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19 Knives
(short stories) by Mark Anthony Jarman: Stoddart Publishing, Canada,
2000
This collection of 14 stories
by Canadian author Mark Anthony Jarman is distinguished for its distinctive
style and fine storytelling. Each story is good in itself - well plotted
and engaging - but what elevates them to a higher level is the daring
and bold writing style that pushes language to the limits.The author
uses and combines words that one would not normally think to do. (He
has been described as Joycean, although he’s far more accessible.)
If at times I felt a line or phrase didn’t quite work, that didn’t
matter. The rewards come when they do work and that’s most of
the time.
A particular favorite is "Cougar."
It opens with the dubious alliteration, "Motor to the
mega mall and the mall moves me to a minor rage"; but thankfully
takes off nicely from there. It’s about a man in the throes of
a middle-aged funk, half-heartedly contemplating suicide. He’s
a fairly typical character in the collection: a man of around 30-40
years old who has lived hard, worked a lot of odd jobs, etc. He’s
been around. He’s smart, familiar with pop culture, listens to
the latest alt. rock music, is a bit of a loner, not out to impress
anyone. In this particular story, the out-of-work narrator is on his
way to get a Christmas tree for the woman he’s living with. He
goes into the woods to chop one down and is attacked by a cougar.
It’s a scrawny cat, however, and the two have quite a go-round.
In the title story, "19 Knives,"
the narrator is a recovering heroin addict. His caseworker now trusts
him to take his methadone home. That trust is rightly given, but destiny
plays a mean role in this new stage of his life. "Eskimo Blue
Day" is set at a public swimming pool where a father sits watching
his young son in the pool. When the boy starts to struggle in the
water and go down, the man jumps up to save him, but the ensuing action
takes a strange and menacing turn; while in "Burn Man on a Texas
Porch" a man with no real roots, living alone in a camper, awakes
one night to a gas explosion:
Propane slept in the tank and propane
leaked while I slept, blew the camper door off and split the tin
walls where they met like shy strangers kissing, blew off the camper
door like a safe and I sprang from sleep into my new life on my
feet in front of a befuddled crowd, my new life on fire, walking
to whoosh and tourists’ dull teenagers staring at my
bent form trotting noisily in the campground with flames living
on my calves and flames gathering on my shoulders (Cool, the teens
think secretly), smoke like nausea in my stomach and me brimming
with Catholic guilt, thinking Now I’ve done it, and then thinking,
Done what? What have I done?
He survives, but must go through many
skin grafts which never quite "fit’ and he ends up with
a terribly scarred face. The story gives his view of the world: he’s
bitter, of course, but there’s a sort of dark humor in the narrative
too.
Fate often plays a strong role in the
stories, suddenly throwing characters into a "new life."
Jarman captures the moment and aftermath of such fate with a deft
and slightly out-of-kilter prose that ingeniously conveys the shock
and mental grappling of events that his characters must be experiencing.
And where fate doesn’t strike in one fell swoop, it remains a
Hardyesque force that moves and shapes lives.
In "The Scout’s Lament"
the focus is on a hockey scout who talks of all the boys he’s
seen in his years of scouting for the big leagues. So few of them
make it - and this is part of his lament. "Song from Under the
Floorboards" gives us a narrator who works lubricating cars,
lying underneath them as they come into the garage. His mind drifts
around while he works under the car, remembering two boys from his
high school who committed suicide, etc. His "song" - a circuitous,
slightly imbalanced yet poignant rhapsody in blue - ends on a perfect
note of clarity.
"Skin a Flea for Hide and Tallow"
is the only story that does not have a contemporary setting. Here
the narrator is a drifter who has ended up in "Iron Butt Custer’s"
army. He knows that it is madness to face all the Indians on the day
of the big battle against the Sioux, but he goes along and gives us
a rundown of events.
"Subterranean Homesick Blues"
is about a young father reminiscing about his boyhood, growing up
in a basement bedroom where he raised all kinds of hell. Now his own
young kids have a basement bedroom and this sets him to contemplating.
"Brighten the Corners" is another story about a young father
who has just returned to his family after a trip to England. He is
immediately thrust back into the familiar world of kids and all their
demands after having had a bit of freedom.
Highly recommended for both the memorable
stories - many of which you can relay to others in the old-fashioned
tradition of storytelling - and the unique prose style that gives
them a sharp cutting edge and lifts them to another dimension. J.A.
[See "Cougar" in this issue
of TBR.]
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The
Blood of Strangers: Stories From Emergency Medicine by Frank Huyler:
Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999; Fourth Estate U.K.
2001
In these twenty-eight, short interrelated stories emergency physician
Franker Huyler gives us a real-life glimpse of the drama of the emergency
room as viewed from the perspective of the attending physician. We're
far from the world of St. Elsewhere and E.R. here, far
from all that frenetic hustle bustle. Huyler's compassion quietly
permeates the narrative; he's just who you'd want if you or a loved
one were being wheeled in, but he is also starkly honest and human,
not afraid to share some all-too-human feelings when they arise: "The
family, as so many before them, sat in the consultation room. I'ts
quiet, off the hall, clean, with two couches and a chair, and I've
grown used to going into it. It's one of the rare moments when I feel
powerful. Events emerge with my voice, families hang on my every word.
A dark vanity, vaguely resisted. Speak the worst: they'll be happy
if you're wrong." He also frankly discusses the mixed sensations
he has felt, such as when he is giving a beautiful, 15-year-old girl
(the girlfriend of a gang boy) her first gynacological exam: "There's
no avoiding the power of the moment, what floats out of you like a
secret. You just don't acknowledge it. You banish it with an act of
will. You are breezy, conversational . . . but she's beautiful anyway,
and you feel dark, ashamed, you do not like what you see in yourself.
But then you're inside, you open the speculum, and it looks fine,
and then you flick in the swabs and you're done."
The collection covers his years as a medical student and resident
doctor while weaving in stories of his current practice. He speaks
of his first day of anatomy: "Our cadaver was sixty-two years
old, and after a while, when we had gotten used to it, we cut around
his tattoos and saved them, like a little pile of photographs which
we left by his intact head. Mother. A read rose, and woman's silhouette.
The United States Navy . . . . even as we reduced him to pieces I
knew that he was real, that he had stories to tell, that he had looked
out at the sea from the decks of ships. I could feel it when I chose
to. Mostly I chose not to. Mostly it was anatomy." He does become
sick, however, three days later when "we carried his leg to the
sink and washed the green stool out of the attached portion of his
rectum."
Certain characters appear more than once, such as the sixty-something
Mr. Santana with his "heavy silver necklace, dark with inlaid
turquoise, and polished hand-woven cowboy boots," who comes in
smelling faintly of alcohol and cologne. He's had three heart attacks,
four heart surgeries, six catheterizations and was once dead for four
minutes; he's even had a leg amputated for gangrene; but whenever
he can, he signs himself out against medical advice. He always "holds
court" in ER, flirting, wisecracking. He's one of the ER regulars.
We last see him signing himself out after another heart attack "because
my girlfriend is expecting me." Huyler likes them when they are
"brave in the face of it," likes the men "who flirt
with the nurses, even though the EKG is unmistakable."
At times, he confesses that he is tired of "staying up all night
with bleeding alcoholics, overdosing drug addicts, murderers, and
gang members . . . tired of families who remade history for the convenience
of personal loss. . . sick of giving my sleep and my personal thoughts
to them." But he does. Even Mr. Garcia - a 45-year-old murderer
("The Prisoner") who has overdosed and is brain dead - is
very human. Huyler postpones the inevitable by checking on other patients,
calling his girlfriend, etc. because "I did not want to turn
Mr. Garcia off." Even when the family is ready for it. And the
nurses.
Throughout it all, Huyler's attention to personal detail never fails.
No one is ever referred to as simply a patient. The dead, black teen
wheeled into ER after a car accident has "hair, cascading to
his shoulders, dark and shining, each strand braided and tied with
red and black beads. It was the labor of hours." The relatives
of patients are humanized as well. The father of a teen boy who has
just died is described as "perhaps forty, white, with long hair,
tattoos on his arms, wearing a muscle shirt"; the man "fumbled
under the sheet for the boy's hand. Then he bent down, his long brown
hair falling into the boy's face, and kissed him on the forehead .
. . It suddenly seemed very important that I look closely, as closely
as I could, at this man taking on for the moment the role of father
to the dead son, kissing him softly, holding his hand, then turning
back to me and the doorway."
We know that the noise of sirens is in the air, that chaos looms
in ER, but Huyler chooses to focus on the intimate details that turn
bleeding bodies on gurneys into the individual people that they are.
The 28 stories, more like vignettes, cover sketches not only of the
patients and their families but of other doctors as well, with of
some of Huyler's own history thrown in. His prose is deceptively simple,
at times lyrical, and powerfully moving. I was left in awe of both
Huyler the doctor and the writer. J.A. [See two
stories from the collection in TBR: "The Unknown Assailant"
and "Speaking in Tongues."]
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Gob’s Grief
by Chris Adrian: Broadway Books, 2000
Quite why the main protagonist is called
Gob is never made clear, but it makes for a dreadful title and that,
in its own way, might serve as a warning. Inside is an incredibly
rich palette of ideas, imagery and themes drawing from elements of
Goth (Frankenstein, etc.), spiritualism, early feminism, engineering,
the brutality of civil war - all set against the backdrop of historical
reality and surreal fantasy. It is epic, with some nicely vivid
descriptive passages and dramatic scenarios, but completely unconvincing;
and its attention to detail and irritating plotting eventually drag
it down to a plodding, tedious read. There is a hell of a book in
here waiting to get out and some readers might actually enjoy the
task of prising it out. This reader didn’t.
It begins in 1863 in the middle of the
American Civil War. Eleven-year-old Tomo Woodhull runs away from home
and his twin brother, Gob, to be a bugler. The twins are the fictitious
offspring of feminist Victoria Woodhull, the first woman to attempt
to stand for the presidency. Tomo promptly gets himself killed and
in his grief, Gob decides that he must do something and the logical
thing to do in these times of science is to build a machine to bring
back the dead. Enter Walt Whitman who helped Victoria’s husband,
Canning, in the military hospitals. Walt has a ghost called Hank following
him around and it is Hank who forces Walt to talk to the now grown-up
Doctor Gob. The two become fast friends and Walt gets involved in
building the machine. As does another ex-soldier, Will – also
with a dead brother - who has a whole army of ghosts urging him on
and an angel who warns him about the abomination he is helping to
create. Next to join this barmy army is Marci, Gob’s wife-to-be,
whose dead brother (you guessed it, another war victim) communicates
through her left arm via automatic writing and drawings.
As every character is introduced, so
must we return to the civil war and learn each one’s story; fine,
this happens in hundreds of books with the unpreventable result that
it has to stop dead any momentum carried in the previous story.
In, let’s say, a Stephen King novel the momentum is back within
a few pages, if not paragraphs, but Adrian’s excessive detail
slows everything down to such an extent that you resent the intrusion.
By the way, the fact that 600,000 war dead never did come back to
life might lead one to suspect the machine was a failure and the end
of the book a rather foregone conclusion – think again. Like
I say, there is a book in there somewhere.
In short – well written, boldly
conceived and with some epic parts, but far too long, irritating,
and at times confusing due to the convoluted plotting. Despite the
negative comments, however, I am impressed enough by this debut to
look forward to a second novel. I would just find it hard to recommend
this first one. M.G.S.
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The Peacock
Manifesto by Stuart David: I.M.P. Fiction, 2001
Peacock Johnson got his name from the
tattoo on his shoulder and the fact that he likes the way the actual
bird looks and struts. He somehow translates this into an embarrassing
look of his own where a Hawaiian shirt is total fashion along with
one of those dreadfully uncool moustaches that go down to the chin
like that of the late Glenn Hughes in Village People. Peacock is just
a regular working-class guy and on his own turf in Glasgow wouldn’t
draw much unwanted attention, although if he did he is streetwise
and tough enough to get out of any situation. A money-making plan
that will make his fortune has taken him from his normal environment
and plopped him in the alien world of Chicago, into a world where
the majority of the people can’t understand his accent and when,
in exasperation, he tells them to ‘fuck off,’ leads to the
inevitable gun being waved in his face. His first setback comes when
his contact in the States, Evil Bob, turns out to think it is Peacock
who can help him rather than the reverse. But once Peacock
explains the beauty of his idea, he and Evil Bob decide to team up.
There then follows a kind of ‘road’ book as misinformation
and bad ideas send the witless two around the States, Peacock slowly
coming to terms with this phenomena called America. To add to the
confusion Peacock’s attractive but rather gormless wife, Bev,
arrives on the scene.
What follows is in large part a slapstick
comedy, but one rather odd, dark moment arises and a strange souvenir
of it seems to cast a shadow over proceedings. A film version would
have something like the Dumb and Dumber team hooked up with
the ubiquitous Meg Ryan, but that would be to completely miss the
point, which isn't to emphasise the stupidity of the characters. The
characters here are actually very normal, regular people in a fish-out-of
water situation, fighting for survival. With Peacock as narrator,
the tale is told in a precise, simple style, double negatives and
all, that says so much in so few words, and makes the photos at the
end a big mistake for me. For starters, Bev looks like Dame Edna Everage
(an Australian ‘drag’ comedian) when I had imagined her
as a Jennifer Jason Lee-meets-Courtney Love type; and Evil Bob doesn’t
even look American; he looks typically northern English/Scottish circa
1985, again hardly how I’d imagined him.
Stuart’s first novel, Nalda Said,
has been hailed by critics, TBR included, as a little classic, so
this follow-up is going to come under some very close scrutiny and
of course comparisons will be made. What Stuart has come up with here
is almost the opposite of Nalda;he has let his hair down, gone
for the laughs (and as much swearing as possible), and created huge
vistas and open spaces rather than the claustrophobia of Nalda.
Perhaps it is a necessary move to clear the way for the third novel.
Peacock Manifesto is a light, clever, amusing read in its own
right with a feel-good ending, but lovers of Nalda may well
be disappointed. I hope they appreciate the dilemma the author must
have had and see this second book as an important stepping stone to
whatever comes next. M.G.S. [See TBR review of Nalda
Said]
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Moby: Replay –
His Life and Times by Martin James: Independent Music Press, 2001
I normally leave rock music biographies
well alone, knowing that they are usually written by sycophants whose
subjects are fairly uninteresting people made interesting by the amount
of drugs they consume or money they make by creating ephemera. My
bookshelf contains a 1969 edition of Hunter Davies’ The Beatles
(they hadn’t even split up yet!), Philip Norman’s 1984 book
The Stones and a signed copy of The Boy Looked At Johnny
by Julie Burchill and Tony Parsons. I keep abreast of interesting
bands and biographies through magazines like Uncut or Q
and the only book on the subject I’d like would be the Zimmerman
brothers’ one of John Lydon - my hero, and, coincidentally, also
one of Moby’s. So why read about Moby? Good question, considering
I agree with Melody Maker’s review of Moby’s world-wide
hit Play: "Bar a few isolated outbreaks of talent, it’s
all rubbish."
My motivation is that Moby is part of
a new breed of ‘musician’ whose work seems to be pretty
much an audio collage of other people’s toil and original thought.
Moby seemed a more serious option to explore the genre than The Prodigy
as he has certainly taken it to a new level. His story is not going
to be nearly as interesting as, let’s say, Bob Marley, but he
has been around for ten years helping to create sounds, beats and
dance tracks that are enjoyed by countless thousands. He has worked
with, or been asked to work with, some of the major names on the planet
and his influences are close to my heart: the aforementioned John
Lydon and Pil, Joy Division, even early Roxy Music. No mention of
The Cramps though.
His personal life wasn’t as interesting
to me as were his studio and working methods. I wish there could have
been a bit more in this particular area but understand how it could
easily have got bogged down in technical detail, so all in all a good
balance is struck. Raised by a hippyish mother (dad died in an accident)
he half-revolted against the 60s communes he was dragged to by becoming
a Christian, which at first sounds grimly restrictive, but he has
his own definition of the word and is very anti the right-wing Christian
groups that are currently giving the religion such a bad name. In
recent times he has certainly become a bit lapse in his beliefs and
is drinking, whereas he was once a teetotaller, and bedding every
famous babe around. This is the boon of fame as the scrawny, bald
Richard Hall (to give his real name) possibly wouldn’t have a
chance in hell, or the nerve, if he hadn’t made it. He is also
wonderfully human and makes mistakes, such as once using ALL CAPS
on an Internet chat line while defending (correctly in his case) his
right to use DAT backing tapes at gigs. The fact he was pissing off
the pedants and bores who thought their views on music the only correct
ones was something I could certainly appreciate, but the bonus (and
added fun) came with the fact that he was accidentally SCREAMING at
them in the process. Unfortunately, he later bowed down and apologised.The
fool.
The book nicely covers the birth of techno,
acid house and the million offshoots and variations that were eventually
to lead to all sorts of snob dance-wars. It covers so much ground,
in fact, that what this book really needs is two CDs, at least, of
the music mentioned. It is very doubtful that many readers have all
the Moby tracks and re-mixes, let alone the many tracks that were
of influence (Joy who?). And dance music was so fashionable
that in just a matter of weeks a hot new sound/beat/song was history.
Listening now to early Prodigy, 808 State, et al, you can hear how
dated the music is (mind you, so is a lot of Joy Division). It is
possibly Moby’s desire to be listened to in two years' time that
has encouraged him to fiddle with music that has survived from as
far back as the 20s and 40s (Play). Shoving a beat and soppy
strings on old blues/spiritual loops doesn’t cut the mustard
for me, but for thousands it does, and this very well-written book
– in clear, straightforward prose - is as much an important introduction
to the man, his music for the new fans who came with Play as
it is a vindication of the fans he has made and lost along the way
as he shifts his styles to fit the weather, fashion, and his love
of punk. Martin James has done well to give fair coverage to a musician
he obviously likes a lot, leaving Moby to come across as a likeable,
but somewhat directionless, nonentity; and it’s done in a style
that doesn’t treat the reader as a brain-dead ecstasy victim.
M.G.S.
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