GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #620: SPINDLE

 

I just finished reading Fireworks by Jim Thompson, so I officially have no more of his work to read. Everything that has been published has passed before my eyes. Unless new work is discovered, I will spend the rest of my life without reading anything from him that I haven't already read.

Take a look at that cover. It took me a while to figure out what that was. Way more time than it should have. It's a spindle. No one ever uses spindles today because they're dangerous to have around. I saw a few of them in shops and offices when I worked as a parts driver for the City of Elmhurst, but that was twenty years ago. Even back then I thought it was crazy that anyone still used them. So crazy that I used one in my first book, Strip.

If you're wondering what the hell I'm talking about, way back when, people used to use spindles to keep track of receipts. Spindles are spikes that point up from someone's desk, and people impaled receipts on them. If you slipped in your office you were likely to impale yourself on it, hence the danger.

Thompson uses it as a weapon in this book. A character pulls another character off balance in an office setting, and that guy lands on his spindle, shoving it through his mouth and out the back of his head. Pretty cool. I liked it.

Here's a part of my writing that no one ever brings up to me: my use of foreshadowing. I don't lack the subtlety of, say, Ti West foreshadowing deaths in X, but I don't think I was hiding it all that well. Here's what happens in Strip:

I just realized I was about to spoil one of my own books. Whoops. I'll try to be vague about it. There is a character, at the end of the book, who kills another character by putting a spindle through that person's eye. Earlier in the book, I believe in the first chapter, the killer sits in that same office fantasizing about shoving that same spindle into someone's eye and killing them.

Spindles, at least in fiction, should make a comeback. They make for excellent weapons.

I'll bet you've never read an essay that uses the word "spindle" as much as this one does.

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #609: CHILD OF RAGE (REPRISE)

 OK, I finished Jim Thompson's Child of Rage, and whoo-boy. If I really had saved it to be the last book I ever read, I think I would have gone out on top, but it is a severely fucked up book. SEVERELY. I thought I would post my Goodreads review of it tonight, so here we go:

I try not to curse in these reviews, so I'm going to self-censor a little. This is the most f*cked up thing Jim Thompson ever wrote, and he wrote a lot of f*cked up things.

I don't even know where to begin with this. Allen Smith, the protagonist of this horror show, is one of the most despicable characters in literature. And the shocker of it is that it's not entirely his fault, but you don't know that until the end, and the way we learn this is a bit of a spoiler, so I won't mention it here.

Allen is a young man (just turned 18) who is forced to go to a school he can't stand to be in. He's an African American born to a white woman, and in the world of the 'Seventies, that earns him some privileges but for the most part he's treated like garbage because of the color of his skin. He takes the worst offense from white people who think they're progressive but are actually kinda-sorta racist in their own thinking without even knowing it. I get that. There is even a character who says that some of his best friends are Black. A definite red flag.

But he doesn't just have a chip on his shoulder. It's a boulder, and he takes his rage out on everyone within his path. And in an odd way, in the end they kind of all deserve it. The only damage he causes that was a complete accident is when he kills a baby and feels bad about it later.

He's sex-obsessed and even finds himself in situations where he could have sex with a willing partner, but it turns out that he's impotent unless he's thinking about his mom. And his desire to have sex with his mom isn't entirely his fault. She sometimes invites him into her bed but doesn't let him enjoy it. Not nearly as much as she enjoys it, at any rate.

And that's not the only incest in this book. He discovers that a brother and sister at school have a decidedly un-sibling-like relationship and sets things in motion that you will simply not believe unless you read this book. I expect the lowest of the low from the human race, and even this shocked me. And this isn't Allen's only manipulation. Not by a long shot.

This book is full of racism, sexism, homophobia, incest and a whole bunch of other stuff that would turn most people off. I'm not surprised to see these labels applied to Thompson himself, as he kind of ham-fistedly deals with these issues. I don't think he's a believer in any of those things, though. I think his point, in setting out to write this one, is to point out how horrible people are, and how violence begets violence and hatred begets hatred. I guarantee one thing though: as much as people like to make his books into movies, there isn't a single soul on this planet who would want to turn this one into a film. It is a truly f*cked up book.

There was also a novella in the back of the book, and I wondered why they included it at first. Around the halfway mark I realized that he'd probably written it as a practice run and then wound up cannibalizing it for Child of Rage. It's pretty interesting and f*cked up in its own right. I also found out that this book is actually signed. Not by Thompson, of course. This edition was published more than 30 years after he died. But it was signed by the illustrator, who I'd never heard of before, and Ed Gorman, the guy who wrote the intro. Gorman was a great writer, too, and it kind of surprised me that this was signed. I've owned this book for many years and never knew that. The reason is, the signed plate is usually at the front of the book. In this case it was at the very back of the book. Weird. But a pleasant surprise, nonetheless.

I can't recommend this book to anyone. I enjoyed it, but I have a very f*cked up mind, myself. If you're f*cked up, you might enjoy this book, too.

Oh yeah, one more thing. This is the second book of Thompson's in which he refers to himself. The first time was in The Alcoholics, when he writes about an alcoholic writer named Thompson admitted to an asylum for The Cure. In this one he refers to an alcoholic writer named Tomlinson or Thomas or something like that. It should be mentioned that Thompson literally died of alcoholism. So no matter what you say about him, you can never say that he didn't have a sense of humor about his own situation. I say that as a recovering alcoholic myself.

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #604: FUCK IT

Child of Rage by Jim Thompson

 

A while back--A LONG WHILE BACK--I wrote about how I was saving Child of Rage by Jim Thompson as the last book I will ever read. Now that I'm older (and possibly wiser) I think maybe I've made a terrible mistake. And according to that old GF column I knew exactly why it was a terrible mistake, and I decided to go ahead and make it anyway.

Well. Fuck it.

Considering all the shit I've been through, there is no way to guarantee that I would know when I was dying. I mean, I've been there before. I survived one death sentence, and I've survived a dozen brushes with death. I could have gone at any moment, and I would have not gotten to Child of Rage. I don't know how I'll die. Right now I'm not certain that I will die. Surviving all the crazy shit I have? It's a shocker that I still walk amongst you. Yet here I am. Maybe the world can't kill me? Although for a while I thought that I had died, and that I was living in the afterlife. 

(If you missed it, when I got out of the hospital in 2020 after going through king hell alcohol withdrawals, I thought I might have died in the hospital and that I was going through the motions of a very boring and annoying afterlife.)

I'm fairly certain that when my time comes, it will be a heart attack. It's the way I'd prefer to go. I don't want to linger for months on end. I don't want to be a burden to others. I don't want to suffer. A heart attack puts you down nice and quick, and you don't have to deal with long goodbyes. So if I'm right, I'll never read this book. What am I going to do, stop a heart attack so I can read a novel?

And remember, I wondered if it was possible that the book was bad. Thompson wrote a lot of great books, but there were a few stinkers in there. I'd feel like a dumbass if I saved this as my last book and it turned out to be shit.

So fuck it. I'm reading Child of Rage now. Watch, it turns out to be Thompson's best book and definitely worth saving it for last. Ah well. We'll find out soon.

I may have said this before, but I'll say it again. Once upon a time I drank a half a fifth of whiskey and wrote a story called "If I Drank as Much as Hemingway." It was a very funny and spot on parody. Then I finished the bottle and wrote "If I Drank as Much as Faulkner." It was funny, but it was also a mess. I told myself that one day I'd drink two fifths and write "If I Drank as Much as Jim Thompson." But I'm pretty sure that would have killed me even at the heights of my boozehound powers. Jim Thompson was a rare alcoholic. He made it to his seventies, boozing at full force. He literally died from drink. So yeah, maybe it was a good idea that I never did that one.

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #233: OUR MUTUAL FRIEND

Remember Desmond on LOST? He was an interesting character, but the thing I found most interesting about him was his possession, even on the island, of a copy of OUR MUTUAL FRIEND by Charles Dickens. His intent? This was going to be the last book he ever read.


I was struck by that because I also have a book I keep in reserve for the very same purpose. I thought I was the only one who did that sort of thing. Guess I was wrong.


I've never read OUR MUTUAL FRIEND. I'm not a big Dickens guy. I recognize his importance to the history of writing, but I couldn't get into anything except for A CHRISTMAS CAROL. That one was all right. The rest? Just not my thing. I can't say if Desmond has good taste or not.


If I may be so bold, I'm pretty sure I have excellent (if questionable) taste. Ever read a fellow by the name of Jim Thompson? He is, in my humble (yet bold, remember) opinion, the greatest crime writer of all time. I still haven't read all of his work. I dole it out because I know there's a finite number of his books.


Everything I've read about CHILD OF RAGE makes it sound like it's the greatest book he'd ever written. Offensive, intense, crazy. An examination of rage and racism. I can't express to you how off-the-walls awesome it sounds. Considering my brushes with death, I have the book in bubble wrap and in an easy-to-find place, so even if I'm in the hospital, I can instruct someone to find it for me.


But hell. I'm a writer. I could probably go at any minute. I've had pancreatitis. My gall bladder has been removed. My teeth are rotting out of my head. I can barely feel my feet. My vision is shot. I have the 'Beetus and high blood pressure and high cholesterol. I'm a garbage dump of a person. I expect a heart attack will get me. If that's the case, I'll probably never get to read CHILD OF RAGE. Shit, maybe Desmond and I are idiots. Who are we to say that we'll know when we're dying? Could be a toilet seat from the space station falls on me and kills me as soon as I finish this sentence. Maybe I should crack that fucker open and read until dawn.


(Good thing I didn't die right there. But the possibility of the toilet seat from the space station falling on me still remains in the back of my head ever since I watched DEAD LIKE ME.)


Fuck it. Let it ride. I'll take the chance.


Oh God! What if it's a horrible book?


It probably won't be. Thompson was a beast, and too many people I respect are saying it's great.


I'll tell you all about it from my death bed.

STRIP IS BACK IN PRINT!

My first book, which has been out of print for a while, is being re-released through Riot Forge! And check out that awesome new cover by Luke Spooner! Currently, it's available on Kindle here, and soon there will be a print edition. [EDIT: The print edition is here!]


For those who only know me primarily from my horror and bizarro work with StrangeHouse, this is a hardcore crime novel. Imagine if Jim Thompson and Richard Stark had a kid together and gave it to Mickey Spillane to raise, and you have STRIP. It's ultra-violent and hyper-sexed, so if your tastes run toward hardcore, and you're iffy about a crime book, this is probably up your alley. A group of criminals try to pull a strip club heist, but it's a mafia joint, and none of them know that one of the strippers is an undercover cop trying to take the owner down. If that doesn't grab you by the nuts, I don't know what will.


But what the hell? Here are some satisfied Goodreads readers talking about the book, Hellnotes did a great review, and apparently people want to pirate it, so I must be on to something, right?


I'll let you know as soon as the print edition is available. Thank you, as always, for reading.

THE DUI DIARY: Chapter Three

I was only able to get $540 together, but it would be enough. They told me I could pay whatever I could afford each time I saw them, just so long as I was all paid up on the last court date. Armed with this cash, I put on my suit of armor. Well, okay, it was just a suit, and it was kind of big for me. I used to weigh 306 pounds, and that was when I got the suit. I’m down to 220, so it hangs off me. One way or the other, I was dressed to win. This is the kind of outfit blood-thirsty people wear when they go to court.

Fortified with a breakfast of Pop Tarts and Tang, I hit the road and got to court early. Yes, I am a very punctual person. Impression is everything. Besides, if there were any problems, I wanted my lawyer to have plenty of time to talk with me.


When I got into the courtroom, where I was to meet my lawyer, I settled in and looked around at my fellow defendants. I was surprised by how many people chose not to wear suits. Many were in t-shirts and jeans. One fellow was wearing his finest soccer shirt. Another was wearing a stained, ripped Slayer shirt. Almost everyone had a dull look in their eyes. It was as if they’d already accepted that they were guilty and were going to have to pay up. Either that, or they were intoxicated on their court date, which I wouldn’t discount. I didn’t smell alcohol, but more than a few individuals seemed to be on the nod.


I don’t think it comes as any surprise that I was the only one in that courtroom who was there to fight the charges against me. One by one, these hangdog people went up to the judge and offered their throats up to be torn out. Maybe they were right to. Maybe the evidence was too much for them.


But not for me. I came ready to roll the bones, and I was excited.


Remember when I was in the drunk tank? There were two guys in the cell next to mine, if you’ll recall. One of them was with me in court, the guy who’d blown .23. Apparently, he’d gone with Don, as well, but since he’d blown, he was here for his punishment. He went up, pled guilty, and was clubbed down like a baby seal. Suddenly, I was very glad that I hadn’t taken the breathalyzer.


My lawyer found me and pulled me out of the courtroom. It wasn’t Earl, and it wasn’t Don, so I decided he must be Steve. And, of course, I was right. Steve sat me down outside and started going over my case. As it turned out, all the paperwork on the roadblock was good, so it was perfectly legal for them to stop me. However, looking over the officer’s paperwork, he came to the conclusion that certain procedures were not followed correctly. It was possible to get this thing thrown out because of this. He also notified me that there actually was footage of my field sobriety test. Chances were, we could go ahead without viewing it, but he wanted to get a glance at it and was looking for a DVD player.


He then gave me the officer’s official report and said he was going to consult with his other client. I looked over the paperwork and grinned. The officer was using an old journalist trick to make me look like a fool. When a reporter wants to make an interviewee look good, he cleans up the “uh’s” and “ah’s” and “um’s” and stammers and stutters when he quotes the person. However, when the reporter doesn’t like the poor bastard, he leaves it as is.


Most people use these verbal crutches. Even the President of the U.S. uses them. I’ll wager that 99% of the people reading this use them, as do I (which is why I’m a writer, not a public speaker or a radio host). To exploit this seems to me to be a bit shady. It makes me think the writer is trying to cover his bases (and his ass).


I was also shocked to find that he’d reported a complete and total failure of the whole field sobriety test. I knew I’d done bad with the balancing stuff, and the alphabet one was kind of iffy, but the finger-eye test? I was certain I’d done well. He said I hesitated a little bit. Also, even though I got all the letters of the alphabet correct, I paused for a second between P and Q, which failed me.


Isn’t that ridiculous? I think this test is geared toward making everyone fail. It reminds me of the old Bill Hicks bit about sobriety tests. “Okay, now do the alphabet backwards. Now touch your nose. Now do calculus.” Shit, if that’s all they want, why not be obvious?


Anyway, I went over the report, and Steve was still with the other client. He said the judge wouldn’t call me for a while, so I should wait outside. Luckily, I had a book with me. I never go anywhere without one. If there’s anything in the world I hate, it’s being bored with nothing to do. I’ll read while waiting for a movie to begin, waiting at stop lights, hell, sometimes while even driving.


I whipped out Jim Thompson’s THE KILL-OFF, which kept me entertained for about an hour and a half, at which point Steve said he’d found a DVD player. We settled in to watch my field sobriety test, which was kind of weird. Honestly, I thought I’d look like a gibbering fool, but as it turned out, I was conducting myself pretty well.


At one point, the officer turned me around, and I saw myself from behind. Why hasn’t anyone told me how baggy my pants are? It is not a deliberate fashion statement, I assure you. Well, like I said, I used to weigh 306 pounds, and I haven’t bought any new pants in a while. I think I should probably get on that immediately.


While I’m poking fun at my non-existent fashion sense, I should also note that I’ve never really thought about my denim jacket before. It doesn’t really look good on me, which is unfortunate, considering how I’ve been wearing denim jackets since freshman year of high school. Since 1992, for those who care or are keeping score.


Steve didn’t care about what I was wearing. He was too busy doing important things, like watching how I was performing. “That’s not so bad,” he said. “I’ve seen a lot worse. This should be a breeze.”


I stumbled a few times while walking the line, and I kept putting my arms up to restore my balance. I could see why the officer might have thought I needed to be arrested. If only I’d thought to mention my crooked right foot to the officer at the time, I might not have had to put up with all of this.


“Why didn’t you?” Steve asked.


I really hadn’t thought of it at the time. I was too busy trying not to fail the stupid sobriety test. Besides, I don’t think the officer would have believed me.


“Good,” he said. “The judge is going to want to know why. You tell him that, and be firm. Don’t shrug and don’t say things like ‘I don’t know’ or ‘I guess,’ just be firm.”


This was good advice, and I was glad he was my lawyer.


We went back in, and I sat for a while, watching more cases. Since I was actually going to get a hearing, they decided to save me for last, so I got to see a lot of defendants get slain. The only interesting case was another hearing. They actually had a nurse as a witness, in addition to another Lisle cop. Apparently, the defendant got out of hand, so the officer had to mace her. But she had an allergic reaction, so they rushed her to the hospital, where they tried to get blood and piss from her for a variety of tests. The woman faked the urine test, but they got her on the blood test. The nurse didn’t know a lot, and the cop hemmed and hawed, so they weren’t able to reach a decision on the case.


Finally, I was up. They called the arresting officer to the stand, and Steve started hammering him with questions. It was a delight to watch. The officer was able to fend for himself pretty well, as he was well spoken, but he answered too many questions with “I don’t know” and “I don’t recall.” When he was asked about procedure, he didn’t remember some of it, despite the packet he was given on the night of my arrest. He also admitted to having a “brain fart” when he asked me to walk the line. He didn’t get the starting position correct.


Things were really looking up. Steve started in with my crooked foot when the ref rang the bell. 12:15. It was time for the court to close down. This was going to be continued at a later date? Yeah, I was disappointed, too. Steve was getting ready to deliver his knockout punch, and it would now have to wait.


The judge asked the officer when he’d be available, and the officer told him that he was free on the 23rd. Steve objected to this immediately because my suspension was scheduled to begin on the 17th. After a bit of talk, they settled on the 16th.


On the way out, Steve told me that things were looking really good. It was too early to be certain, but considering the officer’s neglect of certain procedures and his uncertain answers to some of Steve’s questions, he thought I had a good chance.


I was impressed with Steve’s professionalism. He went at the officer like a bulldog, and didn’t let up. And the prosecutor only objected once (which was overruled), which I think is a good sign. Apparently, the police are only supposed to check your license, your insurance, and to make sure that your car is in legal working order. Then, you should be sent on your way. This did not happen with me. He detained me a bit longer than he should have, making conversation, and then he said that he detected a “faint” odor of alcohol. Steve says it usually takes a “strong” odor of alcohol to be forced into the field sobriety test.


Steve went on to say that “faint” is usually an indicator of beer intake, rather than anything stronger, which would back up my story of only having two beers. He also said that it’s not illegal to drink and drive, it’s just illegal to drive when you have more than a .08 BAC. This, combined with the fact that I was not slurring my words at all, that my speech was very clear throughout the evening, showed that I was not driving under the influence, and that I should not have been given the sobriety test.

So, yes, things are looking very good.


TO BE CONTINUED TOMORROW!