- I’ve been reading a lot of Iain Banks of late. And I haven’t had this much fun reading in a while. Anyone who can write the sentence, “What the crushingly powerful four-limbed hug would have done to a human unprotected by a suit designed to withstand pressures comparable to those found at the bottom of an ocean probably did not bear thinking about, but then a human exposed without protection to the conditions required to support Affronter life would be dying in at least three excitingly different and painful ways anyway without having to worry about being crushed by a cage of leg-thick tentacles,” is a man after my own heart. And I’m kicking myself for not having read the Culture novels earlier, particularly after Player of Games and Excession. Lengthy ruminations on Banks will eventually follow. But in the meantime, this YouTube video of Banks showing off his study reveals him to be quite a funny man. For those who didn’t know this already.
- The hatred towards overweight people in this post is outright sociopathic. I am appalled. What cretin could find such slurs and cheap shots funny? What atavistic mind could take pleasure in this exercise? People come together to a convention to meet others and discuss topics that they’re interested in. Images with Photoshopped frowns and hateful captions are the thanks they get? I am further appalled to discover that not a single comment has lodged a protest against these calumnies. Well, since “Zathlazip” cannot be bothered to provide her real name, I should note that investigation reveals the coward’s name to be Rachel Moss. She lives in Wisconsin, having moved out there after a stint at John Hopkins. Let that name live in infamy. (UPDATE: For those who missed out on this, I think The Angry Black Woman sums up the incident quite well. I share her explanation for why I will not remove Rachel Moss’s name and why I have little sympathy for what Rachel Moss did.)
- Mark Sarvas scores a Seattle Times profile, which is fine and all. But where’s the talk of Harry, Revised? Where are the necessary queries into literary erections? Where are the pivotal questions about how many funerals Mr. Sarvas has been to? How frequently he has had sartorial mishaps? The spinning debacles he keeps from the public at large? This is journalism, dammit! The questions must be deployed!
- So the insufferable Joe Queenan praises Scandinavian mystery writers. And you think to yourself that Queenan has, after a relentless torrent of grumpy and remarkably unfunny articles bemoaning everything under the sun, finally found something he likes! But then, at the end, the article drifts into an anticlimactic cynicism that cancels out the praise, leaving one to wonder what exactly Queenan’s purpose is in life. But I think I have a solution to the Queenan problem. To my knowledge, Queenan hasn’t written anything about Uwe Boll. But if someone were to whisper something into Boll’s ear about how Queenan savaged Boll in one of his pieces, Boll could then challenge Queenan to a boxing match, and Queenan could then get thoroughly trounced, and he might learn a bit of humility. Yes, it’s an unlikely scenario. Queenan learning humility, that is. But one can certainly dream.
- Is The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction washed up?
- Shameless Words, we hardly knew ye!
- Old news, but blogs don’t necessarily mean bestselling books.
- Will Self has won the 2008 Wodehouse Prize for his latest novel, The Butt, which is out in the UK and hits the States on September 16. The judges showed especially good sense in having Self triumph over Garrison Keillor, a man who may be categorized as “funny” but who cannot provide sufficient evidence. In fact, social scientists have been searching for years for a sufficient exemplar — a mass audience that actually finds Keillor funny. Unfortunately, the last recorded audience who found Keillor funny (at a minimum of 60%) was in 1988.
- Toles rips off Jaffee!
Roundup
– May 26, 2008Posted in: Roundup
The Call by Yannick Murphy: The always interesting author of Here They Come and Signed, Mata Hari returns with a novel that whips up a worldview from a rather quirky set of limitations: namely, the call logs that a veterinarian maintains as his son is unexpectedly put into a coma and an unforgiving economy denies him work. What emerges is a surprisingly optimistic, often funny, and very moving account on how one family uses acceptance and forgiveness as a way to atone for hard knocks. (
Birds of Paradise by Diana Abu-Jaber: Forget Franzen and Eugenides. If you're looking for a social novel that counts, Diana Abu-Jaber is the author you're looking for. Building from the free-form exploration of consciousness and identity in Crescent and the gripping procedural structure of Origin, Abu-Jaber's latest novel is her finest, equally fluent with gutterpunk culture and smarmy real estate men. It has been suggested by The Washington Post's Ron Charles that you will likely gain some pounds while reading this novel. This is certainly true. Abu-Jaber's description of food is so precise that it often made me want to do more cooking. But I very much admired the way in which Abu-Jaber presents all her characters as unwitting victims of rough capitalism, which permits them some dignity even as they perform terrible acts.
The Last of the Live Nude Girls by Sheila McClear: This memoir isn't so much about the decline of the Times Square peepshow, as it is about one young woman's efforts to pull herself up by by her bootstraps when presented with few economic options. Filled with self-introspective candor and a quiet dignity, McClear's story is one that might befall any of us in these volatile times. While McClear does get back on her feet, her book leads one contemplating the terrible fates of other young women now moving to New York and falling into deadlier vocations. (
I am so glad that you brought the roundup back!
Thanks for the info on Ms. Moss. I’m one of the people at the convention and getting her identified so she can’t come back is excellent. Thank you so much.
Kind of a double-reverse “Big Brother” situation (except, like, “Big Sister”, instead). Chilling?
What the hell? I swear, the internet just makes people who are insecure assholes waste their days insulting strangers in a cowardly manner. I like the idea of outing them. That and every jackass on that forum cheering them on, because making fun of fat people is “made of win!”.
This reminds me of Jezebel’s weekly feature on gossip blogs attacking women. Those are the worst – they put down these beautiful thin women for being fat or ugly all the time.
There will be no posts on the actual SA thread coming out against this post. The thread itself is now closed for comments. SA is made for trolling and pileons, and the mods and community will ban and ceaselessly mock anyone who speaks up for decency.
I’d be very surprised if feminist responses to this didn’t also turn up in SA at some future point, thoroughly trivialized and mocked. Expect lots of “ha ha humorless feminist” jokes and Photoshopped sexually-degrading photos.
If you look on the SASS site they re-posted zathlazip’s post and are having a great time turning the misogyny firehose right back onto her.
I would very much appreciate your removing Zathlazip’s real name from your site. I understand that she has already received several threats of physical injury. This even though she had the post removed from the SASS site. What she posted may have been unkind, but I’m sure you don’t truly want to see anyone injured because of your posting. Thank you.
While I don’t like to see anybody hurt, I am not responsible for any threats of physical harm directed towards Ms. Moss. I am not making threats, nor is anyone in this thread making threats. Ms. Moss is responsible for the words she wrote. She is an adult. And I imagine she is learning a terrible lesson about what it means to be an adult.