — ​and she understood this only afterward — ​she put on so much eye makeup and so much lipstick that her face looked like a mask. She was superimposing another person on herself: and that other person was amazingly uninhibited, vain. That other person was everything she was not. But when it was time to leave her apartment, she wavered: Was she not asking too much of herself? All dressed up, with a painted mask on her face — ​ah, persona, why not make use of you and finally be! — ​she sank timorously into the armchair in her all too familiar living room and her heart begged her not to go. She seemed to sense that she was going to be badly bruised, and she was no masochist. Finally, she stubbed out her cigarette of courage, got up, and left. She felt that the torments of the timid had never been adequately described. As the taxi drove along, she was dying ever so slightly. And then suddenly there she was, standing before a vast room filled with possibly very many people, although they seemed very few in the enormous space in which the cocktail party — ​that modern ritual — ​was being held. How long did she last with her head held unnaturally high? The mask made her feel uncomfortable, and besides, she knew she was prettier without makeup. But without makeup her soul would be laid bare. And she couldn’t risk or allow herself such a luxury. She spoke and smiled to one person, spoke and smiled to another. But as happens at all cocktail parties, it was impossible to have a conversation, and eventually she found herself alone again. She spotted a man who had once been her lover. And she thought: However much love that man might have received in his life, I was the one who gave him my whole soul and my whole body. They looked at each other, scrutinized each other, and he was doubtless rather shocked by that painted mask. She didn’t know what to do except ask him if they were still friends — ​if that were possible. He said, yes, of course, they would always be friends. After a while she felt she could no longer hold up her head. But how to cross the vast space from there to the door? Alone, like a fugitive? Then she half confessed her problem to one of her fellow teachers, who kindly led her across the huge expanse that lay between her and the door. And in the dark of the spring night she was an unhappy woman. Yes, she was different. Yes, she was also timid. Yes, she was oversensitive. Yes, she had met an old flame. The darkness and the smell of spring in the air. The heart of the world was beating in her breast. She had always been conscious of the smells of nature. She finally found a taxi and sat down in it almost shedding tears of relief, remembering that the same thing had happened to her in Paris, although that had been even worse. She fled home like a fugitive from the world. There was no hiding the fact: she didn’t know how to live. In the safety of her home, she looked at herself in the mirror as she was washing her hands and saw the persona buckled onto her face: the persona bore the fixed smile of a clown. Then she washed her face and felt relieved to have her soul bare again. Then she took a sleeping pill. Before sleep came, she lay wide awake and promised herself never to run that same risk again unprotected. The pill was beginning to calm her down. And the immense night of dreams began. May 3, 1969 Social Column It was a ladies’ lunch. Both the hostess and the guests seemed genuinely pleased that everything was going so well. As if there were always a risk of revealing that this reality of dumbwaiters, flowers, and elegance was all a bit above them — ​not for reasons of social class, but just that: above them. Perhaps above the fact that they were merely women and not ladies. While all of them had a right to be there, they nevertheless seemed to live in dread of the moment when someone would commit a gaffe—a reality-revealing moment. The lunch was exquisite, a million miles from any idea of hours spent laboring in the kitchen: before the guests arrived all the scaffolding had been removed. Although there was one tiny detail which, for the good of the enterprise—namely, lunch—could not be ignored. The detail that one lady was obliged to ignore was the fact that whenever the waiter was serving her neighbor at the table, he always very lightly brushed against her hair, which gave her the kind of fright that always presages disaster. There were two waiters. The one serving that lady remained invisible to her throughout the meal. And it’s unlikely that he ever saw her face. With no chance of them actually meeting, their only relationship was established through those occasional encounters with her hair. And he knew that. Through her hair he gradually began to feel that he was loathed and he, too, began to feel angry. It’s likely that each of the guests felt a brief flicker of anger during that lavish lunch. Each must have felt, at least for a moment, the urgent, pressing anxiety of a coiffure about to collapse, thus propelling the lunch into disaster. The hostess wielded her authority lightly, which rather suited her. Sometimes, though, she forgot she was being observed and adopted some slightly surprising expressions, for example an air of weary irritation and disappointment. Or, as occurred at one point — ​what vague, anxious thought was going through her mind just then? — ​she looked blankly at the guest to her right, who was speaking to her, saying: “Isn’t the countryside there magnificent?” And the hostess, in a sweet, dreamy, yearning voice, said somewhat impatiently: “Yes … yes, it is, isn’t it?” The person who enjoyed herself most was Senhora X, the guest of honor, who was always inundated with invitations and for whom a lunch party was simply lunch. With delicate, tranquil gestures, she happily devoured the French food, plunging the spoon into her mouth, then studying it curiously—a remnant of childhood. Among all the other guests, though, there was a feigned air of nonchalance. Perhaps if they had feigned less they would have appeared more nonchalant. No one would have dared, though. Each was a little afraid of herself, as if fearing that she might make the most awful blunder if she dropped her guard just a little. No: they were all determined to make this a perfect lunch. There was no chance to relax and be themselves, to allow an occasional moment of silence. That was quite impossible. As soon as a subject happened, quite naturally, to come up, it was pounced on by everyone and the discussion went on until it ran out of steam and faded into a mere ellipsis. Since they all approached the topic from the same angle — ​for they all knew about the same things — ​which meant there was no chance of a divergence of opinion, each topic again opened up the possibility of silence. Senhora Z, a large, healthy woman, fifty years old and newly married, was wearing a corsage pinned to her bodice. She had the easy, excited laugh of someone who has married late. The others all seemed determined to find her ridiculous. And this somewhat relieved the tension. However, she was a little too obviously ridiculous, thus failing to offer us a key to her personality — ​if only she would give us a chance to find out what that key was. But she didn’t: she talked and talked. The worst thing was that one of the guests spoke only French. This proved problematic for Senhora Y. Her only possible revenge came when the foreigner said one of those phrases that only needed to be parroted back, with just a slight change in intonation. “Il n’est pas mal,” said the foreigner. Then Senhora Y, confident that she would be saying the right thing, would repeat the words very loudly, in a voice full of the surprise and pleasure of someone who has actually had a thought and made a discovery: “Ah, il n’est pas mal, il n’est pas mal.” For, as another guest said in French, even though she wasn’t a foreigner and in response to something else entirely: “C’est le ton qui fait la chanson.” As for Senhora K, all dressed in gray, she was always ready to hear and to respond. She felt comfortable in her dullness. She had learned that her best weapon was discretion and was positively profligate in her use of it. “No one’s going to get me to behave any differently,” said her smiling, maternal eyes. She had even found a way of signaling her discretion, as in that story about spies who wore special badges. Thus, she deliberately wore what you might call discreet clothes. Her jewelry was frankly discreet. Besides, discreet people form a kind of clan. They recognize each other at a glance and, by praising each other, praise themselves. The conversation opened with talk of dogs. The final conversation over the liqueurs — ​perhaps because things do tend to come full circle — ​was also about dogs. Our sweet hostess had a dog called José. Something that no one in the discreet clan would have. Any dog of theirs would be called Rex, and even then, in a very discreet moment, they would say: “It was my son who named him that.” In the clan of the discreet, it’s considered normal to speak of children as if they were the adorable tyrants of the household. “My son thinks my dress is horrible.” “My daughter bought tickets for a concert, but I don’t think I’ll go, she can go with her father.” Generally speaking, any member of the discreet clan is invited because of her husband, a wealthy businessman, or her late father, doubtless a famous lawyer. They leave the table. Those who carefully fold their napkins before getting up do so because that is what they were taught to do. Those who casually throw them down have a theory about casually throwing down napkins. The coffee helps settle the copious, exquisite meal, but the liqueur mingles with the earlier wines, making the guests feel somehow breathlessly vague. Those who smoke, smoke; those who don’t smoke, don’t. They all smoke. The hostess beams and beams, wearily. Finally, they all say their goodbyes. With the rest of the afternoon ruined. Some go home with half an afternoon still to kill. Others take advantage of being all dressed up to make another visit. Possibly, who knows, to pay their respects. That’s the way of the world, we eat, we die. Generally speaking, the lunch was perfect. You must come to us next time. No, please don’t. November 1962 Memory of a Difficult Summer Insomnia made the dimly lit city levitate. Not a single door was shut and every window gave out its own hot light. Insects swarmed around the streetlights. Along the riverbank the tables, the few weary conversations, children asleep on laps. The wide-awake levity of the night would not let us go to our beds; we walked as slowly as nomads. We were part of the streetlights’ yellow vigil, and the winged insects, and the rounded, waiting hills, and the vigil of an entire celestial vault. We were part of the great waiting that, in and of itself, is what the whole universe does. Just as those other enormous insects had once drunk slowly from the waters of that river. But within that great absolute waiting, which was the only possible way of being, I called for a truce. That summer night in August was made of the finest fabric of waiting, forever unbreakable. I wanted the night to begin at last to twitch slightly, to begin to die, so that I, too, could sleep. But I knew that the summer night neither fades nor dawns, it simply sweats in the warm fever of daybreak. And I’ve always been the one who has gone to bed, the one who has begun to die, while the night hangs there like a lidless eye. It is beneath the world’s great wide-open eye that I have prepared myself for sleep, wrapping my grain of insomnia, my allotted diamond, in a thousand layers of bandages like a mummy. I was standing on the corner and knew nothing would ever die. This is an eternal world. And I knew that I’m the one who must die. But I didn’t want to die alone, I wanted a place that resembled the one I needed, I wanted them to welcome my inevitable demise. My deaths are not brought on by sadness — ​they are one of the ways in which the world inhales and exhales, the succession of lives is the breath of infinite waiting, and I myself, who am also the world, need the rhythm of those deaths. But if I, as world, agree to my death, then I, like the other thing I absolutely am, need the hands of mercy to receive my dead body. I, who am also the hope of redemption by waiting, need the mercy of love to save me and the spirit of my blood. Blood that is so black in the black dust of my sandals, and my head encircled by mosquitoes as if it were a fruit. Where could I seek refuge and rid myself of the pulsating summer night that had shackled me to its vastness? My little diamond had become so much bigger than me, and I could see that the stars, too, are hard and bright, and I needed to be the fruit that rots and falls. I needed the abyss. Then I saw, standing before me, the Cathedral of Bern. But the cathedral was also hot and wide awake. Full of wasps. Translated by Margaret Jull Costa and Robin Patterson. From Too Much of Life: The Complete Crônicas, which will be published by New Directions in September. Originally published as Todas as Crônicas in 2018. Courtesy of Paulo Gurgel Valente. Clarice Lispector was born in 1920 to a Jewish family in western Ukraine. As a result of the anti-Semitic violence they endured, the family fled to Brazil in 1922, and Clarice Lispector grew up in Recife. Following the death of her mother when Clarice was nine, she moved to Rio de Janeiro. She is the author of nine novels, as well as of a number of short stories, children’s books, and newspaper columns. View the full article

SUZUKI LOOKING OUT AT THE CITY, Suzuki thinks about insects. It’s night but the scene is ablaze with gaudy neon and streetlamps. People everywhere. Like a writhing mass of luridly colored insects. It unsettles him, and he thinks back to what his college professor once said: ‘Most animals don’t live on top of each other in such great numbers. In some ways, humans are less like mammals and closer to insects.’ His professor had seemed pleased with the conclusion. ‘Like ants, or locusts.’ ‘I’ve seen photos of penguins living in groups all bunched together,’ Suzuki had responded, gently needling. ‘Are penguins like insects too?’ His professor flushed. ‘Penguins have nothing to do with it.’ He sounded endearingly childlike, and Suzuki had felt that he wanted to be the same way as he got older. He still remembers it. Then a memory of his wife flashes through his mind. His wife died two years ago. She used to laugh at the story about his professor. ‘You’re supposed to just answer, “You’re absolutely right, professor,” and then everything works out,’ she used to say. It was certainly true that she loved it anytime he had agreed with her and said, ‘You’re absolutely right, honey.’ ‘What are you waiting for? Get him in the car.’ Hiyoko’s urging startles him. Suzuki shakes his head to ward off the memories, then pushes the young guy in front of him. The guy tumbles into the back seat of the sedan. He’s tall, blond hair. Unconscious. He has a black leather jacket on over a black shirt, with a pattern of little insects. The unsavory pattern matches the guy’s general unsavory vibe. Also in the back seat, on the other side, is a girl. Suzuki had forced her into the car as well. Long black hair, yellow coat, in her early twenties. Her eyes are closed and her mouth slightly open as she sleeps sprawled on the seat. Suzuki tucks the guy’s legs into the car and closes the door. ‘Get in,’ says Hiyoko. Suzuki gets in on the passenger side. The car is parked just outside the northernmost entrance to the Fuji­ sawa Kongocho subway station. In front of them is a big intersection with a busy pedestrian crossing. It’s ten thirty at night in the middle of the week, but this close to Shin­ juku things are busier after dark than they are in the daytime, and the area is thronged with people. Half of them are drunk. ‘Wasn’t that easy?’ Hiyoko sounds totally relaxed. Her white skin has a luster like porcelain, seeming to float in the dark car interior. Her chestnut hair is cut short, coming just to the top of her ears. Something about her expression is cold, maybe because of her single eyelids. The red of her lip­ stick shines brightly. Her white shirt is open down to the middle of her chest and her skirt doesn’t quite reach her knees. She’s apparently in her late twenties, same as Suzuki, but she often shows the craftiness of some­ one far older. She looks like a party girl, but he can tell she’s sharp, with the benefit of a proper education. She’s wearing black high heels, and has one foot on the brake. It’s amazing she can drive in those, he thinks. ‘It wasn’t easy or hard, I mean, all I did was get them in the car.’ Suzuki frowns. ‘I just carried these two unconscious people and put them in the back seat.’ I take no further responsibility, he wanted to say. ‘If this sort of thing rattles you, you won’t get very far. Your trial period is almost over, so you better get used to jobs like this. Although I bet you never imagined you’d be kidnapping people, huh?’ ‘Of course not.’ Though the truth is that Suzuki isn’t all that surprised. He never thought his employer was a legitimate company. ‘Fräulein means “maiden” in German, doesn’t it?’ ‘Very good. Apparently, Terahara named the company himself.’ When she says that name his body tenses. ‘The father?’ That is, the CEO. ‘Obviously. His idiot son could never come up with a company name.’ Suzuki has a momentary vision of his dead wife and his emotions boil. He clenches his stomach and feigns calm. The idiot son, Terahara’s son – anytime Suzuki thinks of him he can barely contain himself. ‘I just never thought that a company with a name that means “maiden” would actually prey on young women,’ he somehow manages to say. ‘It does seem strange.’ Hiyoko may be the same age as Suzuki but she’s been with the company for a long time, and has the according rank. In the month since Suzuki joined as a contractor, he’s been reporting to her. As for what he’s been doing in that month, it was all standing in shopping arcades, hailing passing women. He stood in the busy spots, calling out to women walking by. They would say no, they would ignore him, they would swear at him, but he still kept trying. Almost all of the women just walked away. It had nothing to do with his delivery, effort, technique or skill. They scowled at him, they looked at him warily, they avoided him, but still he kept calling out to every woman who walked by. But there was usually one woman each day, maybe one in a thousand, who showed interest. He would take her to a cafe and give her a pitch for makeup products and diet drinks. He had a basic script: ‘You won’t see the effects right away, but after about a month you’ll see dramatic changes.’ He would improvise, saying whatever felt most appropriate, then show her the pamphlets. They were printed in color, full of graphs and figures, but not a single thing written in them was true. The gullible girls would sign an agreement right then and there. The more suspicious ones would leave saying they’d think about it. If he could sense that there was still a chance, he would follow them. After that, another group would take over, far more persistent, starting their illegal solicitation. They would force their way into the woman’s home and refuse to leave, keep constant surveillance on her, until she finally gave in and signed the agreement. Or so Suzuki understood. But that part of the arrangement was still all hearsay to him. ‘Well, you’ve been with us for a month. Shall we take you to the next level?’ Hiyoko had said this to him an hour earlier. ‘The next level?’ ‘I can’t imagine you planned to spend the rest of your life soliciting women on the street.’ ‘Well, I mean,’ he answered vaguely, ‘the rest of my life is a long time.’ ‘Today’s job is different. When you get someone into a cafe, I’ll be coming with you.’ ‘It’s not that easy to get someone to listen,’ he said with a pained smile, thinking of the last month. But for better or for worse, inside of thirty minutes Suzuki had found two people willing to hear him out. The guy and girl who are currently passed out in the back of the car. First the girl showed interest. ‘Hey, don’t you think if I lost a little weight I could do modeling?’ she asked the guy casually. He answered encouragingly, ‘Sure, babe, you could definitely be a model, for sure. You could be, like, a supermodel.’ Suzuki called Hiyoko, took the couple to a cafe, and started introducing products as he normally would. Whether it was because they were young and stupid or just gullible, the young man and woman seemed almost comically willing to go along with what Suzuki and Hiyoko were pitching. Their eyes lit up at the barest of compliments, and they nodded enthusiastically at all the bogus data from the pamphlets. Their complete lack of skepticism was enough to make Suzuki feel concerned for their futures. He had a surge of memories of his students from when he was still a teacher. The first place his mind went, for some reason, was to one poorly behaved kid. He remembered the boy saying, ‘See, Mr Suzuki, I can do good too.’ He was always acting out, and the other students didn’t like him much, but one time he surprised everybody by catching a purse-snatcher in a shopping district. ‘I can do good too,’ he had said to Suzuki, smiling with both pride and embarrassment. Then he said, ‘Don’t give up on me, teach,’ looking like a much younger boy. Come to think of it . . . The guy in front of him flipping through the pamphlet, face pockmarked from acne scars, somehow reminded him of that student. He knew he had never met this person before, but the resemblance was striking. Then he noticed that Hiyoko had gone to the counter to order refills of coffee. He took another look and saw that she was doing something with her hands over the cups, then realized: she was drugging the coffee. Before long the guy’s and girl’s eyes glazed over and their heads started sagging. The girl said, ‘They call me Yellow, and he’s Black. Just nick-names, you know? That’s why I’m wearing a yellow coat, and he’s dressed in black.’ Then she mumbled, ‘Hey, I’m like, sleepy.’ And she nodded off. Next to her, the guy said, ‘Yeah, but my hair’s blond, and yours is black,’ slurring nonsensically. ‘Why is that . . .’ Then he passed out too. ‘Well then,’ said Hiyoko. ‘Let’s get them to the car.’ ‘Depending on how we use them, these two dummies could make us some decent money,’ she says, sounding bored. Would you do this to my students? Suzuki has to tell himself not to ask it out loud. ‘Are we . . . just staying here?’ ‘Normally we’d be leaving now.’ Her voice sharpens. ‘But tonight’s different.’ A sense of foreboding runs up his spine. ‘Different, how?’ __________________________________ Excerpt from the new novel Three Assassins by Kōtarō Isaka published by The Overlook Press ©2022 View the full article

Music composer Bruce Montgomery (1921-1978), who as Edmund Crispin wrote eight glitteringly witty and amusing detective novels between 1944 and 1951 (as well as, with Geoffrey Bush, a fellow composer and the alleged son of detective novelist Christopher Bush, the classic short story “Who Killed Baker?”) is the subject of a now fifteen-year-old biography by David Whittle, Director of Music at Leicester Grammar School, Bruce Montgomery/Edmund Crispin: A Life in Music and Books (2007). Every admirer of Crispin’s mystery fiction (and Montgomery’s music) should read this biography, although affordable copies are hard to find—the publisher, Ashgate, lists it at $155. It took me years to find a copy I was able to buy ($35). David Whittle’s book was money well-spent, for he writes with insight not only about Montgomery’s career in music, but also, more pertinently to crime fiction fans, about the detective fiction that Montgomery wrote under his Crispin pseudonym. Whittle chronicles both the impressive rise of this author—he published eight novels and twenty-one musical compositions by the time he was thirty-two years old—and his long, sad decline. Montgomery’s productive life both as an author and a composer mostly ended by the time he was forty, as he descended into alcoholism and the stunted life of, in Whittle’s words, “an increasingly remote semi-recluse.” To be sure, Montgomery left us the delightful Edmund Crispin detective novels (still in print today), but once one has read them one cannot help but wish for more and wonder why Montgomery’s creative well grew dry so quickly. After his first eight detective novels, Montgomery managed only one additional mystery tale, The Glimpses of the Moon (1977), before his demise at the age of fifty-six. Let us explore the life and death of Edmund Crispin. The son of a civil servant who rose to become Principal Clerk in the India Office, Bruce Montgomery with one notable exception had a normal, happy childhood and never lost the conservative, bourgeois mindset produced by his upbringing, despite his Oxford education and penchant for gloriously affected Noel Coward/Dorian Gray-ish picture poses (see photo). The only unhappiness in his childhood came as the result of the “congenital deformity of the feet” from which he suffered—he was born with his feet turned inward—so that he underwent frequent operations up to the age of fourteen and during this time had to wear calipers up to his shins. Whittle clearly believes that the painful consciousness of his physical imperfection inhibited Montgomery from having normal physical relationships with women (“he could not be bothered to do what they required,” as Whittle tactfully puts it), although he was attracted by the fair sex and frequently enjoyed their company. Montgomery finally married a couple of years before his death in 1978, when he was in rapidly failing health and no one any longer expected him to prove his manhood, as it were. Reading locked room mystery maestro John Dickson Carr’s brilliant, shuddery Gideon Fell detective novel The Crooked Hinge, Whittle explains, inspired Montgomery, while still a student at Oxford, to pen his own mystery tale, The Case of the Gilded Fly, which was published in the United Kingdom by Victor Gollancz in February 1944, when the author was only twenty-two. (The novel was published the next year in the United States by Lippincott under the rather more tony title Obsequies at Oxford.) Influenced by the donnish detective novelist Michael Innes (and his own surroundings), Montgomery made Gervase Fen, the man who was to become his series detective, Professor of English Language and Literature at Oxford. Gervase Fen quickly became one of the outstanding gentleman amateur detectives of English detective fiction, comfortably rubbing sophisticated shoulders with the likes of Dorothy L. Sayers’ Lord Peter Wimsey and Margery Allingham’s Albert Campion. In contrast with these two Crime Queens (and Ngaio Marsh, whose detective Roderick Alleyn, though a policeman, is of the same breed), Montgomery did not make Fen’s love life a focal point, but confined the love stuff to secondary characters, who, Whittle notes, tend rather ingenuously to fall in love and decide to get married almost on sight. Fen himself is not really romantic leading man material. He can be vain, faddish and alarmingly blunt and his most prominent physical feature is his “dark hair, ineffectually plastered down with water,” that is “stuck out in spikes from the back of his head” (Holy Disorders). Love interest is not what distinguishes Edmund Crispin mystery tales, but rather intelligence, humor, wit, narrative zest and—more often, I think, than Whittle recognizes—clever fair play plotting. Edmund Crispin—let us use this name to discuss Montgomery in his authorial guise—has something of the formidable literary intellect of Michael Innes, yet his humor is earthier, less precious, less an acquired taste, with Innes forever remaining the indulgent don and Crispin the precocious, puckish schoolboy. Despite his small output, Crispin is, in my view, one of the great comedic writers in British detective fiction. Such is Crispin’s penchant for madcap humor that at times the humorous interludes rather overwhelm the mystery plot. This happens most obviously in the two novels which followed The Case of the Gilded Fly: Holy Disorders (1945) and The Moving Toyshop (1946). Of the latter novel, in modern times routinely pronounced (by Julian Symons and P. D. James for example) Crispin’s masterpiece, a reader for Crispin’s British publisher Gollancz presciently noted that it had “a thin plot….but nobody cares.” In the reader’s view Toyshop rose to glory on the wings of its comic “verve.” Most modern readers seemingly would agree, although over the years some detection purists, like Jacques Barzun (and, incidentally, myself) have sounded sour notes in the heavenly chorus. “Heaven help you if you’re expecting detection,” noted a querulous contemporary reviewer. Holy Disorders also amply illustrates this quality of Edmund Crispin’s detective fiction (as does publisher Felony & Mayhem’s brilliant cover design). Gervase Fen does not appear at all in the first third of the tale, the early action mostly being a succession of brilliant comic set pieces as Geoffrey Vintner, Fen’s Watson of the moment, attempts to make his way to the cathedral town of Tolnbridge, where misdeeds are running fast afoot. It seems dark forces are trying to stop him, and he almost immediately is thrown into a hilarious melee in the sports section of a department store. (He is there in the first place because Fen, who has called for Vintner’s aid, has mysteriously requested his friend to get him a butterfly net.) Afterwards, Vintner embarks on a train journey—train journeys in Crispin’s books invariably are delightfully presented—and there meets an assortment of colorful characters, including a psychiatrist who is having a crisis of faith in psychiatry—Crispin’s ironic play on the conventional situation of the clergyman losing faith in God—and a vociferous member of the newly energized laboring classes, who demands the right to travel in a first-class carriage. “When we get socialism, see, which is what we’re fighting for, see, you and your like will have to show some respect for me, see, instead of treating me like a lot of dirt, see?” this fellow truculently pronounces, sounding rather like American film star Edward G. Robinson in gangster guise. (One wonders what the Crispin’s noted leftist publisher Victor Gollancz made of him.) Eventually the novel’s mystery plot proper does start to unfold, and an interesting enough plot it is, but probably the highlight of the book is when Fen and Vintner visit one eminent suspect in his home, and find to their bemusement that Poe’s poem “The Raven” seems to be materializing before their very eyes. One reviewer deemed Holy Disorders “social comedy with a focus in murder”—which seems a fair enough description! As well shall see, the mysteries from Crispin’s middle period—Swan Song (1947), Love Lies Bleeding (1948) and Buried for Pleasure (1948)—are less humorously harum-scarum than Disorders and Toyshop and on the whole more satisfying as detective novels as a result. ******* In the late 1940s Bruce Montgomery, still in his twenties, was unquestionably in the prime of his creative life. In 1947, the year his fourth detective novel appeared, he was invited to join England’s Detection Club, a social organization of the country’s finest writers of detective fiction, including Agatha Christie, Dorothy L. Sayers, Margery Allingham and John Dickson Carr. Fittingly, Montgomery was proposed for membership by his idol John Dickson Carr. The next three Edmund Crispin novels—Swan Song, which deals with the world of opera, and Love Lies Bleeding and Buried for Pleasure, which concern, respectively, deaths at a public school and a country village—are all fine books, reflecting in some respects, as David Whittle notes, a greater seriousness on the part of the author, yet still retaining the peerless Crispin humor. Of the three tales my favorite is Buried for Pleasure, one of the most notable British detective novels criticizing life in a post-war, austerity-era England governed by a Labour party determined to make what it saw as long overdue social and political change in the country. (Others that come to mind are Miles Burton’s Death Takes the Living, 1949, Agatha Christie’s A Murder is Announced, 1950, and Henry Wade’s Diplomat’s Folly, 1951.) Montgomery, a lifelong Tory of “strongly conservative disposition” in Whittle’s words, obviously was not enamored with the Labour party; yet his humor is so winning that readers who may not share his political disposition should enjoy Pleasure too. As the cover of the Felony & Mayhem edition of the novel suggests, Buried for Pleasure concerns English politics. It seems that Gervase Fen has rather quixotically gotten it into his head to stand for a seat in Parliament from a country constituency. When Fen steps out at the train station serving Sanford Angelorum, he finds his quest is met skeptically by his driver, an attractive young woman named Diana: “Look here,” she said, “you’re a professor at Oxford, aren’t you?” “Of English.” “Well, what on earth…I mean, why are you standing for Parliament? What put that idea into your head? Even to himself Fen’s actions were sometimes unaccountable, and he could think of no very convincing reply. “It is my wish,” he said sanctimoniously, “to serve the community.” The girl eyed him dubiously. “Or at least,” he amended, “that is one of my motives. Besides, I felt I was getting far too restricted in my interests. Have you ever produced a definitive edition of Langland?” “Of course not,” she said crossly. “I have. I just finished producing one. It has queer psychological effects. You begin to wonder if you’re mad. And the only remedy for that is a complete change of occupation.” “What it amounts to is you haven’t any serious interest in politics at all,” the girl said with unexpected severity. When Gervase Fen makes his way into the village and his lodging at The Fish Inn, he meets an amazingly rich gallery of characters: a traditionalist detective novelist likely modeled on his fellow Detection Club members John Rhode (Cecil John Charles Street) and Freeman Wills Crofts (“Characterization seems to me a very over-rated element in fiction,” he pronounces); the comely and amiable manageress of The Fish Inn; the owner of The Fish Inn, determined to evade exacting labor regulations by expanding his inn himself, with the help of friends and family—with dubious results; a Socialist lord; the lord’s skeptical, phlegmatic butler (who understands Thorstein Veblen much better than his master); Fen’s unflappably cynical “old boy” campaign manager; a cleric living in a house haunted by a not altogether frightening poltergeist; an escaped lunatic (at times he thinks he’s Woodrow Wilson and is apt to lecture about his Fourteen Points); a chorus of rustics; and, last but certainly not least as things turn out, a “non-doing” pig. Always watch out for animals in Crispin, as Whittle points out in his book. Buried for Pleasure is simply brimming over with a delicious comic froth. I would venture to characterize it one of the finest English rural comedy novels, even with its murders. Not for nothing, as Whittle notes, is mention made of Stella Gibbons’ novel Cold Comfort Farm. Yet the fair play murder plot line is capably and cogently managed by the author and engaging in its own right. And the political satire is masterful. Fen’s anti-Labour parable concerning the practice of the politics of envy during the Cold War—it seems there were three foxes—Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, who, jealous of each other’s unique possessions, ended up squabbling until, distracted, they fell “easy prey to a number of cannibal foxes which descended on them from the East and tore them limb from limb”—is quite a clever piece of rhetoric, whatever one’s views of the politics of the era. David Whittle’s own discussion of the Crispin detective novels is quite good on the whole, but I was disappointed that this parable—the high point of the political plot—received scant attention from him. Buried for Pleasure achieves the comic heights of Holy Disorders and The Moving Toyshop, yet it also offers a more controlled mystery plot—a winning combination, in my view. The last two Edmund Crispin novels from the 1944-51 period, Frequent Hearses (published as Sudden Vengeance in the United States) and The Long Divorce, show signs of further artistic development in a serious direction. In particular, The Long Divorce offers the best of Crispin mystery plots along with an interesting, seriously presented female protagonist. ******* In his biography of Edmund Crispin, David Whittle argues, correctly I believe, that the last two Edmund Crispin books from the 1944 to 1951 series—Frequent Hearses (1950) and The Long Divorce (1951)—clearly evince the author’s “growing regard for plot.” One reviewer of Frequent Hearses, Whittle notes, lamented his own previous castigation of the flippancies in the earlier Crispin detective novels: “I railed against his undergraduate cleverness, but now that [Crispin] writes a straightforward crime story without the sparkling digressions and slapstick repartee of his earlier books, I am sorry, as it were, that I spoke.” While I love the manic high spirits of some of the earlier Crispin tales, I find that Frequent Hearses and The Long Divorce have more than adequate compensations, namely strong plots ladled with rich dollops of humor (if not quite of the madcap sort). Frequent Hearses has amusing satire of the film world (with which Crispin had become familiar though his highly lucrative film score work), but my personal favorite of the two is The Long Divorce. The epigraph to the novel (“the long divorce of steel”) comes from Shakespeare’s Henry VIII. (There’s a play you don’t see pillaged for quotations every day.) I will not say more about this epigraph, but it is quite cleverly worked into the story. The Long Divorce takes place in 1950, between the dates of Friday, June 2 and Monday, June 5. (At these respective points Gervase Fen is on his way from and on his way to, appropriately enough in a Crispin novel, a train station.) In the guise of “Mr. Datchery”—bonus points if you know this literary reference—Fen is descending on the village of Cotten Abbas to investigate, at local the request of the local police, a rash of poison pen letters plaguing the citizenry. Just this basic set-up should be more than enough to hook the fan of classic English mystery. It certainly hooked me. One is right to take the bait which Crispin offers with The Long Divorce, because the novel is one of the very best of that ever so enticing literary species, the English village poison pen mystery, probably the best known example of which is Agatha Christie’s The Moving Finger (1942). More serious-minded in this novel, Crispin at times casts a sharp, discerning eye over Cotten Abbas and he provides some interesting social commentary on post-war English life: Cotten Abbas is sixty or seventy miles from London and obscurely conveys the impression of having strayed there out of a film set. As with most show-villages, you are apt to feel, when confronted with it, that some impalpable process of embalming is at work, some prophylactic against change and decay which while creditable in itself has yet resulted in a certain degree of stagnation….It all had a prosperous look—but its prosperity, Mr. Datchery thought, was less that of a working class village than that of a village which has been settled by the well-to-do: in a population which could scarcely number more than a couple hundred, it was obviously the invading middle classes that ruled, badly weakened by post-war conditions, but still hanging on. This sort of keen observation can be found in other 1950s English village detective novels as well, like Agatha Christie’s A Murder is Announced and Miles Burton’s Bones in the Brickfield (as well as a goodly number of tales by Elizabeth Ferrars, a key figure in the replacement of the classic “country house” mystery with the more modern “country cottage” mystery); but The Long Divorce offers a particularly fine instance of such. As in Buried for Pleasure, Fen again ensconces himself at an inn, where he encounters a great many interesting characters. There is Mr. Rolt, the local saw mill owner looked down on by the village elite for his rough ways and determination to locate his mill at a local beauty spot; Rolt’s teenage daughter, Penelope, who talks of the romance of throwing oneself in front of a train and who has a painful crush on an unresponsive local schoolteacher, Peter Rubi, a highly intellectual young man of Swiss derivation; Mr. Mogridge, the gossipy and unctuous local innkeeeper; Helen Downing, an Oxford educated local doctor, relatively newly arrived in the village; George Sims, the established doctor; Inspector Edward Casby, the man tasked with investigating the rash of poison pen letters; Colonel Babington, the Chief Constable, desperately trying to break his smoking habit (like the author at the time); Babington’s demented cat, Lavender, constantly on the alert for a Martian invasion (yes, you read that correctly); Amos Weaver, evangelical preacher and local butcher; and assorted female house servants, increasingly scarce and precious beings in postwar England. Soon after Fen’s arrival, a poison pen letter seemingly induces Helen Downing’s wealthy friend, Beatrice Keats-Madderly, to commit suicide. Following this dire event, a fatal stabbing occurs to one of the characters, who apparently was too close to discovering the identity of the poison pen letter writer. Much to her distress, Helen Downing becomes a “person of interest” in the investigation, many pieces of evidence seeming to point to her as the source of the troubles. Crispin lavishes attention on the two primary female characters, Helen Downing and Penelope Rolt; and they are treated not flippantly but seriously, with considerable insight and understanding. Rolt is an attractive and appealing girl, but she is painfully in love and acutely awkward in her feelings. For her part, Helen Downing is an intelligent and sensitive woman doctor trying to establish herself in a highly traditionalist village. She bears a certain resemblance to Alida Mountwell, a doctor character in Miles Burton’s excellent 1943 village mystery, Murder M.D., though Mountwell is a more confident individual. Indeed, with the middle section of the book, Crispin completely shifts the narrative focal point of Divorce from Fen to Downing, sweeping the reader up in Downing’s plight, as suspicion starts to focus on her. This section of the book rather reminds one of psychological suspense novels from the 1950s by such authors as Ursula Curtiss and Margaret Millar. It is quite effectively done. Narrative focus shifts back to Gervase Fen for the last part of the novel, where he provides a brilliant exposition of the crime. Fen’s deductions are all based on clues fairly presented to the reader, yet in this reader’s case, anyway, a lot of these clues were culpably missed! When Fen departs Cotten Abbas, the Great Detective has restored order to the English village, in the classic fashion so admired by W. H. Auden in his widely-cited (and, indeed, over-cited) essay on detective fiction, “The Guilty Vicarage.” In so highly praising the fair play plotting of The Long Divorce, I do not mean to suggest that Crispin eschews humor in the novel. To the contrary, there are numerous amusing sections. Lavender’s anti-Martian mania is absolutely inspired, for example, and Colonel Babington’s efforts to quit smoking are quite funny. Crispin also gets in some droll satirical jabs at Continental intellectuals, in the form of the Swiss educationalist Peter Rubi: “It is good for the children,” [Rubi] observed benevolently, “to destroy things sometimes. If they are allowed to do that, they grow up to be saner people.” He looked politely to Mr. Datchery [Gervase Fen] in confirmation of his doubtful thesis. “Is that not so, sir?” “No,” said Mr. Datchery. In my view, both Fen and his creator unequivocally triumph in The Long Divorce. Unfortunately it would prove something of a last hurrah for both Crispin and Fen. ******* After the publication of The Long Divorce (1951) Bruce Montgomery would not publish another Edmund Crispin detective novel for twenty-six years. He did, however, author a spate of mystery short stories—mostly short shorts—in the 1950s, plus a very small number of them afterward. These were gathered in two collections, Beware of the Trains (1953) and Fen Country (1979). The former collection, in which Crispin was able to revise the stories, is much the superior of the two, although two of the tales in Fen Country, the classical “Who Killed Baker?”—co-authored with Geoffrey Bush, a fellow composer and supposed son of Golden Age detective novelist Christopher Bush—and the sardonic and brilliantly titled “We Know You’re Busy Writing, But We Thought You Wouldn’t Mind if We Just Dropped in for a Minute,” where a crime writer suffering from writer’s block—who seems suspiciously like “Edmund Crispin”—is provoked to desperate measures to damn the flow of “friends” thoughtlessly interrupting his work) are outstanding. In his biography of Montgomery, David Whittle quite rightly praises both these tales. We also learn in some detail from Whittle how Bruce Montgomery became a devoted member of the Detection Club, that organization of England’s finest detective novelists. It will be recalled that Montgomery was initiated into the Detection Club in 1947, at the recommendation of his 1940s mystery idol, John Dickson Carr. The charming Montgomery was well-liked by members, including the formidable Dorothy L. Sayers, who indulgently referred to Montgomery as “Young Crispin.” In one letter to Sayers, Montgomery apologized for “cadging so many cigarettes at the last meeting.” At least several Detection Club members shared Montgomery’s ample thirst for liquor. Montgomery got along quite well with both the popular, convoicial John Dickson Carr and the less popular, misanthropic Anthony Berkeley, both of whom were themselves bibulous gentlemen. Whittle quotes a colorful letter by Montgomery that is filled with sentimental alcoholic reminiscence (this letter is in the possession of Carr scholar Douglas Greene): Those were the days, weren’t they?—when, e.g., I fell drunkenly asleep on Christianna Brand’s ample bosom in a taxi, and she had the greatest difficulty in shifting me; when you and Tony Berkeley and I indulged in maudlin confessions of our sexual preferences one late afternoon in the Mandrake Club; when I tried, after four bottles of champagne and two of brandy apiece to fight a duel with you in your Hampstead flat with (unbuttoned) foils…. These “amusing” exploits described above are perhaps less amusing when one realizes that Montgomery was developing a serious alcohol problem that would drastically inhibit his creative work. Montgomery also was experiencing dissatisfaction in his romantic life, being unable, evidently, to bring his relationships with women to full emotional and physical consummation. Montgomery “liked to think of himself as a womanizer…but he was simply not cut out for it,” writes Whittle. “This could well account for the idealistic portraits of eligible young women he draws in his novels. There was a juvenile streak in him…and his drinking did not help matters either. ‘There are times I’d be happier without sex,’ he wrote in 1956. With his male friends he talked a lot about women because it was the thing to do, but he was incapable of bringing a relationship to a resolution, perhaps because he did not want to be seen as ordinary in any way.” Additionally, Montgomery’s health was deteriorating due to his overindulgence in alcohol and cigarettes. In Whittle’s view these factors, plus Montgomery’s own temperamental indolence and lack of confidence (despite his impressive early career) led him almost entirely to abandon not only his literary work, but the lucrative writing of film scores as well. Since the mid-1950s, Montgomery had been promising his publisher, Gollancz, a new mystery, Judgement in Paris, but in 1965 he dropped the project. By 1969, Montgomery claimed he was two-thirds through with a new Gervase Fen crime novel, entitled The Glimpses of the Moon, but it did not finally make it into print until 1977, just two years before Montgomery’s death. Judging from his correspondence, Montgomery now found writing a murderous endeavor. “[S]eems the same mixture as before….I don’t seem to have matured in any way,” he wrote dispiritedly of Glimpses in 1969. And: “[O]n the final agonising stages of my bloody novel. God almighty, how I detest writing!” A 1966 journal that Whittle discovered makes sad reading for the Edmund Crispin admirer. Here are some brief extracts: 2 January Hangover. Day in bed. 3 January [N]othing accomplished. Must have read, but can’t remember what. Must have drunk a bit, too. Again futile. 4 January Much too much drink. 5 January Gave up smoking, god help me. No drink all day either. (No work, either). Reading Ngaio Marsh’s ‘Swing, Brother, Swing’—poor, and if she’s going to write about jazz bands, why the hell can’t she find out something about them? ‘Tympanist’ indeed. Whittle quotes two more bleak weeks from this unutterably grim journal of human futility. Unquestionably Montgomery had descended a great way from that handsome and dazzlingly brilliant, insouciant young man at Oxford who produced both detective novels and musical compositions seemingly with the greatest of ease. Still there are some positive things to say about the last dozen years or so of Bruce Montgomery’s life, as David Whittle shows. In 1967, Montgomery became, at his friend Julian Symons’ behest, Symons’ successor as the crime fiction reviewer for the Sunday Times. He remained active in the Detection Club. And, in 1977, he finally gave fans of Edmund Crispin their long-awaited glimpse of a new detective novel. ******* Bruce Montgomery had started his detective novel The Glimpses of the Moon as far back as 1965/66, but had been able to complete it only after his 1976 marriage to his secretary Ann Clements, who proved able to manage her alcoholic husband, difficult as he could be at times. “In many ways,” notes Montgomery’s biographer, David Whittle, “Ann became Montgomery’s nurse, but she was an exceptional woman.” She needed to be such in dealing with her charge: In the 1970s, [Kingsley] Amis recalls receiving telephone calls from Ann introducing Montgomery who, when prompted by Amis, would reply with no words, just vague noises. He was probably so drunk that he could not speak. Amis would keep on trying to get a word out of him, with little or no success. Montgomery’s sister, Shelia Rossiter, recalled visiting Ann to have coffee one morning and arriving slightly early. Montgomery was still in his dressing gown, drunk and abusive, and demanding to know what she was doing there. Rossiter could not tell whether this was the effect of the previous night’s drinking or because he had made an early start. From time to time Ann would pack him off to Moorhaven for another course of treatment. Against Ann’s wishes Rossiter visited him, and on one occasion found him more or less crawling up the walls. Although he had nothing in his hand, he was flicking the ash of an imaginary cigarette and stubbing it out. Incredibly, Montgomery’s so-called “friend” Kingsley Amis—who comes out Whittle’s biography as a nasty, jealous backbiter in my view—declared himself baffled by what Montgomery saw in Ann, in one letter making what Whittle calls, justly enough but with considerable restraint, a “typically ungenerous comment.” Amis, explains Whittle, “thought that someone who had known plenty of attractive film starlets should have had higher standards.” Noxiously Amis wrote another of Edmund Crispin’s pals, poet Philip Larkin: “I say, why’s he going to marry that woman with all the teeth, eh?” Fortunately “the woman with all the teeth” shepherded the rapidly declining Montgomery into finally completing The Glimpses of the Moon. Was it worth waiting a quarter century for this final novel? Personally, I find Glimpses a weak book, a succession of sometimes forced comic vignettes strung together by a frayed murder mystery plot; yet it is nice to see Gervase Fen back in a novel again for one last time, in a bucolic setting and confronting some whimsically oddball characters and situations. All the emphasis on misplaced body parts in rural surroundings suggests that Montgomery had been reacquainting himself with the works of a fellow Detection Club member whom he had enjoyed as a student back in the 1940s, Gladys Mitchell (who was then approaching eighty), particularly her joyously macabre second tale, The Mystery of a Butcher’s Shop (1929). Mitchell also was a great favorite of Philip Larkin. Montgomery bemoans modernization throughout the novel, condemning both the invasion of the countryside by the “South Western Electricity Board [SWEB]”—particularly as manifested in the form of a huge menacingly vibrating pylon (see the stark Gollancz dust jacket) which is known locally, even to little old genteel ladies of the neighborhood, as “The Pisser”—and omnipresent television commercial jingles, which evidently have taken over the brain of the seemingly rather simple-minded local Major, who incessantly repeats them. Whatever one thinks of The Glimpses of the Moon, Montgomery had other creative accomplishments in his generally unaccomplished later years (those past the age of forty). He edited notable anthologies of both detective and science fiction, contributing as well significant prefaces. Whittle’s Appendix One, “Montgomery and Detective Fiction,” profitably examines Montgomery’s views of crime fiction. Although in his own genre writing Montgomery’s comic exuberance could overwhelm his commitment to fair play detection (who really cares about the formal puzzle plot in The Moving Toyshop?), as a critic of the genre “Edmund Crispin” was a passionate and articulate defender of the traditional fair play form, often taking issue with his friend, the crime novelist and critic Julian Symons, who urged the superiority of the serious literary crime novel over the frivolous puzzle-oriented detective story. “I’m also faintly discouraged because the ‘better’ reviewers over here all seem to be highly contemptuous of orthodox detective fiction nowadays,” Montgomery memorably wrote American crime fiction critic Anthony Boucher in 1960. “None the less, I’m convinced that there’s still a large public for that kind of thing, as opposed to sub-Chandler thrillers, realistic stodge about police routine, or spineless pseudo-profound guesses at criminal psychology; so I shall push on regardless.” In his capacity as a Sunday Times crime fiction reviewer, “Edmund Crispin” proved particularly astute in noting the promise of modern day British Crime Queens P. D. James and Ruth Rendell. Both women, Whittle notes, wrote him appreciative thank you letters for his critical support: There is no one whose encouragement and criticism has meant more to me than yours (the more so because of my great respect for you as a writer)….You have been kind to me from the beginning and it was your generous review of ‘Shroud for a Nightingale’ which gave me the breakthrough I needed and which seemed so long in coming. (P. D. James, 1977) [Y]our two reviews, so generous and enthusiastic, have made me really happy and give me a confidence I sometimes lack. (Ruth Rendell, 1970) Unfailingly generous to and supportive of other writers, Montgomery even praised Julian Symons’ seminal genre study Bloody Murder, though he profoundly disagreed with much of it. Yet he bemoaned what Symons praised: the dark and dismal path British mystery fiction was taking in moving away from the detective story toward the crime novel. The original idea of the Detection Club, he noted bluntly in 1976, had been to get mystery writers “to stop propounding imbecile plots in appalling English” in the manner of the Edgar Wallace/Sapper school of crime fiction; now, rather mortifyingly, that body had become “to all intents and purposes, a thriller-writers’ Club.” Despite his concerns about the direction it was talking, however, Montgomery never resigned from the Detection Club, though he did just that—resign—when the Crime Writers’ Association in 1976 awarded its coveted Gold Dagger to Nicholas Meyer’s The Seven Percent Solution, a book he dammed as “a preposterous and inept pastiche.” It was at a Detection Club dinner in 1977 that Montgomery’s mystery writing friends saw a “clearly very ill and…much reduced figure” of a man. “His neck was so thin that it was not touching the collar of his shirt, and his voice was so weak that only those close to him could hear what he said,” writes Whittle, paraphrasing a 1992 letter form Julian Symons. At the time, crime writer Josephine Bell (an octogenarian who had begun writing detective fiction back in the 1930s), wrote Ann Montgomery worriedly that at the dinner she had found Bruce “woefully changed.” Bell was right to worry. Within less than a year Bruce Montgomery was dead—not from liver failure as many suspected, but from heart failure, the latter, badly weakened organ having been unable to withstand the stress of needed surgery on his body. Certainly the later years of Bruce Montgomery tell a tragic tale indeed, but at least these were not years entirely bereft of personal accomplishment. Nor can anything detract from the glittering successes that Montgomery enjoyed in the 1940s and the 1950s with his detective novels and film scores. Concerning the detective novel, “Edmund Crispin” wrote at least several enduring genre classics that will continue to be remembered in the decades to come. As should David Whittle’s biography, a fine tribute to an accomplished and interesting man. View the full article

‘Hello, and thank you for expressing an interest in Her Majesty’s Royal Coven.’ Her Majesty’s Royal Coven Juno Dawson Both history and future are fictions. Only the present is real Inst: @junodawson @harpervoyager_uk Twitter:HarperVoyagerUK @jundawson Juno Dawson is a bestselling novelist, screenwriter, journalist, and a columnist for Attitude Magazine. Juno’s books include the global bestsellers, THIS BOOK IS GAY and CLEAN. She won the 2020 YA Book Prize for MEAT MARKET. Her first adult fantasy trilogy HER MAJESTY’S ROYAL COVEN arrives in July 2022. To the mother I swear To solemnly uphold the sacred sisterhood Her power is mine to wield The secret ours to keep The earth ours to protect An enemy of my sister is mine The strength is divine Our bond everlasting Let no man tea us asunder The coven is sovereign Until my dying breath. Dawson’s novel, which came out on the 21st of July, has already reached the number one spot for many reviewers, readers, and booksellers alike. Her Majesty’s Royal Coven, has bewitched those who have dared to enter Dawson’s magical world, leaving every reader spellbound and addicted, salivating for the next novel’s emergence, HMRC: The Shadow Cabinet. 25 years ago, 5 teenage girls are hiding in a tree house. Helena, Leonie, Elle, Niamh, and Ciara are bickering about Boyzone and the Spice Girls, causing an unbelievable pang of nostalgia for the reader whilst engendering an instant connection to these characters as well as the narrative at large. They could be any of us when we were younger, huddled in a tree house eating snacks, and preparing for the next day. For us, it might have been the school disco, our S.A.T exams, or our first day of high school. But for the five teenagers at the start of Her Majesty’s Royal Coven (named for the witch’s coven within the narrative, nicknamed HMRC throughout), the summer solstice is looming, and they are practising to be initiated into the coven. For these five girls are witches, and it is time for them to take their rightful places within a British coven which was founded by Anne Boleyn in the 1600’s; Her Majesty’s Royal Coven. We work as a team to support the UK government in the handling of supernormal events and incidences After meeting our young witches, the narrative skips 25 years to the present day. To a time after war; a time of precarious peace and quiet, a time that is something like now. Dawson’s narrative is constructed with magical realism in mind; the primary technique being to nestle the narrative in plain sight, amongst familiar and recognisable places and settings, but with the added benefit of ‘magic,’ to prevent non-magical people acknowledging any of the magic or ‘supernormal events,’ that might happen around them. ‘That’s him,’ […] cloak the whole street.’ Stray pedestrians strolled by, blind to what was happening. Sandhya’s cloaking spell was evidently working. They weren’t technically invisible, but mundanes wouldn’t see them either. Sandhya was planting a very simple instruction in their minds over and over: nothing to see here. Whilst the settings and narratives are built into the contemporary world of mobile phones and teenagers obsessed with the internet, there is a magical underbelly that Dawson exposes and allows her readers to enjoy. I do admit, I was nervous that there would be lots of nods towards J. K. Rowling’s wizarding world of Harry Potter or other familiar tasting aspects of magical realism, but I was pleased to find very few. The only notable nod being that non-magical people are called ‘mundanes’ (or HOLA? ‘Humans of Limited Ability’), a tenuous but notable similarity to Rowling’s ‘Muggles’ (or mud-bloods). Unlike Rowling’s witches and wizards, all of Dawson’s magical-folk have particular abilities/powers and these can be measured by a level system (that I won’t pretend I followed accurately), with an insistence that witches have more power, strength, and control over their given powers than any warlock could possibly have. Esther Jackman didn’t pretend to understand the life-style, as she called it, but always asked after their respective covens. Whilst there are few allusions to contemporary magical-fiction, there was lots of historical context (some true and worth acknowledging, and some fabricated but also worth acknowledging). Dawson freckles her work with fragments of interesting historical snippets, about the world and witchcraft, concepts of Gaia, and a variety of religious beliefs/practices which mix into a tasty cocktail of what ‘witch-craft’ means in the world of HMRC. Both history and future are fictions. Only the present is real. Remember that. Whilst there are good and bad magical practices occurring within the narrative, from summoning demons, to necromancy, to helping ease the passing of dying animals – I will let you judge for yourself which you find good or bad-, the general reason for those possessing witchy-powers having been ‘given’ power in the first place, is to protect and watch over the Earth (Gaia). Much like modern Paganism (Wicca) may have been inspired by ancient belief structures and concepts regarding taking care of the earth, Dawson’s witches feel protecting over the earth, and feel power in it. And in this they can draw strength from nature and the natural world. Night is thickest between two and three in the morning. Dawn is hours away and no one has any honest business being awake. Helena banked on it. Naked and barefoot, she strode into the pasture. The sky was overcast with thin cloud and the waxing moon was oddly lilac. One of the most powerful aspects of Dawson’s work concerns the incredible identity journeys that take place within the story. Dawson delicately and beautifully deconstructs social constructs of gender and identity, by using magical identities (witches and warlocks) and the expectations that these types of identities carry. Whilst the narrative takes place within magical social constructs and hierarchies, very real social issues are confronted and challenged, such as Racism, Transphobia, and Homophobia, as well as exploring a plethora of problematic treatment of peoples and inclusion issues. As if being a teenager wasn’t hard enough, Dawson’s characters have got to contend with hormones, new magical powers, as well as the old coven ‘traditions,’ which were constructed before any of the feminism movements began. Those who breach constructed social boundaries in the novel are treated as more than ‘Other’ and rejected, by some of the characters, and embraced whole heartedly by others. Interestingly, Dawson chose for the High Priestess (Helen Vance) to embody all the problematic leftover attitudes of our darker ages, and she is eventually overthrown. A beautiful triumph for all the HMRC witches. ‘Helena Vance is a TERF. Why are people so fucking disappointing’ Dawson’s novel is a triumph. After a mixed-bag of a year in regards to magical realism, from the incomparable novel ‘The Atlas Six,’ by Olivie Blake, to other less successful magical novels that I will not title, I was uncertain as to what to expect for Her Majesty’s Royal Coven. I am delighted to admit that I was anything but disappointed, I did not realise this was the first novel of three until I had finished reading this one, and I was thrilled to learn another was coming. This novel stressed me out, made my heart thump, and my blood boil. However, this novel also made me smile, laugh, and engendered lots of tears (which means it packed an emotion punch). Juno Dawson, you have put a spell on me, bring on: HMRC: The Shadow Cabinet The post HER MAJESTY’S ROYAL COVEN by Juno Dawson (BOOK REVIEW) appeared first on The Fantasy Hive. View the full article

Bullet Train, directed by David Leitch and adapted by Zak Olkewicz from Kōtarō Isaka’s novel of the same name, promises a perfectly-contained, hurtling premise: a handful of assassins with vague ties to one another all find themselves, seemingly randomly, executing conflicting missions on a speed train bound for Kyoto. Even without knowing anything else about it, that should be enough to make you buckle up. Brad Pitt plays “Ladybug” (a nickname given to him by his witty handler, whom he talks to via earpiece). He is a cheerful but unlucky small-time operative sent to the bullet train to steal a suitcase from the baggage area. Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Brian Tyree Henry are “Tangerine” and “Lemon” (respectively), two Cockney contractors known as “the Twins” who are in charge of guarding the briefcase, as well as delivering the delinquent son of a crime boss (a face-tattooed Logan Lerman) back to his father. Joey King is “the Prince,” a stuck-up teenager with her own plan to grab the case, and Andrew Koji is Kimura, also known as “the Father,” a man lured onto the bullet train to become a patsy in a plot to assassinate the very crime boss coming to claim his rescued son. (Kimura is called “the Father” because he is tricked into boarding the train to avenge an attack on his own son. If you’re starting to see double, don’t worry—you’re supposed to, and this won’t be the last time.) Of course, there are more players in this game scattered among the train cars, waiting on station platforms, and phoning into the action—and as the high-speed rail shoots along, shuffling passengers in and out, pushing the various agents into each other’s stories more and more, the whole thing turns its parallel stories into an impressively intricate and yet surprisingly streamlined chain of redemptions that, like train tracks, all merge into one, sooner or later. In other words, even those who do start out simply as strangers on a train won’t stay that way for long. I’ve been riding the high of Bullet Train for a few days now; when enough time passed after my initial viewing and I was able to think of other matters again, I went and saw it a second time and found myself transported once more. It is a gleefully breakneck romp—“pure cinema!,” I exclaimed to far too many friends and family members on the phone afterwards. It’s an enthusiastic contribution to that category of high-octane, ensemble action movies that concentrate on the collision of various interests—it’s a bit like Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels, a bit like The Hateful Eight, even a bit like The Usual Suspects. Bullet Train is also clearly, squarely a comedy—and I’ll admit that its trailers, which advertise that kind of Deadpool-esque crassness and glibness famously trod in by director Leitch, made me a bit nervous that Bullet Train ’s comic stylings existed simply for irreverence’s sake, for the chaotic fun of combining social thoughtlessness with displays of physical competence and corporeal mastery. But Bullet Train is nothing if not thoughtful, even when it jokes and especially when it doesn’t. It boasts surprising organization not only on a narrative level, but also on a thematic one. The film is laced up with dueling themes of “luck” and “fate,” and perhaps the greatest of all the film’s showdowns is the one between these two concepts in its characters’ minds. (Though, perhaps, like everything else in Bullet Train, these two disparate strains will wind up leading to the same terminal, too.) The players in Bullet Train are obsessed with making their own choices, taking control of their lives, and acting with free will all while acting as puppets for the other characters and in the shapes that their life experiences have cut out for them (and therefore also the machinations of a greater providence, perhaps). As such, the movie has a lot to say about coincidences, close shaves, and deus ex machinas. Bullet Train also has a warm emotional center, fueled mostly by the loving collaboration between the hitmen Tangerine and Lemon. Taylor-Johnson and Tyree Henry have a brotherly chemistry—the kind that would be perfectly suited to a sitcom about nearly-incompatible roommates—and also supply the film with a unique moral order based on one of the greatest ensemble-driven texts of all time, Thomas the Tank Engine (talk about conflicting personalities showing up at the same station!). There are rules upon rules in Bullet Train ; even when it seems like the whole thing might easily fly off the rails, it barrels neatly through numerous philosophical platforms, even ones you might never expect. And it’s hard not to root for the somewhat-hapless Ladybug, even when his interests butt up against Tangerine and Lemon’s. It’s been said by many that Brad Pitt is a character actor cursed by leading man looks that prevented him from having the career he was meant to. Fortunately for us, he’s been playing his fair share of quirky side characters since at least 2008 (looking at you, Chad Feldheimer… and also you, Lt. Aldo Raine). There’s a lot to observe as you zoom along, but don’t sleep on the visuals. Each train car is its own colorful little capsule of a set—each with its distinct lighting and wallpapers and upholstery. Each car glows as if it was filmed through a designated section of a church window or a unique piece of sea glass; the whole train is a rainbow of connected bottles, with its shadowy characters trapped inside, with nowhere to go but back-and-forth. Bullet Train packs a lot into its outing, but not at the expense of coherence and capability. Its locomotion is steady, despite its twists and turns. I’ve seen it twice and I expect there are still many more nuances left to catch, many more thrills left to experience. As they say, the point is the journey, not the destination, and the journey of Bullet Train is not only worth a ticket, but also at least a return trip. View the full article

2022 has been a banner year for true crime and critical nonfiction, and it was difficult to narrow it down to just the top 10 —and that’s just so far! August in particular has been a great month for new true crime, and you’ll see the month overrepresented in the following selections, but I promise that isn’t recency bias—it’s just a really great month for true crime. The selections on the list below run the gamut for the true crime genre, including an impassioned take-down of junk science, an erudite history of jazz and the underworld, a deeply empathetic examining of a sensational true crime case, a riveting account of a bizarre historical crime, ethnographic encounters with the NYC sex industry, a clear-eyed reckoning with Southern history, a queer history of a women’s prison, a timely investigation of a shocking historical courtroom drama, and a South American-set tale of intergenerational trauma. Keep an eye out towards the end of December for our Best True Crime of the year and Best Critical/Biographical Crime of the year. M. Chris Fabricant, Junk Science and the American Criminal Justice System (Akashic) Much of the so-called “forensic pathology” developed and professionalized in the 20th century has now been discredited, and DNA has emerged in the 21st century as the only scientifically tested and proven method for forensics-based conviction. M. Chris Fabricant’s ground-breaking new work is here to explain (and explain well) what happened, where we went wrong, and how many have paid the price of junk science convictions. Fabricant’s long involved with the Innocence Project lends his book credence and weight, as he details overturned convictions, shoddy research, and the vast egos that underpinned some of the worst work in the history of criminal (in)justice. –Molly Odintz, CrimeReads senior editor T. J. English, Dangerous Rhythms: Jazz and the Underworld (William Morrow) T.J. English’s newest slice of American noir culture is a sweeping history of the long, entangled tradition of jazz and organized crime, from the early days of Storyville, with Black performers and Sicilian club owners operating a complicated network of protection, endorsement, exploitation, and wild, creative invention. In cities across America, jazz musicians often found their homes in connected clubs and performing venues. Some believed it was to their benefit, but as the century rolled on, divisions within the arts community began to spread, as some musicians no longer wanted to play along for the mobsters who had a taste of their careers and profits. So in the end, the story becomes a distinctly American one, of course: of racial inequality, economic injustice, and the immortal art form that sprang from this hotbed of corruption and striving. –Dwyer Murphy, CrimeReads editor-in-chief Kathleen Hale, Slenderman: Online Obsession, Mental Illness, and the Violent Crime of Two Midwestern Girls (Grove Press) Kathleen Hale initially wrote about the Slenderman case for Hazlitt, an article that still stands out from the general sensationalist coverage of the case for its enormous empathy for all involved. When two middle schoolers stabbed another middle schooler in the woods in 2012, they claimed to do it on behalf of a mysterious figure known as Slenderman. Hysterical parenting sites spread a moral panic about CreepyPasta, the website where stories of Slenderman originated and then became memes, but undiagnosed schizophrenia, midwestern stoicism, and intense friendship dynamics are much more to blame for the attack, as Kathleen Hale illustrates in both the original article and now a full-length title. –MO Susan Jonusas, Hell’s Half-Acre: The Untold Story of the Benders, America’s First Serial Killer Family (Viking) The story of the “Blood Benders”—the homesteading family in 1870s Kansas believed to have perpetrated one of the most grisly slaughters of the 19th century—is well known, or at least we think we know it. That’s where Jonusas’ illuminating new study comes in. The family itself remains something of an enigma, as they escaped the mobs descending on them looking for justice, but Jonusas finds, in their escape, a bigger story that depicts the country at an auspicious moment, as the frontier was beginning to close and new industries and attitudes were pushing their way across the nation. Jonusas’ dogged archival work reveals new truths that cut through the legend—in particular, she traces the Benders’ fugitive journey and appears to have solved a great portion of the mystery surrounding their escape. She also brings to life the marshals and other detectives on their trail, as well as the families left behind to grieve the victims. In all, it’s a masterful portrait of a nation revealing itself through one of its most atrocious crimes. –DM Terry Williams, The Soft City: Sex for Business and Pleasure in New York City (Columbia University Press) Before the Disneyfication of Times Square, before luxury high-rises took over the meatpacking district, before the sex trade vanished from the corners and went indoors to secret semi-public spaces, before porn migrated from the theater to the internet, New School ethnography professor Terry Williams and his students roamed the streets of New York City doing fieldwork and having encounters with the denizens of the so-called “Soft City”—a place defined by activities and encounters, not marked or mapped geography, “an invisible part of the city by day and a lively, excitingly risqué section by night.” In this idiosyncratic exploration of the city and its sexual underground, Terry Williams alternates between academic inquiry and the fieldwork of himself and his students for a fascinating and thought-provoking new work. –MO Beverly Lowry, Deer Creek Drive: A Reckoning of Memory and Murder in the Mississippi Delta (Knopf) In Beverly Lowry’s hometown, when she was a small child just beginning to learn the horrific history of the American South, an elderly white woman known for being hateful was murdered with great violence. Her daughter tried to blame the crime on a Black man, but was instead put on trial herself—he attack was too brutal and lengthy for the townsfolk to ascribe such violence to the vulnerable Black community; what’s more, the daughter was suspected of a too-close relationship with a schoolteacher and this, combined with her mannish courtroom outfits, signaled her to be a gender rebel and thus a probable murderess. The daughter found herself convicted, but unending support from her loving husband (the contra-indicator for her suspected lesbianism) and the class differences between this upper-class wife and mother and her lower-class prisonmates eventually convinced the governor to secure her release back into the community that had so rejected her during the trial. –MO Hugh Ryan, The Women’s House of Detention: A Queer History of a Forgotten Prison (Bold Type Books) For over a century, a prison stood at the heart of Greenwich Village; in the 20th century, now a women’s prison, the Women’s House of Detention incarcerated, educated and radicalized queer women from every walk of life and provided a space to challenge sexual binaries and gender norms, even as conditions inside the prison continuously deteriorated. Women and transmasc/gender-non-conforming people rioted in solidarity with the Stonewall Uprisings, which they could see from their windows. Queer denizens of the village waited in the dime store across the street from the prison to witness the comings and goings of their friends, allies, and neighbors. Wealthy bohemians went slumming at the women’s night court, desperate for the drama of human passions to interrupt their lives. And political prisoners were forced to examine their own prejudices towards queer women upon witnessing the many forms of family defining life behind bars. –MO Sarah Weinman, Scoundrel: How a Convicted Murderer Persuaded the Women Who Loved Him, the Conservative Establishment, and the Courts to Set Him Free (Ecco) How could this have happened? That’s the question at the heart of Weinman’s latest incisive study of crime and culture. This time she’s looking at the long, strange, post-conviction life and crimes of Edgar Smith, who was on death row following a conviction for the murder of Victoria Zielinski, and from there managed to strike up a correspondence with William F. Buckley, of all people. The relationship grew to much more than a correspondence, as Smith ultimately convinced Buckley and others to become his champion. Soon enough, he had his freedom and the appearances and book deals came rolling in, until he attempted another murder, upending the lives of those who had supported him and countless others along the way. It’s one of the more bizarre sequences in modern American history, and brutally revealing of Buckley’s neoconservative narcissism and weakness to flattery. But he was just one along the way: Weinman’s book is a study in how person after person can be brought under a killer’s influence, and just how much damage a true psychopath can due with all that credulity. –DM Javier Sinay, The Murders of Moisés Ville: The Rise and Fall of the Jerusalem of South America Translated by Robert Croll (Restless Books) The Argentine investigative journalist Javier Sinay, in his new book, The Murders of Moisés Ville, brings his professional craft to bear on an intensely personal story: of the Jewish settlement of Argentina’s agricultural lands, and of the atrocities the new immigrants suffered there. For Sinay, the story begins with the discovery of a 1947 article written by his great-grandfather, addressing the murder of twenty-two settlers. The reader is then taken along for the investigation as Sinay discovers his great-grandfather’s central place in the era’s Yiddish-speaking community of Argentina. Sinay is soon learning Yiddish himself to better relay the stories of people who fled czarist Russia in search of a new life in the “Jerusalem of South America,” only to find new dangers and oppressors waiting for them. Starvation, land inequality, and bands of violent gauchos were just some of what the community faced, and their stories were passed down through family lore and through the country’s Yiddish press. Sinay’s new book is at once a compelling piece of journalism born of archival research and interviewing, and also a meditation on cultural legacies and inter-generational trauma. –DM Erin Kimmerle, We Carry Their Bones: The Search for Justice at the Dozier School for Boys (William Morrow) This book is intense, moving, and highly necessary. Erin Kimmerle, a forensic archeologist, tells the story of the Dozier School for Boys (chronicled in telling prose by Colson Whitehead’s The Nickel Boys) and the survivors’ quest to inter and rebury with dignity the many victims of the school’s brutality. –MO Notables: Erika Krause, Tell Me Everything: The Story of a Private Investigation (Flatiron) · Martin Edwards, The Life of Crime: Detecting the History of Mysteries and their Creators (HarperCollins) · Jarrett Kobek, Motor Spirit: The Long Hunt for the Zodiac (We Heard You Like Books) · Patrick Strickland, The Marauders: Standing Up to Vigilantes in the American Borderlands (Melville House) · Rachel Rear, Catch The Sparrow: A Search for a Sister and the Truth of Her Murder (Bloomsbury) · Neal Bradbury, A Taste for Poison: Eleven Deadly Molecules and the Killers Who Used Them (St. Martin’s) · Paul Fischer, The Man Who Invented Motion Pictures: A True Story of Obsession, Murder, and the Movies (Simon & Schuster) · Patrick Radden Keefe, Rogues: True Stories of Grifters, Killers, Rebels and Crooks (Doubleday) · Fabián Escalante, 634 To Kill Fidel (Seven Stories Press) · John Wood Sweet, The Sewing Girl’s Tale: A Story of Crime and Consequences in Revolutionary America (Henry Holt) · Kathryn Miles, Trailed: One Woman’s Quest to Solve the Shenandoah Murders (Algonquin Books) · Chas Smith, Blessed are the Bank Robbers: The True Adventures of an Evangelical Outlaw (Abrams) · Carla Valentine, The Science of Murder: The Forensics of Agatha Christie (Sourcebooks) · Martin Sixsmith, The War of Nerves: Inside the Cold War Mind (Pegasus Books) · Jefferson Morley, Scorpions’ Dance: The President, the Spymaster, and Watergate (St. Martin’s) · Huw Lemmy and Ben Miller, Bad Gays: A Homosexual History (Verso) · Jim Cosgrove, Ripple: A Long Strange Search for a Killer (Steerforth Press) · John Gleeson, The Gotti Wars: Taking Down America’s Most Notorious Mobster (Scribner) · Eden Collinsworth, What the Ermine Saw: The Extraordinary Journey of Leonardo Da Vinci’s Most Mysterious Portrait (Doubleday) · James T. Bartlett, The Alaskan Blonde (Territory Books) · Nancy Dougherty, The Hangman and His Wife: The Life and Death of Reinhard Heydrich (Knopf) · Howard Blum, The Spy Who Knew Too Much: An Ex-CIA Officer’s Quest Through a Legacy of Betrayal (Harper) · Leslie McFarlane, Ghost of the Hardy Boys (David R. Godine) · Keith Thompson, Born to Be Hanged: The Epic Story of the Gentlemen Pirates Who Raided the South Seas, Rescued a Princess, and Stole a Fortune (Little Brown) · Benjamin Gilmer, The Other Dr. Gilmer: Two Men, a Murder, and an Unlikely Fight for Justice (Ballantine) · Brian Hochman, The Listeners: A History of Wiretapping in the United States (Harvard) · Mark Arsenault, The Impostor’s War: The Press, Propaganda, and the Newsman Who Battled for the Minds of America (Pegasus) View the full article

On September 5th, 1965, the Courier of Waterloo, Iowa ran an article concerning the scourge of juvenile delinquency. The juvenile caseload was “small but involved,” the headline read, presided over by a judge who “can’t reach youngsters.” 20 juvenile cases had been tried in the neighboring city of Cedar Falls across the past nine months, and though this number fell well below the number of adult cases that made their way through the courts, these situations were far more complex. In some cases, so-called delinquents appeared before the judge not because they’d broken the law but rather at “the request of parents who find their children ungovernable.” “They are the ‘shook-up generation,’” John Dos Passos wrote in his 1958 ode to juvenile delinquency, ‘The Sinister Adolescents.’ “Demonic, but lovable under it all.” Coincidentally, the September Sunday that saw the Courier publish its story also provides the setting for the conclusion of Sam Shakusky (Jared Gilman) and Suzy Bishop’s (Kara Hayward) dead-end exodus from New Penzance island, the primary location for Wes Anderson’s 2012 film Moonrise Kingdom. Sam and Suzy are themselves budding juvenile delinquents—or, very troubled children, to paraphrase the title of the handbook Suzy finds stashed atop her family’s fridge. These two pint-sized rebels have not just run away from home, they’ve assaulted two of their peers in the process (Suzy stabbing one in the back with a pair of lefty scissors, Sam shooting another in both arms with an air rifle), becoming bona fide fugitives. And the potential consequences for these and their other transgressions are dire—by September 5th, 1965, the last of the story’s three fraught days, the orphaned Sam is the target of Social Services (as embodied by an officious Tilda Swinton), who surmises that he’s a likely candidate for institutionalization, and even electroshock therapy. Sam has been given up on—though he believed himself to finally be part of a family, he’s recently learned that his foster parents have banished him from their home for ungovernable behavior. Suzy’s parents are trying not to give up on her, too—“Why is everything so hard for you?” her mother (Frances McDormand) asks in reference to what we’ve seen as a withdrawn lifestyle punctuated with verbal and physical assaults. Neither child relishes their emotionally turbulent life; Sam admits with stoic chagrin that he understands why people “do not like [his] personality,” while Suzy despairs over her inescapable tendency to “go berserk.” Anderson does not soft-pedal the children’s misdeeds—be it Suzy’s schoolroom brawling or Sam’s potentially narcoleptic pyromania—but nor does he condemn anyone in this spiritually generous film. It’s just that neither Sam nor Suzy is able to effectively communicate with the adults charged with caring for them—or, to place blame where it’s perhaps more appropriate, none of their emotionally remote caregivers have worked hard enough to communicate with them. And so the only alternative these two would-be delinquents can fathom is to secret themselves on a deserted New Penzance inlet, a hideaway where they can playact at adulthood, rushing headlong towards a future in which their choices might be their own. As Anderson discussed with Matt Zoller Seitz in the 2013 book The Wes Anderson Collection, Sam and Suzy’s seaside idyll bears strong resemblance to Terrence Malick’s 1973 debut film, Badlands, the story of two juvenile delinquents who take to the woods as refuge from a world they can’t fit into. Like Sam and Suzy, Kit (Martin Sheen) and Holly (Sissy Spacek) flee home to pitch camp, fish, and dance awkwardly to the pop music of the day. But by virtue of their advanced ages (Kit is 25, and Holly 15) they represent a sort of worst-case scenario for the future Sam and/or Suzy might find themselves in. For lack of proper guidance, Kit has grown into a psychotic killer—their escape into the forest is preceded by Kit’s murder of Holly’s father (Warren Oates), and his body count will skyrocket in the weeks ahead—but there’s something eerily naive and borderline wistful to these misbegotten souls playing house. “Badlands is a story of lost children at large in a moral vacuum,” filmmaker Michael Almereyda writes in the essay accompanying the film’s Criterion Collection release, and the same might be said of life on New Penzance, a place that is, if not a vacuum, then at least a whirlpool of moral disorientation, as embodied by Suzy’s unfaithful mother, and emotional bewilderment, as embodied by Scout Master Ward (Edward Norton), who finds his previously certain worldview stymied by the story’s events. The Badlands Criterion release comes packaged with an episode of the TV program American Justice detailing the case of Charles Starkweather and Caril Ann Fugate, the real-life fugitive lovers who inspired Badlands and so, by extension, share DNA with Moonrise Kingdom. Starkweather’s killing spree—which claimed eleven lives across Nebraska and Wyoming in late 1957 and early 1958—became something of a flashpoint in the American psyche. The nation was on edge as some among the emergent demographic of teenagers (the modern American conception of adolescence having functionally not existed prior to the economic and industrial boom of the ‘50s) took their newfound cultural cachet as permission for acts of criminality. “Something has gone wrong,” journalist Benjamin Fine wrote in his 1955 treatise 1,000,000 Delinquents. “Boys from eight to eleven years old, already turning towards delinquency, already filled with hatred and spite against a society that censures, but does not help, them.” This anxiety found purchase and personification in Starkweather and Fugate, two heartland kids who emblematized the potential for terror to emerge in the last place anyone might expect, and so represented a clear and present threat to the postwar domestic dream. Starkweather and Fugate established a new archetype in American narrative, two lovers on the run whose legend may have drafted off earlier cases like Bonnie and Clyde, but who replaced bank robbery with seeming nihilism. It’s this existential hollowness that Malick infused into his cinematic interpretation of the case—released at a remove of 15 years—and soon enough, Badlands would come to form its own kind of foundation for other stories, including True Romance (an overt pastiche that borrows Malick’s musical motif), and its sibling film, Natural Born Killers. But if these films interpret Starkweather, they serve as a refracted interpretation of an even earlier American legend: James Dean. Starkweather modeled his personal style and affect on Dean, specifically the star (then just over two years dead) as seen in Rebel Without a Cause. His sister would later recall the soon-to-be killer practicing Dean’s postures in the mirror—“Charlie almost felt that they were brothers,” Michael Newman wrote in his 1998 book, Waste Land: The Savage Odyssey of Charles Starkweather and Caril Ann Fugate, “with a kind of psychic bond that reached beyond the grave.” It’s a comparison that Malick adopted for Badlands; “I’ll kiss your ass if he don’t look like James Dean,” one arresting officer marvels to another as they drive Kit away from the scene of his final crime. The resemblance isn’t merely—or even primarily—surface level. Kit embodies something about the collective unconscious spirit of Dean, one among a generation of “lost cats in love with themselves,” Dos Passos wrote in ‘The Sinister Adolescents,’ who “look at themselves and see James Dean; the resentful hair, the deep eyes floating in lonesomeness, the bitter beat look, the scorn on the lip.” In The Wes Anderson Collection, the director notes a resemblance between Moonrise Kingdom and Rebel Without a Cause, another story of alienated young people who carve out a secretive ersatz home for themselves, living a fantasy of peace and happiness on borrowed time. Jim (Dean), Judy (Natalie Wood), and Plato (Sal Mineo) are three more wounded children who feel abandoned by the world and its governing generation, and that confusion leads them to an endpoint of violent disillusionment. This was the iconography that took root in Dos Passos’ “shook-up generation.” As one tribute to Dean, published in the Daily Tar Heel of Chapel Hill, North Carolina just over a month after his death, read, “All those parents who don’t understand their teenage children had better start understanding them right quick or all juvenile hell is likely to break loose.” And break loose it did with Starkweather, who traced his own dysfunctions as far back as kindergarten. Recalling being mocked by classmates and chastised by teachers, he “builded up a hate that was as hard as iron,” he wrote from prison, breeding a desire for “revenge upon the world and its human race.” Though he acknowledged that this “wasn’t much of an excuse” for what he’d done, it’s meaningful that he was radicalized at such a young age. The child, as Wordsworth wrote, is father to the man, and nurturing a budding adult is a daily and essential responsibility. The future that Sam and Suzy have already begun carving out for themselves is of vital consequence, and the solution comes at the level of individual compassion rather than at the hand of Social Services, that single person who stands as synecdoche for an entire faceless and brutal institution. By 1965, a decade after the publication of 1,000,000 Delinquents, there was a clear sense of exhaustion in coverage of the juvenile delinquency problem. The judge in Cedar Falls, Iowa was cited as having said that lecturing juvenile delinquents “gives him a great feeling of righteousness, but it does very little if anything for the juvenile.” So what recourse might be available to prevent very troubled children from developing into sinister adolescents? Wes Anderson offers a fairly clear prescription, one that emerges less through narrative than through musical motif. Anderson bookends the film with selections from Benjamin Britten’s “The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra.” In this 1961 recording, a child narrates Britten’s 1945 educational composition, which uses a theme by 17th century composer Henry Purcell to illustrate what each instrument in an orchestra can contribute to the whole. Each instrument takes its turn playing in isolation as Anderson’s camera tracks each member of the Bishop family’s domestic detachment—parents and children silently coexisting, a spirit of ennui infusing the home. By the ending, however, once Sam has accepted the offer of foster parenthood from local policeman Captain Sharp (Bruce Willis), preventing his separation from Suzy, Britten’s composition returns to reach its fruition: each previously solitary instrument is now joined in a complex harmony that achieves the theme’s full potential. The denizens of New Penzance have learned that living out their daily struggles in emotional solitude represents a thin and paltry life, and only by community union can anyone’s full potential be reached. The significance of Britten’s piece isn’t limited to this overt thematic resonance. “The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra” represented the composer’s staunch belief that children should be treated with dignity—why shouldn’t they be capable of understanding complex musicology, Britten implicitly asked, so long as they’re spoken to on their level? Their inner workings are as worthy of respect as any adult’s, and meeting them with warmth and wit is the best way to draw out their ideal capabilities.To quote another musician, and another artist inspired by Starkweather, Bruce Springsteen concluded his 1982 record Nebraska with the song ‘Reason to Believe.’ “Struck me kind of funny,” the Boss reflects at the conclusion of what amounts to a concept album spiritually adapting the Starkweather archetype (including a direct reference to the opening image of Badlands), “how at the end of every hard day, people find some reason to believe.” And that reason to believe, in Wes Anderson’s conception, is our own belief in one another, and the conviction that we’re each worthy of human sympathy, no matter how juvenile we may be. View the full article

My debut novel, The Awoken, is a different kind of science fiction in that it is actually about an absence of science. Despite the story being set a century into our future, most scientific and medical innovation has been halted, and in some cases even made illegal. The story is centered around a young woman who dies and then is brought back to life from cryogenic preservation a century later. The issue is, in this future world, it is illegal to be a resurrected person. The technology to resurrect humans from preservation has been discovered, but the science has been criminalized due to society’s fear of wielding such a Godlike power. The result is that the millions of people who are only alive because of this prohibited science are considered illegitimate and are to be killed on sight. It is an adventure-driven, high-stakes, quick-paced novel full of romance and plot twists as our girl fights against an authoritative government for the rights of resurrected people. However, like any good science fiction, at its core is a story that serves as an allegory for modern issues we face. Through writing this novel, I set out to examine the ethical debate of scientific advancement as well as the growing fears around suppressing access to medical procedures, something highly poignant in this post-Roe world we’ve found ourselves in. The central question being, should we ever make science a crime? We’re living in an era where science is moving at lightspeed. We are the ones holding it back, like an old cracking dam. In the middle of the 20th century, science was widely seen as a new and fun tool to make life easier for everyone. Even President Ronald Reagan—and who doesn’t love that guy—signed a bill that prohibited the regulation of scientific research. Today, we’re moving further and further away from that ideal. In the last two decades, popular opinion on science has wavered, with one VCU study showing a majority of people believe that “scientific research these days doesn’t pay enough attention to the moral values of society.” With that shift has come more restrictions on science, along with less access to potentially lifesaving medical procedures. We’ve known how to clone humans for a quarter of a century, so why haven’t we? Sure, maybe the ethics around a colony of narcissism-induced clones is debatable, but at the very least using cloning technology to allow for perfect organ replacements or to personalize medicine in a way unmatched today would only save lives and prevent tragedy, right? Alas, in some cases, dabbling in cloning technology at all is considered so immoral, it’s impossible to be funded and in other cases, it’s downright illegal. Similarly, stem cell research was so reviled when it first was introduced to the world that its progress was set back decades. For The Awoken, I looked at the emerging field of cryogenic life extension science, which essentially means the ability to freeze yourself to be brought back when there is a cure for your disease or other necessary medical advancements. Currently, this science is on the cusp of some huge breakthroughs. Every year we see a trial that has successfully resurrected a more complicated mammal. Human resurrection can’t be too far off. How amazing, and utterly terrifying would that be, if we could essentially decide when, or if, we wanted to die? In my novel I constructed such a world and, following real world trends, imagined what would happen if we then rejected such an advancement. Whether cryogenics, or another kind of scientific advancement, the criminalization of science is a future that is all too plausible, and one that I’m terrified of, which is why I decided to write about it. After all, that’s what the genre of science fiction does best—address our greatest fears. I’ve been magnetically drawn to and devoured science fiction stories since I’ve been able to read. My main fascination is how a gripping, entertaining story set in a faraway world can so clearly reflect on our own lives, allowing us to see with a new perspective. Classic science fiction, from Frankenstein to 1984, has always reflected our current fears. Starting in in the late 19th century, as scientific discoveries boomed and the technology from those discoveries started working their way into households, a commonly examined fear was that humans would one day go too far with science, forgetting what it means to be human. Times change. Fears evolve. There’s an entire murder investigation driving the plot of Frankenstein, but never once do any of those police officers turn around to the good doctor and place him under arrest for daring to make such a monster. Frankenstein’s only reluctance in telling the truth about his creation is that people would label him mad, not criminal. By the end, he even goes to a judge and confesses: So, look, I made this human out of dead body parts and he’s really violent and you should do everything you can to stop him (paraphrased a bit). The judge couldn’t care less about Frankenstein’s unethical use of science as Mary Shelley was interested in other dilemmas. But I wonder, based on the ethical concerns we now face, if Mary were writing that novel today, would she make the same decision? After a hundred years of stories warning us of the unwieldy power that science promises mankind, we have returned to our medieval roots of criminalizing science itself—a modern day version of Galileo’s persecution. In The Awoken, I am no longer questioning if we can lose our humanity with scientific progression and access to medical innovations, but wondering if we actually lose our humanity in trying to curtail it. What happens when we make science a crime? Well, firstly, it tends to only be a crime for those who aren’t among the rich and powerful. The overturning of Roe will never prevent the daughter of a wealthy politician from getting a needed abortion. Criminalizing science tends to be about control, not ethics. There’s no black and white answer. Of course even the most well intentioned scientific research when placed in the wrong hands can have catastrophic ramifications. Very real risks have reset the 20th century assumption that science should be left to its own devices. How can we justify the study of biochemical engineering to save lives when it is turned around and also used for genocide and warfare? The fact that humans are capable of horrific evil proves that there is certainly a compelling argument for the regulation of scientific research, but most experts believe that the regulation of science should be left to the scientists, not politicians. I first started writing The Awoken years before the Supreme Court overturned Roe. In the novel, there’s an eerily similar Supreme Court case that is overturned, allowing for the condemnation of all resurrected people. I’m continually terrified how close the dystopian world that I dreamed up is becoming real. There probably is a line we can cross in the pursuit of progress in which we sacrifice the indescribable thing that makes us human. But I also think we need to consider that, in the pursuit of avoiding that line, we’ve already strangled out our humanity by forbidding progress that can save and improve lives. As it plays out in my book, once we set down the path of criminalizing science, it’s very hard to turn back, so it’s prudent to fully understand our actions before it’s too late. Through science fiction, we can safely explore these questions, envisioning such a future before ever having to live it. Because that is, and always has been, storytelling’s core purpose: to let us fully immerse ourselves in our fears through fiction so we can make more informed and empathetic choices in the real world. *** View the full article

Fire Island by Joel Kim Booster Jax Media A Not a Book When I saw the half-naked men in promos for gay rom-com Fire Island, I erroneously assumed it was a reality dating show. That placed Fire Island in my mental queue just after finishing Love is Blind Brazil. Meaning moderately high, but not at the top of my To Watch list. But then Sarah told me it was actually a reinterpretation of Pride and Prejudice about a group of friends who vacation stay with their lesbian house mom, played by Margaret Cho. I stopped what I was doing and watched it immediately. And I’m telling you to do the same because this movie is lighthearted fun, y’all. Let's go! Witty Noah (Joel Kim Booster) and nerdy Howie (Bowen Yang) have been best friends since they bonded over being the only Asian-American waiters at a boozy brunch spot in New York City. Years later, they still don’t have much money, but they have an annual tradition of spending a beach week on New York’s Fire Island with their best gay pals and fellow servers Max, Keegan, and Luke at a house owned by their Mrs Bennett-esque older friend (Margaret Cho). Noah has no trouble pulling one night stands all year long so he offers to help perpetually single Howie step up his game, and make this the first year he gets laid on Fire Island. They’ve only been on the island a hot minute when Howie meets Charlie, a gorgeous doctor with the personality of a golden retriever, who invites Howie to a posh party at his mansion, ahem, beach house. The whole gang tags along, ostensibly to help Howie land Charlie, although the Lydia and Kitty characters spend most of the evening downing free liquor and cheese while being as loud as possible. Charlie’s rich friends aren’t impressed, and Noah takes an instant dislike to uptight Will, played by How to Get Away with Murder’s snackable Conrad Ricamora. Cue banter, matchmaking, class collisions and drama! I was completely sucked in within ten minutes of this film. Will Charlie’s friends keep him and Howie apart? Is Will really as unfeeling as he seems? And how long will it take Noah to realize the hot guy who he’s flirting with is clearly a Wickham in disguise? Fire Island is possibly the funniest thing that I have watched all year. I kept having to pause because I was laughing too hard to be able to hear. For example, Noah describes the inanity of Charlie’s entourage by explaining that one of the partygoers thought that troll-like American Senator Lindsey Graham had starred in The Parent Trap. There’s some epic clubbing scenes, including one where Noah persuades Will to compete in a dance-off judged by a drag queen. Will’s awkward and playfully robotic moves made me laugh until I almost peed. Click if you love robots The arc of Pride and Prejudice translates well to this setting, and the movie hits many of the emotional beats of the original story. The Lydia and Wickham storyline is particularly pitch perfect. I adored flamboyant Keegan and himbo Luke as the Kitty and Lydia characters. They have an endearing quality that made me want to hug them, while keeping the key “you’re embarrassing me” energy. Click for totally sedate behavior I loved that Fire Island doesn’t lock itself into P&P’s structure, like when we get a resolution for the characters in the Lydia and Elizabeth roles and for their relationship, one that doesn’t happen in the original story. I was also happy to see Charlotte’s bittersweet storyline excised entirely. Austen movie fans will have fun with the many references, including a dramatic scene in the rain echoing Darcy’s declaration of love in the 2005 version. I adored how the movie handled Noah shutting down Will’s moment of vulnerability. Will tells Noah to get over himself, which I honestly think he needed to hear. The P&P references are just the cherry on top, however. Like Clueless, the movie is fabulous enough to transcend the book it’s based on. Along with being funny and fan service for Austenites, Fire Island has two sweet and satisfying love stories. We get drama and passion between Noah and Will—and I loved seeing Ricamora finally playing the leading man he was clearly meant to be after years of playing shy second fiddle on HTGAWM. Click for eye candy I wasn’t sure how the movie would handle Noah’s sex positivity in the context of falling for Will. At one point, he says “Monogamy was invented by straight people to make us less interesting.” Show Spoiler So when Noah and Will end up with the non-monogamy HEA of my dreams, I cheered. Meanwhile, Howie is the sweetest man on earth, so kind and easily bruised, and worn down by a dating scene that doesn’t appreciate his softness. I just wanted all the good things to happen to him. I would like to watch a sequel where Charlie and Howie buy a house in San Francisco and decorate it together. That’s it, the entire plot. There are so many other things I loved about Fire Island, like it’s smart skewering of gay dating culture’s “No fats, No fems, No Asians” ethos, and the class segregation that happens in queer social scenes. I thought it was brilliant to use “Time works differently on Fire Island” to explain how an entire relationship could develop in a week’s vacation. I loved the idea of a group of working class queers building family and traditions together. Click for cuteness I adored the secondary characters, and my main critique was that we don’t see much of Max, the only Black and only fat character in the movie. Max is based on dour Mary, who is my favorite of the Bennet sisters. Mary needs her own movie, and so does Max! There’s a great moment where Max accidentally gets high at a club and falls for his own reflection, but I wanted more. I would have loved to see a movie with so much sex do a deep dive on a buttoned up character like Mary. I also wanted more Margaret Cho, but that’s just because…she’s Margaret Cho. Who could get enough of that? She kills her scenes though, offering helpful advice like “Everybody should fuck on Fire Island…[which for Howie means] vanilla sex with the man of your dreams.” Is it sacreligious to say that Fire Island might topple Clueless from its perch as my favorite modern Austen interpretation? I don’t know, y’all. It was pretty damn fantastic, and blissfully free of borderline incest vibes. As a fan of the other gay beach spot, Provincetown, I have no idea how accurate Fire Island’s depiction is. Still, this movie made my belly hurt from laughing, hooked me with a love story I’m still thinking about, and gave me vacation vibes without ever making me leave my house. I highly recommend it. View the full article

By Fran Hawthorne For a number of plot-related reasons, my new novel I Meant to Tell You had to be set in and near Washington DC. But almost as soon as I began moving my characters around on the ground, I panicked. Where would one character take her daughter for fun? Where would a couple go on a date? In the last year before the pandemic, Destination DC (the district’s official tourism Website) reported more than 24 million visitors. How could I possibly make such a popular venue seem fresh and interesting? No matter where I placed my characters, scores of readers would either pick out inaccurate details, or just be bored. Then add to that list all the readers who have zero interest in politics. Assuming that my book must be a political thriller, they might well ignore it. (While my novel centers on a kidnapping, there are no conspiracies to kill the president, stage a coup, or even mastermind an election. Sorry.) I settled on three strategies to maintain readers’ attention: First, I asked friends who’ve lived in the area in recent years for suggestions about little-known spots where they might take out-of-towners – the kind you don’t find in most guidebooks. I was deluged with intriguing ideas. They ranged from the tiny (the weird Temperance Fountain, once called “the city’s ugliest statue,” which used to spout ice water for both people and horses from its intertwined dolphins) to the opulent (a tour of the Diplomatic Reception Rooms in the State Department, jam-packed with porcelain platters and silver tea sets, oil portraits and landscapes, upholstered sofas and mahogany desks…) Next, I asked those same friends about ordinary life. Do the buses stop running in a severe snowstorm? Where’s the up-and-coming bar scene? What types of ethnic restaurants were popular in the early 2000s? In what neighborhood would penny-counting newlyweds typically find an apartment? How about a middle-class family, or a yuppie couple? These are the details that make any setting come alive, famous or not. Finally, I decided to embrace some of the “tourist traps” and make them a part of the book. After all, how can you place a novel in Washington DC and ignore the Lincoln Memorial or the Smithsonian? Thus, for instance, two important characters “meet cute” at the display of the Wright Brothers’ Flyer at the National Air and Space Museum. In addition to providing a nice change from the usual Starbucks encounter, the location also offered insight into the two characters. A person who chooses to visit a historic airplane on her lunch break is very different from someone who spends that time working out in the gym. I don’t know if these unsung details will bring more tourists rushing to visit Washington DC. But I hope they will make non-DC readers feel a little bit like they’ve actually been there. * * * Fran Hawthorne has been writing novels since she was four years old, although she was sidetracked for a few decades by journalism. Her eight nonfiction books -- mainly about consumer activism, the drug industry, and the financial world -- include Ethical Chic (Beacon Press), named one of the best business books of 2012 by Library Journal, and Pension Dumping (Bloomberg Press), a Foreword magazine 2008 Book of the Year. She's also been an editor or regular contributor for The New York Times, Business Week, Fortune, and many other publications. But Fran never abandoned her true love: Her debut novel The Heirs was published in 2018, and now I Meant to Tell You will be published in November 2022 by Stephen F. Austin State University Press. Follow her on Twitter @hawthornewriter And Instagram @hawthornewriter Check out her Website. www.hawthornewriter.com ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Would you like to participate in Friday "Speak Out!"? Email your short posts (under 500 words) about women and writing to: marcia[at]wow-womenonwriting[dot]com for consideration. We look forward to hearing from you! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ (C) Copyright wow-womenonwriting.com Visit WOW! Women On Writing for lively interviews and how-tos. Check out WOW!'s Classroom and learn something new. Enter the Quarterly Writing Contests. Open Now![url={url}]View the full article[/url]