I managed to get a gig selling t-shirts
for Fearwerx. I spent most of the weekend
behind the table selling shirts hand over fist. I brought two of my best friends along to
help work the table in exchange for a little bit of money and a free trip to
the convention. My friends offered to
relieve me any time I wanted to walk around the con and see the sights, but
since this was my first gig for Fearwerx and I’d been to about a dozen
conventions I felt a commitment to giving my best effort for Fearwerx who paid
for my presence at the show.
The man behind Fearwerx asked that I take
a walk around the vendor room and take some pictures. Pictures of the Fearwerx booth so he could
see how we set the booth up with the s.u.v. full of components he sent us out
with. Pictures of the other t-shirt
booths to see how our booth looked in comparison and to get an idea of the
designs that everyone else was selling.
And pictures of the traffic in the vendor room, so he could determine
whether or not to pay for the privilege of attending the next Horrorfind. The profit to cost ratio is a useful
indicator which influences the decision of whether or not to return to a
convention, but it doesn’t give a real sense of what attending and working the
convention is like.
While I was doing my walk through, the Raw
Dog Screaming Press table caught my eye.
The books were set up in a rack, displaying the cover designs of the
books the table was offering. The
covers were well-designed, and since they stopped me in my tracks for a moment,
the man behind the table did his duty as a vendor and struck up a conversation
with me. The man behind the table was
John Edward Lawson, an author and editor and Editor-in-chief of Raw Dog
Screaming Press.
At most of the conventions I had attended
I made it a point to stop by any tables manned by authors or publishers. I review books for a few media sources and
stopping by a booth is a great way to get new books for review. The positive side of this is that it makes
authors and publishers aware of the magazines and websites that publish my
reviews, and when the reviews are published, it provides free advertisement
for, and raises public awareness of, the authors and publishers that provide
their books for review. The negative
side is that since I get so many complimentary books for review I’m unlikely to
pay for a book unless it’s something that I already know and love, so a
conversation with me results in an immediate loss to the authors or publishers
in exchange for advertisement which will hopefully lead to a long-term gain.
Allow me to state that my intention in
conversing with John Edward Lawson was not to acquire books for review. I had come to the convention to sell shirts
and have a good time and I had turned the book reviewer switch off. But old habits die hard.
The conversation started innocuously
enough. I told John that I was
impressed with the cover design of the Raw Dog Screaming Press books. From my side of the conversation I mentioned
that I review books for a few media sources.
This led us into a conversation about horror genre books and authors and
publishing. I said that I wasn’t very
impressed with your average black-bound horror paperback which populates the
horror section of most of the major bookstores. They read like horror-themed Harlequin
novels. The horror genre equivalent of
bodice-rippers. So few of them are
really scary or horrifying or manage to raise the small hairs on the back of my
neck.
The conversation of course diverged into
the requisite name-dropping. Stephen
King and Clive Barker. Edgar Allan Poe
and H. P. Lovecraft. Then with the big
names out of the way, I expressed my enthusiasm for Richard Matheson and how I
thought that Jack Ketchum was a promising author who rises above the
expectations for the black-bound paperback publishers. Finally I was closing by saying that I
thought that the two best horror novels I had read were by authors who were
primarily non-horror authors. Chuck
Plahniuk’s ‘Haunted’ and Bret Easton Ellis’s ‘Lunar Park’. I wasn’t trying to solicit books for review,
but the mention of the last two authors kindled a gleam in John’s eyes. He said he had two books that he wanted me
to have. ‘Vacation’ by Jeremy C. Shipp
and ‘Last Burn in Hell: Director’s Cut’ by John Edward Lawson, which he opened
up and signed for me.
This is the end of the story of how I
sometimes accidentally get books for review.
Now let’s roll on to the reviews.
I read ‘Vacation’ first because it was the
smaller of the two, but I’m going to review ‘Last Burn In Hell’ first, because
although I enjoyed both books for different reasons, I found ‘Last Burn in
Hell’ the more enjoyable of the two.]
‘Last Burn in Hell’ is an exceptional
creature as far as books go. The format
seems to have been crafted in the style of a novelization of a film. This device seemed a bit superfluous and did
little to add to or detract from the impact of the book. The book’s protagonist is a prison
guard. But he’s not a prison
guard. He’s more of a whore. He “services” women that are on death row,
as a special consideration. Kind of
like a last lay to follow-up their last meal.
But he’s just doing a service.
Except when the execution of a particular woman keeps getting
postponed. He gets personally involved
and decides to devise a plan so that she can avoid execution and they can live
happily ever after. As interesting as
the book was setting up the initial scenario, things get a lot more interesting
while they’re on the run. Identity and
sexuality blur and the inter-group alliances and dynamics become unhinged. Mexican gangs and federal agencies and a
Latin Madonna play pivotal roles in this story. One thing that is certain, his mother is not
quite right, and the protagonist is one of a pair of triplets who may or may
not be the result of an alien abduction.
I’d like to say “you get the idea”, but I’m fairly certain you don’t,
and reading is believing, so you should.
Both of the books I was given mention William Burroughs in the
back-cover blurbs. I don’t think Burroughs
is quite the right comparison. Rather,
I think that Burroughs serves as a common cultural touchstone which serves to
give potential readers a sense of the tone of the book within. Lawson reads more like Palahniuk. Some times comparing one author to another
is for classification not for accolades.
If I read another blurb touting an author as “the next Stephen King” I
just don’t know what I’m going to do.
Wait. I know what I’m not going
to do. I’m not going to read their
book. Because all of King’s potential
heirs fall short of the high water mark set by the King. Lawson is an exception to the business of
comparison in that his voice is a worthwhile addition to the chorus of authors
following the trend most prominently presented in Palahniuk’s body of
work. An earnest, but wry honesty in
writing, exploring the paradoxes of our contemporary American society. In ten years, these books may seem dated,
with their pop-cultural references and their reaction to the disillusioned
sardonicism of our generation, but I’d rather read something contemporary than
another book which safely stays within the prescribed boundaries of the
black-bound horror-genre novel.
The other book I was given from Raw Dog
Screaming Press was ‘Vacation’ by Jeremy C. Shipp. The plot for vacation is difficult to
discuss. It begins as a post-modern
tale of a privileged member of the higher echelon of academic society. Inside, he feels that he does not deserve
his rank and privilege, and his discontent inspires him to take a
‘Vacation’. This is not a vacation in the
traditional sense. In this post-modern
world, ‘Vacation’ is a governmentally regulated program that grants every
citizen a one-year trip around the world to exotic locales for exciting adventures. This would have been an interesting premise
to explore, but the author takes the tale in a surreal direction. This is where the Burroughsian comparison is
apt. The protagonist finds himself
abducted and entangled in a factional dispute, the guidelines of which are
unclear and ever-changing. The setting
for this dispute is the tropical area outside of the area prescribed and
protected for the ‘vacationers’. The
relationships between the characters become a bit to Jungian archetypal for my
liking, with the formation and disruption of pseudo-familial
relationships. The premise through its
many permutations stays fresh and disorienting, crossing back and forth between
the permeable boundaries between the conscious and the unconscious thus becomes
another discourse on phenomenology.
This flexibility and changeability accompanied by the tropical setting
may be what conjured the comparisons to the work of William S. Burroughs, but
Burroughs might still be the cultural touchstone that reviewers select when
reviewing books that explore post-modernity in this style. Perhaps a closer comparison would be to Paul
Auster in his book ‘City of Glass’ which is another book that explores the
themes of uncertainty and alienation, which are also fundamental concepts for
existentialism and existentialists, whose work ‘Vacation’ is a welcome addition
to. Readers looking for light horror
genre reading may be disappointed at the effort and attention required to explore
this brief, yet dense book, but those who accept the challenge will be rewarded
with an engrossing ‘vacation’ into the world of post-modern, phenomenological, existential,
but nonetheless truly enjoyable fiction.
More Online:
www.johnlawson.orgJeremy Shipp on Facebook: www.facebook.com/jeremycshipp
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