“Vicodin.  Imagine waking up to your morning stomach knot and subsequent rituals:

Shower.

Coffee.

Traffic.

Talk radio.

Hell.

Home.

Drink.

But you remember that it’s Sunday.  That four-second blast of relief is what Vicodin feels like for six hours.”  Nice.

The book is written with a calm yet panicked voice.  It is told as if there is a shot clock counting down in the corner of the main character’s life.  The main character (on the outside) is being hunted by organized crime for his talent but (on the inside) is trying to convince the hospital Evaluator that he isn’t a suicide risk even though this is the 5^th time or so he accidentally overdosed.  If the Evaluator thinks the main character is a risk to himself he will be incarcerated.  The story is told using flashbacks while trying to convince the Evaluator at the mental hospital that the main character is sane.

Here is a paragraph I like.  This demonstrates the calculating the main character does in every facet in life.  “A person’s life story is equal to what they have plus what they want most in life, minus what they’re actually willing to sacrifice for it.  You find out those things about someone and you’ll know almost everything.  The fractional numbers are their headaches, facial tics or finger movements they don’t realize they’re doing, and they all add up if you can spot them.”  This is what the main character uses in being able to read people therefore being able to tell them what they want to hear.

This book gives great and accurate descriptions on what it feels like to overdose and have your stomach pumped.  This is a classic story of a genius who is almost too smart for the world to understand.  As a result the world labels the person as being an outcast, a weird-o or a mental problem.

I just finished the book Another Roadside Attraction by Tom Robbins.

If I can be so bold as to make an observation.  You have the right to do a bunch of things at this moment…you can read on, accept, reject, argue for and/or against my observation or you can simply get up right now and take a shit without wiping you ass if you would rather.  Whatever you do next is your business…my business is to record my observation here.

When I lived in Atlanta I saw in the July 2003 (I’m going off of good memory) issue of “Playboy” a Tom Robbins’s book reviewed.  I’ve always wanted to read one of his books but until I moved to Maui I didn’t have the chance.  I’m now on his second book and he has jumped up to Top 5 Author Status in my mind.  I’ve already been on ebay looking to buy lots of his books so I can Stephen King him (that is to say read all his books).

In reading my second Tom Robbins’s book (the first being Still Life With Woodpecker) I’ve decided that the way modern Americans (and maybe all humans for that nature) has changed over time.  The best authors are those that teach us something at the same time entertaining us.  Americans want to be smarter, they want to know things and be original, they want to learn but the idea of sitting in a non-smoking classroom with a 1955 General Electric clock on the wall subtracting minutes from their lives completely turns them off.  This was the case back in the olden days.  People could read pages and pages of lecture from Plato to Freud to whatever.  American’s who wanted to learn something and were motivated to do so could stomach textbooks.  That has changed.  My observation: enter in the modern novelist (and knowledge medium - television).  Why was Dan Brown’s DiVinci Code, Tom Clancy’s Hunt For Red October, Tom Robbins’s Another Roadside Attraction, and Jon Stewart’s “Daily Show” so popular.  Because it TEACHES us something.  Dan Brown teaches us about history, Tom Clancy teaches us about world government powers, Tom Robbins teaches us about philosophy and Jon Stewart teaches us about politics.  American’s crave to learn and be smarter at the water cooler than their peers.  We no longer need to hunt, gather or defend our homes…most of the pains of life have been solved for us.  So what is left to evolve to?  Knowledge.  That is the final frontier.  Truth.  We must become hunters and gathers for truth…and that only comes from knowledge.  But again, knowing that we as a whole can not just pick up a textbook dusty from a basement and plug through (and answer the questions at the back of the book).  No sir.  We’ve become accustomed to drive thru pick up windows at doughnut shops, liquor stores even coffee houses.  We don’t have time to wait in line and do one thing at a time.  Multi-tasking is the modern word of life.  American’s crave 2 big things…to be productive (at work, in gathering knowledge…whatever) and to be entertained.  The modern historian, novelist, film maker, politician…EVERYONE who wants an audience to listen to what he/she has to say needs to possess 2 important things:  One – knowledge that others want and Two – a way to entertain us while they deliver the knowledge to us.  One without the other is just a monkey on a string or a textbook written by some sterile corporation that starts off like “to fully appreciate the beauty of a painting one must first dissect the actual medium as to which the said artist uses to further express his unique vision – the paints.”  Snore fest.

Tom Robbins uses nonlinear plot progression to express his views on politics, religion and other topics.  The book is written in the 3^rd person for 2/3 of the story and first person for the last 1/3.  My favorite part of Tom Robbins’s writing style is his use of eccentric characters in eccentric situations in a non-eccentric world.  The stories are brilliant (even though he does go on seemingly unrelated tangents).  Tom Robbins’s style is much like a modern version of Mark Twain.

Another Roadside Attraction is about 4 characters (a magician artist, a gypsy hippie sexy women, an ex football hero and a brilliant young scientist) and a baboon who opens a roadside hot dog stand in Skagit County, Washington together.  One of the characters (the ex football hero turned drug dealer) actually stumbles upon a corpse while working in the Vatican and the corpse (who’s identity isn’t revealed until the end) is a symbolic time bomb that is powerful to crush and destroy all of civilization as we know it today.  “What do we do with the corpse?  Do we blow the minds of every living human being by making it public or do we just bury it silently?”  This is the ultimate problem the characters have to deal with.  This book was written in 1971 and has become a cultural icon for the Hippie Baby Boomers.  It is a MUST READ for anyone who likes Twain brilliance but wants something modern.  My ebay name is kc07…so if you see me bidding on a Tom Robbins’s lot of books…let me win.

I just finished the book Click by Kristopher Young.

This is a small press book.  Possibly self-published.  I got it because the subject of the main character being a schizophrenic was interesting.  I had visions of a modern day Catcher In The Rye.  Plus there were 7 great reviews for it on Amazon.com at the time.

Problem – this story is as confusing and frustrating as having to listen to someone recount (in detail) a long dream they had the night before.  I just feel this story was some kind of weird display of art where the artist actually tries to be confusing and snub conformity just to call it “art”.  I can shit in some black pages and call it art – and some may agree…but the fact is it is still shit.  For instance, there is no capital letters in the story.  This is not brilliant, unique or clever.  It constantly reminded me that I am reading a book AND doesn’t allow me to get lost in the story.

The author doesn't develop the characters at all.  Their motives for the little they do in the story are non-existent.  The book is 165 pages and all I can stomach at one time is 10.  The writer may say to me, “you just don’t understand me man” but if he is deep and self reflecting he should be able to realize that he didn’t allow me to understand what the hell he was talking about with this piece of work.  Writing stories is about storytelling.  Sitting on the beach reflecting on this book only yields that there really isn’t a point of it.

One thing I did like was the female character (there are no names given – ala the narrator in the book Invisible Man) explains her compulsive behavior of keeping everything in a certain place.  This was well written, clear and cool.  Unfortunately, the rest of the story isn’t like this.  The author (through the female character) says:

(page 42) “she’s saying, everything had these invisible strings attached to them, and I could never let the strings get tangled.  if i picked up this glass, for example i’d need to make sure it was put back exactly as it was.  if i turned to talk to someone i’d have to be careful not to get trapped by the strings.”   -  Cool.

I also liked how the main character (narrator –written in the first person) starts every day by playing Russian Roulette with a loaded pistol.  He puts the gun to his head and pulls the trigger.  The gun obviously doesn’t ever go off but it is a solid, intense image.  Again, I needed to know more of his reasons for wanting to kill himself…I needed to sympathize and feel what he feels in order for me to have any emotion for a character.  Don’t just tell me the main character wants to kill himself and expect me to say, “yeah man…do it.  It is your only way out” or “NO! Stop.  You have so much to live for”.  I just didn’t care…and not caring is the worst thing that can happen to a novel.

I know what the writer was trying to do – he was trying to make the reader see and experience everything the schizophrenic narrator saw but this technique only works if the reader understands and sympathizes with the character.  The author fails because the story reads like a bunch of unrelated, random ratings.  Boring.  Frustrating.  Ineffective.  If you want a novel not cut from the same cookie cutter format…a novel that is written differently than the standard novel…a novel that is art BUT works.  Read The House of Leaves by Mark Danielewski.  Good stuff!

I’ve just finished the book The Losers’ Club by Richard Perez.  I got this book because I needed something to read over the 2 days I was in Hana.  It actually took me 3 days to read but it was a fast read.

Basically the book is a coming to grips with yourself book.  It is labeled as a romantic comedy.  I am so far disinterested in romance right now that all the main character’s bitching about finding love and having his heart broken really bothered me.  Thank God it didn’t take long to read.

What I wanted this book to deal more with was a kid (the main character – who is an unpublished writer like me) to fall into a deep dark, gothic, drug, and booze related downward spiral.  I wanted to read something dark, depressing and hopeless.  Instead I got a hip version of a Nicholas Sparks book with pop culture references in it.

The best part of the book was a novel the main character mentioned he liked.  It was a book called A Fan’s Notes by Frederick Exley.  I did some research on this book and found it to be interesting.  I am going to read it very soon and report back on it.  The main character also mentioned the book The Fan Man by William Kotzwinkle which was one of my top ten all time favorites.  I think I would really like to hang out with the main character and talk shit with him – but before agreeing to meet him I would make sure he promised not to bitch about the single scene or how hard it was to meet women.  I would not go out drinking with him because I feel that he would spend the whole night sniffing women’s asses and playing the full court press looking for love (I would respect him desperate for sex but love…go watch a movie for that shit).

I just finished reading The Angel of Darkness by Caleb Carr.  This is the second book by Carr that I’ve read…the first being The Alienist which was absolutely great.

During my time in Maui I’ve found myself reading a bunch of anti-war books published around the 60s.  Now…this is not an anti-war book but one of the major headlines during the time period in which this book takes place is the Spanish American War of 1898.  The point of this was a quote that I’ve found on the internet while doing a little brushing up on the facts of this war.  Senator John M. Thurston was a Republican who favored a war for economic reasons.  Quote: "War with Spain would increase the business and earnings of every American railroad, it would increase the output of every American factory, it would stimulate every branch of industry and domestic commerce.”  War lasted for 113 days which the United States came away victorious.  This fact leads me back to my anti-war reading in which the opinions of most of that literature states war is unnecessary (most of the time).  I am not out here saying that World War II was unnecessary but when an elected senator of the time justifies killing thousands of people so government contracts, national productivity and government spending increases…well I file that under the category unnecessary.  Plus another interesting fact was that a man named Joseph Pulitzer was also a major player in publicizing the war in New York City.  His newspapers (were well known) to publish inflammatory articles in NYC to incite the public demand for war.  Joseph Pulitzer was the inventor of “Yellow Journalism” which is the term used to define unethical or unprofessional practices by news media organizations or individual journalists in order to drive up newspaper sales.  So for all you that bitch and whine about how America is going to hell in a hand basket because CNN, Fox News, ABC, NBC…blah blah blah are biased – well just look to your most respected writing award (the Pulitzer Prize) and remember that back in the 1800s (and further back I’m sure) news was just another form of entertainment.  Enough of the history lesson…those that don’t understand now either do not want to or never will.

The major theme of a book I’ve read a few weeks ago Invisible Man was invisibility.  Basically the main character in that book by Ralph Ellison says that the world wants him to be invisible because they don’t necessarily want him dead (even though most do) but just don’t want to see him because he is a black man.  One of the main characters in this book (Sara Hamilton) talks to the narrator (Stevie) about how the men in the world are mostly evil because they want the women to be invisible.  I just wonder does every one think the world wants them to be invisible?  I mean, seriously…I’m a white male and sometimes I just think that the world would prefer me to just conform, walk the straight line, follow the leader and not voice my opinion.  If that is the case, if I feel like it would be better to be invisible maybe the theme of invisibility ends up becoming a cop out…a convenient eject button for the intelligent people of the world to use to hide the fact that they are a coward…afraid of confrontation and to fight for something that they want.  Maybe those same cowards would rather just walk through doors instead of working on a way to open or even knock the door down.  Or maybe they have a point.

The book is written in the first person by a kid named Stevie.  Last book (The Alienist) was written in the first person by another character Mr. Moore.  The author dropped hints that he was going to write the next installment of this series in the first person of another character.  The problem with this book is that I don’t feel that the author actually captured the feelings of the first person Stevie.  I have to constantly remind myself (even after 600 pages) who is in fact talking.  It is really annoying and cheap.  It is my feeling that the author got a good idea to write the story in this character’s first person but didn’t bother to really know his character.  I just feel it is a 3^rd person told story sprinkled in with a bunch of “I’s” and “me’s”.  I give this piece of the story a very weak C-.

I read this book based off of the merit of The Alienist.  I will not read the follow up to this one (if there is one) unless the subject is interesting.  This book wasn’t good enough to make me read the next one just because it comes next.

The last 50 pages flew by…but I just felt that this book could’ve been shorter and I found myself thinking about what I was going to read next many times throughout this story.

I’ve just finished reading Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut, which was published in 1969.  This is my first Kurt Vonnegut book...up until now he has just been the old guy Thornton Melon said to, "and another thing Vonnegut I'm going to stop payment on the check...fuck me? Hey, Kurt, can you read lips FUCK YOU!  Next time I'll call Robert Ludlum [then hangs up the phone].  But now I realize he is a great author and I'll definately read another one of his books.

In the office of the main character there is the prayer: “Lord grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the thing I can, and wisdom always to tell the difference.”  This makes me think: does this prayer admit the fact that there isn’t a God.  Sure the prayers asks the Lord for something…but if it acknowledged the fact that there is an all powerful God wouldn’t another line in the prayer say something like: serenity to accept the things that you’ve done or some other statement recognizing that God does do things from heaven.  Maybe the prayer suggests that God doesn’t do anything to interfere with life and that we are on our own…but then I wonder why pray to God all the time if prayers will never be answered because God doesn’t do anything to interfere with life.  The reason for this observation on my part is because a major theme in this book is that the author suggests that any attempt to change life is futile – that prayers or offerings to a higher being can not alter the fate of the main character (past, present or future).  The author says in the book: “[a]mong the things Billy Pilgrim could not change were the past, the present, and the future."

The main character Billy Pilgrim learns that there is no such thing as free will.  The aliens tell him that having been to 30 different inhabited planets and studied 100 more ONLY earthlings talk of “free will”.  Vonnegut says that all people and things are trapped in life’s collection of moments like bugs trapped in amber.  Bill is locked into his fate; any resistance to break away or change things is useless.  What is relevant and important is how each person interoperates what happens to them in life versus what can he do to make it the situation better.

Slaughterhouse Five is an anti-war book.  One great scene is when Billy watches a war movie backwards.  The planes suck up the bombs and deliver them back to America.  The women take the bombs off the plane, disassemble them and ship the harmful agents to skilled men in the field – who burry them in a way that no one should find them easily.  He then (in his mind) sees Hitler digress to being a baby and the whole human population digress into Adam and Eve (who digress into sinless people).  The message is simple…by going backward the world evolves into paradise.  The further forward we go the farther and farther away paradise gets.

Albert Einstein had a theory that says in order to know where something is, one must know when it is.  Because object change and are different as time passes in order to fully describe the nature of anything one needs to take all the snapshots of the object over the entire course of its existence and future and put it all together.  Slaughterhouse-five, through the Tralfamadorians, say the same thing can be said about a person.  Kurt Vonnegut forms his main character by having him jump back and forth through time.  We knows how he dies early on in the story and jump backwards, forwards, back again, forward…etc throughout the whole story.  The genius of Vonnegut is that not only does this technique work it actually is very clear and effective.  “Things happen because they always happen that way”.

One of my favorite parts in the book is when Kurt Vonnegut tells the reader that his war buddy Bernard O’Hare’s wife (Mary) hates him though he can’t understand why.  By the end of the first chapter the Vonnegut tells the reader why she hates him (without knowing him).  That is because she knows Vonnegut is going to write a book about the Dresden disaster but he is going to write it with the tone that the soldiers in WWII were men.  Vonnegut promises her that he will write the characters as they really were (young 18 year old children) and Mary O’Hare instantly warms up to Vonnegut.  That is why the book’s subtitle is called “The Children’s Crusade” and he co-dedicated the book to her.  I really think this is a great point because those that fight our wars are really children…overgrown children that haven’t had the chance to become adults on their own.

The last words of the book are “poo-tee-weet?” which the author tells us in Chapter One is a bird call.  This suggests that (after the Dresden massacre) that war and mass destruction are as clear or intelligent as a bird call.  I agree with that.

I've just finished the book "Invisible Man" by Ralph Ellison.

The first reaction I have when someone accuses me (or any part of me – my family, my friends, my race, my traditions, my beliefs…etc) is to defend and justify them using as much logic as I can.  Invisible Man is about race struggles.  I am, like most people claim, not a racist person.  But when I hear of a struggle between a black man and a white man my initial reaction is to defend the white man in my head…why?  I don’t know.  Maybe it is the same reason most people can’t picture their parents having sex…because in my mind I can’t relate to white people treating black people with such disrespect; since I was raised to treat everyone like they were my grandfather.  Maybe it is my exhaustion of hearing people talking about playing “the race card” way too often and frivolously.  It took me one full chapter of this book…where the main character is black…to dissolve any reaction I may have to defend either the white man or the black man in the book.  In order to hear the important and powerful message this book speaks I realized after chapter one that I need to quiet my conditioned mind and open it up like an empty vessel.  That is just a fancy way of saying I told myself to “shut the fuck up and listen to what this man has to say”.

A main theme of this book is the advantages and disadvantages of being invisible.  Being invisible allows one to move in and out of situations without threat or harm towards him…but by being invisible one also doesn’t get the same “shake” as a visible man would.  That is to say by being invisible one is treated as a lesser of a person.  But invisibility can also be used as a tool to forward one’s personal ambitions or objectives.

Another theme of this book is men using other men selfishly to achieve a personal or selfish goal.  This too happens to all races and religions.  Humans are selfish and will only do something if there is something in it for them (a good feeling by doing charity, money for doing a job, safety for being in a relationship…etc).  The fact that in order for us to achieve what makes us happy we need to use others to get there.  And sometimes the other person doesn’t know they are being used.  This is a horrible truth…and is one of the reasons why I live on an island in the Pacific Ocean.

One of the tools for success in this book is whether or not the black man can become invisible enough and independent of his own identity to survive in a white dominated society.  The narrator feels that in order to survive one needs to shed his own identity and take that one of which the white dominated society tells him he should take.  The success and failure depends on whether or not the man is willing to sell his identity.  I disagree with this point.  I feel that there are certain rules that society as a whole (not just a race dominated one or whatever) functions by.  To completely shun conformity is to put yourself as an outcast and go against the grain of what works.  That means you will stand out…and in standing out you put yourself in a position to be judged and ridiculed.  Understand that to be different comes with it a responsibility to grow thick skin and not care.  One should not harm others (emotionally, physically, financially…etc) in order to be an individual but aside from that the more you want to be yourself the more people will try to tear you down.  Be as much as who you are as your stomach and skin will allow.  But don’t bitch to me if you can’t handle it and wake up one day only to say, “I don’t know who I am because I’ve always been who ‘they’ wanted me to be”.  The fact would be you chose that because it was easier to be what you are told to be.  But don’t blame “them” blame yourself at that time.

I’ve just finished the book Into The Wild by Jon Krakauer.

In April 1992 a young man from a well to do family and Emory University honors graduate hitchhiked to Alaska and walked alone into the wilderness.  His name was Christopher McCandless.  He had given $25,000 in savings to charity, abandoned his car and most of his possessions, burned all the cash in his wallet and crossed into Alaska.  Four months later, his decomposed body was found by a moose hunter.

In my opinion this is a story similar to Timothy Treadwell in the movie Grizzly Man, Jeremiah Johnson, Jim Morrison (which the main character Christopher McCandless does quote in his journal “the West is the best”).  There are two opinions of this book:  1.  That the main character was in fact on a spiritual quest.  A quest to find something in the wilderness that would answer soul questions, slay demons inside and experience something long since lost – ultimate freedom. OR 2.  That Christopher McCandless was suicidal.

There are many excerpts from past explorers and environmentally romantic idealists such as Tolstoy, Jack London and Thoreau (Walden).  These experts (some written as far back as 1818) talked about escaping technology and civilization to find and experience the core of what it is to be human.  The point is no modern day person would think a man living in 1818 experienced anything BUT savage and pure living.  In a world full of moving gismos, electronics, Big Brother etc. one can only look back into the past and realize that man (for all time I suspect) has wanted to escape other human thinking that we as a race have maxed out and conquered life.

The story starts off telling you that the main character is dead.  BOOM!!  The story then works backwards to figure out why this talented, intelligent, gifted, charismatic guy is dead based off of interviews from family, friends, strangers, his journal writings, his graffiti he made where his body was found, underlined literature passages he took the time to highlight.  I love this format for this story.  To me it is a coming of age story with a dead main character that does what we all do…goes out into the world trying to find himself and answer questions about life.  Unfortunately he died in the process…but you know what? We all die.  But do we ever follow through with out search for answers or do we end up just settling for what society, the loudest voice or someone else tells us what they want us to believe?  I think most of us just get tired of searching and end up choosing the latter.  The main character didn’t.  I don’t know if he had an epiphany right before he died…but the fact is he searched for his own answer and in the end died before he accepted any one else’s.

I’ve just finished the book “Watership Down” by Richard Adams.  Many times I bitch about not being introduced to great books as a kid.  I was like all of you…reading was forced on me and became a chore to do.  I was lucky to one day decide that I like to exercise my mind in this way.  There are so many great stories captured in books.  Watership Down would’ve been a great book to read or for someone to have read to me.  But I am glad to have been turned onto it by a friend and if I ever have kids will definitely read it to them before they fall asleep at night.

The best part of this book is the sense of hope.  A hope that death, when it comes, will not only be beautiful but something that I will willingly accept.

Another great theme of this book is history, legends and folk heroes.  These heroes that have been immortalized, galvanized by time (Babe Ruth, Jesus, Jack the Ripper, Hitler…etc) while not all of them are considered heroes…they are all legends and folk characters that will never die.  But most importantly…they were actual men who lived, did something great (possibly terrible but huge never the less) and died like all do.  The point is every day that we live (as the characters in this book) the choices we make, the roads we take all allow us the possibility of being heroes and remembered like Jackie Robinson, Martin Luther King Jr., Abe Lincoln, George Washington etc. will be remembered.  I like the thought that everyday men and women…if they live without regard to the opinions of others and have the courage to follow their hearts…can one day be immortal like Jesus Christ.

One last theme I like is that wit, strength, cunning and intelligence cannot succeed alone.  There must be a healthy combination of all in order for a warren (in rabbit’s case) or civilization (in human’s case) to not only survive but also thrive.  This book demonstrates that all traits are needed.  Even the villain is needed in order for survival.  There needs to be love, struggle, death, birth, anger, victory and repetition for life to exist.  Otherwise there is no point of living…no point of playing the game.  There has to be a fight.  There has to be a winner and a loser.  But there has to be another fight for the loser to have the chance to become the winner.  And if there is enough fights…everyone will taste defeat and victory.  This is life.  This is a good life.

 I just finished reading the second installment of the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.  The book is “The Restaurant at the End of the Universe”.  The novelty of a humorous sci-fi book wore off by the time I got into this book, but this is when the brilliant comedy writing took over.  This is a great book.  There are 3 more books in this series, which I will read.  The funny concept this book introduces is: after the destruction of earth the main characters get blasted into a space ship traveling back in time.  They end up with a group of middle class people (business men, advertisement executives, mid-level store managers etc) who are escaping their home planet to populate another (ala the Pilgrims).  These middle class men and women are complete idiots.  After they land on a planet (which happens to be earth 2 million years prior to its destruction) they decide to use leaves as currency “now we are all rich.  But in order to deflate the value of the leaves we should burn all the forests down.”  This is the crazy kind of thinking that shouldn’t make sense but it does.  The concept is that earthlings are NOT decedents from apes or cavemen but of these idiot middle class morons.  “We’ve just found a new continent across the water and have already declared war on it.”   Sound familiar?  My only grip about this book is that the best character of the series “Marvin – The Paranoid Robot” only makes a brief appearance.  I like that he isn’t the main character because it would water him down too much but he definitely need to be a strong supporting character.

The best part of the books in this series is the fact that Douglas Adams is basically calling all humans complete idiots and fuck ups.  The main character Arthur Dent (a dent being a blemish in perfection) is the only "normal" human because he doesn't try to hide the fact that he is stupid and has no idea what the hell is going on around him.  Unfortunately the average human pretends to know shit which throws him into the play pen with all the other idiots.  Arthur Dent avoids that zoo by just saying "I have no idea what the fuck is happening and no idea what to do next."  This is the most intelligent and normal honesty there is in the universe. 

I just got done reading “The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy” by Douglas Adams again.  This is the second time I’ve read it while being on Maui.  This time I am going to finish all 5 books in the series.  Douglas Adams (dead now) was a British writer who thought it would be funny to write about science fiction with a humorous twist to it.  Now know that I absolutely HATE Monty Python humor.  I can post a huge entry regarding why it sucks and why the world would be less inclined to beat the hell out of a British man if it didn’t exist but that is for another time.  For some reason this book really made me laugh on many occasions.  I would say that this book’s humor is right there with the Naked Gun type.  There is a paranoid/depressed robot named Marvin who actually (in my mind) steals the show.  I never really think that robots have personalities but Marvin not only has one…his is dysfunctional.   When one of the main characters asks Marvin why his is lying face down in the dirt Marvin responds: “Don’t pretend you want to talk to me, I know you hate me…I only have to talk to somebody and they begin to hate me.  Even robots hate me.  If you just ignore me I expect I shall probably just go away."

This book was published in 1979 and it is a case in point that no idea is truly original.  Douglas Adams in the book introduces the idea that Earth is not a planet but a large computer and its job is to calculate the meaning of the life and why the universe exists (the computer actually comes up with an answer – 42…and is sent back to work because the question which yields the answer 42 needs to be defined in order for the answer to make any sense).  Anyway, the humans are actually just pieces…organic programs alive in the computer.  Does this sound familiar – The Matrix perhaps?  I’m not saying that the Matrix has plagiarized in any way…but I am just using this as a case in point that Douglas Adams wrote this book over 20 years before the Matrix and when the Matrix came out most people thought that it was the most mind-blowing idea ever.  This is a case in point to writers, inventors, business owners etc.  The point is don’t search for the original idea because someone has already done it.  Find something that interests you and do it BETTER than it has been done in the past.  I’m not saying that the Matrix is better but I am saying that it has taken an already existent concept and put a dark spin on it which works.

I didn’t see the movie version of this book but I know that it didn’t do well.  I don’t know why.  There are TONS of obscure events in this book…but the logic behind the obscurity is sound and if you can see that you will appreciate the genius and brilliance of that obscurity.  If you want a book that will make you laugh the same way you laughed at the Naked Gun when Lt. Frank Drebin says “Bingo” and then pulls out an actual Bingo card from the desk drawer…then this book (and possibly the whole series is for you).

I just finished reading the NON-FICION book “Pimp” by Iceberg Slim (Robert Beck).  This was a great first person book about a glamorous profession.  Throughout the book I was thinking to myself “I would hate to be a pimp…there is too much danger, jail time, mental chess and distrust to ever enjoy what life is.  If I ever get sex desperate I’d rather just pay for the company of a woman versus making it my profession and having some dirty roll for free.”  This book is a must read for anyone who buys what Snoop tires to be.  Snoop is a rapper NOT a pimp.  Joe Pesci is an actor NOT a gangster.  This is an important concept to understand because if you want to know what it is like to be a pimp THIS is the book to read.  Just like if you want to know what it is like being in a famous black California gang is like read “Monster: The Autobiograpy of an L.A. Gang Member” by Kody Scott don’t watch a Denzel Washington movie.

The background of the author Iceberg Slim:  He rose to pimp greatness in the 1930s Chicago.  He is probably the most famous and successful pimp of all time.  Oh by the way he had a 175 I.Q.  and died around the age of 90 so he made it all the way through.  The author warns in his write up that this is NOT a book to be used as an instruction manual as to how to pimp.  That disclaimer alone makes the book a must read for anyone interested.  This book was published in 1969 and is equip with a glossary in the back because Iceberg Slim takes you right into his life without dummying it down or polishing it up for white society who just doesn’t know.  He writes like he talks and if you don’t understand what he’s throwing down at you…well turn to the glossary and get informed.  Don’t worry no one will know that you didn’t know what a “jib” or a “hog” is.  Iceberg Slim is advertised as the “most read black author”.  He has written six other books so when you get done reading this one you have other to read (which you are going to want to do…trust me).

A great line out of the book that has stuck with me: “A good pimp doesn’t get paid for screwing, he gets his pay off for having the right thing to say to a whore right on lightning tap.  A pimp is really a whore who has turned the game on the whore.  Be as sweet as the scratch, no sweater, and always stick a whore for a bundle before you sex her.  A whore ain’t nothing to a trick to a pimp.  Don’t let the whore ‘Georgia’ you.  Always get your money in front just like a whore."

After you read this you will be more black than most black men.

  Iceberg Slim

I went to a shitty high school…actually is there a good high school.  Due to my sub-par inner city education I am now forced to read classics that I should’ve been reading back in tenth grade.  Enter Lord of the Flies by William Golding.

This book is only 202 pages long but every bit as complex as a 1000+ epic.  The themes and issues of this book include (but are not limited to): innocence, Jesus Christ, The Devil, science versus brute strength, totalitarian and democratic society, savagery versus civilization…and many others.  Instead of going into my take on each of these which would read like Cliff Notes I’m going to pick one that strikes me as a modern problem (as it was in Lord of the Flies – published in 1954).  That is fear.

A bunch of English choir boys trying to escape a war stricken Europe are shot down by plane and land on a deserted Pacific island.  The pilot must’ve died and there are no other adults.  The kids elect a “chief”…who is Ralph.  Jack another member of the singing English boys lusts for power (this is the guy in high school who wants everyone to fear him as a result he becomes a cop where law and savagery hold hands).  Anyway Jack massages the fear some of the younger boys in the group has regarding a “monster” that they believe lives on the island.  Most of the older boys really don’t believe in the monster but Jack instigates the fear and finally takes over the “tribe” by positioning himself as the only one who can protect these boys.  Instead of finding facts and separating them from myth regarding the monster Jack needs the monster and the kid’s fear of it in order to remain in charge.  And his rule is of a violent, savage and murderous nature.  He uses the other’s fear and the monster’s myth to concrete a savage tribe together so they will obey his bloody whims.  Jack’s successful approach is not unlike modern television or government.  Fear sells.  Fear brings people together.  Fear allows men to step up and convince those afraid that they will protect them.  And it is fear (as in Lord of the Flies) that ultimately destroys civilized society and thrusts all members into savagery.

The author William Golding says: “the theme of the Lord of the Flies is an attempt to trace the defects of society back to the defects of human nature.  This book is not just about a bunch of kids stranded on a desert island.  This book is about the root of life…how things start and evolve.”  Bad things.

My only problem with this book is that it was a little vague and hard to follow.  Vague meaning that characters wouldn't just say "let's kill him and stick his head on a spear" instead they would say "I'm sharpening the spear on both ends" - one end to stick in the ground and the other to stick the head on.  Also hard to follow meaning that the characters are running through the jungle chasing one another while ducking in and out of bushes, thorns, fields, rock piles and beaches.  I found myself a few times thinking that the character was laying face down in the dirt under a stump and the next sentence he is running flat out on the sand beach...that pissed me off.  Just say what you want to say Shakesphere and quit trying to over describe things...I hate paragraphs that look like bricks.

I have just finished the book “Still Life With Woodpecker” by Tom Robbis.  I went to a bookstore here on Maui that sells old rejected library books for ten cents each.  I can’t ever pass up an opportunity to rescue a book from a fire…especially when they give them away for ten cents.  I just happened to find a book by Tom Robbins who I’d never read before but always wanted to when I saw Playboy favorably review one of his books.

Still Life With Woodpecker is ultimately a love story between a self-proclaimed outlaw of modern times with an exiled princess.  The story spanned from Seattle to Lahina (Maui) back to Seattle (in the attic) and then out to the middle east (inside the main room to a newly erected $300 million dollar pyramid).  This book at times was confusing because…well maybe because I just don’t think that Tom Robbins is funny lest of all a funny writer.  But I do applaud him for taking on the job of trying to explain why red heads are so fucked up generally.  Here is a great line from the book:

“There’s a tendency today to absolve individuals of moral responsibility and treat them as victims of social circumstances.  You buy that, you pay with your soul.  It’s not men who limit women, it’s not straights who limit gays, it’s not whites who limit blacks.  What limits people is lack of character.  What limits people is that they don’t have the fucking nerve or imagination to star in their own movie, let alone direct it.  Yuk.”

Great paragraph.  Nuff said.  Read this book slow…digest paragraphs and don’t be in a hurry to finish.  It is the journey…the slow journey that holds the best part of living.  This book is no different.

I just finished reading “Wonder Boys” by Michael Chabon.  Over all I think I like this book.  The problem I have with it is that the story (plot) wasn’t really that exciting.  What Chabon makes up for in dull plot is his writing.  I did have to consult the dictionary a few times because my vocabulary isn’t as vast as it should be.  This was a book that you had a hard time putting down, but once you did it wasn’t that easy to pick back up.  I just didn’t really care to turn the page because I was feeling anything (danger, anxiety, wonder, etc) but some of his paragraphs were written so well that once you did turn the page you are not sorry to have.  This is a coming of age novel where the starting age is middle-age.  This is a story about a writer who is working on a 2000 plus page book that he’s been working on for over 5 years…and the end is no where in sight.  It is about an old, eccentric college friend that comes to town to read his friend’s not-yet-finished-work-in-process book.  This is a story about a tuba that won’t go away, a murdered dog that arranges sticks in the backyard as if it is trying to communicate with the world, a jacket worn by Marilyn Monroe while married to Joe DiMaggio, marijuana, a cool car with a trunk load of drugs and death, and a bunch of stolen (liberated) library books.  If you want to read a well written piece of literature so you know how to do it right…this book is the way to go.  But if you want a page turner that you are thinking about in middle of your day while you are away from it…well this book didn’t do it for me in that way.  All and all we read books for different reasons.  This one satisfied one of my reason for reading.  The last line in the book (which doesn’t contain plot info.) says: “The young men dutifully, for the most part, and from time to time some of them even take the trouble to go over to the college library, and dig up one or another of his novels, and crouch there, among the stacks, flipping impatiently through the pages, looking for the parts that sound true."

I just finished the book What's Eating Gilbert Grape.  I really liked
the story.  It has a little feel of Holden Caulfield to it.  That is
what I loved about the story...the fact that the main character is
freaking out - that he is lost and there is no hope for him to be
found.  Every day that he opens a door you almost wish that door lead
to death but as a person you know it isn't going to; why? because
death never comes when you want it to.  As a result you have to keep
opening up doors, looking for something you don't know what it is or
when you will find it.  Sure you can hope for death to take you away
but it isn't going to and you must continue to open the doors.  Arnie
Grape says to Gilbert Grape in the first chapter that..."you are
getting littler and littler.  You are shrinking".  I really like this
line because when you die you initially shrink as your skin collapses
over your body.  Gilbert Grape is a walking corpse through most of
this story...while he is alive in the medical sense he is dead unable
to go to heaven or hell.  He is like a zombie.  But as the story takes
form and moves forward it gets worse for him but as he keeps opening
doors and walking it starts to get better until at the end he has
found what he's lost...life.  I'm not sure if this is the author's
intention but if it was I wish that the story was more focused on THAT
and less on how weird the Grapes as a family were.  I wish that there
were more stories of Gilbert as a child happy, naive whatever and the
big question being "what happened to Gilbert"...this would've been
perfect since the whole theme of the book is following Gilbert when he
is in a "rut".  The first person voice and a few great lines are
classic in this book...I just think that the author missed a great
opportunity to capture Gilbert Grape more by focusing on the family
like he did.  The book ended great though - even if it doesn't have
that Sixth Sense holy crap did that just happen feel.

"If you take the bear and put him anywhere in our society, he'll do
fine." - William Kotzwinkle

That was the quote that sold this book to me.  This book is a funny
fable about literature, art, evolution, bears, human society, and just
how desperate people are for something good and pure in their lives
after they fuck and dirty theirs up.  This book, to me, is a sad
representation on how miserable and confused people are and how blind
and willingly we would be to follow and agree with anyone who says
"follow me - I know the way"...even if that person is a bear.  This is
the second book in a row I've read of William Kotzwinkle and in his
bio section of the book it says that he lives with his wife on an
island just off the coast of Maine.  This will not be my last book by
him I read.  Besides the cover for this book alone demands that it be
read.  How great is the confused and overwhelmed look of the bear
holding a manuscript to his chest while wearing a suit towering over
Times Square full of people and not one of those people even think to
question that this funny looking giant be anything BUT a human.  I
wonder if any of my friends are actually a bear.  This is a funny
satire of the publishing/writing/Hollywood industry.  By the way did I
mention that the the main character (the bear)'s name is Hal Jam???
How great is that?

I just finished reading The Fan Man by William Kotzwinkle.  I was a
member of the Maui Writer's Conference eating dinner with a nice young
lady when a guy in a white beard came up to our table.  We were eating
alone and I made a stupid joke about him interrupting our first date.
We welcomed him to our table and the guy with the white beard named
Douglas told us about his favorite book called The Fan Man.  He gave
us a quick teaser and quoted Kurt Vonnegut ([The Fan is]"Flawless and
seamless as nearly as I can tell")...yes Kurt Vonnegut is the old guy
in the movie Back To School - but he is also a brilliant writer.  But
what really haunted me into getting this book and reading it was the
fact that Douglas told us he had read this book out loud to at least 7
different people (one being his father in the hospital).  Being the
ass hole I am I challenged him to a bet.  Pizza and pride are the
prizes.  He told me that if I read the book and didn't think it was
one of the most creative, engaging, brilliant, unique stories I have
ever read I win...the alternative being I agree with him and I loose.
I had one year to read it and we would settle up next year at the
conference.  I ordered the book from Boarders and it came in
yesterday.

I finished it today.  Douglas won.

This book is in my top five of all time.  It is a cross between
Confederacy of Dunces (my number 2) and Catcher in the Rye (my number
1).  How this book isn't more known is a CRIME...it is like watching
Michael Jordan playing PIG in the suburbs of Albuquerque.  I am
looking for someone...ANYONE to read this book out loud to.  It is
that good.  All I want to do right now is get a Maui Gold
Pineapple...go down to Makena beach with an umbrella - eat pineapple
and read this book to someone who wants to listen.  If you don't read
this book (190 pages - $12.95) you can look at yourself in the mirror
and say, "I'm a lazy dumb ass".

I've read Carrie for the first time today.  I will admit that I've
never seen the movie or knew the actual ending.  All I knew from bits
and pieces of life is that this simple bullied girl get red paint
spilt on her and she freaks out and ends up killing a bunch of high
school peers that bullied her.  I've learned that this book has been
banned in many schools because it is believed to cause violence.  This
is my opinion: Steven King is one of the best writers, if not the
best, of our time.  His only flaw as a writer is that he's become too
popular that to like him is seeming like following the herd.  The fact
is his characters and dialogue are very easy on the eye, believable
and his voice is original and as identifiable to his generation as
Mark Twain was to his.  I think that this book Carrie should be
mandatory reading in all 6-8th grades.  This book should not be hidden
for the fact that it may put bad thoughts into kids minds...the
reality is kids have bad thoughts already.  But instead this book
should be embraced as a warning (like the Bible of sorts) to what can
happen if you push a human being too far and he/she snaps.  Be good to
people and maybe you won't be killed.  The Colombine Killings (as
tragic and horrible as they were) are a modern day verson of Carrie
(without the TK powers).  The kids felt like outcasts...bullied by
those and unprotected by those of authority.  The book Carrie nor NWA
nor Garth Brooks nor Marilin Manson nor the Bible made those kids act
violently towards their peers and teachers.  The unaccounted or
supervised bullying and lack of respect that is chalked up as "boys
will be boys" caused unstable kids to snap...as I realize that some
kids will freak out and hurt others don't ban this book and pretend
that Carrie is causing the violence.  You who don't watch and
supervise children and allow yours to be part of the problem cause
violence.  Carrie and other books like it should be used as a
guideline...a worse case scenario of sorts to what can happen if you
allow "boys to be boys" and not hold children accountable for their
actions.

Atlas Shrugged is the follow-up to The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand.  It took me a little while to finally finish this book because it wasn’t as engaging as The Fountainhead was.  This 1000+ page book had a bunch of good and bad stuff.  Here is my list I just made after just finishing this book.

Good:
1.  This story is an example of what happens to the world when the mind goes on strike and decides not to “do work” just because a person/manager in power says it has to be done.  This is a work that says “here’s the shovel…you do it if you think by barking orders you are actually doing something”.
2.  Ayn Rand calls out all the looters (who are those that don't have the ability, energy to create but instead live off of the work of other).  Managers who are just ass kissers versus those who lead and create a better environment.  AKA Government.  Ayn Rand is a huge anti-big company, anti government woman.  She doesn’t trust them.
3.  She introduces an interesting concept of money.  She says that money is the best award given to productive, quality.  People are only willing to part with their money when the product is good.  Therefore if you get more money you deserve it because you are producing a good product.  Charity is shit because you are just allowing the weak to loot off of other's hard work.  She says that if you see someone with money he/she deserves it and don’t hate on them because they did something productive.  I think in this day and age Ayn Rand would say “most people with money were not just given it” – don’t believe what VH1 and MTV shows tell you. 
4.  Who is to say that your kid's braces so they are not ugly are more important than my kid's desire to own a BMW?  The world of people who can't do anything make those that can feel guilty for their ability.  This is a belief that Ayn Rand had regarding those with money versus those without money.  She would totally be in favor of Alex Rodriguez making as much as he does because no one can do what he can do.  She will call those who are jealous and attack how much he makes to go out and do something meaningful and important and maybe you will be rewarded with money too.
5.  When people put the need of their neighbor over their own only evil and ciaos follow.  Stop doing for others...make them either do for themselves or die.  Survival of the fittest.

Bad:
1.  Sometimes the male characters seem a little too "close" for a guy to act.  Especially back in the time period when gayness is so horrible and unacceptable.  Men are using the word love and words like "I love him" too much for a male character in a story who is not gay should
2.  The long ass winded lectures her main characters use to talk.  There is one point in the story when the main character talks in a lecture to the country over the radio for over 50 pages.  The pages looked like solid, big blocks of brick and was WAY too much to comprehend.  There are multiple times in the story when the characters went on rants for crazy periods of time.  This ultimately made me not like this story too much.

A Bad Gone Good:
1.  As crazy as this book’s concept was to me I actually saw an article last month in a very popular magazine (I can’t remember if it was Popular Science or Reader’s Digest or another one) but the article in the magazine talked about how art should be free to be used.  Free music...books etc.  The artist needs to be paid or what is going to happen is that the artist is going to go on strike and art will not be as good as it once was because all walks of life want recognition and reward for brilliance.  Just because technology allows us to have access to these doesn't mean that they should be free.  Otherwise you are going to loose the truly brilliant artists and get hacks that stand in their place.

I’ve just finished the book “Night” by Elie Wiesel.  The book is only 109 pages in length…and if it were longer it would almost be so horrible that reading it would practically be impossible.  Sure we’ve all heard of the Holocaust and know the numbers (over 6 million innocent people brutally and inhumanely murdered) but “Night” is a first person account of a true story as experienced by the author.  It is a story of survival and how desensitized a human can become when he is forced to deal with the absolute worst conditions a human can experience for an extended period of time.  This book is not only a classic but should be required reading for every child BEFORE they get out of the ninth grade.  Read this only if you want to be depressed and hate your human side…because who knows how you would’ve acted if you were German and Hitler was in front of you during the 1940s.  The psychologists agree that we would’ve followed the devil.