Heartbroken man climbs into morgue freezer

Heartbroken man climbs into morgue freezer - Yahoo! News
TAIPEI (Reuters) - A Taiwan man grieving over the death of his girlfriend climbed inside a morgue freezer to be with her and was only pulled out alive half an hour later, media and an official said on Tuesday.

The 41-year-old man was discovered on Monday when workers detected an unusually high temperature in the freezer and realized the hatch was not securely fastened.

"A morgue manager opened the hatch, saw two people lying inside, felt scared enough to yell out and then even cried," the Liberty Times reported. "She didn't stabilize for a long time."

The man took a drug before entering the freezer to speed what appeared to be suicide attempt, local papers said. They said his girlfriend died on Friday from an overdose of sleeping pills.

The morgue would step up security to ensure that family and others who come by to identify bodies do not stay too long, morgue administrator Chang Lung-ching said.

Overheard in a drug ad

"Call your doctor right away if after taking Lunesta you walk, drive, eat or engage in other activities while asleep."
-From an ad for prescription sleep aid Lunesta. Yeah, driving while sleeping might not be a good thing.

Mystery deepens as 4th severed foot found - Yahoo! News

Mystery deepens as 4th severed foot found - Yahoo! News: "VANCOUVER, British Columbia (Reuters) - Another severed human foot has been discovered washed ashore on Canada's Pacific coast, but police are no closer to solving the gruesome mystery.
The foot, still wearing a shoe, was discovered on Thursday on a small uninhabited island south of Vancouver in the Strait of Georgia, and is the fourth discovered in the region in the past 10 months.
The previous cases all involved right feet still in sneakers, and each was found on a different island.
The Royal Canadian Mounted Police have not said if the latest discovery was a right or left foot.
DNA testing has failed to link the earlier discoveries to any missing person cases."

The Cure at Red Rocks

Twenty-one years ago, I saw The Cure at Red Rocks. It was 1987, and I was 16. Then, this week I was there again. Twenty one years later. Twenty one years older.

And it was a great show. Playing as a four-piece again, three of the members the same as the Head on the Door heyday, they really rocked. Even pop songs like "Lullaby" and "Hot Hot Hot!!!" came off heavy without all the horns and strings. Then they pulled out some songs a little less pop, and a little more rare, like "The Blood," "Push," and "If Only Tonight We Could Sleep." And they played a few new ones that made me eager to hear the new album. The third encore, maybe the best part of the show, was all songs from their first album, including "Grinding Halt."

Here's the video for one of the new ones, "The Only One":



And here's one of the many videos on You Tube from the show this week at Red Rocks, "Jumping Someone Else's Train":

Denis Johnson and Antonin Artaud

I forgot to mention that Denis Johnson gets extra points for quoting extensively from Antonin Artaud's "Voyage to the Land of the Tarahumaras."

Mallarmé for Babies

Yesterday, while in my basement study, my son (he's one) pulled from the shelf and brought over to me, with an eager look in his eye, a collection of poems by Mallarmé. I opened it and read to him,


M'introduire...


To bring myself into your tale
is as a hero much afraid
if he has touched with naked heel
any grass-plot of that glade


Ravisher of glaciers I
know no artless sin that after
hindering you'll not deny
its very loud victorious laughter


And am I not joyous, say,
thunder and rubies to the naves
to see in the air pierced by fire


among realms scattered and afar
as in a crimson death the wheel
of my chariots' only vesperal.

Book Review: Tree of Smoke

Tree of Smoke by Denis Johnson

I should begin with an admission. I don't care for war novels. Usually. It's not something I generally relate to or am even interested in even following. Johnson's Vietnam novel does things differently. There's half a dozen characters to follow, so pay attention. There's a fair amount of downtime, some general pointlessness, but when the chaos hits it really is chaos.

The story here is driving, though. It was the kind of thing that pulls you along. There's plenty of mystery and misery to keep things compelling among a slew of characters. It's really the writing here that makes things so strong. The language is solid, the dialogue is spot on. As dense and difficult as this novel could be, I enjoyed the reading all through its 600+ pages.

Now, I could complain some about the ending. I just finished it this afternoon, so maybe I should give it some time to sink in before I criticize, but the ending left me wanting. I'm guessing Johnson, maybe, had a little trouble finding a way out after writing such a long book. And how on earth would I be satisfied with any exit?

It is though, a great novel, and not like any of the Denis Johnson I've read before.

Movie Review: Running With Scissors

Running With Scissors

This movie is so bad that I can't believe the book is any good. Now, I haven't read it, but it sits on my shelf next to other memoirs waiting to be read. There's not a likeable--or sane--character in sight. There should be at least one foil for us to relate to, someone to say, geez, these people are crazy. Young Augusten has no personality. Then when he does begin to act out, it seems out of place and uncharacteristic.

Maybe this all has to do with the film and is not reflective of the book. The movie, though, had nothing pulling me through, nothing that made me care a lick about what happens with any of those people.

Another Damn JK Rowling

Frustrating? Yes.

'Twilight' Author Pens Other-Worldly Romance : NPR: "Few writers can imagine this kind of commercial success. And what may be even more frustrating for those who write in obscurity is Meyer's insistence that she never set out to be a writer. The way she tells it, the Twilight series began with a dream about a vampire and a teenage girl. Meyer wanted to remember it, so she wrote it down and then began expanding on the story."

Notes for a New Project

I'm barely done with the hard work of the last project and still going through it again before I send it out to readers, and my mind is already mulling over the next project.

The jumping off point is a man, up early in the morning, sees one of his neighbors sneaking out of the house of another neighbor. Their spouses are either out of town or working. The man watching is shocked and disturbed by the affair. They are both people that the man and his wife know well from the neighborhood. People they would never think of as doing this sort of thing. It sews doubts in him. It takes him a while to tell his wife, worried at first that she is aware and hasn't told him. It disturbs the foundation for both of them.

I want to do this in a very different style than the last project. I want to be close in, more stream of consciousness, more modern. And I want forward action. So much of what I've been doing involves recall, people looking back and scenes occurring back in the past. And, unlike what I've been doing, this would not be an ensemble work. I want this to be a linear novel, at least on a linear timeline, which seems to require some sort of adventure, a plot. The trouble is that I often resort to a course of disintegration. And certainly that needs to happen here.

This minor neighborhood intrigue, the affair, sets his marriage on edge. Things get turned upside down, things that once seemed firm become fragile. An underlying unhappiness comes to light. His wife, it turns out, is unhappier than he is. She thought she was destined for a different life. In the arts, dance, theatre, with creative types, not here in the suburbs married to this man. It's a pedestrian life.

For him, it's more than the marriage, it's about right from wrong, about justice, and also about what's hidden. If this thing across the street has been going on, what else doesn't he know about? Couldn't his wife be having an affair? Could he have an affair? I'm think this is where it leads him. He sees an opening, the foundations are not solid, and he could be a different person. He could be someone who has affair. He could quit his job, leave his family, and do anything he wants. So, does he go this course, or is it about his consideration of these options?

It seems like it requires some adventures, misadventures. Maybe he makes a move on his neighbor who is having the affair. Or a waitress, or someone else. Maybe he decides to confront the man. The man had been his friend, maybe they played poker together, and maybe they fight. And what about the children? They must have kids. What is his relationship to them?

While this situation opens up some underlying unhappiness for my character's wife, what he must go through is more existential. It shakes the walls, unsettles his sense of being. He'd really only been hanging on a thread as it was. He was achieving great things, on a particular path. And maybe it was stealing his soul, or maybe he never had it to begin with.

Do you ever feel bad for the books in the bargain section?

I do. I admit it. Not for the schlocky books that of course they over-bought. But I feel bad for the quality books sitting there, with their marked down $5.98 price tags, being ignored. It is the first section I go to, before even the new releases. But, did I buy anything there on my most recent trip to that big-chain-box-store? No.

Rain Taxi Reviews Anna Kavan's Guilty

In the Spring 2008 edition of Rain Taxi, Kate Zambreno reviews Guilty by Anna Kavan and, though the article praises Kavan's "lost" novel, Zambreno spends more time describing the book than actually reviewing it.

The writing is good and the review serves as a decent introduction to Kavan's work:

Nearly everyone compares Kavan to Kafka, her alphabetic peer, although there is a difference between "Kafkaesque" and "Kavanesque": in Kafka there is a paranoid fear that everyone is laughing at youer, whereas in Kavan there is the ice-cold realization, the unlaughable certainty, that everyone is persecuting you.

But finding the real judgments is difficult work. To the reviewer, it is "one of Kavan's best works." So sure of it is Zambreno she concludes, "In the best of Kavan, of which Guilty can now be included, Kavan tells the story of not only the homeless but those who feel displaced inside their own home."

But who am I to criticize a review? Some times we really need to learn about the book that is being reviewed. Sometimes that's how I learn that I'd like to read a book. What I really want is to hear about the quailty of the book. I want to hear why the book is good, or bad. Of course, when I review a book here, I do little more than that. Thumbs up, thumbs down. What else do you need?

As far as Guilty goes, I don't really regard it as one of Kavan's best. I do have to say, though, the book has lingered with me since reading it. I still think that if she'd had another chance to revise this book, it could have been great.

Second Draft Complete

This week I finished the second draft of the novel I'm calling Barnes County. While there are likely still some larger revisions necessary, it's just a strong line edit that is left. It is time to look closely at the word choice, the flow, and the the sounds of the words. This is where I should be reading it out loud, though that's hard to get away with in public.

It's been about a year and a half's labor and it feels like a long time coming. But there it is, 435 manuscript pages of hard work. And still more to come.

One of these days I'll have to tell you what it's about.

In the Death Cab

New Death Cab for Cutie. Very nice. Makes me think I need to go see them when they come to Red Rocks next month.

If Only

Rowling tells court she's stopped working - Yahoo! News: "Rowling told a New York court on Monday that the demands of the case had caused her to halt work on a new novel. The author, who wrote seven novels about the boy wizard, said the stress has 'decimated my creative work over the past month.'"

Oh, poor, poor, Ms. Rowling. Too busy raking in millions and suing a fan to do any decent writing.

This woman is a joke.

Book Review: The Lives of Rocks

The Lives of Rocks by Rick Bass

For such a well-reviewed book, this short story collection was extremely disappointing. The stories, though they contain lyricism and apt descriptions, were naive, as if written by a first-year MFA. Nearly each of the ten stories contained some element that was far-fetched, hard to believe, or simply unnecessary or out of place. It's as if they were written by someone just new to the craft and exploring what he can make happen in a story. Either that, or they read as autobiographical, but no less far-fetched. The kind of stories that would be defended by "Well, that's how it happened."

Rick Bass has a name that carries with it some credibility and so coming to this collection with a high expectation and anticipation, I was extremely let down. Let me not discount Bass's ability to put together strong sentences, vivid descriptions, all filled with content that demonstrates his wide ranging knowledge. I only wish he'd been coached some on shaping the stories into what they could have been.

First Freelance Piece

This week, my first piece of freelance journalism was published. I'm happy. I'm proud. But let's keep it in perspective. This is a relatively small trade publication, ACTE Global Business Journal, published by the Association of Corporate Travel Executives. Don't ask how I got hooked up with them.

It feels good, though, to see my name there in the glossy print. And it really wasn't hard work. 1500 words. I've written more 20 page papers than I can count, so this wasn't difficult at all. I had nearly 3000 words to start with and had to cut it back.

There are two things that may be better than see my name up there under the article's title. First, I got paid. That would definitely be the first time I got paid for my writing (other than minimal prize money). Second, I can hopefully use this credit to get more writing gigs.

Book Review: A Sport and a Pastime

A Sport and a Pastime by James Salter

I was very surprised by this book for many reasons. I simply wasn't aware of Salter until just a few months ago, though this novel was published in the early sixties. It is reminiscent of many classics. The style is like Hemingway. If Hemingway was in a colorful mood. It is also reminiscent of On the Road. It is told from the point of view of one character, telling the story of another more colorful and heroic character, here also named Dean. It does benefit from these characteristics, and it is beautifully done in its own right.

Most surprising might have been just how dirty it was. I mean truly explicit. It is not for the faint-hearted. Makes Henry Miller seem tame.

It was the perfect kind of book for a quick three-day immersion. I'll definitely have to read more Salter in the future.

Judging Your Literary Taste

It's Not You, It's Your Books - New York Times: "Sloane Crosley, a publicist at Vintage/Anchor Books and the author of “I Was Told There’d Be Cake,” essays about single life in New York, put it this way: “If you’re a person who loves Alice Munro and you’re going out with someone whose favorite book is ‘The Da Vinci Code,’ perhaps the flags of incompatibility were there prior to the big reveal.”"

Yes, I will judge you by your literary tastes. Let me in your place and I will gravitate to your bookshelves, head cocked sideways, reading titles. Unless, dear lord, you don't have bookshelves. It's almost as disturbing as not having a stereo. And if you don't have bookshelves or a stereo, I'll bet you have a large TV centered in your room like a shrine.

Books definitely tell a lot about a person, though I can't say I've ever dismissed someone because of their literary tastes. I've been attracted to someone based on their literary interests. I once went on a date with a woman because we had struck up a conversation about Steinbeck. She turned out to be about as dull and dry as the Salinas Valley. Books provided a perfect way to strike up a conversation. On a plane last week, the man across the aisle was reading American Pastoral. We ended up talking about our children instead. His wife was reading Driving with Dead People. I'm not sure what this says about them. Their child, crying most of the flight, was watching Elmo DVDs. That might say more about them. Or at least it explains why they thought they could read on the plane with a toddler.

(Also, I almost stopped to talk to a woman at the airport who was reading with an Sony Reader.)

Regarding the quote above from Rachel Donadio's piece in the NYTBR, I list Alice Munro among my favorite writers...and there's only one person in my house who read The Da Vinci Code. It wasn't me.

Children find woman's head on beach

Children find woman's head on beach - Yahoo! News: "LONDON (Reuters) - Children playing on a Scottish beach discovered a woman's severed head in a plastic bag, police said on Tuesday.
The discovery, along with a hand, was made in the town of Arbroath, Tayside police said. 'Officers attended at a stretch of foreshore near to South Street shortly after 10:30 a.m. after the grim discovery was made by children playing on the beach,' a statement said.
'They found what appears to be the head of a woman concealed in a plastic bag. A hand has also been recovered from the beach.'
No other details were immediately available."