Sunday, February 6, 2022

Once Upon a Time in Hollywood

 I loved Quentin Tarantino's Once Upon a Time in Hollywood film. It was a great character study set in 1969's Hollywood with Charles Manson as the backdrop. It seamlessly wove actual Hollywood history in with the revisionist history he started working into his films with Inglorious Basterds. When it was announced that the novelization of the film, written by Tarantino, was on its way and it would go beyond the movie, I pre-ordered that 400 page tome.

Then it came and I had other things to read.

Then I read it.

Disappointment set in.

Rick and Cliff were what I enjoyed in the film. In the novel, however, they are almost secondary characters to their own tale. Tarantino figures we've seen the film and know the characters. So what does he give us? Not too much more insight into them, though there is some. No, he delves into the Johnny Madrid character and how the actor playing him got the job for Lancer, and then delves into a how guest-spot on Bonanza went for him. And he goes into great detail on the plots of both shows. That is a common occurrence throughout the book. Meaningless tangents that go nowhere.

Oh, and the Manson Family? It is there, but it could have been left out of the book entirely and not made a damn bit of difference. The slaughter that Cliff and Rick engage in at the end of the film is mentioned part of the way through the book, but the conclusion of the book is far different from the movie, and the dead hippies never happen.

Tarantino needed an editor. Tarantino needed to stick with what made the film work. If anyone picked up the book without seeing the movie . . . well, they wouldn't want to see the film. I'm certain of that. And if anyone reads the book who doesn't love film and Hollywood . . . well, they will be bored beyond belief. I'm certain of that, too.

How could something so good go so wrong? Mediums. Film is a different medium than books and vice versa. It's why a movie is never too much like the book from which it spawned. What works in one does not work in the other. It's not to say they can't be similar, but it's a balancing act and sacrifices will be made. 

And for those who think Tarantino has a foot fetish . . . this book will not change your mind. Not one bit. I don't know how many descriptions of dirty feet I had to read. For some, that will be all they need to know to jump into it. Be warned, though, Tarantino directs films better than he writes books, but I'm still anxious to read more from him. Maybe, like Rick, I'm a glutton for punishment.


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Sunday, January 16, 2022

Deliver Us From Southerners

 My father loved Deliverance the film. Therefore, I first saw it around the age of five or six and then several times throughout the years after. I actually liked the film quite a bit, too. It was not until just recently, however, that I delved into the book. Honestly, my review of it could be this: As a writer, this novel made me jealous.

Yeah, it's near perfect. 

The film has its faults, though it is a great film. The book does not share the film's faults. In fact, it really had none that ruined any of the reading for me. The author, who loved his alcohol, wrote several volumes of poetry, but only three novels. That fact alone makes Deliverance all the more stunning, as it was his first of three. His first of three. I have no desire to read the other two, though. I believe his first cannot be topped. I will not sully that work with something inferior.

The film, after watching it again recently to compare it with the book, influenced me and my writing. I see elements from in it in a lot of what I write about when it comes to fiction. I am hoping his book rubs off on me in the same way. The gorge climbing scene itself is a section that should be taught in writing classes. Some of the lines of dialogue? I read one aloud to my girlfriend and goosebumps traveled up my arms. It's that good. 

My copy of the novel is a fairly beat up edition from Laurel. It's a paperback that I got at a museum sale many years ago. I picked up quite a few good books there, actually, and made my money back and more selling some of them on eBay. I almost sold Deliverance, but I'm very glad I did not succumb to greed on that one. The only way that is leaving my shelf is if I buy a new one in better shape, but to be fair I really like this one's cover.

So here's to James Dickey. He is not alive to read this, but I hope one of his living relatives stumbles across it some day. The man did good. He did damn good.


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Sunday, January 9, 2022

Violating The Corpse Of GG Allin

I promised a review of Blood For You: A Literary Tribute to GG Allin in my last blog post. Well, here it is. Short version: I like the man and his music better than I do this fictional anthology about him and his many guises.

The short stories are much like GG was back when he still stormed the Earth. They are raw, violent, shocking, outrageous, and sometimes incomprehensible. As I mentioned in that last post, since this is an anthology you are going to have some stories you like and some that fail. Well, I liked a few, hated a few others, and did not love any of them. Whether GG was a floating baby, an operative for President Bush, fighting a werewolf as the "ultimate shock," or hosting a nightclub inside his expanding penis, the stories all showed imagination, but they also required a knowledge of GG and his life. I imagine the editors of this book thought that nobody but die-hard GG Allin fans would buy this, and they were probably right, but readers needed to fill in a lot of gaps on their own, and that kind of ruined some stories.

I know how Merle, the Murder Junkies, the Jabbers, and John Wayne Gacy fit into GG's world. I know it quite well, actually. But the writers got lazy with all that. They introduced characters just to introduce them. They fit in song lyrics just to show they knew them. This casual handling makes many of the stories feel more like bad fan fiction than it does a literary tribute, and that is ultimately disappointing. 

I was not expecting this to be a future classic. I was hoping it would be more than a shoulder shrug of a book, however. The truth of it is, if the average reader who does not know about GG Allin was to read this, they would still have no real idea. You could replace GG's name with any other name, and the book would read the same and mean the same. That is bad fiction. That is cookie cutter writing.

With all that criticism, I am still glad this exists. If it can get someone to look into GG's life and music, then it has done its job. I'm afraid, however, the opposite would happen here. If someone just stumbled into this, they would not be willing to take that plunge into mayhem. In fact, they may not even think GG was a real person. I would not blame them for that. How to fix all this? Maybe a second volume that has a bit of a higher standard for its stories? I'm not sure, but I do know I would not be excited to read it . . . though I would probably still give it a go out of curiosity alone. GG deserves better.


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Sunday, January 2, 2022

The GG Allin of Literature

The blog title is misleading. It should be "GG Allin in Literature," but that doesn't attract a crowd. At this point, I'm not sure how big of a crowd his name attracts anyway, having been dead for far too long, but those who remember him know one thing: they never associate the "rock 'n' roll terrorist" with books. GG was not known for his love of reading. I'm not going to go into all of GG's antics both on and offstage. Look him up if you are curious. I'll just say they involve lots of blood, feces (thrown and eaten), wanton sex (with everyone), drugs, gallons of alcohol, and a whole lot of beautiful, wet violence . . . often of the random sort. I've had my own past with GG Allin, which I've detailed in other blogs, but now I'm getting to know him in a whole new way. I get to read about him as the Sin-Eater, the savior of the world, a floating baby, an operative for President Bush, and a giant robot.

What the fuck am I talking about?

Blood for You: A Literary Tribute to GG Allin. That's what. I'm only about halfway through the book and it's already been a ride as wild as the legend himself. I'm not going to do a full book review of it yet. I just want you to be aware it exists in case I die before I finish the damn thing. It's a real novel; a fictionalized account of GG Allin's  different lives. He is many different things here, and since it is an anthology, your enjoyment of his many guises is going to vary. That's just the nature of the biz.

As I mentioned, I'm not done with it yet, but I do know one thing: by this point you know if you want it or not. Any review I would write doesn't matter. You either want it because it exists (which is I why I bought it), or you want to stay away from it for the same reason. Nobody is going to accidentally buy this thinking it is a children's book or the latest Chomsky. They are buying it because it's GG . . . or not buying it for the same reason.

I went into it expecting entertainment, not greatness. I'll let you know how it all goes. At this point, however, my words mean nothing. Stay tuned here if for some odd reason you are on the fence about the whole thing. If that is you, I find that kind of weird. I've never known a GG fan to be on the fence about anything, let alone a work of fiction about the man.

Oh, and I should mention that a certain serial killer friend of GG's in real life makes more than one appearance. Now you should really know if you want it or not.


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Sunday, December 26, 2021

Disturbing Neighbors

One book really disturbed the crap out of me as a child. That would be Thomas Berger's Neighbors. To be honest, I don't remember a lot about it. I remember being aware of the book because I saw the trailer for the movie adaptation that was coming out starring Dan Aykroyd. I got my parents to buy the book for me at that time, so I was ten or eleven years of age when I read it. The feelings of chaos and disjointed reality that it caused me are feelings I remember to this day, though I can't recall key points of the plot. All I really remember about it is that one family is having a hell of a time with the new couple who moved in next door. There is vandalism (I think), sexual flirtation (I think), and a feeling of insanity that runs through the novel (I'm certain). 



I actually went and found the paperback version of the book I once owned and rebought it . . . with the intention of giving it another read. I haven't done so yet, though, because I'm afraid it won't live up to the uneasy feelings it caused decades ago. I'm far older now and understand more about life, and I don't want that precious, uncomfortable memory to be erased by all that. I don't want to ruin what was such a monumental thing. The Shining made me want to be a writer. Neighbors made me question my sanity.

I will go back to the book someday. I will reread it. I probably won't be disturbed. Here's my secret hope, however: I want to be even more disturbed by it. I want to pick up things I was not able to understand as a child, and I want it to bother me. I'm sure it won't bother me as much as some of Peter Sotos' writing, but I still want to come away with having the feeling of my soul being shaken. I want to be moved. It did it once. It can do it again. I know it's labeled as a "comedy" in some circles, but comedy can be disturbing. Just watch the last Hangover movie if you don't believe me.

If it doesn't disturb me the next time around, though, that's okay, too. It's not great, but it's understandable. I won't be bitter. I won't throw the book into the fire and spit at it. It's not a James Patterson novel, so it doesn't deserve that fate. I will be disappointed, sure. But I'm disappointed by a lot of things I revisit from my youth. The mileage varies as the car gets older, right?

I'm crossing my fingers . . .

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Sunday, December 19, 2021

A Threesome With the Wives: Readers Wives (The First Three)

 Oh, erotica, is there no subject you won't broach? Now even the sanctity of marriage is under attack by the first three books of the Readers [sic] Wives series, which has grown to be over 20 volumes! That's more than the erotic Harry Potter nonsense. (To be fair, however, that Harry Potter book was #61 of a series of unrelated themed erotica. Over 60 volumes of erotic Harry Potter? That's either a nightmare or your wildest fantasies depending on your age.) Now you may have heard of the boy wizard, but  have you ever heard of the Readers Wives series? No? Let me explain.



The books in this series are written by various authors (Heidi Flow, Candice Hocking, Mildred Bookings, and others) who may or may not be the same person. The writing style does not vary enough for me to be convinced these are separate people, but it does not matter. One writer writing under several different names is the norm in erotica and has been since . . . well, when people started writing erotica. The first three volumes each feature one longer story and then a few short ones dealing with (for the most part) wives. Wives who pose nude for other men. Wives blackmailed into have "relations" with multiple men at once. Wives trying to earn extra dough by doing both those things. There are lots of photos being taken and lots of well-lubricated feminine interiors throughout each book. And let's not leave out the husbands, who are getting penis extensions, or are aghast that they like what their wives are doing, or are utterly clueless as to what is going on for a bit. It is all in good, sticky fun, and because the British aren't too crass, these books come across as being a bit "higher class" than your normal erotica coming out of America or India. (I'm assuming the writers are British, as it definitely has enough terms to make me think so, but it does seem written for an American audience. After all, American husbands are well-known for wanting to see their wives with other men and women.)
You Know What I Mean

One unique story in the second volume, I believe (they all start to run together), features a female nudist in a wheelchair who hires a wife to clean her house naked. You can imagine what ensues. The story comes across as very natural (no pun intended) and actually very erotic. Other stories in the first three books do not share the same heightened originality, but have their moments of greatness, though if you are expecting more original stories or Harry Potter look elsewhere. There is a formula here, and the writers stick to it.

Will I continue on with the series? I downloaded a bunch of these when they were free, so I'll probably read those unless the series takes a nose-dive into Rod Polo-style erotica. Once they are read, however, I probably will not get any more. Not because I don't like them, but because I don't love them, and I have a lot of books to read before I die. I can also say that erotica about wives is not really my favorite subgenre, but if it is yours, you can do far worse than these. I think you would at least owe it to yourself to read the first two (despite the dopey looking cover of the first one with a model who looks like she had a bit role in an Adam Sandler goofy comedy). After that they all start to run together.


Wheelchair Loving!
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Monday, December 13, 2021

Red Hot Drug Addict

 I like old Red Hot Chili Peppers. Blood Sugar Sex Magik was the last good release as far as I'm concerned, and that's pushing my tolerance limit. In the past I've been able to see the band perform, and it was a damn fine show. When I read that Anthony Kiedis had written and published an autobiography called Scar Tissue I knew I had to read it. It came out in 2005. Only took me 16 years to get around to it. I could have waited 16 more.

I don't hate the book. It's just that it is the same old junkie story, but the cycle of addiction is fragmented by Hollywood stars, worldwide performances, and unamusing tales of what it was like to grow up with Kiedis' father. See Anthony at four years of age get pot smoke blown in his face by dear old dad! See a teen Anthony request to have sex with his dad's girlfriend . . . and dad obliges and seems to watch! See Anthony, not surprisingly, get hooked on drugs and lie to friends, family, and loved ones. Rinse and repeat. I used to find Kiedis to be an interesting singer with his own unique style. Now? Not so much.

Dennis Cooper has written this tale better and in a far more interesting manner. 

Maybe someday I can revisit this book with less judgmental eyes. Unfortunately, it's such a stale tale of woe, that I fear it will never seem fresh and exciting. It will always be a swamp of misfortune and needles. I've known too many junkies. Been lied to too many times. It doesn't matter if they are rich or poor. Functioning or not. It's always the same damn thing. Junkies poison that which they touch. It's not a miracle the Red Hot Chili Peppers lasted as long as they did. It's luck. Pure and simple. Dice were rolled. The result turned out to be positive. There are thousands of other dice rolls that end in public toilets with a needle stuck in the arm. Gruesome performance art to a live lived poorly.

There are lessons to be learned here. They are lessons you already know. Parents can fuck up their children. Drugs lead to destruction. Rock stars sleep with underage girls. This should have been more. Even at its most revealing, there is still so much hidden that you can't help but wonder if Kiedis is still lying to himself and others. The reveals don't reveal. The conceals do, however. The end result is more knee scrape than scar tissue. 

I no longer care much about the Red Hot Chili Peppers. The music is a comprised of memories. This book surely didn't rekindle a love affair, either. It just cemented my anger. Your mileage may differ.


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Thursday, December 17, 2020

Orgy Time

 Orgy '70.  I bought my copy off eBay, shrink wrapped and ready to be torn open like a . . . well, you get the picture. At the time it was published it was a mere .88 cents. In 1970, which is when this came out, the .88 cents was probably the equivalent of $700 or so. I got it for a few bucks, which I considered a steal. 

The book reported to be a look at the orgy scene in the late '60s courtesy of Dr. Alfredo Rathermann. I somehow doubt that this is the same Dr. Alfredo Rathermann who won a Noble Prize in the fictional book Monsters of the Midway, though maybe the author of that book is actually Rathermann because I don't believe Alfredo is a real doctor or ever really existed. Just his descriptions of females alone (with special attention paid to their breasts) is enough to give that away, but if that doesn't convince you, perhaps the fact that the book is exploitive, adults only, and is part of the Hourglass Library (which is an imprint that put out a lot of sleaze at the time) will do the trick.

Rathermann primarily transcribes conversations with his patients regarding the new orgies plaguing America in the late 1960s. These conversations, where everyone talks the same, go into great detail about electric orgies, LSD orgies, orgies in women's clubs, and orgies in the office. He saves the best and most salacious for last: the high school orgy, where teens and teachers smash bodies and genitals in every way imaginable in the hallways, offices, and bathrooms. Can you dig it? Of course you can. That's why people bought this in the first place.

I love vintage sleaze. I love exploitive sex books. I even like books that are both those things but pretend to be scientific studies (a good way to make it past censors and a cover for "respectable" households where the books may have found their way to the shelves). This one, however, kind of rubbed me the wrong way at times due to its ridiculous premise. When quoting another book by Rathermann's medical colleague, whom I believe is the author using yet another name, mention is made of male teens inserting slices of pizza in female teen's vaginas and then eating the slices of Italian delight (the pizza, not the teen girl). Really? Not pizza rolls, which had not yet surfaced in the freezer section of the neighborhood grocer, but full slices of pizza.  I don't know. I find that rather . . . fiction-like. And if Rathermann is going to transcribe conversations, why does all the different men, women, and teens girls he interviews sound like the same person "talking." I get that the "hip" lingo was commonplace at the time, but there are always going to be variances in dialogue.

All of that adds up to this being poorly written sleaze disguised as something so much more important. Granted, people buying this book, shrink wrapped for their own protection and to provide temptation, were getting it for the sleaze factor, but I cannot help but think they would have wanted it to at least be well-written and believable. Nothing takes one out of the mood faster than trying to picture some physical gymnastics that seem impossible during an orgy scene. And does a 17-year-old girl, who is apparently mortified by the amount of sexual hijinks in her school, not only feel so overtaken with lust that she goes down on her female teacher and tells the unknown guy screwing her from behind that he better continue what he is doing or she will "kill" him? I know that is to indicate just how her sex drive went into overdrive, but it does not match up with how the girl has been conversing up until that point. It simply makes no sense.

In Rathermann's world, all of this and more happens. Wild bisexual women drool over BBC. Men drop LSD into candy bars that then soften them up, roll them into a ball, and insert it into their female partner's holiest of holy places. Love juices flow like Budweiser at a kegger, and everyone is turned on, maaannnn. And, of course, they all tell the "doctor" he just doesn't get it.

I was going to sell my copy back on eBay, and maybe someday I will. For now, though, I'm holding onto it. Every once in a while I will need a reminder of what bad writing looks like, and I will be able to turn to this prime specimen. 

Orgies never took over the country like Rathermann feared (or hoped?), but if they had and they had been like these, it would have been groovy. Just ask the young men and women found between these covers. If they take the time to rip the electrodes from their genitals and come down off the acid, I'm sure they would tell you that it's a "real cool scene, cat."



Thursday, November 14, 2019

491 -- The Sin That Can't be Forgiven


I bought Lars Görling's 491 from eBay after reading a review of the film somewhere. It seemed like the book, about young criminal boys who are part of an experiment, would interest me. It does ... to an extent, but seeing as it was originally published in 1962, what seemed harsh then seems less so today. Still, there are moments in it which have an impact, often these moments are ones dealing with sex and young girls.

The idea of a group of young boys grouped together by circumstances beyond their control is not a new one. Many of you probably read The Lord of the Flies, which is probably the most well-known example. The concept is fertile ground because young men of varying backgrounds grouped together, often against their will, is like setting a bomb to go off at a random time. Nothing good will ever come of it, and that is also the case here. What starts out as a mere nuisance (also, for the reader, I must add) quickly becomes a minefield of violence, sexual assault, crime, and devious blackmail plans that go awry. When the film adaptation was released, a scene showing the homosexual rape of one of the boys by a man in a position of authority caused outrage. The book handles it as if it were just another event, which is shocking in a very different way.

As of this writing, I have not yet finished the book. It reads fast, but interest in it wanes depending on the scene at hand. That's not a critique of the writing or condemnation of the cultural differences (this being a Swedish book). It's more about the time period at hand. These boys don't seem all that bad, smart, or even interesting. I'm finding it hard to care about what happens to them, and I think that may be the point. While I haven't finished it yet, it is obvious that this is, like A Clockwork Orange, more of an attack against a reform culture and the real criminals it produces. These boys are throwaways, a point made time and time again. The institution which has authority over them is harsh, uncaring, self-serving, and makes it own criminals. These days we call that "job security." Back then it was "doing the right thing." My how the times have changed.

I'll finish the book ... probably fairly soon. And when I do I'll put a review on Goodreads and Amazon, which is my usual thing to do after finishing a book. I may hold onto it, too. I have thought about selling it once I'm done, but it may be a good one to keep in the library. It will have to really redeem itself for me to do that, however. At the rate it's going, its conclusion looks like will be much like the end of a young criminal's life: basic and easily forgotten.

Post script: Finished it. Selling it. The blackmail was oddly horrific and disturbing for reasons I cannot understand, but not even the girl having sex with a dog saved this one.


Sunday, November 10, 2019

Baby Killer

In my Amazon review of Frank Cassese's novel, Baby Killer, I wrote that comparisons to Bret Easton Ellis' American Psycho were unavoidable. They are and all because of reasons that will become quite clear soon enough. What you need to know now is that if you loved Ellis' book, think the title of this book is a bit much, and pride yourself on being a reader who is not afraid to have their boundaries destroyed ... well, you need to be purchasing this book pronto. Do not, however, expect the safety found in Ellis' work. Nope. This is most likely going to be uncharted territory for you.

The narrator of our tale, the one first dubbed the Baby Snatcher, is ... funny. Actually, he's quite funny at times. He's also obsessed with food, his workout schedule, his body, and music. He's also a killer of babies, which many would say makes him insane. Despite the killing, he is also easy to relate to in many ways, and as a reader, that can be poison. You see, while Ellis' book made an impression, it was only a brief one. Patrick Bateman was so over the top in that novel that he became unbelievable and unlikable at a certain point. Cassese's Baby Killer (I won't reveal his name) always comes across as someone you can see existing just down the street. In fact, you may feel like you know him. That makes the novel stick with you long after the final page. Well, that and the fact that the moments of shock of are actually shocking. It's not the violence that will shock you, though. It is when you read a single sentence and realize what is going to happen somewhere down the line. That takes an incredible writer to pull off as effectively as it is used here. Cassese does it like a seasoned pro.

The section simply titled "Juanita" opens with this gem: "I have always hated children. I probably hated myself as a child." It seems to be a simple two sentences, but it hits at the core of this novel, especially the second sentence. You see, it may or may not be a lie, but there is a lot of truth to it regardless. What is especially telling is that comes to the reader after the first victim has been disposed of in quite the intense fashion. We already assume he hates children. But ...

"Curiously, I don't detest babies with the same intensity that I reserve for young kids ..." Prior to the section of the book these lines appear in, the reader is simply sitting back for a ride. We get to know our narrator a bit, but it is from a distance. He reveals things about himself, and they are accurate details, but they still appear as if coming through a fog. Once we get to this part of the story, though, we become invested in the character in a way that should not be possible given his actions and thoughts. This is where the book begins to really set its hooks in for anyone paying attention. This is where it begins to defy expectations. And what expectations are there?

For most people who read books that are more ... extreme ... and for the media that sometimes pays attention, we all know there are books out there that are over the top, disturbing, gruesome, that deal with unsettling subject matter that is often taboo ... and they are poorly written. The writers of these novels treat their victims like they treat writing, which is all hack and no finesse. Those books are easily dismissed and forgettable. They appeal to the people who only watch gore-saturated horror movies and then only for the kills and the wet stuff. It's rare, almost unheard of, when a novel can take the truly horrific and make it work for the general reader. American Psycho did that, and look what happened to it in the media. Baby Killer does it, too, and better than Ellis' novel, and what will happen to it? Well, that is interesting to think about.

If it is a slow news day and some news show gets a hold of this book, the avalanche of disapproving, self-serving disgust will begin ... and it will be as ferocious as it is inaccurate. Many will not have even read the entire thing before wanting to declare it an obscenity. It will then sell copies to that gore crowd, who will in turn be disappointed because this is, after all, a thinking person's novel. That's if it is a slow news day. The thing that will most likely happen is the media may get a hold of this, and some people may actually read it all the way through, and if they do, they will refuse to let any coverage of it occur. To do so, after reading it and understanding just what is being written, will be looked at as being careless and dangerous. These gatekeepers of the news will decide the public is actually better off not knowing about the book. You cannot have a book about baby killing actually be an incredible, thoughtful, engaging read. That is out of the question.

Should it be?

For many, the answer is "yes." We should never sympathize or try to understand people who do horrific things. With that in mind, we should also never read fictionalized accounts of these acts for entertainment or enlightenment purposes. If we do, the writing and story should be so poorly executed that it is easily dismissed out of hand, which keeps us away from that verboten sympathy and understanding.

I could probably write a book on why this novel works the way it does. Instead, I'll mention another scene from it, a scene that has probably played out millions of times in real life. In it, our narrator has bought a device that disguises his voice. He is angry with the media coverage of his crimes and needs to let the police know this. He isn't a baby snatcher. He's a baby killer, and he needs to call them so they get it right during their press conferences. In making the purchase of batteries for the device, the female clerk's fingertips graze his palm. "It is exceedingly rare that I have any kind of physical contact with other humans."

That is less than 20 words and it tells you almost everything you need to know about the character right there. That is brilliance. That is why this book is dangerous. That is why it must be read.

Dangerous, envelope pushing works are no stranger to this book's publisher, Nine-Banded Books. After all, this is one of the few publishers willing to put out Peter Sotos' work. Readers of this infrequent blog will know how much of an impact Sotos has had on me. By publishing Cassese's work, 9BB is courting danger in a way few publishers would dare try these days. A book called Baby Killer about a baby killer that is actually funny, horrific, and engaging? Most publishers would rather steer clear of the potential controversy. We, the ones who do not mind reading challenging novels, are lucky 9BB has decided this work has merit. I'm sure every one of the major publishing houses would have dismissed this manuscript upon the seeing the title and reading the query, which is why they have not been all that relevant in decades.

Kudos to all involved in this novel. They have produced a book that not only lives up to its potential, but exceeds it in ways most writers only dream about. Now it is up to us, the readers who aren't afraid of being pushed out of our comfort zones, to give it the respect it deserves, to give it that open, honest read and then let people know why it is important. If you read this far, I'm thinking you are up to the challenge.


Wednesday, April 15, 2015

Panic! At the Publisher

If you were a reader between 1975 and 2006 and were into things like fake IDs, conspiracies, drugs, weapons, and overthrowing the system by any means necessary, then you were aware of a publisher called Loompanics Unlimited.

Loompanics was like the crazy cousin of Paladin Press, which actually acquired some of Loompanics’ titles when the company went out of business in 2006.  Paladin always had a very serious air about it.  (That company, which published many books on how to kill people, stopped sending me books to review  for my ‘zine because my ‘zine was too radical.  Picture that for a second.  The company that published Put Him Out! – The Combative Use of Improvised Weapons called my ‘zine too radical.  If you are interested, you can get the DVD version of that book here.)  Loompanics’ works were just more fun.


Loompanics published books like Dirty Tricks Cops Use: And Why They Use Them, Techniques of Burglar Alarm Bypassing, Practical LSD Manufacture and The Construction & Operation of Clandestine Drug Laboratories.  Don’t they sound like a good time?  Yes!  Of course they do!

I own more than a few of Loompanics’ odes to personal freedom.  They are equal parts amusing, thrilling and terrifying.  Back before the Internet taught every jackass how to make a bomb, Loompanics was one of the few places one could turn to … and then you actually had to crack open a book.  You couldn’t just watch a Youtube video.  You had to use things like bookmarks and such.  It was a crazy time, kids.

I miss the publisher.  I mean, Paladin is fine, but its crowd is so survivalist that you can’t help but think of militias, Christianity and vague interpretations of the Constitution.  Loompanics’ crowd was the Yuppies and the chaos mongers.  Paladin’s crowd flies a Don’t Tread on Me flag.  The Loompanics bunch burned flags.  There is a distinction.

There was a time Google and Amazon wouldn’t let Loompanics advertise its goods on their sites.  The books violated their policies.  We all know what barometers of morality those two companies are, but their refusal did shed light on a problem Loompanics had – people were afraid of it.  They weren’t afraid Loompanics would topple the publishing industry, however.  They were afraid of what Loompanics was publishing.  The books themselves were dangerous.  (Yes, the FBI looked into the company.  Luckily, the Feds’ interpretation of the Constitution is not vague.)

Google and Amazon are still here, as is Paladin.  None of them, however, are half as fun as Loompanics used to be.  After all, what other publisher could set you up to be tweaking on homemade meth while carrying a fake ID when you firebombed a bank with personally made explosives?  None … at least not while making you smile.



Tuesday, April 14, 2015

Shrinkage

I have always sought out high weirdness when it comes to books.  Whether it is old Nazi propaganda, medical tomes on parasites that run riot throughout the body, or books on communism written by crackpots, if it’s odd, I’m interested.

Many moons ago I visited the Occult Emporium, which was located in Allentown, PA at the time.  I had always heard rumors about the place, and my initial reaction (other than that it was tiny because it was basically set up in the basement of a building) was of glee.  Scattered amongst the candles, Tarot cards, newspaper articles about people dumb enough to shoplift from the store, and Aleister Crowley’s helmet (which I touched despite the warning sign), were books and pamphlets on the occult.

Bingo!

I was drawn to these things like a goth to a black eyeliner sale.  Books on Satanism, witchcraft, identifying demons (as if one really needed to do that) and astral projection begged for my hard-earned money.  There was one little pamphlet, however, that really caught my eye.  I held it.  I looked through it.  I didn’t care about the price, though it was a pittance at $2.50.  I didn’t care that it wasn’t a standard paperback.  I wanted it and had to have it. 

How to Shrink Heads?  Its title a question.  Its question a promise.  Its promise peculiar.

I can, if forced, justify my purchase of it by saying I’m a writer and it is research material.  That isn’t true, though.  It wasn’t true then, and it isn’t true now.  Yeah, I’m a writer, but the pamphlet is just so damn cool that I had to have it.  Not for research purposes, but for the holy-shit-I’m-learning-how-to-shrink-a-human-head factor.  They don’t write a Dummies guide for that.

You wouldn’t buy it?


Of course not!  What would be the point?  What would you do with it?  How often would you read it?  Who cares?  It’s a pamphlet on shrinking human heads!  You can’t find that at Target.  You don’t stumble across it at a yard sale.  It’s not the type of thing you see every day.  In fact, my copy is the only one I’ve seen, period, and I’m always looking weird shit up on the net.  What’s not to love about that?


I bought it and never looked back.  Incredibly, it’s not the oddest ephemera I own, but it is one of the more interesting.  Conversation starter?  No.  Anything that tells you how to shrink a human head is really a conversation ender.  People learn you have that sort of thing and instantly change the topic to  something less anti-social like anal bleaching.  I’m not disappointed.  I understand.  Anyone who doesn’t want to discuss shrinking human heads isn’t someone I really want to talk to anyway.  I do, however, have something I could use them for …

Sunday, January 18, 2015

Strange Relationships

I often cruise around the erotica section of Smashwords and Amazon looking at what high strangeness can be found for one’s reading pleasure.  What toDo When You Accidentally Titty Fuck the President’s Daughter Twice?; Drag QueenAstronaut and Other Stories; The Alien’s Dairy Queen: Pumping Paula; Whatto Do When a Girl Seems to Only WakeUp If She Can Taste Cum in Her Mouth?; Man& Woman Can Equal Sex, and a BabyToo; and Bigfoot and the Kinky Couple are just a few of the random offerings available for discriminating tastes that I found with just two very basic searches.  This erotica is like the Sigue Sigue Sputnik of the publishing world.  Amazing.  Garish.  Description defying.  Sublime.  Ever since authors have discovered the world of electronic self-publishing, erotica (and romance) has exploded with some of the oddest subgenres imaginable.  This is a good thing for fans of Bigfoot sex books.
That’s not to say these bold subgenres and other weird erotica didn’t exist before epublishing.  Collectors and historians need only point to the output of Sally Miller (Jersey Girl Fantasies) to prove that high strangeness existed before the world of digital.  Digital, however, has blown the doors wide open, and there is no turning back.

Major publishers, and even most of the fringe ones, won’t even consider printing some of the books currently being offered in the world of the self-published erotica genre, and it has nothing to do with the quality of writing.  It has everything, though, to do with content.  Everything from cryptid sex to incest to bestiality to forced lactation can be found, and those are the things that scare traditional publishers.  50 Shades of Boredom this ain’t.  Those terrified publishers may say it isn’t hurting their profit margins, but online retailers would say otherwise.

Amazon and Smashwords, the two biggest online retailers, both have content guidelines, and a lot of these books they offer fall outside those guidelines or are very close to going over the line.  Nothing usually happens to the authors unless someone complains (I’d love to hear some of the complaints), though Amazon does do regular purges of “questionable” material.  The bottom line, however, is that these ebooks contribute to the bottom line of both companies.  The money is nowhere near the level of the Young Adult vampire, zombie, or dystopian fiction that multiplies like herpes, but it is sizable enough to matter, and it draws people to the web pages.  Sex sells, and everybody is buying. 

Perhaps in the future traditional publishers will be unafraid of pushing the boundaries of erotica, but it seems highly unlikely.  The industry has been slow to respond to every single advancement in publishing for as long as I can remember.  It is ridiculous to think this will be any different.  Some would even argue it shouldn’t be, as a novel about dinosaur pimps just sullies the entire erotica pool. 

They would be wrong.

We progress when we push boundaries.  If boundaries weren’t pushed, we wouldn’t have things like interracial marriage or women voting.  One can say bestiality erotica is a bit different, but is it?  People want to write about it.  People want to read about it.  It’s not everyone’s cup of tea, but it doesn’t have to be.  For now, however, if you want to read a new bestiality story, chances are you’ll only find it as a digital copy or self-published paperback.  The traditional publishers, the ones who want you to think they are at the forefront of carrying the First Amendment torch, won’t touch things like that.  They live in fear, and that fear drives content. 

Maybe someday that will change … but don’t hold your breath.  In the meantime, enjoy Step Lust and the Dog.


Saturday, May 24, 2014

Necessary But Pure - More on Peter Sotos

I have been going through a Peter Sotos buying spree, the highlight of which was finding a used copy of Total Abuse at a near eighty dollar price.  Cheap.  Upon telling a friend about this find, he asked, “Why do you even read that stuff?  It’s beyond sick.”

Yeah.  It is.  As the back copy of Total Abuse reads, “Peter Sotos is the world’s foremost practitioner of verbal brutality.”  That is an understatement.
The things Sotos writes about aren’t pretty, and he doesn’t handle them with kid gloves (no pun intended).  Murder, rape, pedophilia, pornography, Nazis, rough trade, self-loathing, racism and the like shouldn’t be the subjects of casual reads.  Sotos, more than any other writer, rubs your face in the filth and makes sure you taste it.  It is uncomfortable, to say the least.  Reading his work is obviously not for the faint of heart, and nor is it for those who are easily offended.  I read it because I find it inspirational, but not in the way of a budding serial killer or cowardly rapist.  I find it inspirational as a writer.


When I write something, I hope to move the readers in some way.  I want to horrify them, make them laugh or cry … any reaction other than one of utter boredom.  Sotos does that at the most base and instinctually gut-wrenching level.  Few authors (Jack Ketchum, Hubert Selby Jr., and James Ellroy come to mind) can even come close to what he has achieved.  (That’s why used copies of his books command such high prices.)  If my work can cause even a fraction of that sort of reaction, then I am satisfied.  That’s why I read him.  I want the reaction.  I want the inspiration.  I study the way the words flow and the images he conjures with their use and repetition upon the page (Ellroy, again, does something similar). 

If all of that sounds slightly magical, that’s because it is.  Reading is a magical experience.  It is unlike any other artistic medium.  It engages its audience in ways that few arts can.  The reader is just as much a part of the art as the writer, too, and anyone who is serious about writing understands what a delicate dance the two are engaged in during that process.  A lot has been written about this tango, but what needs to be remembered is that writing is also magical.  In fact, it is the main ingredient in the spell because without it there would be nothing to experience.  Without the writer, the reader wouldn’t exist, and that doesn’t go both ways.

Sotos, whether or not he would admit it, has an understanding of that magic and he uses it to cause the worst reactions in his readers.  He knows how the words need to flow on the page (any writer of worth needs to understand that sentences, like music, must fit into the greater composition just so or run the risk of becoming disruptive).  He knows what patterns to utilize.  He gives just enough of himself that when the readers fill in the “blanks” they are touched in the vilest of ways.  He forces his readers to create images of unspeakable crimes, and then they become complicit in them.  They aren’t just merely reading about these acts.  They are in the room smelling the smells and hearing the cries.  Whether he puts you in the mindset of predator or prey, the end result is that you suffer.  It is an amazing feat to pull off, and it is dangerous, but when it works it is sublime.

My friend was right.  It is sick stuff.  Beyond sick, as he said.  Shouldn’t it be?  Shouldn’t writing about such dark subjects be sick and disturbing?  Sure, some readers will want to stay away from it for whatever reason (and they should if they have any doubts about their ability to handle it), but for the daring, for those who appreciate the magic, the experience is unlike anything you’ll ever read, and why wouldn’t you want to embrace that?


I understand Sotos isn’t for everyone.  In fact, there are times I question whether or not he is even for me, but I respect him, and if I respect an artist, I engage in his or her work.  It’s not always a pleasant job, but it beats reading the latest James Patterson novel, where everything is safe and you know the story before you read it.  Patterson’s yarns are like a fast food breakfast for the reader’s soul.  Sotos, however is not so easy to digest.  It takes an investment of time and intellect that many readers will eventually regret, scarred and scared by what they have experienced.  I would have it no other way.


Mandatory FTC Disclaimer: Click on a link and I may earn cash.

Monday, September 2, 2013

A Quaint Look at Country-Style Racism Circa 1887

Shams, or Uncle Ben’s Experience with Hypocrites is one of those curious books from way back in the day.  That day is 1887, to be exact.  Benjamin Morgan, author of the work, wrote a tome well over 100 years ago detailing Uncle Ben’s train trip across the country with his wife.  As the title indicates, he encounters shams and hypocrites along the way, but he also encounters things far stranger to his simple, God-fearing country mind.

Black people.

Chinese people.

 And Jews.

Oh my!

For Uncle Ben (though not so much for his wife, who is portrayed as far more intelligent than he) these people are so alien that it is like he is encountering creatures from Mars.  Of course, I understand that this novel is a product of its time, but reading it I couldn’t help but think it was the kind of thing David Duke would take a liking to in the worst way.  Uncomfortable?  Yes, a bit, but only because I’m not really used to such casually racist descriptions and observations.  (Jews have big, hooked noses and are greedy, for example.)  Morgan didn’t have to promote those stereotypes in his writing, but that he chose to do so and that it was probably well-received at the time is absolutely telling of the era.

Reading Morgan’s book was an exercise in tolerance in many different ways.  The plot was nothing more than warnings about people and how city life differed from good ol’ country livin’.  The racism comes across as being so normal that it was even more offensive than it would have been had it been written to actually stir the pot of xenophobia.  And then there was Uncle Ben.  Yes, we he was trusting rube with absolutely zero street smarts, but he, like so many other people I encounter on a daily basis, came off as if he knew everything about everything there was to know.  Spending several hundred pages with the man was far from fun, and I kept hoping he’d get stabbed or contract some “city disease” most likely given to him by a Chinese man, but he didn’t.  (For the record, if anything were to kill Uncle Ben, it would’ve been a strange Chinese man.  Here’s the book’s description of them: “Their pigeyes and pigtails, greasy, yellow faces and heathenish countenances; their funny shoes, and pantalets breeches, with their shirts hanging outside, was so different from any other kind of folks that I couldn’t keep from looking at them as I would a menagerie, and the way they lived, ate, slept and done business was so peculiar that I come to the conclusion that they must have been dropped down onto the earth from some of the planets.  I presumed they fell from Jupiter, as they look as though they might be a cross between a Jew and the original Peter, for the way they live, move and have their being, is strongly suggestive that they came from some celestial climate, and are bound for the place to which it is said Peter carries the keys, and have stopped temporarily on the surface of old earth to pick up what they can, like flies in the summer, and carry it along with them.  Like the bothersome flies, they are content with a little at a time, but they are all the time after that little, and when I found out there was about 25,000 of them in this city, I could readily see how they managed to get pretty much all the subsistence away from the respectable white laborers.”  Again, this kind of stuff went on for several hundred pages.)

I bought this on eBay, and that’s where it will end up at again sometime soon.  I’m glad I read it, though, as it’s not often you get to read an original copy of something that old, but one read-through is good enough for me.  Maybe I can get Duke to bid on my copy.

 

Thursday, April 18, 2013

A Review of my Book and an Interview With ... Me

If you are interested in finding out more about me, you can read Cinema Crazed's interview with me here.  If you want to read a review of Nothing Men that the same site did, you can read that here. (The book can be purchased to the right of this post.)

I want to thank Cinema Crazed, a must-see site for culture junkies.  Danke!

If anyone is interested in doing an interview with me or doing a review of the book, feel free to e-mail me.


Wednesday, March 6, 2013

To Evil Comes a Daughter

There are a couple of things you can say about To Evil Comes a Daughter.  First and foremost is that its beginning and end almost feel like two different stories.  Second, its conclusion is not something you see coming … not even close.  You can decide whether that is good or bad.

A writer of one sort or another trying to solve a mystery he has suddenly found himself in the middle of is a conventional plot for books.  (The Screaming Mimi comes to mind.)  Author Allen Caraway undoubtedly knows this, but forges ahead anyway, leaving thankful readers waiting to see what happens next, though fairly unsure of what they will encounter.  What starts out like a ghost story ends up being a murder mystery that is as touching as it is surprising.  There are a few bumps along the way (chiefly being the supernatural element that dominated the beginning of the story and was soon forgotten), but that is fairly forgivable given the strong characters and unseen twists that are thrown at readers.

If anything, I would have liked to have spent more time with Caraway’s characters.  That said, it’s a weak complaint because the story wastes little to no time in getting to its destination, and that’s not something you can easily say these days.  Improbable?  Yes.  Entertaining?  Yes.  Intellectually stimulating?  No.  Not everything has to be, though.  There is, however, another problem that needs mentioning: the book’s title.

I originally read this book under the title Drowning in Shadow.  Its current moniker evokes a Hammer film and acts as a spoiler.  Readers expecting Gothic horror are going to be in for a bit of a surprise, though the beginning of the story will solidify those expectations for a while before crushing them callously.  The original title was better, and I cannot emphasize that enough.

Minor distractions aside, if murder mysteries are your thing -- especially those with a hint of the otherworldly -- then you may want to give this novel a chance.  It won’t change your world, but it is a welcome, simplistic read while waiting for tires to be put on your car, or for when you are enjoying a glass of wine and Ayn Rand seems a bit too heavy.



Mandatory FTC Disclaimer:  I did receive this book to review, and clicking on a link could earn me a commission.

Monday, December 10, 2012

A Trailer for "Nothing Men"

Here's a trailer for my book.

Monday, October 15, 2012

Pure Filth ... Pure Style ... Pure Sadism

What drives a woman to let a man choke her, defecate on her, write horribly nasty things on her body and generally treat her worse than he would treat a dog?  For some it's a simple as needing to pay the bills.  Others like it.  Perhaps no two people know this better than Jamie Gillis and Peter Sotos.  Neither should need an introduction, but allow me to do so anyway.

Gillis was a porn star.  I say "was" because he's dead.  He's considered the inventor of gonzo porn, and if you saw Burt Reynolds in Boogie Nights, well that was supposed to be Gillis. 

Sotos is a writer who dabbles in some very dark stuff.  He writes of sadistic, violent crimes ... often involving children ... often written in the first person ... often based in reality.  He was once arrested for obscenity and possession of child pornography based on what was on the cover of the second issue of his Pure 'zine.  The obscenity charged was dropped.  He pled guilty to possession.

Pure Filth is made up of transcripts courtesy of Sotos, of some of Gillis darker porn stuff (and an out-of-control commissioned video).  Sotos and Gillis each wrote an introduction, and Gillis wrote a little commentary before each transcript.  The book took about a decade to come out because Gillis was shopping around a memoir and didn't want Feral House (the publisher of the Gillis/Sotos collaboration) putting out something that could scare the major publishers.  (The proposed memoir apparently freaked out the publishers anyway for scenes Gillis recounted, including one where a girl just shy of 13 years of age offered Gillis some oral favors and he accepted.)  Pure Filth isn't horrific, but it is an examination of degradation of some of the worst sorts as well as being a study in what gets the juices flowing in some people.  Some would say the women in these films were nothing but common whores, but reading the transcripts proves otherwise.  Some are broken.  Some are abused.  Some want to be broken and abused.  Most people don't want to know this stuff exists.  Fewer still want to read about it.  If you want some insight into human nature, however, you can't ignore this.  It's disrespectful.

The book is expensive enough to keep it out of the hands of those who are mere dabblers.  Those who do decide to take the plunge won't regret it.  Some of it may bother you.  Some of it may intrigue you.  Some of it may have you questioning humanity.  By the end of it you may not have a better understanding of human nature, but you will have some new insights into yourself and what you are able to tolerate.  And if you aren't careful, you may just find yourself a bit turned on by what has transpired.  Either way, you'll probably never look at a toilet the same way again.


Mandatory FTC Disclaimer:  I paid for this book.  Clicking on a link may earn me a commission.

Tuesday, September 4, 2012

Books Aren't Just For Reading! (Utter Nonsense)

"Books aren't just for reading!"  That's the line I read in a magazine while waiting in a doctor's office some years ago.  It was an article about tips on decorating your home or apartment, with incredibly helpful tips on how to arrange books on a shelf so they look pleasing to the eye and how to use them to create a step pattern so that you can put candles on them.  (It was quick to note that you should not actually light the candles as they are on top of books.  Apparently the author thought that candles, like books, were mere props to show off how intellectually stunted the homeowner or renter happened to be.)

Ridiculous.

Books are for reading.  They aren't decorative props.  They aren't there to prop a window open or level out a table.  Using them as such says a lot about the user, and none of it is good.

I'm a firm believer in John Waters' advice.  If you go to someone's house and they don't have books, don't fuck them.  I can't think of a better bit of advice to give someone.  If a person doesn't have at least a few books on their shelves, how interesting do you think they are going to be?  Perhaps they don't think books are "cool" or "stimulating" enough.  There are literally thousands of titles (some of which I cover on this blog) that say differently.  Books on serial killers, fallen athletes, sex slaves, UFO abductions, criminals of the worst sort, Nazis, cannibalism, revenge, bomb making, body modification, conspiracy theories ... the list goes on.  If you can't find something that interests you, how do you expect someone to find you interesting?

So, if you go to someone's house and they don't have any books, keep away from their naughty bits.  If they do have books, but they're being used as a stand for a decorative vase, burn their freakin' house down.

Monday, September 3, 2012

Smut Unbound: The Elizabeth de la Place Interview


Elizabeth de la Place is the author of short stories with wholesome titles like The Billionaire’s Babysitter: Deflowering the Sitter, Sexy Hardcore Lesbians, Lesbian Strap-On Party, Ambulance Slut, Cum on and Haze Me, and Tie Me Up Teacher. (Click on the pictures for any you want to order.)  Obviously these aren’t for kids or their conservative parents, and they may even be a little more than what the Fifty Shades of Grey crowd can endure, but I was intrigued by them … and more importantly the woman behind them.   De la Place and I “met” on Smashwords, and after I reviewed The Billionaire’s Babysitter: Deflowering the Sitter, I decided to interview her.  After all, it’s not too many “smut” writers who would be willing to be so open about what they do.


De la Place is a college student studying chemistry at what she describes as a “liberal arts college.”  “I write for my school’s feminist newspaper,” she says, “and I hope to get my PhD after I graduate.  I think a lot of erotica authors lie on their author bios, but I actually was a cheerleader throughout middle and high school – my experiences and the stories the other girls would tell definitely serve well as inspiration for me now.”  In fact, the camp in Zombies at Cheer Camp was based on a cheerleading camp de la Place attended.


So how did this former cheerleader start down the much maligned path of writing erotica that borders on pure porn?  The answer is pretty simple: She read a forum post about it and the rest was history. De la Place explains, “I figured that it would be fun to try out – at the very least, if it didn’t work out, it would make for a great story.”  Since her personal sexual fantasies were “pretty involved,” it made getting those fantasies onto the page a bit easier, but as any writer knows, writing is only part of the battle.  The other part involves your readers and what they think of your work.  Erotica has its share of rabid fans and detractors.  Bad porn still can fulfill a masturbation need in the lonely, but bad erotica causes the author to be treated like a leper at the prom.  Everyone wants to look, but nobody wants to dance.  De la Place has been lucky.

“The reaction has been really good!” she states.  “I’ve received fan mail, which is exciting, and my friends, many of whom help me edit and provide me with ideas, have been really supportive and encouraging.  Even if they do make fun of me a little bit.”  De la Place’s subject matter (barely legal erotica, for instance) hasn’t caused an outrage, either, which is surprising when you consider American culture.  “I like to think that, as a younger woman and as a queer woman, I manage to handle those subjects well.   A lot of barely legal erotica strikes me as a little skeevy because I don’t like the idea of a docile, infantile woman – even when the female characters in my stories are being submissive, I want to make sure that they are willing and clever participants.  It’s easy for me to put myself in their shoes and to insert a bit of my own personality into them.  There is one subject she does shy away from, however.


“I would never do a rape/dubcon scene for pure titillation,” she explains.  “I do a lot of work with survivors of rape and abuse, and I think that using the rape of people, especially the ‘Oh, s/he enjoyed it in the end, so it’s okay,’ does a lot of bad things with regard to normalizing rape culture.  Only one of my stories features some mild dubious consent, and I struggled a lot with the decision to include it.”

De la Place’s works aren’t novels.  They are short stories ranging anywhere from 3,000 to 5,000 words, which some would say is just right for a piece of erotic fiction as it gets right to the “good stuff.”  The price for these pieces is $2.99 (more for the bundled works).  “That’s less than a price of a cup of fancy coffee,” de la Place explains, “and a sexy story is the sort of thing you can read again and again.”


Independent authors of ebooks and stories are left to price their works themselves.  It was something I struggled with when it came to pricing my books and short stories, and it is something Place thought hard about, as well.  “My prices mostly come from what I think they’re worth without underselling myself, and from my observations on how the really successful erotica authors price their work.”   One key indicator of how appropriately a piece is priced is by how well it is selling.  For relatively unknown authors, the price can mean the difference between fame and famine, as they don’t have their name to trade in on.  De la Place’s sales vary.

“I have a short story,” Place says, “Ambulance Slut,  that I joke about because I don’t think it sold a single copy in the United States for months after publishing, but it sold bizarrely well on Amazon UK for a while.  As time goes on, my sales have been increasing a lot – I make more in a week than I did in my first few months.”  I had a similar situation happen with Melinda.  It sold in America, but someone apparently started a discussion about it on some British forum, and suddenly I was seeing a spike in sales overseas and hearing from Brits who had a fetish involving starving women.  It was odd to say the least, and it did get me thinking about writing some truly fetishistic porn in order to supplement the bank account.  While I haven’t thoroughly ditched the idea yet, looking at the amount of work de la Place produces has given me pause. 


In June she published “about a dozen titles.”  The next month she did about six.  “I hope to get five more titles online before I go back to university at the end of August,” she states.  “My production will definitely slow down when I’m in school, since classes are my absolute first priority, but I hope that I’ll still be able to publish a few times a month.”


With the amount of short stories de la Place puts out, I felt the need to ask her if she thought she had a novel in her.  As any writer can tell you, there is a world of difference between writing a short story and writing a novel.  “I don’t know,” she answers.  “I’d like to think so.  I’d definitely be interested in writing young adult novels, but I’m not sure if I’m cut out for a longer length.”  For the immediate future, however, de la Place is sticking with what she knows.


“Up next are probably more lesbian works, maybe a dip into fantasy and sci-fi, and hopefully the conclusion to the Cum on and Haze Me trilogy.  I have a big document full of ideas, but when it comes down to it, most of my stories are based on what I feel like writing that day.  Sometimes I wake up and really want to write about horny schoolgirls, and other days I feel like writing about some gay knights having sex with a dragon.  It’s always a surprise, but it also helps to keep me from getting burned out.”

With ideas like that, who needs a novel?  It seems like the short story is working just fine for this author.  And while I’m not quite sure I’d enjoy reading about gay knights having sex with a dragon, I’m fairly positive there are some folks in Europe who will make that a best seller.

Mandated FTC Disclaimer: Clicking on a link may earn me a commission.




  
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