I Love This Book!

The February reading starts off with a roar.

Synopsis: How a famous poet’s daughter became a call girl and then a writer.

The narrator’s life is all over the place, but the tone is fierce. The call girl parts are never gratuitous.

After she re-connects with her father, her life begins to settle down. She moves in with a poet. Let me tell ya, it is positively heartwarming how taking classes from UCLA Extension turned this gal’s life around.

Our neighbor Lucero the bungalow queen collected rent, so she got a discount. She lived top center of the five bungalows, by the courtyard in the middle. Ricardo wrote, sitting on our hand-me-down love sofa with one leg missing. A Balzac book in its place. Lucero walked by in a pirate costume, another day as a bird with purple feathers coming out of her head. A flapper girl or a silk kimono, nothing underneath, for days when she was nude modeling.

— Strip, p. 174

The Evil Villain

I know that’s totally non sequitur, but as the Villain himself would say, Ha ha.

Yes, this Villain ends each sentence with a “Ha ha.” Not laughing “ha ha” but “ha ha” like he’s reading the words from a book.

He has a gun pointed to the back of our hero’s head, and he keeps saying “Ha ha.”

Mr. Ha ha Villain tells the hero to unbuckle his belt, whereupon:

I unbuckled it. The holster hit my knee and turned over. The gun fell out on the shed floor.

“Now you can buckle up again. Nice belt, ha-ha.”

(At this point I’m going to stop most of the ha-ha shit, because he said it all the time, as a kind of verbal punctuation. Just let me add that it was extremely Rumplestiltskin-ish. Which is to say, creepy.)

— Fairy Tale, p. 200

Our hero then has an epiphany: I had no clue how to turn the tables on the little fucker.

Stay tuned.

Top Dialogue, p. 186

Surely no one expects Charlie Reade to be able to concentrate in class when he’s been ferrying $115k worth of gold in his backpack, and has just been bequeathed land, house, and more gold than anyone ever dreamed of in their entire lives? And has just seen a dead giant cockroach in a shed? Let’s give it a try, however.

Charlie Reade is sitting in class, it’s Period Six, the course is America Today. Teacher calls on him just as he’s beginning to daydream about Wizard of Oz:

“Charles, have you fallen asleep back there? Or perhaps my mellifluous voice has hypnotized you? Entranced you?”

“No, I’m right here.”

“Then perhaps you’d give us your considered opinion regarding the blue-on-black shootings of Philando Castile and Alton Sterling.”

“Bad shit.”

“Bad shit indeed. Please feel free to reenter your trance state, Mr. Reade.

— Fairy Tale, pp. 185 – 186

Self has an objection: Are American teachers, she means real life American teachers, really this witty? She thinks not!

Stay tuned.

Skidoo, Who is either a Squid or an Octopus

Captain Nicolette Larson’s trusty right-hand humanoid, Darby, is eight feet tall and has four arms (Now wonder he’s such a demon in the kitchen!). The other assistant is Skidoo, who is either a squid or an octopus. Atlanta, one of the twelve heirs to the Empress of the Hive Mind, caught Skidoo in flagrante delicto with Milly the pastry chef.

Now, where was I?

SPOILER ALERT!

The crew are now prisoners of the meanest pirate in the Known World, Tubal Last (Author Cat Rambo couldn’t come up with a better name for her pirate? She already named the main ship You Sexy Thing!)

They are outfitted with gold bracelets that function as a sort of monitor. When the guard moves to Skidoo (Self is almost sure Skidoo is a squid), he realizes he’ll have to use something other than a bracelet.

Guard: “You gotta get tagged. The others can’t slip out of that bracelet, but you sure as hell can.”

Skidoo: “You are being a handsome one. Perhaps is being a deal possible?” (Skidoo gave a seductive, sinuous wriggle)

Guard: “Honey, I’m not wired that way. But points for trying.”

She extended a tentacle with a sigh.

— You Sexy Thing, p. 198

“Ship, Are There Any More Cookies?”

The ship You Sexy Thing has its own agenda! It is programmed to deliver the putated hijackers — the owner and staff of the Last Chance restaurant from TwiceFar Station — to IAPH (the International Association of Pirate Havens) but it has secretly decided: “not until I learn how to cook!”

Because, the whole time, Thing has been absorbing lessons from the chef and has been experimenting with meals, and then recording the emotions of the crew as they partake of its meals — hunger, pleasure — and this has become Thing‘s addiction.

Self feared, the first time she realized Thing had agency, that the book was entering HAL 1000/2001 Space Odyssey territory. Who knows, it still might veer that way. In the meantime, the crew has discovered that they have a stowaway: one of the twelve heirs to the Empress of the Hive Mind, a 17-year-old who was shipped to TwiceFar Station in a crate — Quel mystère! Good thing the chef decided to open the crate, just before the explosions that destroyed the station!

The Game’s Afoot

You Sexy Thing is not the first ship that Captain Niko (short for Nikolette Larson? Ho ho ho) has been on. She has at least a passing acquaintance with one other ship, called Constant Craving.

HA HA HA HA HA HAAAAAA

To get access to You Sexy Thing, she had to use a password. Guess what it is? Clue here.

Ship Comes Clean: Still #readingspacefantasy

You Sexy Thing comes clean to Nikkolette Larsen, owner/operator of the Last Chance, a restaurant on TwiceFar station:

Need self add: SPOILER ALERT!

“I no longer believe that you killed Arpat Takraven. Takraven likes to express humor, and I believe this was another of his jokes. You are inconvenient, and consume many resources, but it is amusing to watch you play and I do not intend to release you until I have learned to cook.”

— You Sexy Thing, p. 125

When One of Thing’s Passengers is a Five-Star Chef

This book is a wild ride!

P. S.: “It” is the ship. “Niko” is Nicolette Larson, proprietress of the TwiceFar Station restaurant Last Chance (Self’s brain keeps thinking of the singer with the same name, which is distracting)

Perhaps a good baseline would be to serve the meal that it had planned, and then elicit their feedback as thoroughly as possible . . .

It said, “Tell me what you want to eat. Then tell me how you want it presented.” It allowed the place settings to sink back down into the table’s surface, then the table decorations and napkins as well.

Niko said, “Very obliging of you. I would like a class five plant-based protein soup, spiced with flavonoids, toasted coriander seeds, and ground cumin at a ratio of four parts to five, and containing chickpeas or another class four legume. With that I will have class twenty-seven not milk and a plain wheat-based bread in cracker form. A simple white porcelain bowl and plate with basic human flatware.”

— You Sexy Thing, p. 101

“Fortune Tellers in Williamsburg” — Story # 3 in SAFE PLACES

Thank you, University of Massachusetts Press for publishing this book, self is enjoying it sooooo much!

My friend Farhad called me last year because he was sick from headaches and vomit, and no one knew what was wrong. No doctor could cure him. I read his leaves and I said, “Farhad, you will die in seven months if you do not stop eating so much lamb.”

Top Dialogue, Percival Everett, THE TREES

“How is the chili?” Jim asked.

“Do you like chili?”

“Yes, I do.”

“Then you will hate the chili. Catfish or burger?”

“Cheeseburger.”

“Do you like cheese?” Gertrude asked.

“Burger.”

“Wise choice. And what about you?” she asked Ed.

“Catfish.”

Gertrude came back with the food.

“That was fast,” Ed said.

“Luckily we’d already caught the fish,” she said.