Monster Game

So the first evening of my Winter Holiday started last night, with some naval gazing.

Annually I look forward to the Business Shutdown during the Christmas and New Year Holiday. It is a chance to unwind my mind, get away from fixing problems and the ringing phone; giving me a pause to enjoy sharing time with the family, catching up with my reading and writing, but most crucially to reflect and take stock of events in this plane of existence, placing them into some form of context, with my own life. I also consider how I have changed progressing through life as I age. One must always consider how the overcoming of obstacles changes us; so we should pick our challenges and obstacles carefully, for they alter us, as well as the direction of the path we find ourselves on.

Last night was a late one, as I was trapped in deep thought with my cognition encouraged by some Dark Rum and Ginger Beer infused with fresh Limes.

When I got home, traversing atrocious weather with Storm Barbara [making driving conditions troubling]; the family had to make a decision about what we would do over the Holiday. With my beloved Father-in-Law Gerard Keogh in serious ill health and hospitalised in Dublin, we have decided as a family to head across the Irish Sea to not only spend time with him; but also to take some pressure off my Brother-in-Law and Sister-in-Law who look after him. Mr Gerard Keogh is well into his Nineties now; a gentleman as well as a fighter, for he keeps overcoming the adversities that age brings to us all. I admire those who fight adversity and battle the Monsters in our midst, especially those who confront failing health.

My own Father Dr Syed Karim’s health is not so good either; though he is a tad younger [in his mid-eighties]. In consequence we have decided to have my parents over for Christmas Dinner tomorrow, before the family pack up and head to Ireland.

The current health of my Father and Father-in-Law rests heavily upon my mind; for something I am writing is related to these two most misunderstood men. I would like my writing project completed as soon as practicable, so I can read some of it to them. As ever, time is not on my side as the speed of my own writing [which competes against my business, family and book reviewing obligations]; when striated against their declining health - troubles me. Though despite the mental faculties of both Karim and Keogh senior [which are in decline with the ravages of age]; I still wish to sit with them, and read something from my mind that I feel has some significance; namely resonating their legacy and influence on the reality I have uncovered about them, from my own dark imagination and from some long lost secrets of Post-World War Two Europe.

I am reminded of the legacy that the lives of our elders had, by some words from an early track by Pink Floyd, entitled Free Four from their 1972 Album Obscured by Clouds [originally commissioned by Film Director Barbet Schroeder].

The memories of a man in his old age,
Are the deeds of a man in his prime.

I also thought of this old Pink Floyd song [earlier in the year], when I read Andrew Gross’ The One Man for its narrative details the wartime adventures of an elderly American [with failing health] as he is cajoled by his daughter to retell what he did during  World War II. Curiously, my own current writing project delves into the early lives of my own Father, the mysterious Dr Karim and the enigmatic Mr Keogh [my French-Irish Father-in-Law], and the significance of their own deeds, in a dangerous Post-World War II Europe; deeds now lost in time, and held in my imagination, and their failing memories.

Andrew Gross’ The One Man, like the most interesting of narratives indicated to me that the trick is not to reveal where the seams between fact, merge into fiction, as the tale is retold or reimagined. In Gross’ narrative, he fictionalised the life of his own Father-in-Law, who incidentally managed to see some of the completed manuscript for The One Man, but never saw its publication for he tragically passed away just weeks before the book hit the bookstands, earlier this year.

So last night, we made the necessary arrangements for the whole family to travel to Dublin, like we have done over the years traversing the Irish Sea by Ferry. The memories that the children have of those journeys, as do Muriel and I; remain special like many of the deeds from our past.

I have a deep love for Ireland, first visiting the Emerald Isle back in the 1980s, as I worked in the Middle East, as a Petroleum Chemist surveying and inspecting bulk liquid and gaseous cargoes [as Iran vs Iraq War One, was closing]. I learned a little about life offshore and at sea during that time, working six-weeks on, and three-weeks off on a rota. I incidentally read a lot of books while stationed in the Arabian Gulf, as Mariners are often well-read folk, with time on their hands. Seafarers are also a most superstitious bunch. You’ll never find a 13 Tank, on a Chemical or Crude Oil Vessel.

The memories of a particular Chief Officer [from my time in the Middle East] came back to me last night, as I enjoyed some Dark Rum. His name eludes me as it is lost in the depths of my memory, but I can still picture his face; now just an image from days now passed. He was the XO on a regular vessel which loaded 300,000 Tonnes of Celanese grade Methanol from Jubail [Kingdom of Saudi Arabia] for Japan on a dedicated route, back and fro traversing the Arabian Gulf, Indian Ocean and the Pacific. I spent much time on that vessel, during which the XO introduced me to a drink he called ‘The Perfect Storm’ [which is referred to in America as ‘A Dark and Stormy Night’]. The drink is one part Dark Rum to three parts Ginger Beer, with fresh Lime in a chilled glass filled with ice.

While supervising the custody transfer and loading process or cargo operations, we would pass the time drinking Rum and he would tell me tales of the mysteries of the sea, like the Monsters such as The Kraken. He was a walking library on the legends and mysteries of the sea, and I would be fascinated listening to him; for like many of us, we fear what we term Monsters, and the Monstrous; which for me consist of the Horrors of this World, this Existence, with the knowledge that when it comes to Monsters, they are indeed Legion. Some even wear our own skin, and hide among our number.

So after writing away last night while knocking back the Dark Kraken Rum as I celebrated the start of my Winter Holiday; the theme of Monsters kept encroaching upon my thoughts [and writing] as did the upcoming journey to Ireland with memories of days now passed; my time as a Maritime Chemist, as well as the time spent with my family in Ireland when the children were young, all came back to me – especially the MONSTER GAME.

I used to enjoy playing with our Children, Sophia, Alexander and Miriam when they were young while we visited relatives and friends in Ireland. Life was less complex in those days when the responsibilities I shouldered were not as onerous as they are today. I introduced our Children as well as their Nephews Jeffery and Richard [my Godson], as well as Niece Jillian, and their friends, young Conor and Ciara to my MONSTER GAME.

MONSTER GAME was something I would play to amuse the Children, but it also had a more serious aspect, something that I hoped would stimulate them and give them the confidence to overcome even the most insurmountable of odds. As worthy as this all sounds, I wanted to prepare their developing minds for the dangers of this world, all in the context and safety of a game; and one that like Life, contains a Monster.

For MONSTER GAME, I would construct an obstacle-course of sorts in the garden, made [or rather improvised] from Toys, Ladders, Tools, Skipping Ropes, Swings, Bikes, pretend “Land-Mines”, Quicksand, Paddling Pools, Sand Pit, Tightropes and much, much else, all laid-out into a giant maze.

The Rules for MONSTER GAME were simple -

[a] You had to overcome the obstacle-course to reach the finish line in the quickest time, touching the wall marked ‘THE END’

[b] You had to do this with a Monster pursuing you, and of course I was the Monster, and gave them all a weighted head-start depending upon their age.

If the Monster caught up with them before they could touch the wall marked ‘the end’, they would lose to the Monster.

We used to have great fun, and even when exhausted, I would smile when I heard ‘Come on Uncle Ali, play another MONSTER GAME’ from Richard my Godson. Richard would be amused, when I told him that he is special, having a Godfather who was an atheist, but a resourceful one, and one who would watch over him like Don Corleone, so if anyone messed with him, they would have to fear the wrath of the Atheist Godfather as my reach is wide and long, as I know many, many people.

Occasionally my Godson Richard would recall those times when he was an infant; and remind me of the fun of the MONSTER GAME. I look back at that time [close to two decades ago] with affection, and how I enjoyed watching the Children overcome the hurdles, the obstacles and maze, racing to the end and touching the wall, before the Monster caught them. For me the MONSTER GAME is about the reality of our existence, and our ability to overcome the obstacles in our path, both physically as well as mentally with an awareness that time is always a factor, and that there is always a monster behind us; one who will destroy us if we fall. But MONSTER GAME is forgiving, as long as you pick yourself up after a fall and keep running, for to succeed in MONSTER GAME, is to never give in, for there is always hope when we are resilient and resourceful.

As an analogy, MONSTER GAME for me is preparation for life; for there are obstacles in our lives, moments where our situation appears hopeless, the odds in our success being long, and of course there are indeed Monsters waiting for us; many wearing our skins.

Unlike the children who played MONSTER GAME with me close to two decades ago in Dublin; many children are not so fortunate to practise survival skills in a cognitive and physical game. For some children, there is no dry-run, for the MONSTER GAME is real for them, so while some manage to succeed, others do not, for the ‘real world’ MONSTER GAME has consequences, as we see in the Children from the ranks of the Bullied, the Brutalised and Abused, the ones born into Poverty and those trapped in War Zones like Aleppo, who play MONSTER GAME for real.

This year we as a family will be donating to Save the Children, and I would urge you to please consider donating whatever you can afford to assist Children who have to play MONSTER GAME for real.

More Information about the work of Save the Children and how to donate is available here

So as the Karims prepare to travel to Ireland, to be with the Keoghs, may we wish you all a very Merry Christmas, and let’s hope we can overcome the Monsters that may appear in our path as 2017 arrives.

When I wondered why I wrote this piece? I recalled Graham Greene explaining why some of us feel compelled to transcribe our thoughts onto paper -

 “Writing is a form of therapy; sometimes I wonder how all those who do not write, compose, or paint can manage to escape the madness, melancholia, the panic and fear which is inherent in a human situation.”

Sláinte to my writing and reading friends; for many of us, the transcribed thoughts of ourselves and others, are ways that some of us deploy to retain our sanity. 

Monster Game © 2016 A Karim

Shake Hands with the Devil (c) 2016 A Karim

“May you live in interesting times” the Chinese proverb says, and no one can doubt that 2016 has certainly been interesting. When faced with a traumatic fork in the road, I find memories of days now passed, become unlocked. Stuff I rarely think about, stuff of minutiae, random memories resurface for an instance, lucidly and then vanish back into the dark recesses of our consciousness again.

I returned to my days as a barman [and doorman] when I was a student. Perhaps it was due to the liberal [and medicinal] doses of Johnny Walker Black Label last night, fighting my chest cold; or perhaps it was the contemplation and concerns of regime change in North America following the recent victory by Donald Trump and his unspeakable cabal.

I recalled a particular ‘regular’ in the Snooty Fox; the Bar I worked in over thirty years ago in Chester. He was a solitary type and no matter how hard we tried to engage him in conversation, he would blank us, and just smile and avert his gaze. It was not a comforting smile, more akin to a sneer. He came in on a Thursday, Friday and Saturday Night, for a couple of years and was always alone. We never discovered his name. None of the girls behind the bar would serve him, for they said he was creepy and made them feel uncomfortable with his smile, which was really a sneer.

Three decades on, I found myself wondering whatever happened to him. He always sat against the bar alone. He never spoke to anyone, always solitary and always left alone. He would watch people discreetly from his bar stool, from the corner of his eyes, but never caught anyone’s gaze. He would drink five pints of Stones Bitter each night. He never spoke, apart from when he grunted ordering his beer. Occasionally we would see his lips move subtly, as if he were talking silently to himself; except for one night.

It was as a Saturday, I opened up the bar. Doorman Big Chris was ill, so later Spike and I manned 'the door'. The 'loner' bloke [the silent and weird one] was leaving. As he left, this time his gaze held mine. He clasped my hand in a hard grip and very weirdly whispered 'shake hands with the devil'. His hand was icy, and I felt the hairs on my body become erect and I felt a chill come over my body as I stared into his eyes and the troubling smile.

He winked before eventually releasing my hand. There was knowingness in his eyes as he continued to hold my gaze; grinning menacingly before buttoning up his coat and vanishing into the night.  Spike and I watched him from ‘the door’. Before he turned into Frodsham Street, he paused and looked back at us under the glow of a street-lamp. He had an arm outstretched. It pointed to the full Moon above us. When we looked back down, he was gone.

We never saw him again, though we would speculate as to who he was, or might have been. Spike postulated that he was ex-Army, by the way he walked, his gait and his attire. But no one really knew who he was, or why he was.

So with the World in geo-political turmoil as we face 2017, I wondered last night where he went? And who he was; now existing as just a shadow trapped in my memory.

I don't know why I thought of that 'odd' thirty-year old memory last night in my dreams. Perhaps it is due to the Cassandra Complex that I suffer from time-to-time related to what so many people just did in North America; voting to elect a dangerously unstable man Donald Trump to the highest seat in the World.

One should be aware that when you shake hands with the devil, there are consequences. Let’s hope sense prevails with the imminent regime change in North America as they lurch toward the Right Wing of the Political Spectrum.

Human nature has a troubling side as the Devil rides amongst us, often in disguise but occasionally he reveals himself, even if it is at times in our memory of days now passed, like the dreams of Cassandra or the result of an overactive imagination.

I prefer the latter over what Cassandra saw in her dreams.

Photo Top (c) 2016 A Karim [New Orleans, Louisiana]
Photo Bottom (c) 1969 20th Century Fox [The Planet of the Apes]

The Parallax View

“If you begin to understand what you are without trying to change it, then what you are undergoes a transformation.” 

Jiddu Krishnamurti

‘Self-Awareness’ increases as we age, and is most evident in those that ‘think’ and contemplate their place in this shared reality, and therefore can cope better than those that live like dust particles in the Brownian Motion tube, unthinking and buffeted by the random wind we term fate.

Today, something happened in my lunch hour that illustrated the causal link between what I saw [and considered] about to happen to me, and my reaction to what appeared on my ‘Event Horizon’. What I saw, and interpreted through the prism of my consciousness was wrong, totally wrong. The stimulus of the approaching ‘event’, was filtered through my consciousness, and as I got ready to confront what I perceived to be trouble and braced myself for what I perceived to be danger, I understood why I made this miscalculation. It was much later when I ruminated over the incident, and became ‘self-aware’, I realized I had viewed the upcoming event through a parallax view. The conclusion I came to as I saw events unfurl in front of me, was wrong, but most crucially I understood why I had seen things through a parallax, because I understood myself – with due consideration of my frame of mind and frame of reference - that was specific to that situation, and the context of my thinking at that exact time.

So before I detail the incident, let’s take a look at my frame of reference, what my mind was engaged with, grappling with - when the incident kicked off, because from that I realized I viewed the event through a parallax.

I am living under a great deal of stress currently, and I think [with all due modesty] I’m managing it well, though it is hard on the mind. Specifically, I have our children scattered around the world, my wife is away looking after her elderly father, while my own elderly parents take some of my time; being the eldest son, and the one who lives closest by.

The business I co-founded over a decade ago is going like a freight train, which is great, but takes a huge slug of my time to manage as I’m not involved in the distribution of Baked Beans and Toilet Rolls, but problematical and heavily regulated products.

I have agreed to work, in a senior role and in a pro-bono capacity on a major event this autumn [Fall], and the time is getting closer, and expectations high. When I ponder in my dark moments why I agreed, back in 2012 in a bar in St Louis, MO to carry out this role, I realise I did so, as a way of saying thanks to the people who have given me so much pleasure over the years at these events. Coupled to that, I have been asked to be a proposed speaker at an upcoming TED TALK; something that is as prestigious as it is time consuming.

I also sit on two Boards, chair a working group, am a Company Secretary, and a Fellow of three Institutes, and a literary judge for The Crime Writers Association, Assistant Editor at www.shotsmag.co.uk - so I am basically a busy bloke.

How I cope, is a combination of a very understanding family, hyper organisation and my obsession with crime, mystery and thrillers which is my method of coping with reality and life, as this short BBC TV interview from World Book Night in 2011, indicates.

An active imagination and an addiction to reading [and watching] crime, mystery and thrillers can also have an effect on your cognition that you need to aware of. One such effect is a heightened sense of awareness, which some would call paranoia. Excessive reading about the dark side of human nature has consequences. I find it allows me to cope with life, a distraction to keep my consciousness occupied, trapped, engaged and away from rumination and dark thoughts about our ‘existence’; something that troubles many of us manifesting itself as ‘existential angst’. 

The problem is that all this “living in my head”, has another side-effect, which when all things are considered, is actually useful – the heightened sense of awareness, and therefore becoming actively ‘self-aware’ coupled with an understanding on how disingenuous can be our ability to ‘rationalise’ our actions, “as to” the situation we find ourselves in – and therefore justifying our actions, in the theatre of life, and the ashes of our death.

Today’s Event Horizon

Today, I woke with a troubled mind as I have much going on externally, as well as internally in my mind. My ruminations create stress, which I try my very best to channel in a positive manner. Over the years, I have found as uncomfortable as it is to grapple with the stress created by a troubled mind, the ruminations of my consciousness often result in finding solution[s] to what is troubling me. I find it very useful in problem solving and in business, especially as the ruminations are often prompted by reading detective novels.  I also find the act of writing helps ease the existential angst that are my thoughts, once committed onto paper like here, here, here and expanded upon as my world view here, I feel a weight lift.

Anyway, with a very busy and troubling start to the day, I went to Tesco, a local supermarket to get my lunch, a Tuna and Cucumber sandwich and some Cranberry juice. On the way back to my car, as I unlocked the door, I heard a shout.

“Hey, You!” I ignored the shouting as I unlocked my car door.

“Hey, You!” He shouted again, louder and as I turned my head, he was running toward me. He was a big bloke, mid-twenties all skinhead and muscle with a face molded into an ugly grimace.

“Hey, You!” He shouted again. People were looking over as he raced toward me. I realized I was at an event horizon, something was going to happen. Due to my stressed mind, I threw my Tuna Sandwich and bottle of Cranberry Juice into the car, shut the door, and braced myself. In that split second, I had thought he was some thug, and perhaps was bringing trouble to my door. Due to my troubled mind, circled with worries and stress, I had decided, fuck it, if he wanted a fight, he’d get one. With many onlookers, I realized I would have witnesses so I turned toward him and made myself rigid and braced for an attack. I recalled my youth, and the fights and thought if he throws a punch, I will not only defend myself and though I’m a middle-aged businessman, and my stamina is not what it used to be, I knew I could take him down, I just needed him to throw the first punch, and then I’d knock him down, hard. The act of defending myself would be helpful, a cognitive release; like an archer pulling back a bow and releasing all that kinetic energy with a solid defensive blow, so I felt my arms tense, muscles locked and eyes ready.

“What’s you problem?” I said cautiously as he approached.

“Not mine, yours”, he said pointing at my rear tyre.

With one eye on the big bloke, and the other on the tyre, I saw a sliver glint.

“I noticed the nail in your tyre, and when I saw you approach your car…” His face was no longer coated with the visage of aggression, but with a warm smile. “I’d get that looked at sooner than later” he continued.

I thanked the man profusely, and realised that I had viewed the incident in parallax, allowing my stressed mind, and my paranoia fuelled by reading crime / thriller fiction to totally misinterpret the situation I saw unfurl in front of my eyes.

As I sat waiting at ATS for my tyre to be checked, I thought of how treacherous our cognition can become, given the right situation and circumstance.

I also thought of Warren Beatty, and Alan J Pakula, and I felt a calmness spread over me as I again understood myself, and the problems and stress that circled me like wild horses started to dissipate.

I also felt a wave of déjà vu, as if this had happened to me before, as Membrane Theory postulates. Either way, at least I thought through and analysed my actions, and therefore helped understand myself.

“Greater in battle, than the man who would conquer a thousand-thousand men,
is he who would conquer just one — himself.

Gautama Buddha

“Life isn't a support system for art. It's the other way around.” Stephen King

True Detective Season 2 Main Titles from Patrick Clair on Vimeo.

Last year, I became obsessed by Nic Pizzolatto's TRUE DETECTIVE, and exposure to this remarkable TV Miniseries still affects my thinking, and my world-view. It reintroduced me to my early reading of Howard Philips [HP]H. P. Lovecraft, Robert Chambers, Gothic stuff - the Existentialist and Philosopher/Writers including Stoics such as Marcus Aurelius, but especially Albert Camus, Sartre, Freddy Nietzsche and many, many others.

The exposure to TRUE DETECTIVE, was wonderful, as I am now a different person, in terms of the way I interpret the context of my existence, and those I share my time and thinking with. So my re-interpretation of those works from my youth, is different today, very different - but perhaps another key aspect of TRUE DETECTIVE, were the new writers and philosophers I encountered, such as Thomas Ligotti, Laird Barron, Joe Pulver and many others, and discovered the Antinatalists such as Emil Coran, Arthur Schopenhauer et al, and so my thinking was hijacked.

So Season 2 of TRUE DETECTIVE uncoiled itself last week, and again, it has dominated my thinking. After a second viewing of episode one, the excitement and anticipation of episode two is like an itch I can't stop scratching, as a huge slug of my cognition, my daily thinking is devoted to exploring this TV show, its themes, its core and poke the escalating cynicism we have toward reality.

This may make me sound mentally ill, but I really don't care.

Many with less patience, or are less aware of the perceived belief of having 'skin' in the game [we call life], have been perplexed by the opening episode. Not me, as I see the strands of Pizzolatto's narrative is revealing - like an angry river, leading to a bay, which on its journey is allowing us to observe the absurdity of this existence, though the parallax of another man's imagination - and a team assembled around him, to craft into physical reality from the fevered, and existential dreams of his consciousness, a shape we can see, in our own reality. A shape that when it emerges is as disturbing as it is curiously uplifting.

Imagine my surprise, when the show aired last week, that the title track, crafted to the surreal titles, is NEVERMIND by LEONARD COHEN.

So Season 2 of TRUE DETECTIVE has me returning to my love of Leonard Cohen, and in so doing, I have been re-evaluating his body of work; and I have to admit that his last album, POPULAR PROBLEMS [from which T Bone Burnett selected NEVERMIND for the titles], is utterly, utterly, total genius, thought-provoking, fuel for our cognitive process, beautiful, insightful, I could go on, but I won't, as I love it so much.

Though much of the songs on POPULAR PROBLEMS are dark, very dark, when dissected, however, they are remarkably insightful, and one in particular resonates in my mind like a Church Bell summoning the faithful for worship; It's called "DID I LOVE YOU", and it plays in my mind, in a perpetual loop - like the swirl of a roller-coaster from which I sit strapped.

'DID I LOVE YOU' also makes me smile, as the very first gift I sent Muriel Keogh, [from Saudi Arabia, where I was stationed], was Jennifer Warnes' FAMOUS BLUE RAINCOAT : The songs of Leonard Cohen'. I chose the Warnes tribute album, as I thought her interpretation of Cohen's words would be more accessible to this woman, the one, I fell in love with - only to discover, that she too was a fan of the Laconic Canadian, poet. One of the things Muriel and I share.

So for the next few weeks, I will be distracted by TRUE DETECTIVE, for which I am thankful, as it allows me to manage some of the problems ahead of me. I have found, one key method to reduce anxiety, and manage the existential panic that lies at the core of being a thinking human being, is to keep the mind and its cognitive apparatus fully occupied, distracted, if you will; otherwise madness beckons

Andy Dufresne: "Get busy living, or get busy dying."
STEPHEN KING - RITA HAYWORTH AND THE SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION
FRANK DARABONT 'THE SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION

Because Stephen King was correct when he said “Life isn't a support system for art. It's the other way around.”, because we need to manage our thinking-cognition to survive this reality - and I am thankful to Nic Pizzolatto and his team for TRUE DETECTIVE, as its density is such, it is all encompassing, to many of us - as we're headed deep into TRUE DETECTIVE territory. This means that the insane logic that drives the engine of my thinking, and therefore my existence will be firing on all cylinders.

So I will leave you with a remarkable song, a gift from Leonard Cohen, with words that provoke thought, thus providing comfort and distraction from the shapes that emerge from the surrounding fog that some term the 'cloud of probability' that envelopes [and perplexes] us, and what others call - our lives, our reality; trapped in this rock in a corner of time and space.

Have a great weekend, TRUE DETECTIVE - Monday, and for that I am thankful

……………………Nevermind, Nevermind, I live the life, I left behind…………………………

From London to LA - Bouchercon 2014

I am very excited [and fortunate] to be attending Bouchercon 2014 hosted in Long Beach California under Chair Ingrid Willis, and her team. It’s a long journey from London to the West Coast of America - made exciting and amusing by my wonderful friends and travel companions Mike Stotter and Roger Ellory.

I am very proud to be a member of the Bouchercon Board, putting something back into the genre that I love; as experience has shown me that viewing reality through the parallax prism that is Crime, Mystery and Thriller fiction, a most enlightening experience.

So after Long Beach, next year Bouchercon is being hosted in Raleigh, North Carolina – with novelist and academic Stacey Cochran Charing the team, with me helping on the Programming.  

2014 Long Beach, CA 13/11 – 16/11 >  www.bouchercon2014.com

2015 Raleigh, NC 8/10 – 11/10* > www.bouchercon2015.org

2016 New Orleans, LA 15/9 – 18/9 > www.bouchercon2016.com

2017 Toronto, Canada 12/10 – 15/10 > web page to follow

2018 St Petersburg, FL 13/9 – 16/9 www.bouchercon2018.com

*Raleigh, North Carolina is named after the famous British Explorer Sir Walter Raleigh who amongst other matters is credited in being the bloke responsible for bringing Tobacco to Europe 

So as we board that West Bound 747 next week, we are delighted to see that The Blouchercon Long Beach have developed a wonderful app for Iphone and Android. I’ve tested it today, and it is really superb, like having the Bouchercon Website in your palm, but with relational databases, making searching for authors, colleagues, panels, information fast and easy. Janet of Mystery Readers has more information here, with download links.

If you are coming, say hello to Mike, Roger and I. 

I am moderating two panels that might be of interest, so please look us up.

or search the whole program using the Bouchercon app.

And finally, here’s some music that I’m listening to as I pack for the Journey West, and get my frame of mind sorted.

LA Woman by The Doors

It Never Rains In Southern California by Albert Hammond

Hollywood Nights by Bob Seger and The Silver Bullet Band

Say Goodbye to Hollywood by Billy Joel

Hotel California by The Eagles

Carmelita by Warren Zevon

Lodi by Creedence Clearwater Revival

Macarthur Park by Donna Summer

Little Wine Drinker, Me by Dean Martin

Come a Long Way by Michelle Shocked

प्यार

from Paul Hamilton on Vimeo.

From “Eric Zann” to “The Bungalow House”

I know I am late to the party, but I must admit my growing enthusiasm and admiration for the work of Thomas Ligotti which just grows and grows as I read though his work, in between CWA reading / evaluating, and my own writing. 

My interest in Thomas Ligotti was initially sparked by Nic Pizzolatto’s True Detective. The True Detective HBO series really rocked my world with its fusion of crime fiction and the genre of weird fiction. Tracking down his work is rather expensive, as much is now out of print, so I asked my family not to buy me any birthday presents, as I’d like to celebrate my 51^st year on this giant rock [trapped in space time] collecting and completing my Thomas Ligotti collection.  

In my youth I was an avid reader of horror, detective, mystery and the fiction of the weird; so I was delighted to revisit my love of horror and the weird, thanks to True Detective.

I have a particular fondness for Ligotti’s dark, and Lovecraftian-influenced tale ‘The Bungalow House’. It reminds me of one of my favourite HP Lovecraft tales, The Music of Eric Zann, an equally creepy tale, with a dream-like quality. It can be read here and a rather good video adaptation is available to view here. This little film version of "The Music of Erich Zann" is a horror film of haunting beauty and terrifying poetry, filmed in the style of the German Expressionist films of the 1920's.

A young student of metaphysics is forced to take the only lodging he can afford, a crumbling and decrepit building in a strange part of the city. Every night, he hears strange and unusual music coming from the room above him, music he cannot describe and cannot ignore.

He finds that the music above is being played by Erich Zann; a mute and eccentric German man who plays at night in a local orchestra. 

Fascinated by the man's genius, the student tries to befriend Zann and understand why such a great talent chooses to live in such squalor. Eventually, Howard learns of the secret behind Zann's music, one too terrifying to imagine.

Anyway, with roots deeply buried in the weird worldview that came from the imagination of HP Lovecraft, comes Thomas Ligotti’s "The Bungalow House", and here’s an extract -

“The bungalow house was such a bleak environment in which to make a stand: the moonlight through the dusty blinds, the bodies on the carpet, the lamps without any lightbulbs. And the incredible silence. It was not the absence of sounds that I sensed, but the stifling of innumerable sounds and even voices, the muffling of all the noises one might expect to hear in an old bungalow house in the dead of night, as well as countless other sounds and voices. The forces required to accomplish this silence filled me with awe. The infinite terror and dreariness of an infested bungalow house, I whispered to myself. A bungalow universe, I then thought without speaking aloud. Suddenly I was overcome by a feeling of euphoric hopelessness which passed through my body like a powerful drug and held all my thoughts and all my movements in a dreamy, floating suspension. In the moonlight that shone through the blinds of that bungalow house I was now as still and as silent as everything else.”

Thomas Ligotti described the story in an interview at Wonderbook -

“In ‘The Bungalow House’, I described a series of what I designated as “dream monologues” that were recorded on tape and intended to be works of art. The first dream monologue was a transcription of an actual dream I had and wrote down soon after I awoke, so it was also initiated my writing of the entire story. A second dream monologue in ‘The Bungalow House’ was only summarized, while a third was simply given a title, because at that point I had established the nature of the dream monologues in their incidents and meaning. For my purposes, to describe each dream monologue in its entirety would have slowed the pace of the story. All of the dream monologues were used to characterize the peculiar nature of the main character’s psychology. Sometimes I’ll characterize the events of a narrative as being dreamlike in some specific way, because over the years I’ve noted qualities that characterize dreams, such as that they have no beginning, an idea that was recently used in the movie Inception to prove to a character that she was functioning in a dream and not in conventional reality. 

A very short story I wrote called ‘One May Be Dreaming’ is pretty obviously a dream from beginning to end. The whole point of the story was that the protagonist was having a dream at the same time he was dying in real life. Usually, it’s not exposed until the end of the story that the whole thing was a dream. For his story ‘Where He Was Going,’ William Burroughs employs this method, his use of which he credits to Ernest Hemingway’s ‘Snows of Kilimanjaro.’ ‘Man from the South’ was Jorge Luis Borges’s rendition of this narrative structure. Perhaps I should say that I don’t think that dreams are anything more than rearranged experiences, sensations, and emotions. While they may easily be interpreted as symbolic or premonitory or whatever, I don’t believe that they are anything but intrusions upon what might otherwise be wholly unconscious hours of sleep.”

Thomas Ligotti interviewed at Wonderbook Read More Here

Listen to a wonderful dramatization from Pseudopod Here which will make you think, about what we term reality.

“The Bungalow House” was first published in 1995 in the horror fanzine The Urbanite and was nominated for a Bram Stoker award for short stories published in that year. Subsequently it was collected in THE NIGHTMARE FACTORY.

THOMAS LIGOTTI is one of the foremost contemporary authors of supernatural horror literature. His works been honored with several awards, including the Horror Writers Association’s Bram Stoker award for the collection THE NIGHTMARE FACTORY (1996) and the novella MY WORK IS NOT YET DONE (2002). Revised, definitive editions of his first three story collections — SONGS OF A DEAD DREAMER, GRIMSCRIBE, and NOCTUARY — were published in 2010, 2011, and 2012, respectively. Revised editions of his collections THE AGONIZING RESURRECTION OF VICTOR FRANKENSTEIN AND OTHER GOTHIC TALES and DEATH POEMS were issued in 2013. Ligotti has also published THE CONSPIRACY AGAINST THE HUMAN RACE (2010), a nonfiction work that explores the intersection of the darker byways of literature, philosophy, and psychology. Forthcoming titles by Ligotti include a collection of interviews and a chapbook consisting of two newly written stories. The web site Thomas Ligotti Online was founded as a forum for discussions of and media related to Ligotti’s writings as well as those of wide range of authors, artists, and musicians whose work is associated with the horror genre, among other areas of interest to devotees of unconventional art and thought.

Incidentally http://pseudopod.org is a great resource for lovers of audio horror, with plenty of weird fiction available for download and streaming.