John R. Lindensmith

Bullete

2012-02-13T19:31:00.000-08:00

I have a gun

inside its chamber is a single bullet with your name on it engraved into golden steel

I’m supposed to deliver that bullet into your chest at midnight tonight

I was offered 50 Grand

I don’t plan on failing

Streets are smoky and dark

move down an alley

three thugs dealing smack they turn and look at me

black trench coat swishes open like a bat opening its wings

guns drawn out in both hands

cold fingers pulling even colder triggers

shells flying

doing ballet dances in the icy air

I am a killer

I feel nothing but adrenaline pounding pulsating in my ears

smack dealers dead on the ground lying in black puddles of water

sirens scream in the night

doing shit doing nothing about the scum on these streets

only I deal out righteousness in this god forsaken city

I am St. Anne the avenger angel of heaven

destroying the demented angels of hell

Sitting in a bar dull eyes studying you watching you

drinking with friends flirting hormones raging

preying on young girls defenseless and naïve like I

once was

let’s go back to my place sweetie

goddam pigs and their goddam sluts hanging on their arms like trophies

A gin and tonic please

bartender looks my way with suspicious eyes

slides the poison down the counter

I drink it

tastes like shit

I smoke a cigarette

tastes like shit

but everything tastes like shit until you dull your senses to it till you become numb

I feel nothing

You’re ruining me

I look your way

sitting at the big desk shoulders hunched over ceiling fan whirring softly above us humming babies to sleep in their cribs

I won’t do it, I say

I’m offering you 40 grand

your hand slaps down on the desk

40 fucking grand! To kill the prick

that’s a lot of goddam money, woman

Too risky, I say

Too risky, too fucking risky

nothing’s too risky when you have fifty fucking grand

your spittle is flying across the desk flecking the ancient oak

the light of your green lamp reflects coldly in your blue eyes old ancient eyes

I wonder about your childhood

how the hell did you become this monster lurking in the shadows

dealing out death instead of meth or even crack or cocaine or cheap dime bags to stupid youth

who know nothing about life

just the moment the pure pleasurable moment that soon sparks a hot ping of pain

into the groin into the chest into the heart

50 grand

that’s my last offer

why must he die?

This you do not need to know,

only that he must

I’ll do it

I guess

I have nothing else

you walk in

tall blonde

you look as beautiful as the day you left me

I hear you’re killing people now

tender lips spilling vile words

Yeah I am what of it?

Why are you doing this, Anne?

I stare at you into your dazzling blue eyes specks dancing twinkling in the moonlight

None of your goddam business

I know how painful it must have been when I left you

I pour myself a glass of Jack throw it back just stare at you into those deceitful eyes

You have no idea

I’m sorry things had to be this way

Really?

Are you?

Why are you here?

I’ve heard things while lurking on the walls of shadowy night clubs as a fly

there are people out there who want to kill you

I laugh

I nod

I drink

There are always people out there who want to kill me

I am, after all, a killer

killers have killers who want to kill them in return

What are you doing this evening, Anne?

I am going to the ballet

it’s much like my own work so beautifully planned performed each move precise

but what I do is not ballet not quite so elegant

my line of work involves cold slugs of death

bullete shall we say?

Fountains of blood pouring out of chests

hands groping for the heavens hoping for redemption but finding none

You’re so silly, you say

Am I?

I’m sorry I left especially in such a mess but they were after me don’t you know?

And now they’re after you

So let them come, I say

let them come and find me let them kill me I have nothing to live for

nothing to die for either

let them kill me see if I fucking care

you smile

lips stretched across that rugged face

you haven’t changed a bit, you say

watching the ballet

moves precise dancers elegant

there is a smile on your face

eyes sparkling with each prance each twirl of the skirt each tip toe across the stage

a boulder of a man stares through the darkness

eyes bleeding through smoke

cigar in his right hand

giant rock on his finger

he waves to me

I wave back

excuse myself to the bathroom

pamphlet folded into my pocket

crushed velvet gown against my chest

smell of flowers in musty air

among the chairs among the billowing red curtains that hang on the stage like an opened vulva among the smiles and dark studious eyes among the prancing dancers in their tight outfits

sweat dripping from their precise fine work reeking with art beauty passion intelligence

he catches you in his hands holding your thick sturdy thighs above his head

staring into your womanhood

feeling pleasure and beauty and ecstasy and the cold calmness of rain against the skin

the tingle of adrenaline the glow of passion

I meet you near a glowing green EXIT

you haven’t been around lately, fat man

you’re smoking a cigar

beady brown eyes twitching

face incased in fat

top hat on your head

rim wet with sweat

lapel on your chest

hello Bernard

Hey Anne, haven’t seen you ‘round lately

Haven’t seen you either Bernard you’re usually at the Gentlemen’s Club getting a lap dance from that bitch that looks like a hyena

Yeah uh huh I know but I’m in a bit of a pickle

What is it now Berny?

You owe money?

You high?

You smokin’ the rocks again?

You drunk on the sauce?

I warned you about all that cheap wine you keeping buying from that shithole liquor store, Bernie ol’ pal

I killed somebody, Anne

We’ve all killed somebody who in this god forsaken city hasn’t?

I killed the wrong fucking person

Who?

I killed his daughter

What the fuck are you talking about Bernie?

I killed the Boss man’s daughter I fucked her I fucked her and then I killed her

I stare at you

silence envelopes us

we are sent first class into a void

How the fuck did this happen?

I don’t know

You’re fucked

I know

Why?

Why

why

She looked lonely in that tight red number spaghetti straps hem of skirt right above her knees and I was lonely

haven’t had any in years, Anne

years and years and years and she looked so elegant

soft brown hair framing her face

cleavage spilling out of the top of that dress

those soft knees

and long brown legs

I felt up between her thighs and I kissed those candy apple lips and I couldn’t control myself, Anne

I fucked her and then I killed her

Why the fuck did you kill her?

I thought she’d tell

Men all the same

Fuck now kill now think later oops too late

Now she’s dead, goddammit

now you’re dead

if the Boss finds out

He won’t find out

How the fuck do you know?

I don’t know

How did you kill her?

I beat her with a tire iron, Annie

Don’t call me that

I beat her to death with a goddam tire iron I put her in my trunk I pushed the car into the ocean off the docks near Sunset Boulevard

I swallow

watch the dancers dance so graceful so beautiful I wonder if you are wondering where I am

I see you turn your pretty blonde head looking back searching with icy blue eyes searching for me

I turn to you fat piggish monster fat monster who beat a fifteen year old girl with a goddam tire iron

fat monster who fucked an innocent girl

the delicate flower the angel of our Boss the Boss who runs this shithole town

controls the media the politicians the cops the ground you fucking walk on

every blade of grass that is misplaced in the breeze

I watch

the dancers so eloquent moving among the red curtains, the gaping vulva

across the stage beautiful and graceful

deers in a field

birds flying in flocks

ducklings following their mother

I almost forget

almost

Bernie, you need to get out of town

rain pouring down you get in the cab

I tell you to get as far away as possible you look at me with scared eyes

the rain drops are biting my skin

icy termites

it won’t be long, Annie

won’t be long till they find me

get out of the country

They’ll find me on the plane they’ll put a bomb on the plane they’ll poison my food they’ll shoot me while I’m waiting for my flight they’ll get me one way or another when I least expect it

I’ll be sittin’ near Great Ben and a man with funny teeth and a horrid British accent will fucking stab me

right there

while I’m eatin’ fish and chips and reading the London Times and he’ll say

“eh, you that bloody bloke dat killed da Boss man’s daughta!”

They’ll get me, Annie

one way or the other

I stare at you don’t know what to say

Are you worried curious scared wondering where I am

why I’ve left the ballet

left you alone in the stuffy theatre with stuffy theatre types adjusting their monocles tucking their nose-blows in their breast pockets clapping like fruits

fingers in palms

good show

clutching the hand of their trophy wives in their satin dresses

hair in a hive but no buzzing

just nothing

empty heads full of stuffy air

and you put a hand through your soft blonde hair tucking it behind that delicate white ear shaped like a beautiful soft shell

You’ll be just fine

Annie, I’m scared

You’ll be just fine, Bernie

you’re always just fine

You give me one last horrid look

beady eyes sunk in fat

fat hands quivering

in the cold breath of this starless night

the cab pulls away

last thing I see is your top hat reflected in the back window under dim street lamps before the cab blows up

ignites in a fire ball

climbs up the stairs of heaven and then drops to the black asphalt like a firey star

o wormwood wormwood!

flickering red and yellow and white

fractured in rain droplets

cascading

down

I light a cig

inhale the black smoke

Bye Bernie

you dumb bloody bloke

by the time the ballet is over it is 11 p.m.

I’m supposed to kill you at midnight tonight and that’s when I make my 50K

I sit here in my living quarters

drinking milk

the lights off

nothing but the cold blue glow of the moon against your peach face

against your tender lips

you sit across from me on the love seat but there is no love here

I am sweating staring at the clock on the wall

a crescent in the darkness but I can see the arms twitching toward death

the long arm stretches to the five

little arm on the 11

thirty-five minutes and this will all be over, my sweet my love

I missed you

you coo in the darkness across from me

me sipping at my milk all I can smell is gun powder flames black boiling smoke death

I missed you too

I take a large gulp of cow juice down the gullet into the belly

curdled in the guts pushed out the bowels pissed out the bladder

it is cold

I shiver

perspiration fills my palm

cold in my hand like a trigger

a bullet

and earlier in this night in this dark city where the sun never rises I carved a name into that bullet

your name

you’re awfully quiet, Anne

I’m thinking

What are you thinking about?

Remember three years ago at the pond where I lost my virginity?

yeah

are you mad that I left?

I watch dust dance in the air through beams of moonlight

I had to leave, Anne

why?

a single word, drifting through the silence like a feather

descending

landing on my soul

I can’t tell you that

I set the glass down

ring stain on the coffee table

silence

dead silence

you work for him now

yes, I do

I kill people for the Boss

and would you kill me, Anne?

If I had to the Boss knows best

he cleans up the shit in this city because the pigs won’t do it

he controls the cops, Anne

he controls everyone, don’t you see?

You’re working against yourself

he runs the drug rings he runs the prostitution rings he runs all the shit in this city

Remember what you said after the sex?

After we lied in the dewy grass

a moon much like this sparkling in the pond as if the water had swallowed it up

ducks coasting along the reflective glass

quaking

remember what you said?

You stare blue eyes sparkling gleaming glowing

I said I felt empty I said I was in pain I said I was bleeding I said I felt nothing

And why did you feel nothing?

I don’t know

I know because you didn’t love me and you felt the way you did with the others

What others?

Your clients, Anne

No stop

don’t even fucking bother you were a goddamn hooker in this shit city and you never told me you sucked every cock you let every man violate you with his putrid flesh that’s why you were so easy to penetrate that night

I wanted out that’s why I left

I did what I had to do to survive in this shit city and the Boss took me in and I didn’t have to do that anymore. I’m free.

You hate these people, Anne

you want them dead you want to clean up the streets so why are you working for them?

I love you

You lie you were never pure never the girl I loved just a dirty rat in the gutter crawling with the junkies lookin’ for your next fix

Tom, you’re right I do want to clean up the trash

I have a gun

inside its chamber is a single bullet with your name on it engraved into golden steel

I’m supposed to deliver that bullet into your chest at midnight tonight

I was offered 50 Grand

I don’t plan on failing

And worst of all you fucked Bernie that pervert that fucking pervert I should have killed you both

I can’t believe I ever loved you that we ever spent time together in Paris sitting next to the duck pond drinking wine fucking under the stars you claiming to be pure but you fucked so many other paying clients under those same stars in dark alleys with the rats with the junkies and you liked it you dirty whore

I bet you fucking liked it

I’m so sorry, Tom

I put two bullets in your chest

Good job, Anne

here’s your 50 Grand

Thanks Boss

Your son is dead

it wasn’t much of a loss

love is lust

and lust is love

and in the end

it’s all bullshit

you staring down the barrel of a .38

death delivered in a cold slug right through the head into the brain kill the cells kill the nerves kill the being

trapped within the shell of skin tight skin so tight and confining you’d think you’d never be able to escape except for that sweet poison that sweet oneness of becoming part of another flesh

drinking the fluids of death under the stars where blood and cum was once let and you know this is all you have left

a gun a fucking gun in your cold hands pulling that trigger

killing people who are already dead

...I hate everything

2012-01-27T14:16:00.000-08:00

Self-sufficiency is not Lynzeeeee's strong suit.

GOD THAT SHIT-EATING GRIN IS THE WORST PART

SHE'S SO DAMN CONFIDENT IN HER STUPIDITY

‎"Boys, start working" FUCK YOU YOU CHESHIRE CAT FACED FUCK GODDAMITLSFJDLSKFAJDSKLFJDSKFLJSDLFJDLKFD!!!!DJSFLKJDFKJS!!!

Lynzee isn't aware that she has an occupation in mind already: prostitution. Her husband gets sex and she gets to spend his money.

American Psycho Review

2012-01-27T13:49:00.000-08:00

American Psycho Review

The Reagan 80s: a time period defined by surface, cut throat capitalism, Wall Street, cocaine, AIDS, night clubs, bad music and serial killers. This is the thesis of Bret Easton Ellis’s most controversial novel, American Psycho, which when published in 1991, garnered an F review in Entertainment Weekly (Lyons), put Ellis on the FBI’s watch list, and infuriated a radical feminist named Tara Baxter (Waters).

Ellis had only published two previous novels before American Psycho made him infamous: Less Than Zero and The Rules of Attraction. Both dealt with similar topics of greed, excess, and surface. Less Than Zero, published while Ellis was still attending Brown in 1987 (Waters), was a novel about a teenage boy named Clay who returns to LA for Christmas break, only to discover his “friends” have become drug addled zombies, snuff film producers, and prostitutes. The Rules of Attraction was about a love triangle between three apathetic college kids who view sex as an extracurricular activity, one in which they participate more than actual classes (which are dropped like dying flies). Finally, American Psycho was about the infamous Patrick Bateman, Wall Street yuppie, whose extra curricular activities included clubbing; snorting coke; dining at New York’s finest restaurants; purchasing overpriced sunglasses, suits, brief cases, Evian water, Walkman headphones; and murdering prostitutes, animals, co-workers, and the homeless.

With graphic, detailed, and vivid descriptions that include sadomasochism, decapitations, eviscerations, dismemberment, and torture, it is no wonder American Psycho garnered so much controversy. Sadly, in today’s culture (that has created a genre of film called torture porn--see Saw and Hostel, or rather, don’t), such a novel would not cause most to bat an eye lash. But in 1991, before the novel was even published, the controversy was nearly as hostile as the protagonist (antagonist?) of the novel. Tara Baxter, a radical feminist, read portions of American Psycho out loud in a B. Dalton’s bookstore, which led to her arrest. “After her jail and court date, Baxter went around California and poured blood on 27 copies of the novel at every bookstore she could reach” to protest scenes in the novel that depicted deplorable acts of violence against women (Waters). Of course, these scenes were read out of context, but that probably wouldn’t have made much difference, considering Baxter’s radical attitudes. Baxter had this to say about the author:

“There are better ways of taking care of Bret Easton Ellis than just censoring him. I would much prefer to see him skinned alive, a rat put up his rectum, and his genitals cut off and fried in a frying pan, in front of -- not only a live audience - but a video camera as well. These videos can be sold as ‘art’ and ‘free expression’ and could be available at every video outlet, library, liquor, and convenience store in the world. We can profit off of Ellis' terror and pain, just as he and bookstores are profiting off of the rape, torture, and mutilation of women” (Waters).

In making such a statement, Baxter proved herself to be just as sick and twisted as she thought the author to be, completely undermining her criticism of the novel. While Baxter’s statement is hostile, rude, and inappropriate (in context), the graphic, deplorable scenes of violence in Bret Easton Ellis’ American Psycho serve a purpose: to define the inhumanity of a society that puts its value in objects instead of people. Or rather, treats people as objects. There is a disturbing line from a chapter entitled “Tries to Cook and Eat Girl” in which Patrick Bateman refers to a girl as “meat” and “shit” (Ellis 345). This quotation: provocative, offensive, but true. In a postmodern society that places the value of objects over people, this is a universal truth, or rather, an illusory truth, since there is no actual truth and nothing really matters, including morals, values, principles, compassion, or compromises. People are not special. They do not have hopes and dreams or souls. They are meat. They are shit.

Patrick Bateman is not the only sociopath in the novel. In fact, they populate the streets of New York City, the law firms, the finest restaurants and clubs. They are soulless individuals who do not care about others, only advancing themselves, only possessing, and accumulating more wealth. They are individuals who use others to their own advantage. In American Psycho, they are Wall Street yuppies, the upper class, the bourgeoisie, who destroy and use the unfortunate (homeless, prostitutes, children) so they can live in excess. Whether Tara Baxter realizes it or not, she may fit in perfectly in Ellis’ dark satirical world.

One reoccurring theme throughout the novel is that Patrick Bateman and his yuppie friends often mistake their co-workers for other co-workers, since there is no distinct individuality, only conformity to an ideal surface. No one really knows who anyone else is; as Patrick Bateman states, “Inside doesn’t matter” (397). They are so self-absorbed that they do not take time to notice anyone outside themselves or their possessions, unless a source of ridicule or competition. Patrick Bateman, competing for the Fischer Account (which is never clearly explained, except for the fact that it is the best account), literally axes a co-worker named Paul Owen in the face, in order to get ahead. Talk about cut throat capitalism!

Most of American Psycho’s criticism has come from the fact that it depicts scenes that are disgusting, vile, crude, and just plain immoral. Of course, what these critics don’t realize is that the novel itself is a looking-glass, reflecting a society that is itself disgusting, vile, crude, and just plain immoral. Maybe some critics are more disturbed by the fact that they see themselves in Ellis’ characters than any real criticism of the graphic content. To quote Stephen King: “If you intend to write as truthfully as you can, your days as a member of polite society are numbered” (148). What the novel does not do, to any extent, is shy away from truth or sugar coat the ugliness of a society obsessed with surface and possessions; a society overcome by greed. In the late 70s and in the 80s, America experienced a string of serial killers (i.e. Bundy, Gacy, and Manson), that both terrified and fascinated Americans. Nothing quite captures America’s attention like murder---and material possessions.

This is exactly why Patrick Bateman, the antihero of the novel, is a serial killer. For one, the novel is set in a time period, the 80s, gripped with greed, consumerism, Reagan economics, and fear (serial killers, war, AIDS). What most readers of American Psycho do not realize, or fail to realize, is that the murders and sex scenes are not the only thing described in pornographic detail. Patrick Bateman is a character sick with obsession; obsession with all the wrong things. In many scenes, Bateman describes, in pornographic detail, his wardrobe, his apartment, brands of bottled water, his music collection, the food at his favorite restaurants. These are the things that consume not only Patrick, but his cohorts. In fact, one could say that a surface obsessed society creates monsters like Bateman. In a society gripped by fear, whose only solace is found in possessing and dominating, there is no where to go but down; into madness, psychosis; anything to try and feel, to escape the void. In the chapter “Tries to Cook and Eat Girl,” Ellis underlines the only real thing that can fill the void. Scene: Bateman attempts to turn a dead girl into meat loaf, but then he starts to cry: “The smell of meat and blood clouds up the condo until I don’t notice it anymore. And later my macabre joy sours and I’m weeping for myself, unable to find solace in any of this, crying out, sobbing ‘I just want to be loved’” (Ellis 345). This scene is at the same time utterly disturbing, and in some sick, morbid way, touching. There is only one thing that can fill the hole in Bateman’s consumer-obsessed soul: love. But, living in the society in which he does, love is an illusory concept, just like truth, compassion, and morals. In a postmodern society, there is only one truth: nothing matters. In a postmodern society, there is no love and there is no escape from one’s emptiness, as the last lines of the novel seem to indicate: “THIS IS NOT AN EXIT” (Ellis 399).

Works Cited

Lyons, Gene. "American Psycho Review | Book Reviews and News | EW.com." Entertainment Weekly's EW.com. Entertainment Weekly, 08 Mar. 1991. Web. 21 Sept. 2011. <http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,313575,00.html>.

Waters, Tom. "Bret Easton Ellis - Interesting Motherfuckers." Acid Logic - Humor Pop Culture Zine. Acid Logic, 2005. Web. 20 Sept. 2011. <http://www.acidlogic.com/im_bret_easton_ellis.htm>.

Ellis, Bret Easton. American Psycho. New York: Vintage, 1991. Print.

King, Stephen. On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft. New York: Scribner, 2000. Print.

Social Media Self-Destruction

2012-01-17T15:01:00.000-08:00

The first time social media and I were really intimate was when I was about the age of sixteen and my girlfriend at the time decided I NEEDED to start a Xanga so I could share all my personal thoughts and feelings with strangers on the internet. Being sixteen, this sounded like a great idea to me. After all, I met my girlfriend on a message board dedicated to some indy tween horror film entitled Hangman’s Curse. If I could date a stranger via webcam, MSN messenger, and internet forums; why not further detach myself from the fleshy-space by projecting all my thoughts and feelings into the World Wide Web?So I did. I started a blog on Xanga called The Bad Place where I mostly whined about my girlfriend, how unfair life was, and made “jokes” about murdering whichever group of people I thought deserved the pointy end of a blade. I was a real class act. Then my “girlfriend” broke up with me, I had a nervous breakdown, shut down my blog, and quickly returned to Xangaland in the form of The Church of Fat, a second blog I started October 23, 2005. Unbeknownst to me, this blog would gain a huge following of insecure, hateful, xenophobic misanthropes and fat emo girls who wanted to bone me. The reason I attracted such followers was because my content, again, consisted mostly of hateful, expletive-laced rants against humanity. At one point, I had up to sixteen thousand hits a week, was on Xanga’s top ten featured blogs, and had almost 1000 subscribers.
I now see all this hatred for what it really was: insecurity in myself. Looking through my old posts, I’m very glad I am not seventeen years old anymore. For an insecure teenager to be garnered with so much attention is unhealthy. Because I experienced quasi-internet fame (the lowest form of attention one can receive), I became a narcissist, believing every word I typed was gold and that nothing I said was ever wrong. For God’s sake, I was King of Xanga--in reality, a cold, dark, and meaningless corner of the world; but at that age, I thought it was everything. It had become my world. All the comments, all the subscribers, all the attention, all the propositions for sex—it had consumed me, until there was no real me, no real self, just a digital projection of me on the internet: a façade of burning hatred and malice for all things.
And that’s how social media destroyed me.
Now, I’m more mature (that’s not saying much) and realize validation shouldn’t come from random strangers on the internet who only care about you because you make them feel better about being angry, hateful bastards or want to bone you because you look like a gay cowboy.

Now, instead of using social media to exploit myself, I use it to promote my self-published work. Most recently, I have used it to promote my novel Hell, a satire about small town evil and teenage self-destruction in North Dakota. One could argue writing in itself is a selfish act, but now that I’m older, I realize that it’s not all about me. I’m not the center of the universe. I write because I enjoy it. I share my writing because it is important to me, not because I want attention. Validation of the self can only come from the self. What really matters is having the strength to know who you are, to be an individual, and not a façade. What really matters is those you love and care about. Exploitation of the self and others will only lead to emptiness and destruction. This is a big problem with social media today: that so many are so willing to exploit their lives, the lives of others, for just a tiny bit of fame, a tiny bit of attention. It happened to me. I’m just thankful I’m not in that place anymore. I’m happy I have learned to use social media in a healthy manner: to express myself without exploiting myself.
These are the following new new media sites I have used to promote my work: Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, Blogger, Tumblr, deviantART, Authonomy, fictionpress, Create Space, and Smashwords.

2012-01-09T11:32:00.001-08:00

You ever notice that "true Christians" and "real Americans" are usually just dicks?

English Major lulz 2

2011-12-21T12:01:00.000-08:00

Finally found a purpose for my English major. I can be a Grammar Nazi on the internet. Hope that pays well.

Comments from http://failblog.org/2011/12/07/dating-fails-dating-fails-all-the-english-majors-out-there-know-what-im-talking-about/

The pretentiousness that abounds in the English field annoys me. I sometimes regret taking this major, realizing how meaningless it is. I don't see why anyone should think they are superior to others when it comes to academia. Unless you're intelligent in science, mathematics, English, and all other fields, you really have no reason to put yourself up on a pedestal.

Actually, NO ONE should put themselves up on a pedestal, because WE ALL FUCK UP.

For example, my professor used the wrong form of "to" while correcting my paper. I could have been a total pretentious shit and circled her error, handed the paper back, and given her a D- on correcting. But I realize even professors make mistakes. And I wanted to get a good grade in that class. She'd given me As on mediocre essays, so I just kept my fucking mouth shut. Wish more college kids would do the same.

What I do love about English is literature and writing. Discovering new voices and writing techniques. Discovering new ways of expressing yourself. Revision, polishing, editing.

The best thing about English is the fact it combines so many studies: religion, psychology, history, science---all can be found in literature.

Sadly, all the things that made English unique and exciting and creative . . . it all just seemed to be raped by nazism and pretentiousness and elitism once I entered the halls of academia, or halls of snobbiness and pretentiousness, I should say.

The worst thing about English is this: http://johnrlindensmith.blogspot.com/2011/11/english-major-lulz.html

Fuck the pretentious! Hope you enjoy the fall from your high horse.

2011-12-21T11:45:00.000-08:00

"God, Avril Lavigne is an awful person. I can't think of anyone worse."
"Well, maybe Hitler."
"Well, yeah, maybe Hitler."

2011-12-21T11:25:00.001-08:00

Hey Kids, tone your self-worth down a tad. YOU'RE NOT SPECIAL

2011-11-22T17:44:00.001-08:00

Saying a book is better than Twilight is like saying a book is better than being eviscerated by dirty bums who dig through your intestines searching for half digested food.

Terrorists are Nice

2011-11-22T17:07:00.000-08:00

Today I discovered that if you want to insult someone but don't want to sound like a complete bitch, you just add five magic words at the end of your rant: "Yeah, that Alicia girl is so weird. She wears combat boots with a mini and fingerless gloves. She has like no fashion sense whatsoever. Like where was she raised? In an alley by incestuous, genetic dead end vagrants?...I'm sure she's nice, though."

English Major lulz

2011-11-22T17:04:00.000-08:00

(from http://www.photoblip.com/pictures/6085/your-english-teacher-vs-the-author.html)

I know, I know, "literature means something different to everybody." But I've never believed that wishy washy crap. I think the author has an exact point to make, and often the English teacher butchers it by projecting her own feelings of gender identity crisis, repressed homosexuality, and deep seated parental issues directly into the text, while the classroom just sort of nods in agreement so they don't look stupid for not agreeing. And then there's the Douche who will elborate on the teacher's ridiculous points while sprinkling literary jargon on his pompous illogical word salad: "Yes, I too thought the blue curtains were a reflection of Cynthia's repressed homosexuality and her inability to connect with her mother in a anally sexual matter. If you view this from a purely Lacanian point of view, the blue curtains are really just a part of the Symbolic Order, and further, if we apply the Deconstructionist view, the curtains are simply a stand in for something Cynthia cannot yet articulate, a barrier between her and facing the inner truths of her repressed desires to be a man."
Silence. We all look to the teacher. She smiles and nods. A few students gush, "Gosh, Stephen is smart."

Another Night on the Town

2011-11-22T17:01:00.000-08:00

Another night on the town. Just girls and booze and lots of smoking and driving fast and people laughing like idiots thinking they’re so goddamn cool but really they’re just like everybody else. I’m sitting in the back of the car and we’re moving forty miles too fast in a twenty-five and the fat guy who is driving is smoking a Camel and he’s on top of the whole world, thinking he’s God, as the wheels seem to float off the ground as we reach 100 on the sixty and I’m staring out the window---feeling lost and empty---tracing my name on the fogged up glass, realizing I want to cry, but I’m so dead inside that I can’t. My “friend” James turns to me and he asks me if I want a smoke and I say sure because I can’t say no and I light up and I choke but then I ease into it, and every time I talk, I riddle my speech with “shits” and “fucks,” because I’m a shy weak fuck.

Just another night on the town. We’re driving on Main, and there’s all these empty souls just like us, standing around, chatting, lighting cigarettes, talking about how much they hate their parents, how much police officers suck, who they’ve fucked lately, what drugs they’ve tried--- some new drug I’ve never heard of. Collie parks the car on the curb and we crawl out and head toward this small gathering of blondes who are wearing bunny ears and smoking cigs and cussing and one girl has a beer bottle in her hand and they all have really glossy eyes and lips and I feel sick.

“What’s up?” one of the girls asks, and I’m not sure which one, because they all look the same.

“Just hanging out and shit,” Collie says, and it seems we end every sentence with “and shit.”

What you doin’?

Hangin’ at the mall and shit.

Goin’ to the movies and shit.

Just doing shit and shit.

And shit.

James is talking to me but I can’t hear him and this car with a loud muffler rattles by and I hear screaming and these sophomores stick their heads out the car and flip everyone off and smoke cigs and scream “SUCK IT!” and we all force dead laughter and James says something again, something about milf chicks, but I’m not sure, because I’m on lots of Demerol and Lexapro and it seems like everyone I know is on Lexapro, and Lexapro makes it so you can’t get it up, and I haven’t had an orgasm for three months now and I really don’t care.

One of the blonde chicks is talking to me and I take a drag off a cig and I pretend to listen.

“I’m thinking about getting a tattoo on my lower back. I’m like addicted to tattoos. It’s like crack for me I just want to get more and more and I love it when people notice them and compliment them and”

blah blah blah fucking blah

“Um...yeah...sure...whatever,” I say.

Collie is with some other blonde chick and they’re talking and he leaves with her and James is off somewhere else, in the dark, smoking pot with some junkie most likely and I’m just standing here with this plastic girl wearing bunny ears, thinking she’s the goddamn Playboy bunny or some shit. She even has a Playboy bunny tattoo on her neck.

God, I want to kill her.

Her eyes are glossy and stuck in this permanent dumb ass stare and she just keeps talking about tattoos and I look around, bored out of my fucking mind and shit.

She tells me she has a tattoo on her cunt. “Do you wanna fuck?” she asks, and I just shrug, and say, “Um...yeah...sure...whatever.” I’m in her car and I’m fiddling with my fingers and listening to Dashboard Confessional and heavy-metal and rap on the stereo. A song plays “we’re losing our souls” and tears run down my face and I wipe them away and the blonde cunt asks me what’s wrong and I say, “Nothing. Just drive. Keep your goddamn eyes on the road.”

She drives out to the middle of nowhere, in some field, and I look at her pasty face in the dark, smeared in gallons of cheap make-up. She reeks of perfume and hand lotion. She starts taking off her shirt and asks me to rip off her pants and I tell her to take off her own goddamn clothes and just continue taking drags off my cigarette. She has ugly flap-jack boobs.

Eventually we’re in the backseat and I can’t get it up and I’m getting pissed off and the next thing I know I’m putting cigarettes out in her eyeballs and she’s screaming and I punch her until she stops moving and breathing.

I remember the time I set my “friend” up with a girl who I knew was infected with herpes.

I remember the time I poked holes into my “friend’s” condoms.

I remember the time I rolled cyanide into a “friend’s” joint.

I remember the time I hung a stupid blonde in my shower and ate her out while she choked to death.

I’m sitting in some random restaurant with “the guys” and all we talk about is perverted sex and cars and girls and drugs and I stifle a yawn. The waiter is slow. I’m bored. I want to kill myself. James is talking about a girl he fucked tonight. He’s saying she was easy pussy or something and I tell them I killed a girl tonight and there’s this long awkward silence and then I force a smile and the whole table eases into nervous laughter.

My food is cold and I’m not hungry.

James talks about a new way of getting high. Collie talks about this girl he fucked with huge tits, but her cunt smelled like rotten tuna. Someone, I don’t know who, talks about his parole officer and detention and how teachers are stupid and cops are stupid and parents are stupid and how authority is stupid and I’m just staring blank eyed at whichever longhair prick is spewing this dribble and I am so fucking sick. I have a slight feeling of déjà vu and realize its just history repeating itself.

Just another night on the town.

Collie says he once fucked a religious chick and made her cry out Jesus’ name in bed and then someone, from somewhere, says, “We’re all going to hell.”

“Yeah, but we’ll party!” Collie laughs.

My stomach is twisting up in knots. “Who fucking cares.”

“What do you mean?”

“Who fucking cares,” I say. “You go wherever...and...that’s life. And shit.”

“Yeah.”

I take a sip of a soda, but my taste buds are so dull I can’t tell what it is.

My cell rings and I pick it up and listen to some girl I don’t know drone on the other end about how we never hang out anymore and that she’s mad because I’m hanging out with James and she doesn’t like James and I ask why and she doesn’t tell me and I say, “Um...yeah...sure...whatever” and hang up on her and then I go into the bathroom and smash a toilet seat.

Next thing I know it’s nearly three in the fucking morning and I’m at some party with a bunch of people I could care less about and I’m sipping spiked punch and these blonde girls are talking to me and they’re wearing bunny ears.

“Did you know that Lilly is going out with Drake?”

I feel myself twitching and I say so very numbly I don’t think anyone hears me, “Who cares.”

I remember the time I got drunk at a party and I started screaming at everyone: “I’M GOING TO KILL YOU ALL! I FUCKING HATE ALL OF YOU! YOU ALL THINK YOU’RE SO GODDAMN COOL! BUT YOU’RE FUCKING NOT!!! I WILL KILL YOU ALL! YOU WORTHLESS PIECES OF SHIT!!! YOU FUCKING GAY ASSHOLES!!!”

Everyone laughed. They said I was a fun drunk.

I listen to this guy talk about all the people he wants to kill. He wants to kill people who don’t drink or smoke. He wants to kill people who believe in God. He wants to kill anyone who’s a virgin. He wants to kill people who go to church. He wants to kill people who get good grades in school.

I tell him he’s a fucking piece of shit.

He lunges at me but some blonde holds him back and I tell him I’m just fucking with him and I go grab him a glass of punch. I drop a cyanide tablet in it.

I’m trying to fingerbang some girl but her pussy is too tight and I can’t get my fingers in. And I’m thinking I’ll probably tell some longhair in study hall that she smells bad down there. And this makes me even more depressed and homicidal.

A blonde girl shares a poem she wrote with me:

I see your eyes bleeding

I see your heart beating

I see everything that’s wrong with you

and more

I see that you’re a whore

I tell her it sucks and to shoot herself.

Someone asks me who I’m going out with and I actually say “your mom.”

I look at the other guys at the party and they all have long hair and they’re all laughing like junkies and I’m just sitting in a corner, trying to be ignored, and I keep drinking punch, and I feel woozy.

I get bored of the stupid repetitive sex jokes and the drama shit and guys kicking around soda cans for amusement and....

I leave and go to another party, in the next room, but I can’t tell the difference.

James comes up to me, and I think I already know what he’s going to say. He’s going to ask me if I know someone. Most conversations here start with “Do you know (insert name)?” And then it’s followed by a less amusing story about said person or perhaps some stupid rumor or some drama shit that I really don’t give a fuck about.

Two blondes are bitching about who slept with a certain guy and I am not feeling good.

“Hey, do you know that one Miller girl?” James asks.

“There’s a million fucking Millers.”

“Uh...she’s the blonde one.”

“Who cares.”

“Yeah. Who cares.”

Long silence.

“Who fucking cares,” I say again.

“Uh...yeah...I don’t know.”

“Uh...yeah...I dunno,” I mock.

Blah blah blah and shit.

There’s a long silence, and then James says, “I don’t know what I’m gonna do with my life, man.” And since the topic of conversation isn’t perverted sex or girls or cars or drugs, I have no idea what to say, and I get nervous, and start fidgeting, lighting a cigarette, and and and and....

“Uh...yeah...sure...whatever,” I say, walking off into the crowd.

Just another night on the town. And shit.

Suicide Town

2011-11-22T16:58:00.000-08:00

In an attempt to do something heartfelt and worthy with my writing abilities, I decided to travel to Pierre, South Dakota to investigate teenage suicide. It's a sad fact that 30,000+ teenagers commit suicide every year, the third leading cause of death for U.S. citizens ages 15 - 25. Pierre, South Dakota has seen its share of these suicides. In fact, there have been so many suicides, Pierre is becoming known as "Suicide Town."
I talked to Lacey Harwood, a student at Pierre High about the problem.

Me: You know who you remind me of?
Lacey: Oh, I always get this. Celine Dion, right?
Me: Uh . . . no.
Lacey: Well . . . sometimes people confuse me with that one girl. Aw fudgesicles . . . what's her name again?
Me: Hillary Duff?
Lacey: No . . . that girl that's in all those pornos.
Me: Um . . . I don’t know.
Lacey: I saw one of her videos in the backseat of your car. What was it again? Something about a runt? Runt on runt action?
Me: Uh . . . yeah. That's right. A documentary on pig fights. Not a porno. Anyway, I'm here today to talk to you about suicide.
Lacey: Oh . . . that's depressing.
Me: Well, yeah. But it's what I'm reporting on. So . . . we need to talk about it.
Lacey: Why does the news always have to be sad? Why can't journalists talk about happy things? Like . . . like about that man on Main Street who gives candy to the little kids and gives them free rides in his car.
Me: . . . actually, I think I did write about that last week.
Lacey: Awww, that's sweet.
Me: Yeah, not really. But anyway, let's talk about this suicide problem.
Lacey: Okay, fine.
Me: Okay . . . so uh . . . Pierre has become known as Suicide Town.
Lacey: I don't get why people are so depressed all the time. I don't get why people commit suicide. I think it's because they’re stupid.
Me: . . . Yeah . . . that's probably it.
Lacey: If you were smart you'd enjoy life. I mean . . . there's so much to do and experience. Why on earth would you kill yourself?
Me: Well . . . the most common reasons for suicide amongst adolescents are divorce of parents, physical or sexual abuse in the home, low grades in school, feeling worthless, rejection by peers, substance abuse, death of a close friend or relative, or the suicide of a friend.
Lacey: Sexual abuse? What are you talking about?
Me: Lacey, do you know anything about the outside world?
Lacey: I love cruising on my daddy's yacht and going to the mall in my BMW and buying twenty suuuper cute outfits at Abercrombie & Fitch. Oh God, life is just so amazing. Why give it up?
Me: You're rich.
Lacey: . . . no. Living reasonably.
Me: Lacey, not everyone has it as good as you. A lot of these kids who committed suicide had pretty awful lives. They probably suffered from clinical depression.
Lacey: Well, if they can't live decent lives, they don't deserve to live anyway.
Me: Lacey . . . that's horrible.
Lacey: Not as horrible as it could be.
Me: . . . what?
Lacey: Things can always be worse. At least we don't live in Russia and work in sulfur mines.
Me: What the fuck are you talking about?
At this point I was tapped on the shoulder by my publicist and he told me to not swear while performing an interview because it made me look unprofessional.
I told him to fuck off and get me a Coke.
Me: Lacey, some kids are abused in their homes and molested. Some kids go to school every day and get the shit beaten out of them.
Lacey: Molested? Oh, that's just baloney!
Me: Baloney?
Lacey: Those damn girls complain every time their daddies touch them. My dad touches me all the time. I don't mind at all when he tickles my fannywagon or my choochoo or my mellons. Daddy says those are my tickly parts.
Me: . . .
After that interview I needed a breath of fresh air, so I cruised around in my SUV and checked the town out. It was just your typical friendly small town. Children playing in the park, teenagers sitting in driveways drinking Coke, Grandma setting apple pie on the windowsill, white trash cookin’ meth in the trunk of their cars.
I got bored. I went to a nearby brothel and picked up Pierre's finest hooker and got a room at the Slee-Z Bag Inn and banged her brains out for about an hour, which was rather difficult since I had been masturbating the whole night before, but eventually, I had a weak orgasm and then sat on the edge of the bed crying. The harlot didn't care, so I put a gun to my head and contemplated pulling the trigger, but then I decided to kill the hooker instead and I put her head on a pail of ice from the machine down the hall.
Feeling dirty yet satisfied, I headed into the heart of Pierre once again and approached a group of guys sitting on their front lawn, all drinking Cokes. When they saw me they all quickly hid their Coke cans. Not sure why.

Me: Who are you guys supposed to be? The fucking Backstreet Boys?
Justin (dude with shades): Fux yizzle, my nizzle!
Me: Okay, Justin . . . what do you think about suicide?
Justin: I'm totally down wid it dawg!
Me: Um . . . okay. Who are your other friends?
Justin: They ma possie.
Me: Do they talk?
Justin: No, dawg! I seiz they ma possie! They only talk when I seiz they cans. I'm reprasentin'!
I'm glad I had already disposed of my violent/homicidal desires.
Me: Okay . . . uh . . . why are you down with suicide?
Justin: Peeps can do whatever they wants. If ya wanna pop yourself one in da head, fine . . . do it! Ya know what I'm sayin'?
Me: I smell gin.
They all looked at each other, still holding the Coke cans behind their backs.
Justin: Don't play wit me, dawg.
Me: Do you think drugs can cause suicide?
Justin: Fux no! Drugs make ya happy.
Me: But what about when you come off your high?
Justin: Then ya do some more!
Me: Until you eventually die.
Justin: Ya!
Me: Which is suicide in itself.
Justin: Whoa . . . I'm lost. Wait . . . what was that question about boobies?
Me: . . . uh . . . there was no question about . . . boobies.
Justin: Oh . . . you wanna hear us rap?
I quickly left.
I cruised around Pierre some more, stopped at a gas station, poured myself a glass of steaming coffee, held it between my legs as I drove, spilled it all over my groin, took our sweet Lord Jesus' name in vain numerous times, and then stopped at Pierre High for one last interview.
This is where I met Mrs. Takenalive.

Me: Uh . . . you . . . look . . . lovely, today.
Takenalive: What did you SAY??!
Me: So . . . how long have you been teaching here, MRS. TAKENALIVE?
Takenalive: What?!!
Me: HOW LONG HAVE YOU TEACHED?!
Takenalive: I taught Moses his ABCs. Ungrateful bastard went off into the wilderness and came back with these stone tablets and hung em up in the school. Thought he could tell me what to do!? Fucking bastard. I wouldn't have minded those rules if I wasn't fucking every Dick and Jerry in my classroom. I'm still trying to get those fucking things taken down.
Me: SO THERE'S BEEN A LOT OF SUICIDES HERE?
Takenalive: It's those damn violent video games and TV shows. That's the problem! It all started in the 20s when they introduced those damn moving pictures! That's when it all started. Those damn Flappers showing off their goods.
Me: WHAT'S A FLAPPER?
Takenalive: A girl who shows too much skin, asshole!
Me: HOW ARE VIOLENT VIDEO GAMES AND TV RESPONSIBLE FOR SUICIDE?
Takenalive: They make kids violent. And they end up killing themselves. And they're on all those . . . damn medications. And they're listening to those damn earmuff phones all day. And they're constantly reading Harry Potter. And they're all eating candy and sugar all the time and McDonald's. It all leads to suicide!
Me: MAKES SENSE!
After that shouting match, I again drove around Pierre in my SUV, and was slowly becoming aware that I myself wanted to blow my fucking brains out. I steered my wheel to the off ramp, to get the hell out of there, leave and never come back . . . but something dark and sinister touched my hand and I found myself driving aimlessly through Pierre, thinking of ways to off myself.
I sat down at a nearby park bench, watching a prepubescent girl buy weed from some shady looking hippie. I watched some mother yell obscenities at her children. I watched an androgynous-lookin’ guy get beat up by his “friends” . . . but I felt too numb to do anything about it. An older fellow joined me on the bench and I decided to interview him.
Me: So . . . they call this "Suicide Town?"
Guy: Yeah. I find it very degrading. This is a good town. A nice little town. I don't like the fact that people judge our town like this just because so many kids here have killed themselves. It's a nice town. A very nice town. With nice people. Good churches. Friendly people. Sure we have our problems . . . but it's a nice town. With nice people . . . who fear God.
Me: Oh God! I'm so fucking bored.
I put a .38 to my temple and pulled the trigger.
Guy: I mean . . . it's . . . uh . . . a . . . very nice . . . town.
He stole my wallet off my “dead body.”
In case you were wondering, I really wasn't dead. It turns out I had stuffed grape jelly in my .38 last night for some unknown reason. So I went back to my hotel room and watched porn.
No one had a good answer.
As I watched the blonde whores devour rivulets of cum from each others’ cunts, I thought that there were no simple answers.
Video games, industrialism, capitalism, abuse, divorce, the church, the government…I don’t know. All these answers felt myopic.
The whores on screen tangled in one another’s flesh, to the point I couldn’t tell where one began and the other ended. All I saw was the vacant look of lust in their eyes.
I contemplated those lost. Thirty some thousand a year . . .
. . . and then I started sobbing, but at the same time, attempted to maintain an erection, numb the pain . . . but I couldn’t come . . .
. . . I thought about how I never felt my parents loved me. How they never loved each other. How I never learned to love . . . only hold my dick in my cold hands while watching whores violate each other in their naked, ceaseless dance . . .
. . . that’s when I realized . . .
. . . the world is a black empty hole . . .
. . . with nothing to fill it

The John and Kyle Chronicles: The Scrawny, The Bald, and the Ugly

2011-11-22T16:55:00.000-08:00

This is how I greet my friend Kyle in an email. I suppose a "Dearest Kyle" would have sufficed:

Well, well, Kyle Joseph Hopkins. They told me you was back in town. Didn't believe 'em, so I had to see fo' myself. You really are a tough sonuvabitch ain't ye? Or just plain crazy bananas. I told ye to get yer ass on outta here, but here ye are, back fo' more.
You sure have a big pair o' mellons on ya, don't ye boy? Ye come swaggerin' back in this town like goddamn John Wayne after ye stole our money, slept with all our finest whores, gave them HPV, and poisoned our water wells.
Well, ye see here, boy. I don't take kindly to that kinda behavyar.
When I put my .350 Magnum in yo face and told ye to scadaddle, I thought ye got the message. But here ye are, your tongue in my gilly's twat, one hand on yer six-shooter, the other on yer cock. Well fuck me sideways. I can't believe it.
Now ye got two choices, boy. Ye can attempt to draw that six-shooter and shoot me in the neck, but I reckon you'll shoot yer slimy load on my whore's face before ye even git that gun halfway out yer holster.
They dun call me Johnny Fast Hands fer nothin'.
Yer second choice. Put that there gun in yer mouth and pull the trigger. It'll be more merciful that way. Because me...well, I'll take ye out piece by piece, boy. Shoot off yer pecker, then yer balls, then yer fingers, then yer toes, then yer asshole, then finally, give ya two lead eyes where yer soft-squishies used ta be.
What ya gonna do boy? It's yer funeral.

Love You Forever

2011-11-22T16:52:00.001-08:00

I know what you’re thinking but you’re wrong
I am not here to entertain you
I am here to kill you
Blood on the mind
Knife in hand
Coming up behind you in the night
Burying the blade into your pale skin
Blood froths in the oceans
Black seagulls scream
Their eyes brimming red with madness
Oh god oh god oh god
They fill the Martian sky like black bats
Swirling in tight circles overhead
Singing the song of death
God, you looked so beautiful when you died
Master of the universe
Knower of all things
Blood draining from your immaculate form
Onto the sandy beach
Crabs moved their stalks over your face
Pinched at your eyeballs
Oh glory glory!
Hallejuliah!
Teach you a lesson you won’t soon forget
You goddam whore
Sitting in the beach house
Drinking wine
Thinking I’d never notice the stains on your dress
What a lavish life we live
Near the sea
Near nothing at all
Out here alone
On the sands of time
Now all I have is death and murder on my mind
Nothing to do but sit and contemplate
Think about how you died
Eyes roll over white
Looking at nothing but angry-red sky
And the goddam seagulls
Oh how they flapped their little wings
And cried out to the heavens
“why oh why oh why?”
He didn’t love you
Not like I did
But it doesn’t matter now
I wonder if he’ll ever find you
Lying on the beach
In your bikini
Draped in blood
The crabs on your face
The sand in your crevasses
The moonlight in your blonde flowing hair
Used to smell like roses
Used to be so soft
After you came out of the shower
And lay down on the bed
Filling the bedroom with your warmth
But now you’re so pale and cold
And rotting rotting away
No I guess I could not keep you entertained long enough
Even though I am a poet
Such a goddam shame it had to be like this
Me alive, sipping warm milk
And you on the sands
The tide pulling you in
To black ceaseless waters
Oh well then
Farewell my love
See you in hell I shall
See you in bloody hell
The perfect place for you and me
I a murderer
You a liar
A whore
When we meet in hell
Well my dear
We can finally be together forever

The Girl in White (excerpt from Hell: A Novel)

2011-11-22T16:50:00.000-08:00

THE GIRL IN WHITE

I’ve been sitting in Taylor’s tiny house on Sunset since five o’clock and it’s nearly five in the morning now, and I can’t believe I’ve just sat here for twelve hours doing absolutely nothing. All I remember is fucking Daniel in the master bedroom. Well, not exactly fucking: he was eating me out and I was sucking on his tiny cock (which he actually thinks is huge) and then he left to get some beers but he hasn’t been back since he left at around four-thirty and I know he wasn’t going to get beers, and I know what he was really doing, yet…I can’t seem to care.

Taylor is watching Seinfeld and we’re both fucked up on pot and hash oil and meth (which my brother says is composed of battery acid, bleach, and cold pills, and I was like: “I gotta try that shit!”) and a couple of times the TV has floated at me and my heart started hammering but then I just figured it was the mixed pills and I tried to grip onto reality…but all I did was grip onto the chair and tear a hole in the arm and my teeth hurt from me gnashing them all the time.

I don’t know if I’ve fucked Taylor before or not.

He keeps turning to smile at me, and then turns back to the TV and simply stares into it with glazed eyes. My head is pounding as I try to remember…anything. I remember…Alexis and Clover were over. Alexis is Taylor’s fuck buddy, and Clover is Alexis’s fuck buddy, but I don’t think Taylor knows this, and Clover is also fucking Jillian, and Jillian is fucking this hot guy named Dillon, and Dillon is fucking this chick named Sammy, and Sammy is fucking Leonard, and Leonard is fucking everybody.

I wonder who else Daniel is fucking.

I close my eyes and reopen them…but the room keeps blurring in my vision, and I can barely concentrate on Seinfeld. All the words are slurred and Elaine’s face is floating in front of me and I think we’re married…and Jerry is there…and so is George and he’s talking smooth…and…I can’t understand what he’s saying but I think he’s coming on to me…but George’s father interrupts us and then Doug and Carrie Heffernan show up somewhere and I’m really fucked up on hash right now.

I remember one time when we did ecstasy and I was worried we were going to get in trouble.

“Don’t worry, baby,” Taylor said. “That’s what makes it even more of a thrill.”

It’s a Saturday morning and the night before we went over to Anywhere and we were hanging out at The Post and some band called Bloody Cunts was playing and they sprayed red syrup all over everybody and I was feeling really sick and fucked up on heroin and the whole time Clover was hitting on me and I think she was drunk and she said she wanted to eat me out. I told her to go away and somewhere during the night I stumbled out in front of a car and almost got hit and someone yelled at me. And then…I was in a car…and we were driving…and everything was blurry…my eyes were watering…and I was moaning…because someone was touching my leg…but I don’t know who. I remember going over the bridge into Hell and sitting in Pizza Ranch for awhile and we ordered two pizzas and Daniel was telling me to drink this giant Pepsi because he thought it would sober me up.

And then we came back here…and uh…that was…wait…then we couldn’t have gotten back at 5pm. It must have been around one in the morning or maybe even two…but it feels like I’ve been sitting here forever, in front of this TV, but maybe…I don’t know. Maybe Daniel’s only been gone for five minutes and I’m just really fucked up. Maybe nothing happened. I don’t know.

Our weekends have become even more repetitive and dull than the school days. Taylor’s dropping out, Clover’s going to possibly end up in a group home for drinking, Daniel is doing ok, Jillian is too busy eating out other girls (and we all hate her for it), but I don’t know how I’m doing; all I know is that I hate that school and I hate the teachers and I don’t want to go back after Christmas break is over.

And then, I realize…Christmas break was over a long time ago.

I’m staring at the TV, and it slowly comes into focus, and it’s that episode where Elaine tells Jerry that she faked in bed with him.

Taylor slowly turns onto his side and winces at me. “Is it true…do girls fake sometimes?”

I nod my head, try and force sound out of my lungs. “Yeeeeah.”

“Why do you have to fake? I mean…sex feels good no matter what, doesn’t it? I’m just saying, when I’m up to my balls in pussy…you know…it feels good.”

Vomit rises in the back of my throat. “It’s different for girls. Uh…you have to hit…certain spots.”

“Like where?”

“Like the clit. You have to rub the clit. That’s where…it feels…the best—est.”

“What’s a clit?” Taylor says. My eyes are sitting dull and numb inside my head, and I’m hoping I misheard him.

“What?”

“What’s a clit?”

“You…don’t know…what a clit is?”

Taylor stares at me. “Yeah…but uh…what is it?”

“It’s the…thing girls piss out of, dumbass.”

“What?”

“You know…that…bump…between the lips…it’s like a really tiny penis.”

“What the fuck are you talking about?”

“Do you ever look at girls when you fuck them?”

“No.”

“What it is actually…is a…undeveloped penis.”

Taylor has this really sick look on his face and it makes me want to burst out laughing. He’s so gullible.

“Girls have tiny cocks inside their pussies?”

I laugh and nod my head. “Yes, Taylor. They do.”

“Oh my God, that’s disgusting. Are you serious? Are you fucking with me?”

“No…I’m serious.”

“Show me.”

“I’m not gonna show you ya sicko!”

We sit there in silence and Taylor is shaking his head, staring at the TV, and the whole room is spinning again and I feel horrible. Something is throbbing behind my eye and the hot pain fills my entire head. I feel like I’m going to die.

“God…I have a headache.”

“You know what can cure a headache?”

“What?” I ask.

“An orgasm.”

“Go fuck yourself,” I mutter, placing a hand over my eye.

I peek through my fingers and there’s some kid in a giant coat walking up the front steps of the house and my heart starts hammering, but then I realize it’s just the paper boy. He puts the paper in the Tribune box and then just walks off.

“Who is that kid?” I ask.

Taylor gets up off the floor and peeks out the front window. “Uh…I don’t…yeah…I think he’s in one of my classes.”

“What’s his name?”

“Jack…Prince something.”

“Delivering papers…out in the snow…must suck.”

“He’s…a quiet kid. I don’t know. He’s weird. Did you know that fifty percent of shy kids grow up to be serial killers?” Taylor lies down on the floor in front of the TV again, turns and smiles at me, and I just stare at him, not sure what to say.

“Where…did you hear that?”

“The internet.”

“You think…he’s a serial killer?”

“I think anyone’s capable of killing someone. It’s the people who say they’d never kill anyone that end up doing it. They…something invisible drives them…and…it’s like…they don’t even know what happened…life changes from moment to moment…and sometimes changes are so sudden…and you have a dead body in front of you…and there’s blood on your hands…and you get a taste for it.”

I shake my head, putting a hand through my hair. “He’d never kill anybody. I think…I’ve seen him before. He wears these…Christian shirts sometimes. I think he’s a Christian.”

“If you’re a shy Christian that means you’re seventy-five percent more likely to become a serial killer.”

“Where do you get this bullshit?”

“The internet.”

I’m staring out the window, watching the snow fly by, and I’m feeling very cold, yet my chest is pounding with heat, as is my head. Throbbing.

“I wonder what he’s doing right now?” I ask myself.

“Delivering more papers.”

“What do you think he’ll…do after that?”

“I don’t know…go to bed…read his Bible.” Taylor starts laughing.

There’s commercials on the TV, yet Taylor is still staring into it. My eyes are sore and I have to close them. I can feel the room spinning inside my head. Or maybe it’s my brain.

“People don’t come over to Hell,” I say.

“No…they don’t,” Taylor says.

“We go over to Anywhere all the time…but people…don’t come over to Hell.”

“That’s because this is a shitty town.”

“The mayor tried to close down that porn shop…did you hear about that?” I ask, not really caring. I’m bored out of my mind. I’m just talking…because I can…and I don’t want to listen to the TV.

“I got Dillon a plastic vagina from there once. It was ribbed and shit. I don’t think he ever used it.”

“A lawyer came from New York to try and keep it open,” I mumble. “Why would a lawyer from New York come to North Dakota to try and keep a porn shop open?”

“I…don’t…know,” Taylor says?

“The mayor’s family…was…uh…getting…” I don’t remember what I was talking about.

“The mayor died, didn’t he?”

“They found his body cut up into five different pieces and thrown into the sewer.”

“Hell’s been floating on toxic waste for thirty years. Can you believe that shit?” Taylor says.

“No,” I say. “I guess I can’t.”

We sit there in silence and continue to watch Seinfeld and I yawn and my eyes droop shut. I am so dead inside. So fucking empty. When Seinfeld is over, Taylor sits up and clicks the TV off.

Silence. There’s this maddening silence that just overwhelms the room. It drives me crazy. I don’t know why. I start shaking, squeezing my hand into a fist, hoping Taylor will say something, anything…but he doesn’t. I feel so sick inside and my head is pounding….

I think silence makes you realize you’re alive. So many of us live without actually realizing we exist.

In the silence, I can hear blood pulsating through my veins, I can see the dirt-caked pores on Taylor’s face, I can feel the fabric of the chair, the coldness of the room, the breath moving in and out of my lungs…everything is so vibrant…and it’s driving me insane. I need the noise to cover up the fact that I’m alive, that I’m living in a fucked up world.

If I could shut off my thoughts, then I guess I’d realize…how very alive I am. I could pick up a gun, feel every tendon in my hand twitch, fluctuate, every blood vessel pumping, my heart beating, my brain processing information, sending nerve signals to muscle, muscle reacting to muscle, nerve to nerve…and then the gun at my head, the clicking of the trigger, the loud explosion, the gun powder, how it reacts, the stench, the blood spraying everywhere, the death of existence, everything shutting down….

“I drove past the school once,” I say.

“What?” Taylor asks, sitting up on the floor, lighting another joint.

“I drove…past the school once…into that neighborhood.”

“Why?”

“I was curious…what was out there.”

“What was out there?”

“It was like a maze…of houses. And…I became trapped…and I didn’t know where I was going, and I was panicking…and I thought that maybe…maybe this maze of houses went on forever…and maybe there was something beyond Hell, maybe some magical city of gold…out there…somewhere…once you reached the end of the maze…but then…I just followed this one street…and I saw the school again…and I was still in Hell…and I uh…I started crying.”

Taylor stares at me with wide black eyes. He puts a hand through his long hair and then gets up on his knees and tries to hand me the joint. I shake my head.

“That’s…really weird. Uh…you’re really deep. I think the uh…pot is making us…you know…more observant and smarter and shit.”

“You think so?” I ask.

“Uh…yeah. I mean, uh…yeah. Pot makes you smart. It…increases your…senses. Right?”

“Yeah, I guess.”

“You’re…hot.”

“Uh, thanks.”

Taylor smiles. “Yep. No problem.” He sucks in on the joint.

“Taylor…why do we have freshmen in our school? And how come Anywhere doesn’t?”

“I…don’t know. I hate them. They’re very…pathetic…you know? They’re all…so very…desperate…to have a boyfriend or girlfriend.”

I nod my head. “Yeah. They are.”

“I mean…what’s the point? Why can’t people just…fuck whoever they want? You know what I’m saying? Everyone’s so…fucking uptight. I mean…if you see someone you think is…hot…you should just be able to go up to them and ask them if you can fuck them. And they shouldn’t be offended by it…I’d take it as a compliment. I mean…for Christ’s sake! Someone wants to fuck you! And if they don’t want to, then you just don’t. And…it’s as easy as that.”

I stare into Taylor’s dark eyes. The room is spinning. “Yeah…but…fucking…has become so dull for me. It…really doesn’t…have any meaning.”

“Fucking is the best thing God ever created,” Taylor says. “It’s…uh…a beautiful thing. I’ve fucked ugly girls before. You know…someone needs to fuck them. I have no problem with it. I mean…I had to get pretty drunk to enjoy it….” He bursts out laughing, snorting. I just stare at him. “Everyone needs lovin’.”

“We are really…we talk about…stuff when we’re high, Taylor. We can never talk like this…when we’re not high.”

“See what I mean?” he says.

“When you see a hot girl, what’s the first thing you think?”

“I want to fuck her.”

I cringe, try and readjust myself in the recliner. “What’s uh…the second thing you think?”

“I want to fuck her.”

I just sit there, and it’s silent again.

“When you…uh…first did it with Daniel…did you actually…go all the way? He said you…sucked his dick.”

“I sucked his dick,” I say. My head is pounding and my hands are flinching and I’m bored out of my mind and I’m sick of talking about this shit and I feel completely empty.

“Oh…kay. Why?”

“I wasn’t ready.”

“How many…people have you fucked?”

“I…don’t know,” I say.

“Do you like Daniel?”

“No.”

“Do you…care about him?”

“No.”

“Do you care about me?”

“Not really.”

Taylor just sits there, and there’s a sound from outside, and I’m thinking Daniel has come home, but then I realize it’s just a cat. It quickly runs off and I’m watching it run away, scamper off into the snow, and for some reason I wish I was that cat.

“Why do you…hint around about things so much, Taylor?”

“What?”

“Why can’t you just say what you want to say? Why do you always have to hint around?”

“It…uh…makes things…easier?”

“You want to fuck me, don’t you?”

Taylor nods his head.

“Do you want to fuck me now?”

“Yeah,” Taylor smiles, and he’s actually salivating, like a fucking dog.

“How ‘bout I suck your dick?”

“That’d…be good.”

I slowly get up from the chair and stumble toward the master bedroom. Taylor already has his pants down, and I kneel down in front of him, put his cock in my mouth and suck, moving my tongue along the shaft, and he’s breathing hard, but he’s not moaning.

“Suck harder,” he says.

I suck on it hard, bobbing my head, running my tongue under the head, even playing with his balls, and then Taylor starts moaning.

“OH! Oh! Oh…hey…what’s your name?” he asks.

I stop sucking.

“I uh…always call you ‘the girl in the white shirt’.”

My mouth is sour with pre-cum, my face and chest are burning, and all I know is that one moment I have Taylor’s dick in my mouth, and the next, I bite down hard and there is this crunching sound and hot blood sprays into my mouth and Taylor’s on the floor, screaming, crying, and I actually have his dead, lifeless penis in my hand, and it’s shriveling up, growing cold, and I sit on top of Taylor and I shove the cock into his mouth and grab his sack and squeeze his balls and tell him to “FUCKING EAT IT!!!”

I bite into his testicles and they burst open with a loud popping sound and red jelly-like shit splatters my face and then white gunk comes spraying out near his rectum and I think I’ve ruptured his prostate and Taylor’s screaming: “MY ANUS HURTS!”

And I’m thinking about that band we heard play last night: Anal Blast.

I take his torn up testicles and shove them down his throat and I make him eat them. There’s blood and shit and semen and piss all over the floor and I’m sitting above him, my white shirt stained red, and I lean down into his face, and I whisper into his ear: “My name’s actually Sylvia.”

READ THE WHOLE NOVEL

Now available from Amazon.com and Kindle!
http://www.amazon.com/Hell-John-R-Lindensmith/dp/1463613385/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1310274975&sr=1-1
Amazon UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B005BT6E3M
Also, purchase the novel for Nook, Kobo, Sony Reader, and other ebook formats here: http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/71307

Barnes&Nobles: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/hell-john-r-lindensmith/1104086414

Hell Review from Graham Worthington, author of Wake of the Raven and Zorn

2011-11-22T16:46:00.000-08:00

In the town of Hell, North Dakota, seven teenagers lose their souls in a cesspool of drugs, sex, and violence.
These are the best years of your life: Football games. Dances. Romances. Drugs. Parties. Sex. Hate. Murder.

In the town of Hell, North Dakota, seven teenagers lose their souls. After a cruel prank causes a girl to commit suicide, their lives spiral out of control. At the junior prom, none of them may survive, when a gun-wielding maniac seeks revenge for the girl's death.

Now available from Amazon.com and Kindle!
http://www.amazon.com/Hell-John-R-Lindensmith/dp/1463613385/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1310274975&sr=1-1
Amazon UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B005BT6E3M
Also, purchase the novel for Nook, Kobo, Sony Reader, and other ebook formats here: http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/71307

Barnes&Nobles: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/hell-john-r-lindensmith/1104086414

Here's a review for this crazy adventure, from Graham Worthington, author of Wake of the Raven and Zorn:

"Hell the town's called, and a hellish picture Lindensmith paints of its high school. It's not long since this young author was himself incarcerated in one of these Halls of Learning, and grim places they must be, if they at all resemble his fictional, small-town school, where all the cruelty and confusion of youth comes together in a satanic dance that culminates in nihilistic slaughter.

The outer hell of high school is mirrored by the fiery pits of anger and emptiness within each of Lindensmith's characters. Shallow, pointless sex, often between people who loath each other, the confusion of recreational drugs and quick-fix psychiatric medication, the jealousies of possession and lust, the rigidity of pseudo-macho ideals. Sometimes love is found in this cesspit, and then as swiftly lost, to be replaced by unceasing sorrow.

Incessant bullying stokes these inner fires, and is usually performed by characters who writhe with self-doubt, themselves the victims of bullying or humiliation, while a mocking, ignorant teaching establishment ignores the rising hatred and terror. Nor is this climate of grief relieved by the "Christians" also boiling in this stew; hypocrites, who drone out trite formulas lacking the force of any kind of depth, values, understanding or commitment.

All the foulness that can happen populates the pages of Lindensmith's Hell, a hideous compression of small town evil, and Lindensmith's writing deals in no half measures. But how much does the novel reflect real life, and how realistically describe the hell that would exist if our worst desires were always made true?

Exaggerated? Unlikely? So you or I might say. But the realities of such massacres as Columbine High School say otherwise, with a far louder and far clearer voice.

As an avid reader and writer, I'v followed the progress of this emerging writer since his publication of Mystery Man and was eager to read and review this new novel, which I now have. And I tell you in all seriousness, I now need to go find a peaceful, dark place, and lie down for a while."

End of the Road

2011-11-22T16:37:00.000-08:00

Got no one to impress

No one to undress

So I reckon I’ll have another drink, my friend

You’ve seen the weather?

I’ve seen better

There’s a storm a comin’

Gonna wash the dirt away

Reckon I’ll wash it down with another gin, my friend

Hmmm…what’s that? Why’s the Miller boy cryin’?

Hmmm…well, I reckon it’s his dog Scraps

Died last night

Hit by a tow truck that never stopped

Reckon the Miller boy just realizin’

that everythang’s tempo’rary

And it ain’t easy bein’ six

‘scoverin pain for the first time

Realizin’ the equations is cold

And I reckon you should pour me two shots, Joe

Two shots to forget the too much I know

And didja hear? That Ol Henry died last night?

Syringe in his eye

Too many horses in the blood

Lost his wife and job last year

A goddamn shame

Hmmm…you know what?

I’ll have one more for the road

And where it goes

Oh my dearest friend,

I needn’t be told

I already know

I’ve seen where it goes

I’ve seen where it ends

Tattoo

2011-07-27T05:13:00.000-07:00

She asks me how I got the scar.
I could tell her something cool like I got in a fight with a bear or disarmed a Russian death ray with my right cheek, but instead, I tell her the truth. Which is this:
One day I was driving aimlessly downtown and I saw this place called the Dino Shack. Their logo was a T-Rex playing drums. And I was like: “Holy shit! That’s bad ass! I should totally get that tattooed ON MY FACE!”
So I did.
Three days later, I didn’t find the T-Rex playing drums on my face so bad ass anymore. So I got it removed.
And that’s why I have a huge scar on my face.
The girl gives me a blank look.
“I make a lot of snap decisions,” I explain.
She laughs. “Me too! That’s how I got this scar on my left tit!”
“The T-Rex and the drums?”
“The same one!”
We dated for three minutes. Then we got bored and went our separate ways.
Instant gratification. There’s nothing like it. When will our society ever learn to value patien---
HOLY SHIT! A GIRAFFE PLAYING A KAZOO! THAT IS BAD ASS! I SHOULD TOTALLY GET THAT TATOOED ON MY FACE!!

Flash Fiction

2011-07-25T13:28:00.000-07:00

Subtext

She removed the bloody bandages from her head as he watched. Neither said anything. Her mascara trickled down her cheeks in tendrils. He sat on the bed, the springs inside squeaking like feral mice.

He didn’t move. A block of lead resided quietly in his throat.

She washed the wound, the sink filling with crimson like chum on a salty sea. He exhaled a slow breath and she jumped. His eyes looked sad and innocent in the glow of the sliver moon.

Her scalp throbbed. Tiny crumbs of green glass fell from her long blonde hair, tinkling in the porcelain basin. Somewhere downstairs, a shattered beer bottle lay in the trash. She glanced at him. He stared through her, at the picture on the wall. In the picture, he held her from behind: he in a pressed charcoal tux, she in a flowing pink Cinderella dress. Prom 2007.

He exhaled again. She did not jump this time, only quivered. She could smell rotten barley permeated on his tongue. Heat rose in her chest. Her gut twitched. The tap on the sink was silenced. Crickets whispered to each other in the night. Tires squealed in the street, destroying the cricket’s serenity. Loud laughter and screaming soon followed. She jumped again.

He did not move. He did not say anything. She crawled into bed, turned on her side, and watched the moon wane through the window. She expected him to say something, perhaps kiss her on the cheek. He said nothing. He sat for a long moment on the edge of the bed and then moved, the springs beneath crying as he turned away from her. He stared at the opposite wall and fell asleep.

Faces

The man didn’t move. He stood in the rain like a statue, droplets of rain glittering on his trench coat like diamond beads in the yellow glow of the street lamps. I was afraid of him, but I didn’t know why. It wasn’t the pale moon that cast his shadow long on the sidewalk. It wasn’t the Pall Mall that dangled between thin white lips. It wasn’t the fact that I couldn’t see his eyes beneath the brim of his hat. No, I was afraid of all men, not just this man. The kind and gentle faces struck fear in me, as well as the ones hidden in shadows. As I passed him on the street corner, I felt my chest tighten. He did not move toward me. He did not look at me. When I locked myself in the safety of my apartment, hot tears poured down my cheeks, and I realized why I was afraid. Every man wore the face of my rapist.

HELL UPDATE

2011-07-19T08:26:00.000-07:00

HELL: A Novel is now availble on Nook, Kobo, Sony Reader, and other ebook devices. Thanks Smashwords!

http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/71307

Txtng iz soo0 stoopid lulz

2011-07-11T16:33:00.000-07:00

You ever meet someone so devoid of humor you swear they spent their entire childhood being raped and fondled by a family of sexually deviant honey badgers?

Example.

Text messages.

Jill: u want to meet @ the mall?
Cassie: Sure. What time?
Jill: 7
Cassie: Kk. sounds good.
Cassie: Sorry. Can't meet at 7. Does 8 work?
Jill: Ya. 8 worx.
Cassie: K. See you then.
Jill: Kkk.
Cassie: Racist.
Jill: Whut?
Cassie: You're a racist.
Jill: Why? :(
Cassie: Look at your last text message.
Jill: oh...
Cassie: You're a racist piece of shit and all you have to say for yourself is "oh"?
Jill: so does this mean u dont want to meet @ the mall?
Cassie: ...never mind. forget it.
Jill: :(

Hell: A Novel

2011-07-09T22:17:00.000-07:00

My second novel, HELL, is now available from Amazon.com and Kindle!

http://www.amazon.com/Hell-John-R-Lindensmith/dp/1463613385/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1310274975&sr=1-1

These are the best years of your life: Football games. Dances. Drugs. Parties. Sex. Murder.

In the town of Hell, North Dakota, seven teenagers lose their souls. After a cruel prank causes a girl to commit suicide, everything falls apart. At the junior prom, none of them may survive, when a gun-wielding maniac opens fire on the festivities.

Godzilla Clitoris

2011-05-25T22:03:00.000-07:00

Fourth time Godzilla has attacked the great city of Tokyo. Too early for this shit. Called into the Godzilla Task Force Center at 4am today. Not even time for some Ramen noodles and coffee. I slide my Level 60 clearance card through the scanner, then allow the armed men to grope my every orifice, searching for what…a hand gun? Lotion? Hello Kitty Chap Stick? The fellows seem especially frisky today, no pun intended. The facility is all chrome and marble and sliding plexiglass doors--which block your every movement from room to room. I pass through twelve of these sliding doors, each time having to slide my card like some kinda capitalist American, until I reach a bank of elevators. These lifts are inaccessible until you allow a blue laser to scan your retina. I can no longer see colors in my left eye.

The elevator ascends to the top floor. RESTRICTED ACCESS. LEVEL 60. TOP LEVEL PERSONELL ONLY. All that jazz. Nothing really special.

The elevator dings, lets me off. I press my fingertips onto a green pad, which lights up, scanning my prints. A female voice asks me my identity. I say Dr. Yoshi Takanawa. Female voice verifies my voice signature. Eighth plexiglass door slides open, allowing me access to the Godzilla Viewing Deck.

Outside the plexiglass observation windows: the beautiful city of Tokyo…currently in shambles and flames as the monstrous mutated iguana known as Godzilla goes rampaging through towers of glass and steel. Its mouth gapes open and it lets out a mighty roar that causes the observation deck to rattle.

My three comrades acknowledge me with a slight nod. Their names are Shogo Takanawa, Shimmy Takanawa, and the one female, Noriko Takanawa.

“So, what do we know?” I ask.

“She’s a female,” Shogo says, lighting a cig. “We had our birds fly between her legs and found a gaping vagina.”

Noriko raises an eyebrow. “A little early for this much misogyny.”

“Never too early,” Shogo says, putting a hand through his crisp white hair. He’s an old bastard.

“So, solutions?”

This time, Shimmy speaks up. A miracle. He’s the quiet one in the bunch. “We have built a replica Godzilla robot.”

“Ah, to fight Godzilla,” I say.

“Uh, no,” Shimmy says, looking shyly down at the chrome floor.

“To fuck her brains out,” Shogo says through a mouth full of smoke.

“Excuse me?”

Noriko jumps in: “Building a battle robot always results in more damage to the city than if we just let Godzilla have his way with Tokyo. So instead we built a Godzilla sexbot. ”

“Good god,” I say. “Do you think it will work?”

Shogo: “We’ve programmed the Godzilla Sexbot with a male brain. First thing it will do when it sees that gaping vagina is fuck it.”

“Seriously, Shogo. It’s four a.m.,” Noriko says.

“What do you think this is? San Francisco? Shut up you feminist wench.”

“Asshole,” Noriko mutters.

Shimmy hits a big red button on the control panel and the Godzilla Sexbot is released into the city through two steel bay doors. The Sexbot stomps into the heart of Tokyo and immediately goes for the female Godzilla. Ravaging her on top of a glass skyscraper.

“Men,” Noriko mutters.

“She doesn’t seem to be enjoying it,” I note.

“Shit,” Shimmy says. “We programmed the Sexbot with a male brain. He probably can’t find the clitoris.”

“You fools!” I yell. “Why didn’t you program it to be able to find the clitoris?”

“Well,” Shogo says. “To be apt…I’m not exactly sure where the clitoris is myself.”

“But you’re a scientist!”

“Hey, I love the vagina…but once the bay doors are pulled back, I don’t want to look down there. Looks like a bad salami sandwich.”

“Shogo!” Noriko says.

“It’s like getting a Christmas gift wrapped in green paper and red bows, but once you open it, the only thing inside is smashed up chewing gum.”

“It is too early!” Noriko says.

“When is the right time for misogyny?”

“After noon, when I’ve already had four sake.”

“Have some sake right now, then.”

“It is too early.”

“You fools!” I scream, waving my fists in the air. “Look! Look! The Godzilla Sexbot is already finished, leaving the female Godzilla unsatisfied.”

“Shit,” Shimmy says. “She looks pissed.”

“Must be on her period,” Shogo says.

Noriko breaks out the sake. “Fuck it. Who’s with me?”

“Oh God!” I cry. “Now the Sexbot is watching baseball on the Teletron in Center Square.”

Shimmy: “Not only that, the Sexbot is asking the female Godzilla if she could get him a beer and a sandwich.”

Shogo stomps out his cigarette. “Jesus Christ. We’re all fucked.”

The female Godzilla attacks the Sexbot and they both plummet into skyscrapers, further destroying our beautiful city of Tokyo. But then I realize something. The female Godzilla isn’t killing the Sexbot, she’s ravaging him. She’s on top now, riding him like a donkey in a Tijuana sex show.

“Look, she’s taking control!” Noriko cheers. “How empowering.”

Shogo lights another cig. “Yes, yes. Women power. How inspiring. Now let’s scramble the jets and fire tomahawk missiles into that whore’s cunt.”

Another crisis averted by the Godzilla Task Force.

Interview: Rosa Sophia, author of Taking 1960

2011-05-03T23:02:00.000-07:00

Rosa Sophia is the Editor-in-Chief of the Pagan Writers Community, a website she created to review and promote new writers. Just recently she has published her novel Taking 1960 through an independent publisher: Dreamz-Work Productions.

The book revolves around the story of a girl named Kat Maslin who inherits her grandparent’s farmhouse and while residing there, discovers a horrifying truth. Walking through the woods one day, she’s transported backward through time, to the 1960s, where she discovers her grandfather Philip played a role in the murder of her uncle John.

Here’s a passage from the book:

“She screamed when she saw the ax come down on John and break his body as though it had been nothing more than a twig…before Katherine could think twice, there was blood everywhere. John’s skull split like a melon and emptied its contents on the barn floor. Two swipes with the crude weapon and the less manly of the brothers was dead, murdered by his own father. Kat stood shaking by the barn doors, too weak to even cry. Philip turned, covered in blood, the ax held firmly in his right hand.

‘Why,’ Kat muttered, but it was all she could say. She wanted to vomit. The stench of blood was on the air, the barn was like a slaughterhouse.

‘I liked having you around,’ Philip said. His voice was strong and he didn’t even seem fazed by the fact that his son was lying dead beside him. ‘But I can’t have you telling people about this.’

She backed up, terrified, her muscles frozen with fear”

How did you go about getting your novel published?

I actually gave up after a while. Other writers tell me that they have enough rejection slips to paper a wall with. One man told me that he has over a hundred in his closet. I have a few, but definitely less than ten. This isn't because I'm a success story, necessarily; it is because I gave up. To be honest, I could have done a lot more to get recognized. In the end, networking with other writers, editors and publishers was what got me where I am today. I forged connections, which is probably one of the most important things a writer can do when working toward publication.

Did you seek an agent?
I did not seek an agent. I ended up with one, somehow. When I started my professional editing business, I had two clients; author David P. Smith and Dreamz-Work Productions, LLC. David became a friend of mine and pitched my idea to the owner of Dreamz-Work. For his part, David gets a percentage of my earnings.

How many rejections did you receive?
I have had less than ten rejections in my life. As mentioned above, I blame it on the fact that I had more or less given up. Still, I know that my writer and editor friends would say that I am not giving myself enough credit, which is probably true. It also has a lot to do with professionalism. Another important thing that a writer can do when working toward publication is strive to be professional. No one is going to pay any attention to you, no matter who you are, unless you polish up your query letter and submit highly professional material.

Timeline: start to finish. How long did it take between first draft and final publication?
It took me three months to write Taking 1960. That was in the summer of 2005. I had it professionally edited maybe a year later. It was polished and ready to go by 2007. Nevertheless, three to five years passed until it was published in August of 2010.

How many revisions were required?
It was edited a few times, by me and then finally by my editor. I added things to it, but not much was taken out. All in all, I am proud of how well it was done from the get-go.

What challenges do creative writers face today? What opportunities do they have today?
Challenges: It is very difficult to get noticed. The market changes constantly. What was true three years ago isn't necessarily true today. If you don't have connections, your book could sit on a “slush” pile for years. That's not to say that you can't get anywhere without connections. You can. It's just really difficult. And when you do get published, most publishers expect you to to do much of the marketing on your own, so by the time the agent and the publisher gets paid. . . Well, you really don't want to know how much (or rather, how little) I made at my first book signing.
            Opportunities: With the advent of self-publishing, a writer can get published no matter what as long as they have the money. However, the downside of this is that there are hundreds of terrible writers to every good one, and there are a lot of people out there who don't take self-publishing seriously because of this fact. The opportunities are there as long as you are willing to work for them. You can make money off writing, you can be successful: you just have to be aware that you cannot give up, and you cannot expect anything to be easy, no matter how many connections you make.

How did you promote your book? How did you network?
Blogs are very important, an author website, and an author page on Amazon. Put yourself out there and contact people. The more pushy you are, the better. Shameless self-promotion is key. I used Facebook a lot and Good Reads. Once you get out there, people will ask you questions just out of curiosity. Most people think writers are weird and eccentric. Don't ruin this for them. They love that cliché, and as long as they believe it, they will keep coming back for more.

What is your writing process?
My process depends on the material. If it is more involved and demands research, I might not start writing until after I finish the research. Most of the time, I do a little bit of outlining, but then I just go for it and start writing.

Why did you feel it was important for the story of "Taking 1960" to be told?I like to make people think. The story reinforces the fact that you never really know what's going on behind closed doors. Domestic abuse happens, and some people fall between the cracks. Some people get away with harming their family. Other than the paranormal part of the book, this story could easily be reality.

What's the difference between editing your own work and someone else's? You know your work, therefore you are less likely to catch mistakes. This is why it is so important to get your work professionally edited. The money is worth it, as long as you are careful about who you choose. I am an editor, and I know that when I edit someone else's work, I am more likely to catch mistakes. You're too involved in your own work to see certain things, especially if they are small details. Reading out loud helps, but it doesn't always suffice.

Do you have any advice to creative writers?
Be creative, but also be professional. Don't give up on professionalism “because I'm a writer and I just can't adhere to those rules.” Fact of the matter is, publishing your work is just like any other business. The publishers want what sells, and they want to see professionalism. If you don't adhere to those rules, you are just cheating yourself out of possibilities, and you're taking the easy road (giving up) because you don't think a clean query letter matters. (I've seen people like this at the magazines I used to work for.) Finally, don't give up after one or two rejections; if you're a good writer, there's a publisher out there who wants you. You just have to keep trying until you find them.

What's your ultimate purpose as a creative writer? What's your goal? What do you want to achieve?
I have already achieved it. This is what I wanted, to be published. I have made PEANUTS as far as royalties go, but the important thing is that I made it. And I'm hoping to be recognized by the big stores, like Barnes and Noble, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

Rosa's Amazon Page: http://www.amazon.com/Rosa-Sophia/e/B0040NN5W8/ref=ntt_athr_dp_pel_1

Other Websites: www.paganwriters.com

www.rosewrites.webs.com

www.xanga.com/lily_scarlet

Interview: Karl Vadaszffy, Full of Sin

2011-04-28T21:18:00.000-07:00

"After studying literature, linguistics and Spanish at university, Karl Vadaszffy trained as an English teacher and an actor. He has edited magazines, taught English as a foreign language and is currently the Head of English at a school in Hertfordshire. As a freelance journalist, his articles regularly appear in seven magazines that cover the automotive, aerospace, technology and travel industries. To find out more about Karl visit his website: www.karlvad.co.uk. You can also follow Karl on Twitter, Facebook and his blog" ( http://wildwolfpublishing.com/KVadaszffy.aspx).

Book description from Amazon.com:

Born a mistake, Sean is taken from his drug-addicted prostitute mother at the tender age of eight, but after years of neglect and abuse all the tenderness has long been beaten out of him, leaving behind only a deformed soul. Foster families can't handle him, but he meets his match when he is taken in by the Andersons. Life seems normal, but when a passionate tryst with his foster sister ends in violence the comfortable life Sean has come to see as his own is over and he must learn to fend for himself.

Alone, desperate and fighting for survival, Sean's darkest urges become uncontrollable and his sins go too far. A broken individual, haunted by the darkest of dreams, he fi nds solace in the drug world. But it is in the arms of love that Sean unexpectedly starts to feel human, all the time unaware that his past is preparing to make a surprise reappearance.

How did you get published?

I submitted to agents and over the years (four!) got a lot of feedback. Ultimately, Full of Sin was deemed 'too shocking' for mainstream publishers. So I approached independent publishers and got an offer from Wild Wolf Publishing.

How many rejections did you receive?

At one time, I thought I'd been rejected by every agent in the UK (and a good number in the US too). But I now admit it was only about 99%. That said, the feedback I got from agents was invaluable, so rejections often came with benefits (I was fortunate to have contact with some agents through writers I've worked with, so I got feedback, which isn't particularly common unfortunately).

Timeline: start to finish. How long did it take between first draft and final publication?

Four years, give or take, from seriously working on it to publication. But I wrote a first draft of Full of Sin when I was about sixteen, put it in a cupboard and then reworked it when I was 22. It was published when I was 28.

How many revisions were required?

Repeated. In fact, non stop. I rewrote it so many times that I have memorised much of it. The same is true of my new novel, The Waiting Game. I write and rewrite and that's the only way I can produce something that works.

What challenges do creative writers face today? What opportunities?

Mainstream publishers generally don't want to take a chance on a debut author, so getting started is hard. Then a lot of them won't pay new writers much. Plus with such a focus on e-publishing now, the door has been opened to self-publishing. This can be an opportunity for new writers who can tell a good story well, but it also opens the door for a load of rubbish to become available, which makes getting your book noticed in the crowd much more difficult. Gosh, that was harsh, but it's ultimately the truth.

How did you promote FULL OF SIN?

As Wild Wolf was relatively new when Full of Sin was published, there wasn't much reach in terms of publicity. I worked very hard locally and got local press and a lot of help from local bookstores. That's where every writer should start. In addition, I approached larger newspapers, radio and TV, but with limited success. I had a positive response from the Times Educational Supplement as I'm also a teacher. That's a national paper in the UK, so it gave the book good exposure. Other than that, Facebook is helpful. I also used Authonomy, the Harper Collins website, to let previous readers of Full of Sin (from when it was on the site) that it was available. Amazon forums can have a good response, but then again some of the users can be vicious to what they term 'self-promoters', so be thick skinned if you use them.

What is your writing process?

I don't do outlines until I'm well into the story, and then I only use them to make sure I don't forget what's happened. Not the best memory, so I need them! I have an idea for the opening and then I write. I let the words take me where they do. I don't aim for perfection when writing a chapter; I prefer to get ideas on the page and redraft later. I don't always know the ending when I start. For The Waiting Game, I had a great opening but no idea where I would go with it. I finished the book and then after getting agent feedback I changed the last third of the book. A new ending completely. And I'm much happier with it. Full of Sin has remained pretty much the same since I first finished it. The only change was the order of the first three chapters - author Sophie Hannah, whom I've worked with, read it and made some structural suggestions, which I followed.

Is FULL OF SIN autobiographical in any way?

No, no, no. I'd even go as far as saying I can be quite a nice person, which Sean, at the beginning at least, isn't. Some of the place descriptions are places I have been to slightly altered, but that's it. Oh, one thing is true: I don't like naval rings, so you can understand why what happens happens.

Why did you feel it important that the story of FULL OF SIN be told?

Because there are sick people in society. By sick, I mean people who do bad things. And sometimes there are reasons. Sometimes it's society that lets people down, not the other way round. I don't want the reader to like Sean, but I do want him to be understood. I think that's a reflection of real life and I think books should, in some way, look at the lives we live, whether pleasant or not.

What writers inspire you?

Full of Sin was inspired by The Cement Garden by Ian McEwan. I read that novel and was amazed by how writing could make you feel disgusted yet compelled to read on - like a car crash. So that's what I tried to do with Full of Sin. The Waiting Game was inspired by Sophie Hannah's Little Face. How does somebody react when faced with the most unbelievable and unpredictable situation? In addition to McEwan and Hannah, I'm inspired by Wilkie Collins, Harlan Coben and John Harvey.

Any advice to creative writers?

Persevere and dive under a hard shell. Accept criticism of your work and listen to people already in the business. Make as many connections with those people that you can; they are invaluable. And grab the reader within the first page, or two, or three... go on too long and you'll never get published the traditional way (or, at least, that's the way the saying goes).

Do you have any new projects in the works?

I've mentioned The Waiting Game, which is currently with an agent who's been redrafting it with me. I'm waiting to hear... I've also started the next one (only one chapter though - again, I have no idea of the ending, but I think it's a decent opening). I've moved on to more commercial crime writing - one of the biggest markets in publishing. The Waiting Game introduces a female detective who, if published, will star in a series.

Read an excerpt of Full of Sin:

Interview: Graham Worthington, author of Wake of the Raven and Zorn.

2011-03-29T14:34:00.000-07:00

(picture from Amazon.com Author Page)

"I was born in England. Not the England of bustling London, nor even the southern counties, but the North of great industrial towns, separated by vast expanses of hills and moors, the land of 'Wuthering Heights.'

I read a lot from childhood onwards, and attempted my first short story at age eleven. 'Would you like to be an author?' a girl asked me in my teens; 'there's no money in it,' I replied, not from desire for wealth, but from desire for life, and travel, which require a solid job to bring in the cash. So I worked, and travelled through life, though experience, through the world, yet always the dream of the novel drifted in the back of my mind.

Europe I saw, touched its worn stone and ancient Istanbul, and crazy Rio de Janeiro; and America too, from cold Toronto to sweltering Miami, touching its chill chrome, its smooth plastic.
Then the story entered my mind, lived there, grew, and kicked the sleeping dream awake, till at 8.30 pm on the thirty-first of December,1999, I paused as I left the shower. Soon, I thought, soon the century ends, mere hours, and the novels are still merely an idea. So I opened a Word file....

My first is Wake of the Raven, available on Amazon, the first of a series chronicling a disastrous love affair from the early fifties to the end of the century. I'm pleased with it, and the second in the series is partly written" (from Graham Worthington's Amazon.com author page).

Graham Worthington's newest novel, Zorn, is now available through Amazon.com and other online book retailers.

Here's the book description from Amazon.com:

"In the year 2035 it's cool to be bisexual - or at least pretend to be - and cool to be young, but to be both and on holiday in France is the coolest of all. Zorn and family are at The Anders Hotel, in the little port of Roknor, whose main attraction in daytime is its crowded beach, and in the evening its many clubs. Rejoicing in recently turning sixteen, Zorn has ten days to find Holiday Love, and isn't helped by the presence of Kevin, a coarse and violent homophobe. But despite their differences, neither can escape life's challenges, and find to their dismay that our joys and sorrows come mixed and inseparable. The mid twenty-first century is a time of looking back, a time laden with much nostalgia for the past, but little money. The Great World Depression of the 2020s has seen to that. It is a time of thumbing through the music, films and fashions of the last century, a time of imitating the lost Golden Age of the 1900s. It is also the era of core language, the final perfection of politically correct speech avoiding the use of such hideously offensive words as "he" and "she," with all their built-in stereotypes, all their dangerous assumptions about gender roles and sexuality. Yet it is a time when, though all has changed, nothing has changed. The sea still surges to the distant horizon, the waves still crash to the beach, and on these daily washed sands new people act out the ancient dramas afresh. Zorn is a story of romance, adventure and coming of age in this post-apocalyptic society."

Why did you choose to self publish Zorn?

This question gnaws at all little-known authors nowadays, because, for them, the traditional industry might as well not exist. In centuries past such talented authors as the Bronte sisters, or (Miss) George Eliot passed themselves off as men in order to penetrate the publishing industry’s prejudices, yet they as women attacking this male fortress had more chance of success than we do today. The industry goes with what is safe; they will not risk the cost of printing and shelf space in a world that is content to chew on the work of known names. When a writer self publishes he becomes an author, and with some effort can make some sales, and get customer feedback by reviews. He may even make a name, and so force the industry to pay attention.

Did you initially seek an agent? If so, how many rejection letters did you receive?

I did, but not for Zorn. When I’d finished my first, Wake of the Raven, I sent off massive amount of submission letters to agents, in whatever format they specified: approach letter only, or plus summary of 50 or 200 words, or plus first chapter, or plus first three chapters, or plus favorite chapter… whatever! I downloaded a list of 200 agents, and probably went through about half of them. A dozen or so replied with encouraging little format letters saying stuff like “interesting, but not for them,” or one line refusals. One only offered any useful advice. By the time I got the idea for Zorn, in early 2006, I had despaired of agents.

From what other authors have told me, and my own experience, I’d say that most agents are bullshit artists. Also, they are a dying breed, with too many bad manuscripts driving them nuts, and too few traditional publishers listening to them.

Timeline: start to finish. How long did it take between first draft and final publication?

With Wake of the Raven, I got an idea for a story, and chewed on it for about eight months. Then I made some notes, so I guess that was Day One. I finished the final Ms two years and six months later, in July 2002, at one hundred and thirty-four thousand words. Then it sat on the shelf for about four and a half years, while I got involved with heavy crap at work, and had this futile second business/hobby of sending submission letters and part-writing other novels. I chose a self-publishing company in October 2006, and had it on the market by January 2007.

Zorn I wrote as a longish short story in 2006, about thirty pages over a month or so. I came back to it in late 2008 and wrote another hundred and eighty pages over a couple of months, turning it into a complete novel. I wrote it in this two-stage way deliberately, as I wanted to try writing by a different method. I formatted to self-publish immediately, then all kinds of work commitments and my wife’s illness arrived at the same time, and I didn’t publish till January 2010.

How many revisions were required?

I don’t really work that way. I start re-writing very soon after I’ve done any original creative writing. By the time I finish what I could call the “first draft,” which means a coherent story with “The End” after the last line, I’ve done at least three-quarters of the re-writing and editing. This is good, as I hate editing.

I have a separate Word doc. for each chapter, and every time I open that doc. and add to that chapter or (re-write) I save as a new doc. So ch.1.A is abandoned for ch.1.B.doc, for ch1.C.doc, etc., even if I only alter or add a few words. I usually have the rough first draft of a chapter by version C, but (depending on the difficulty of the chapter) the final version of every chapter can be anything from the eighth to the thirtieth, with each successive re-write becoming more minor. When I’m happy, I joint the whole lot together into one doc.

What is your writing process (outlines, notes, etc)?

I think I could best describe it as continuous growth towards a goal. Get an idea, chew on it mentally, and at some point say enough, and start. So far I’ve invariably started at what will be page one, but I aimed towards different goals. In Wake of the Raven it was the climatic event, after which I worked towards the final solution that ends the novel. In Zorn I wished to act out a complex dance of events that rise to a crescendo. I write outlines throughout the process in separate files. Notes I write in italics, directly onto the chapter, and delete them in later versions.

What challenges do creative writers face nowadays? What opportunities?

First they need to find out if they ARE creative, whether as a writer or anything else. This is a point on which I’m liable to get excited and bite people. I don’t think that this will be a popular view, but I don’t think writing is a “real job,” or a “real career.” By the way, is “creative writer” a good description? Aren’t fiction writers really investigators, whose musings on reality turn into a sort of vomiting-forth of speculations, as seen from an eagle’s eye viewpoint, with convenient condensation of timeline and highlighting of major high and low points? Then how can they report on reality if their working life is no more than that reporting? A mirror facing nothing more than a mirror?

Also, I don’t believe in Creative Writing Courses. Do you want to create? Then start, and learn how to do even as you do. The vision, the idea, the vague picture in your mind, the obsession in your heart: these make books, not writing classes. Taking a writing class is like a man taking lessons in bicycle riding with the idea that he may some day own a bike. Creative writing is an expression of what is learned in life, in fascination, joy, horror, pain and suchlike.

Re opportunity: become a doctor, or a plumber, or something else useful where the usefulness is real, and not dependent on someone’s “artistic” judgment. Making a living by writing is well nigh impossible. Do something else. Becoming a creative writer depends on your desire, and your ability. Making a living by it depends on a fickle world.

In reality, I know nothing about opportunity. I’m an engineer by profession. But if I could see a clear path to achieve effective marketing, I would write full time. I have ideas for several years of novel production.

How did you promote your Book? How did you network?

When it comes to promotion, having written something worth reading is a pre-condition, not a guarantee of success. Networking is a great thing, and easy, but the networks are choked with others who also found them easy to use. Xanga is the best blogging system I’ve ever used, but it’s overrated. The trick is to involve people who have a mouse in one hand and a credit card in the other. Listmania on Amazon is good for this, and I use it. On a larger scale, I feel it essential that indie authors band together to recapture the public’s eye, and this is something many of us are working on. Marketing is a vile, desperate business that has little to do with writing.

Is Zorn autobiographical in any way?

Not really. Both my novels are biographical of people who could exist, using characters who can exist, and probably somewhere do exist. But not necessarily me. Some incidents do exist.

Why did you feel it important that the story of Zorn be told?

I’m wary of claiming importance to either work. I would rather that others told me. Zorn is essentially a conflict between two viewpoints: that of an elderly, cautious, successful man, and that of a fiery teenager. Is it important that such stories be told? Perhaps it is. Perhaps that theme is important.

What writers inspire you?

Reading enjoyable writing inspires me, but not necessarily the writer who wrote it. Jack Kerouac inspires me to avoid the mistakes that ruined his work: self-indulgence and lack of rewriting. I’ve read so much different stuff that I wouldn’t know where to begin, so I’ll leave it at that for now. To me, the work remains, but the writer vanishes.

Any advice to creative writers?

Tons.

Woking in short chapters is easier, but you may not want to publish in short chapters, in which case you combine them. I’ve found that a chapter length of about three thousand words is best to work with.

Don’t stare at a blank page wondering what to write on it. You had an idea, an interesting story of characters who do, say, leap, agonise, betray, laugh… but now you might find yourself stuck, unable to write story. Then, try writing about your idea instead of writing it. Write notes or speculations on what they may be like, or do and say. These notes may make the story obvious, or even suddenly transmute into part of the story.

Something I learned in England: if a writer’s group is formed, it should have a rule: support each other, and avoid bitching contests.

A novel is essentially a long letter written to one person. Even if a million read it, it is addressed to one person, the reader. Do your best to make him feel what you feel. Do not try to be all things to all readers. There is only one reader.

Get others to read your work. Listen to their comments, take them seriously, thank them, and then ignore 90% of them. People are very eager to leap about excitedly when asked for literary opinions, but nine times out of ten they talk rubbish..

Do you have any new projects in the works?

Most definitely. I have three novels and one factual work part written.

An excerpt from Zorn:

Fucking twat, thought Kevin, biting into his pizza savagely. We were supposed to be together, and he fucks off and leaves me.

Kevin had not had a good night. Here a week already, and not a sniff of a girl. Last night he and Michael had sworn not to drink too much, and that way they’d pick up a couple of girls while everyone else were falling down drunk. So he’d taken it steady, but Michael had gone and got pissed up at Ranchers as usual, and then got lucky at Silvers. They nearly couldn’t get in, and when they did Mike had got talking to some girl, and slutting about with her all over Silvers, and then they’d both vanished. So where was he this morning? Not in his room, and hadn’t shown up by 12 o clock, and so he, Kevin, was sitting at mid-day eating pizza on his own.

He’d banged on the door, but Michael never showed his face, so he never came back last night, unless he’d got so pissed he was still out cold. Did that red-haired slut have a room of her own? If it was her he’d left with, which wasn’t certain, ‘cause he hadn’t seen them leave.

Kevin chewed on his pizza uneasily, and pocked with a finger at the mushrooms, brooding on another possibility. That little slut with the purple eye liner vanished about the same time, that Zorn bitch with the smart mouth who’d been sniffing around Michael a couple of days ago. What if they’d left together? No. Michael hadn’t said anything, and in any case he liked things straight, none of these butch girls or fairy boys. So he’s been on top of that red-haired piece all night, and was probably on top of her now, and he’s said sod you and left me on my tod. Twat. Bitch. Of course I’d do the same, but so what? What’ll I do now on my own?

Kevin bit into the pizza and looked across the room glumly. An older guy a table or two away looked up at the same moment, and their glances met. Kevin wagged his slice in vague greeting, then looked moodily out of the window at the passing people. He remembered the dude from Silvers last night, and smelt the scent of a fellow sufferer, for he didn’t look too happy either.

Iril didn’t remember Kevin at all though. Lump, he thought, some straight dummy stuffing his face. Hit the gym would be a good idea.

The door swung open and a trio of birls came blasting in, noisy and giggling behind dark sunglasses, wet-patched Bermudas pulled hastily on over wet bikini bottoms, bare feet sandy from the beach from where they’d fled in hunger. “Iril,” cried their leader, and crashed down into the seat opposite his, hair dripping.

Iril winced at the spray of saltwater drops and spread his hands protectively over his plate. He liked Evren – she was always cheerful – but she couldn’t seem to get it through her head he was gay.

Lucky sod, thought Kevin, watching slyly through narrowed eyes while pretending to indifference. That’s a nice looking chick, and she’s too young for you. More my age. Lay off and send her over here mister. But the chick was all over the dude, standing and leaning over the table, smiling into his face with her big knockers nearly coming out of her top, almost dumping them on his plate. Mangoes! Rub them up against his nose, why don’t you, thought Kevin enviously. And the dude was talking to her so easily, not stuck for words.

I wish I could do that, thought Kevin. Now the girl was twisting round the table, half going to the service counter with her feet and half hanging in there with her elbows on the table, still talking to buddy, and now it was her bum wagging at him, Kevin, and she must have made a joke, ‘cuz the dude was laughing.

To Kevin it seemed – again – that there was a realer world than his, with realer people in it who were comfortable and knew the rules. Some people were shiny, somehow, and belonged, and people talked to them as if they were important. He felt greasy, and little.

Now the girl was scurrying away to join her friends at the counter, and the dude was looking after her with a funny smile, sort of tolerant, as if she was nothing else but amusing. He must have a bunch of girlfriends, thought Kevin, he doesn’t care about her much. He’s cool.

As he turned back the man glanced at Kevin, who gave him a smirk of complicity. The guy laughed a little in a self-conscious way, and dropped his attention back to his plate.

No sense hanging out here, thought Kevin, I’ll go to the beach and see if Michael’s there, the twat.

Kevin walked the promenade from one end to the other, and back again, but there was no sign of Michael. On the way back he saw someone familiar, standing pensive at the water’s edge, denim shorts and flowing black hair. Kevin stopped. That Zorn bitch again! But there was no sign of Michael, and the bitch was kicking the sand, sort of lost. Hate you all the same, thought Kevin, yet felt envy at the slim, athletic shape…

For more information on Graham Worthington, check out his Amazon.com Author's Page:

http://www.amazon.com/Graham-Worthington/e/B002UV8QTE/ref=ntt_athr_dp_pel_1

Interview: Poppet, author of Exploits

2011-03-25T14:51:00.000-07:00

Poppet lives in her own little world, and suffers from an intense crush on Cupid. So much so she's
taken up archery to impress him. She's currently giving up her addiction to sarcasm by going cold turkey, loves jelly beans, and has a closet Lamborghini fetish. She also thinks planets rock, because they take up space.

Poppet is the author of Exploits, a novel about a girl named Stephanie who becomes entangled in an abusive relationship. The novel was released by Night Publishing and is available on Amazon.com in paperback and Kindle editions.

Excerpt:

Chapter 39

Mr Smooshy

I spent the afternoon cooking the perfect meal for the best friend any girl could wish for. Selene has rescued me from my mistakes more times than I can count. The drama merry-go-round with Gary is so old, she must be sick of it and sick of me being on it and always running to her. I've organised for my clothes to be delivered out of storage, but pretty much sold up everything else I owned to get money to take abroad with me. Somehow, I'll find a way to get back on my feet without breaking this friendship in the process. At least with my work clothes back in my closet, I'll be able to apply for real jobs that pay real money.

* * * * *

Well hallelujah. Sinclaire gave me my old job back. I've decided men are bad news, and have started wearing a wedding ring when I go out, so the buggers will leave me alone. Selene is enjoying having me cooking in her house, and the wine, and Luke is off limits apparently. Just as well, we all know that good looking men spell disaster. Don't suppose you know where the ugly guys hang out? I was thinking that if I need someone to go to the movies with, or a wedding, it might be nice to have a plain old chap as back up.

Oh, I forgot to tell you, Selene has a boyfriend. He's super dishy and nice. Seriously, this dude is an ex-personal trainer with broad shoulders and a wicked sense of humour. He gives me hope that there are men out there who aren't messed up, and who won't mess the woman they're with up either. His name is Zeke, and he's my hero. Weirdest turn of events. Zeke lives up the road and needs a room-mate to stay in his spare room so that his money can go further. Damn strange, but his new roomie is going to be me. I'm beginning to think that the top of this hill is the place to find sweet hotties hiding from the world. It's the best kept secret in Cape Town.

Returning to work was like coming home after a year in the army. It was the best decision I made to swallow my pride and Gary-shame and get that employment back. Frank, James, Shayne, Julie, Michelle, Lindsay, Ted, Dianne, just everyone really, wanted to celebrate and return right back to where we left off.

So guess who's going out to the Swinging Door tonight? Yep, you guessed right – me and Selene, Zeke and his friend Tom, and the gang from work. This gives me just two hours to go shopping after work to get myself a killer outfit. I'm planning on doing plenty of flirting, but this time, my heart's staying out of it.

Window shopping is fine. Even testing, like a free sample, or spraying a hint of perfume to decide if you like it, is okay. You didn't get that did you? Dancing, kissing, hugging, that's what I'm talking about, and of course accepting drinks is on the acceptable list, just no serious dating, not for a very long time; but, I don't think I'm ready for anyone new. Can't a girl just go out with her friends and not have to play the gender game?

...Pause ...

… Play …

I'm alive! What is it about dancing that is so life validating? I'm wearing boots, and a strappy black dress to show off my new tramp stamp. Did I or did I not say, I Shirley, will? My body, my life, Fuhquim! Anyway, so this is fun, not to mention the interested stares coming my way. My esteem is finding this good ego-medicine. My mojo is coming back.

That does it. Relationships and me are like phosphorous and water, we don't mix well at all, therefore I deduce I will be a very happy single girl until I meet someone plain and sweet, about a hundred years from now. Right, so, would someone please tell that to Mr-Tall-and-Fabulous walking towards me.

Deliberately I smooth my hair behind my shoulder with the hand wearing the fake wedding ring, currently on loan from Selene until I buy my own.

"Hi."

I smile back. "Hi." He's been eying me out all night from the other side of the dance floor. And he's tall enough to see right over everyone's heads. How tall is that exactly? About six-foot-four? Dayam, go away, you are far too drool-worthy to be good for me.

"I'm Richard."

That would make him a Dick. It takes all of my self-control not to laugh in his face. "Shirley."

Yes, you heard me, I don't want to know men hot enough to blister my lips with their eyes, thank-you-very-much. If he doesn't know my name, we can't manifest an attachment.

"Can I buy you a drink?"

I offer him an apologetic smile, "No thanks." Waving finger in his face, "I'm married." And for the record I only take drinks from ugly boys and friends at this point.

"That's too bad. He's one lucky guy."

Bugger! How is it that a man can manage to snap the cartilage in your knees with one sentence and a strong chin combined with velcro, soft brown eyes? I don't think mine can hold me up any longer. He seems so sweet. None of the usual arrogance or attitude coming off this dude at all.

"Thanks," I reply, watching him turn and shrug sadly to his friends.

Zeke walks over and does the 'my broad shoulders can protect my woman and her friends from anything' step in. Blocking my view of Mr Smooshy walking away.

"Everything okay? He's not bothering you, is he?"

Aw, how sweet is Zeke? Okay, hang on a sec! Where did all the nice men come from? Why now? Why, when I want to hate every single last one of you, do I suddenly have a Zeke and a James watching my back. Oh and look, Zeke's back-up in the form of Tom has just arrived on my other side. Two personal trainers with the muscles to prove it. I feel famous, as if this is my bouncer squad. Tom glares over to where I can't see Mr Smooshy, also known as Dick. Waaaahahahaha.

"I'm fine, thanks." I reassure the goon squad. I'm not used to being protected, I'm used to being stomped on.

Tom offers me a businesslike smile, "Need a drink?"

Well now that you mention it, "Yes please."

As Tom moves away, attaching himself to my elbow and carving a path through the dance floor to lead me with him to the bar, I catch Richard's stare. He points at Tom and mouths, "Is that your husband?"

I shake my head in response, smiling at the guy's balls. They put Texas to shame they're so big. Do men not care that you're married? Or am I just a really bad liar?

Hours later, I'm tired and sitting upstairs watching my friends still dancing. Quietly having a smoke with my feet propped on the bars that make up the railing overlooking the dance floor, when heat arrives next to me, and Mr Smooshy sits down next to me with his drink, which is a Coke and something.

Glancing at him, I'm stuck in his velcro eyes again. One look and you're burred. You can't look away.

"Shirley ..."

"Yes."

"How come your friends call you Stef?"

"It's an inside joke." Finally I unhook my gaze and stare back at my friends, wondering if I'm going to need help. Where's James?

"How long have you been married?"

Um, fuck. That's a good question. "A while." I can do this. Play it by ear.

"You used to come here all the time."

Ow, I think I just pulled the tendon in my neck when I Linda Blaire'd him with that comment.

"Yes, I used to."

"I was chuffed to catch you tonight. I've been working up the courage to talk to you for about two years."

No fucking way! "Oh really? Why?" I mean, come on, am I that scary?

"Hot girls make me nervous."

Oh, so I'm hot am I? Are you kidding me? You're bloody walking chocolate, and you think I'm hot? Girls probably stalk you.

"You're much too kind," I say. What an overused saying, but he's obviously forgotten to wear his contacts tonight.

"Pity you left and got married."

Okay, now I'm staring. He seems really sincere, and all heartbroken. His expression would look good on a "I'm so sorry I fucked up" card from Hallmark. Your timing really sucks, Dick. Pfffft! I'm going to laugh again. DON'T LAUGH! You can't laugh when he's just stuck his vulnerabilities out far enough for the entire club to notice. He's actually totally adorable. Fuck it, you know, maybe this is the universe finally taking pity on my sorry ass.

"I'm not married, I just wear it so guys will leave me alone."

Oh crap. He looks like I slapped him twice and kneed him in the nuts.

"God. I'm doomed." He runs a hand through his short brown hair as he ducks his head to stare at his foot propped next to mine. Standing, he backs away as he says, "I'm sorry I bothered you."

And he backs straight into Tom. Tom gives him the second bouncer glare of the night. Richard shoots me another, 'Would you mind explaining who this guy is?' stare, before disappearing into the black hole that is the stairwell going downstairs.

Tom replaces Dick's presence next to me, leaning elbows on knees to stare down to where Zeke is being all romantic with Selene. "That guy just won't leave you alone."

"Nope." I'm looking for him to reappear back with his friends. I'm feeling just horrid.

"Well at least we have each other while those two make you want to puke."

Casting a quick glance at the love-birds, I nod, "Yep."

"So I heard you're staying with Zeke?"

Where is he?

"Yep."

"So we'll be seeing a lot of each other."

Red flag! Sirens! What the hell is he saying? Stopping my search for Mr Smooshy, I stare at Tom. He's a player, you can tell. "Probably."

"Good, I like you."

Generic smile. He's a nice enough guy, as Zeke's friend. I'm not sure how to respond, but he clarifies for me.

"I mean, it's good that we'll get along. It'd suck if I thought you were a bitch and I had to see you every time I visit Zeke."

Oh right. Better smile, "Well, yeah. Thanks for not thinking I'm a bitch." And I snap my attention back to look for Mr Smooshy, and all of his friends are gone!

This calls for action! Jumping off my perch, "Sorry Tom, I'll be back in a bit." And I dash down the stairs toward the entrance, looking for Richard. My heart sinks when I see the three of them turning the corner down the next street. Shit! My pride just won't let me run after a guy, no matter how nice he seems,

Sighing heavily, I go back inside. I guess I'd better get used to Tom then, as we're the two extra wheels on this ride. But right now I'm really annoyed with him for distracting me at such a crucial moment. Just my crappy luck.

How did you get published?

I was signed on by Wild Wolf Publishing who released my novel Darkroom. Following that I was signed to Night Publishing who released two of my novels under two different author names.

How many rejections did you receive?

More than I kept count of. Hundreds.

Timeline: start to finish. How long did it take between first draft and final publication?

About a year.

How many revisions were required?

None.

What challenges do creative writers face today? What opportunities?

The challenge is patience. This is a process of refining your work and to keep writing, improving your craft. Have a writer network who aren't afraid to tell you the truth about what is working in your writing and where you are falling short. Only honest opinions will improve your work and get you to the place where people want to sign you and publish you. I think too many authors are impatient and expect to be signed and published overnight. It took me fifteen years to get to this point. Writing for many other media forms to gain experience and credibility as a writer. If magazines are willing to publish you ongoing, your future looks bright. Don't expect anything to happen overnight.

Opportunities - Amazon, Createspace, Lightning Source, Barnes & Noble - these are self-publishing outlets. This is something that was unavailable when I started trying to get published. For myself I'm pleased I couldn't self-publish because my writing now is far superior to my writing then. But these are opportunities for authors who feel their writing is up to publishing standard and run out of patience.

How did you promote EXPLOITS? How did you network?

I got an Authonomy editor's star from harper Collins for the novel. I networked with hundreds of other authors, I then carried on expanding my network on Facebook and Twitter, I have a blog and two websites. I approached people to review it. That's about all an author can do for self-promotion until they reach the book signings stage. However the same book was released as Clawback, it received no marketing and has outsold the original book Exploits by far having seven hundred sales in the US alone in a month. So marketing is all about genre and book cover and blurb - the consumer takes care of whether or not it's a success or not.

What is your writing process (outlines, notes, etc)?

I know the full story of every novel before I start it. So I write down key points and just start writing. For me it's that simple. Some aspects I have to research, that's what takes the longest especially when setting the book in a place I've never been (I love Google Maps)

Is EXPLOITS autobiographical in any way?

Not at all. It's a novel which too many people I know should have read. They inspired it. A loving couple respect each other, control is a dead end. Why don't couples get this? I wrote it for the younger adult reader, hoping they'd get that message via a novel before making the mistakes so many people I know did. One girl I knew went back to her abusive boyfriend, pregnant, even though he beat her. What kind of survival instinct is that? *Because he said he loves me*. Are woman really that gullible? Apparently so. That's the kind of woman who inspired Exploits. It's a tale of many *falling into love* moments, until she figures that only one love matters. It is a love story, that is no lie, but it's about self love more than all the others.

Any advice to creative writers?

Don't overwrite. If you can say something in an economical amount of words, choose the economical version. Overwriting is hard to read and bores the reader.

Do you have any new projects in the works?

Yes, three. One romance, one classical horror, and one sort of sci-fi futuristic novel.

Buy Exploits on Amazon.com:

http://www.amazon.com/Exploits-ebook/dp/B004DI7KOY/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&m=AJZ1BLME50KG1&s=digital-text&qid=1301008319&sr=1-1

For more info on Poppet:

http://authorpoppet.wordpress.com/

http://poppetsplanet.weebly.com/

http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100001124641100

http://twitter.com/PlanetPoppet

http://www.amazon.com/Poppet/e/B0046MYVO4/ref=ntt_athr_dp_pel_1

Kyle Joseph Hopkins, Kyjo the Bunny and Stupid Tears

2011-02-28T16:52:00.000-08:00

Kyle Hopkins is an accomplished writer and cartoonist from Independence, MO. He grew up loving cartoons, and never stopped (not even a little). While attending Northwest Missouri State University, he created his own ‘toon, a rabbit called KyJo the Bunny. KyJo, a hedonistic, atheistic, asshole(istic?) scholar of a bunny takes shots at religious trees, talking top hats and, if she hasn’t yet filed a restraining order, the occasional woman. Some might consider KyJo an extension of Kyle. Those who know him best know it’s merely a coping mechanism for a hard life full of grandmas and babies. Kyle’s cartoons can be found on the “Kyjo the Bunny and Friends” Facebook page. http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/KyJo-The-Bunny-and-Friends/113122295395994

Stupid Tears
by Kyle Joseph Hopkins

It was the day. It was the day I’d been dreading and hoping for. Ever since I learned of this power I knew that this day would come. I finally figured out all of the kinks and glitches that came with this power and had to use them to my advantage.

I stood up in the middle of the meeting which met with stares and orders to sit down, but I wouldn’t listen. Instead I pointed my hand out and swirled the other until everything slowed. No one was the wiser as they began to become stuck with their faces frozen with shock and awe.

The only people unaffected by the freeze were me and the girl I was aiming for.

The clock stopped, a dropped pen sat motionless in the air as if it were stuck in ice. Time and space had vanished. My heart thumped and filled with sharp anxiety as I walked over to the very confused girl. After two quick gulps I said the following…

“No doubt, I understand, you are wondering what the fuck is going on. Let me explain. Have you ever seen Saved by the bell?”

She nodded, still confused and frightened. What possibly could a 90’s Saturday morning teen dram-com have to do with mystic powers?

“You know when Zack says ‘freeze’ and everyone stops, dead cold, as he spits some cheesy lines to the audience?”

She nods, casually wrapping her mind around the phenomenon.

“I’ve been able to do that for years. Nobody would believe me because they’d be frozen, of course, but I started learning recently how to trap…that’s a terrible word…how to catch another for the moment. I’m doing this because at every meeting we’ve had since you started working here, I’ve frozen it. Before you were around, I would use it to take a nap or get all my freight ran to meet with this company’s insane demands. But ever since I saw you I’ve been freezing the meetings and talking to you. Nothing more. I give you my word. I finally caught my cat about a week ago. Three days ago I caught my best friend and we used that time to iron out all of our problems. I think we spent about a month, just hanging out, crying, fighting, and building upon our relationship. Then we came out of the freeze and resumed our lives, with a big hug and tears. But I’m not going to keep you here for that long; I only need the length of this speech to tell you everything I need to tell you.

Please let me do this.”

She looked like a shocked animal, a majestic deer. She wasn’t staring into headlights, but into a stark revelation, from a guy she doesn’t know. She pulled out a cigarette, her hands trembling as the lighter sparked and then engulfed the tip; her chest filled with smoke. She exhaled as her ruby red lips formed a small circle, expelling the cloud. It floated into the air. A small puff came into the first cloud and danced about as it framed her. The cloud stood dead in the air, slowly fading, as she felt the tension points on her head, never looking away. A fluttery note of a cough came out; she sat back in the chair, flicked some ashes on the floor, and nodded.

“I’ve rehearsed these lines…that’s a terrible word, this soliloquy in my head over and over again, and it was never quite perfect. The…no, it’s a monologue. A soliloquy would mean I’m talking to…you’re smart, you know what I mean. It’s a lot harder actually talking to you about these words that make my chest ache so. But I don’t need to act like an English teacher right now. I’m so goddamn stupid. But I don’t mean to frazzle you… I’m already about to drop. I’m sure this whole experience is…fuck it, I have to get into this, now or never. “

I exhaled and found the strength. She trembled and nearly spoke but would just raise her finger for a second, breathe, and then would lunge back in her chair. When she did this I tried to coax her to talk. I’ve been dreaming of a real conversation ever since I’ve seen her. Alas, she couldn’t.

“I don’t know you. You don’t remind me of anybody I’ve ever met before or will ever meet. But I want to change all of that. Today. For better or for worse. I just want you to know that you are the only thing on my mind these days, that doesn’t anger me.

Even when you don’t talk to me, even when I try to make contact with you. My heart tears, tears roll down my cheeks, and I continue on with the day, devastated, but with beautiful sadness. The way ‘tears’ and ‘tears’ are spelled the same way is gorgeous to me. They have two different definitions in a dictionary, but they are the same to me. English isn’t the most beautiful language, but that word is among the most beautiful. And…I have to talk in this language to tell you how I feel, because it’s the only language I know, and I have to know that you understand every single word.”

Tears developed on his cheeks and heart. She stared. Her soft green eyes with those beautiful gray lines, artfully crafted were fixated on me. Her soft white looked irritated not with anger, but with heaviness.

“You’re much more than what’s on the outside to me.

I know I don’t know you, this must be the millionth time I said this in this conversation, minus the conversing part. Jesus, why won’t you talk?”

Her lips shook like a jigsaw cutting but she gave a quick hand motion that just seemed to say “go on”. She looked completely exasperated.

“Underneath all of your physical beauty is a goddess hiding below. Under those silky black bangs and elegance that, I’m only guessing, feel as soft as down is flowing acres of the softest fur that I want to lay in for ages. Behind those vibrant gray-green eyes is all the intellect, humor, darkness, love, fear, and desperation that could overflow all the libraries in the galaxy. Under your pointy little nose are all the scents. I imagine it’d smell like freshly dead flowers that are giving off their last aromas, but they stay like that, never fading. Those lips, those goddamn lips I’ve wanted to kiss from the moment I’ve seen you, under those, is something I’m not yet ready for, if only because I don’t have you. If I could have all of you I’d live in your universe, forever.

I know that last part sounded lazy, and fuck, this whole thing sounds lazy…because I’m so goddamn stupid.”

Tears.

I slapped myself.

She flicked her ashes.

“I’d go on but I’m not making War and Peace here, I’m just trying to tell you everything that I possibly can. I know I have technically forever to tell this, but I don’t want to keep you here. I mean, I do, but it wouldn’t be right, you know? It wouldn’t be right if I couldn’t have you, one hundred percent of you with me on this. Like the way you just won’t talk to anyone unless you’ve known them. I’ve known about you for only about a month, and I think we’ve exchanged about sixteen words. Fifteen have been from me, and one was from you. It was actually a noise. A sweet little noise I don’t even know what to classify. It could have been a burp or an attempt to say ‘hello’ back. Either way, that made my year. You may laugh because it’s only January.

You make me feel like a cartoon character doing his funny little routine when he sees the girl of his dreams for the first time. I’m not saying this to cheapen anything; it’s just how I am. I get the bugged-out eyes with valentine’s hearts. My own heart takes the form of those valentine’s hearts and pounds until the blood flow floods my brain and I garble words like I just had a stroke. My tongue falls out of my head and rolls ten feet on the floor. It’s felt real several times. “

She trembled for another cigarette from her red pack. Puffed in the same fashion as before…and stared. Those cold dead stares had more emotion that day then I give them credit for. She was on the verge of crying, laughing, going batshit insane, all at the same time. I didn’t realize I could strike this kind of emotion in anybody before.

I almost grabbed for her cigarette lighter, but stopped myself cold. I hadn’t earned the privilege to light her cigarettes yet.

“If we ever got to that point, fuck, if you even say anything after this solil…monologue, devastating or otherwise, I’ll listen. Whether it makes me die or live, I’ll accept it. I know that before you, you see an ugly, balding, crass, jackass with bad skin, a gut, and just enough underneath to keep me from jumping off a building. You see an incompetent dork that’s pleading to the fucking gorgeous heroine like in every romance. Only this dork actually adores, treasures, embraces, cherishes, and worships you. I don’t want to idolize you because I want to find out your flaws and do the same to those. But you should know I also don’t love you.

I feel all of the above but I can’t love you, not yet. I need to know you. Obviously, I want to love you, but you’d have to say yes, let me in, and we’d show each other the pits of our very beings. I always thought these feeling were trite and annoying, but it’s because I never met you.

I only had to see these sequences in bad movies and poorly written novels, and I would always roll my eyes. I hope my version is better, but then again, well you know.”

I took a breath, followed by her. For a moment, all is right.

“Now I’ve said my piece. I’ll accept anything you tell me. If you say no, I’ll unfreeze everyone else, quit this job, and drop from any plane of existence. If you say yes…well that’s another monologue. “

She began to speak, with heavy eyes and bewilderment. Her tongue was reaching up to the top of her mouth to enunciate the first syllable. But I froze her, with a simple wave of my hand. I couldn’t dare hear her refusal or acceptance, because the depression and realism in me knew better. I was about to leave when I suddenly kneeled down and hovered right by her cheek. My lips plumped, ready to soil her soft, perfect white skin.

“Goodbye sweet Jessica.”

I stopped, turned away, turned back, took the cigarette from her hand and the few that fell on the floor. I almost smoked the half-smoked cigarette just to get a lingering of her lips, but if I can’t kiss tender flesh than I don’t deserve her saliva. Then I walked out, waved my hand and unfroze time. As I left I heard commotion. Amongst the ruckus, a pen clattering, intakes of breath, and screams of “What the fuck? Where’d Roger go?”

I tore from every angle.

Interview with Tyler Knight: Porn Star, Writer, Painter

2011-02-14T23:55:00.000-08:00

(picture from Tyler Knight's Facebook page)

"Tyler Knight is a pornstar, blogger and painter. His blog is located at TylerKnight.com.

Tyler's foray into writing began when he fielded questions on a mixed martial arts forum about his life as an adult film star. Tyler’s work has been published in several print and online literary magazines including Danse Macabre, Thieves Jargon, Ignavia Press, Thirst for Fire, Sex and Murder, and Ronin Press. He also writes a monthly column for a woman’s magazine, For The Girls.

On August 4, 2010 his blow-up doll was a guest on The Colbert Report. Tyler was not invited" (Tyler Knight).

Currently, Tyler is working on a memoir that chronicles his "attempts at juggling pimps, porn starlets, pills, and a semi-normal life with [his] girlfriend" (TylerKnight.com)

What made you want to be a writer? Do you plan on quitting the porn biz?

Writing isn’t something I chose. Two years ago I wasn’t even thinking about writing, but it just happened to work out this way. It began for myself, and even though I’ve developed a large readership, it’s still for me. That other people enjoy reading my thoughts is a side benefit.

I have not quit the adult industry. I took a few months off to return to finance, but after working for yourself for almost a decade, it’s a tough transition to make. The idea of seeking permission to eat lunch...having to wear a suit and tie...well, that didn't last.

Who are some of your favorite authors? Influences?

There’s not enough bandwidth to list everything that has influenced me because ideas come from everywhere. A well turned phrase can be found in the most unlikely of places...like a gossip magazine (Jacko IS WACKO!) and you may not be aware of it, but you store it for later manipulation...to make it your own. Often times I take something someone said and use the exact verbiage, but in another context of a story I’m working on it’s different. Picasso said: Good artists borrow, great artists steal.

A few authors I’ve stolen from include: Dostoevsky, John Ridley, Nabokov, Jim Thompson, Richard Rayner, Albert Camus, Jean-Paul Sartre, Dashiell Hammett, Richard Stark, Louis-Ferdinand Céline, Richard K. Morgan, Martin Amis, Poe, Bukowski, Bret Easton Ellis, Irvine Welsh, Melville, and Stephen King. Half of these guys write noir. I love the noir aesthetic. Altered Carbon...I stole that entire novel. I’ll stop here. The more I add to the list, the less meaningful any one name on it becomes.

I lied. In an indirect way, Chuck Palahniuk, too. Of all the novels he wrote, I’ve only read one of his short stories. But it was Chuck that turned me onto a style of minimalism called Dangerous Writing. I’m not a blind follower of any school of this-is-how-things-should-be-done, but I stole some principles from there, also. That I (for now) write in first person, present tense, some of the ideas from Dangerous Writing are a natural fit.

Describe your worst day on a porn set.

A man ejaculated on my thigh once. Maybe I’ll write that story.

You have a girlfriend. Does doing porn make that relationship complicated? Or is sex on the set mechanical, purely professional? (I remember you sent a tweet while fucking a girl on set once).

Porn is a job. I will never have the connection during intimacy with someone on set to the degree that I will off set. Once the camera cuts, the fourth wall comes down and I wash “Tyler Knight” down the shower drain before I leave the set. Some days are better than others. Some women are great and it’s always nice to see them. Others, I’d never even look at on the street. But you’d never know which scene is which by watching them because I’m a professional and I do my job the best that I can, regardless.

Any coupling, on or off camera, is as unique as the two people within it. That, and the circumstances of the pairing affects the dynamic.

What do you like to do when you’re not fucking? Not writing?

I’ve been painting a lot. Museums to analyze the pictures: composition, color, movement. I dissect paintings the way I’d do with a story. Reverse engineering to understand why something works. With a picture, I see subjects...sometimes there are adjectives. And there are verbs.

Are you surprised that some readers actually WANT TO be in porn after reading your stories?

Nothing people do surprises me.

Porn Myths: Most porn stars have been sexually abused. The porn industry is run by the mafia. True/False?

No.

How did you get started in porn?

Two decades ago I was a print model. My agent at the time sent me out for this job for a (now defunct) magazine in Australia called Women’s Forum. That was the first time I took my clothes off for cash. Years later, when I was leaving the Hollywood library, a pornographer named Gino Colbert ran up to me and put a business card in my hand. I called. Here I am.

Any favorite memories from a porn shoot?

With anything, there are good days and there are bad days. I tend not to write about the good days because there is no conflict. And when there’s no conflict, there is no story. It goes back to the grief-per-dollar ratio again. For now, doing what I’m doing serves me.

Is there a lot of prejudice against blacks in the porn industry?

Some sectors of the porn industry operate like a minstrel show, except not as clever...and without the passage of time to evoke quaint nostalgia. It’s here and now. This is not exclusive to any individual ethnic group. I’ve seen three Asian male performers in the last decade.

Tell us about STDs in the porn industry. Do casting directors require that actors be tested?

STD tests are required. Some persons are cavalier about them, though.

Fluffers?

Fluffers don’t exist. I’ve had one set (a gang bang) with fluffers, but the girls were drawn into the melee of the scene, so they were no longer fluffers. They were active participants in the footage like everybody else.

Do you have any strong views about porn and morality?

Who am I to make any assertions of morality? Nobody should listen to what I have to say on that matter...or anyone else. Form your own point of view.

Some would argue that all porn is degrading to both sexes, and there may be merit in those arguments.

Whatever.

Do you ever watch porn?

No, I don’t.

You’re friends with the infamous Tucker Max. Is he as much of an asshole as the Tucker Max depicted in his books I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell and Assholes Finish First?

Everyone has facets of their personality they choose to show at different situations. The side I see is an opinionated yet generous man. As with anyone, you’d be better served to meet the man and form your own opinion.

What do you think of your blow-up doll?

(picture from Tyler Knight's blog)

I should have negotiated my compensation better.

Do you have any other sex toys fashioned after you?

I have a vibrating dildo.

You’ve won awards for your porn, but refuse to attend the ceremonies. Any particular reason? Also, what kind of rewards did you win for porn? Best anal penetration? Best cock?

Simple. My time is better spent on things I find interesting.

What will the title of your porn memoir be?

This has yet to be determined. My agent and I have one we like, but a publisher may have different ideas.

How many manuscript rejections have you received?

Hundreds. Most were my fault. I wasn’t discriminate to whom I’d submit my work to.

What is your writing process? How many revisions do you typically do?

No process. I write when I feel like it. Aside from proofreading I almost never revise. I say what I mean the first time.

What challenges face creative writers today? What opportunities?

If you create something different, something new, you will face opposition, even blatant hostility from those in position who cling to the status quo like a warm Snuggie. Change is terrifying to them. Ask Jobs and Wozniak how their meeting with IBM went when they were kids. In the arts, it’s the same. When you marry the arts and business, it’s the worst. Publishers will publish work that they know is shit, passing over some unknown with something to say, in favor of tripe penned by a name that will move X number of units. Like, say, a reality show personality who never read a book. It’s a business.

How did you promote your work?

Interviews such as this. Social media. My stories have been published in lit mags and chap books all over the world. Word of mouth.

Why do you feel it’s important for your story to be told?

If I didn’t believe I have something to say, I wouldn’t bother.

Any advice for writers?

The arts are full of charlatans. There are no secrets. No great answerers. No gurus, rules, or any single way it should be done. Just write.

Read Tyler's infamous story "Bukkake" here: http://www.tylerknight.com/archives/1325

For more information about Tyler Knight and his work, check out his blog: http://www.tylerknight.com/

Follow Tyler on Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/TylerKnightxxx

Tyler on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/#!/profile.php?id=1285020513