Book Review

Dancing After Hours
by Andre Dubus

In the world of Andre Dubus, pain is the center and driving force of love. Pain leaves a beautiful hole in the world; all the elements spiral down into its center, leaving streaks of color. Pain lies buried in the inner lives of Dubus's characters, puppeteering their lives towards happiness or failure (although Dubus usually cuts the story short before his readers have a chance to find out which).

Dancing After Hours is a sublime example of this philosophy. Each gem of a story resonates with a sweet sense of pain, as if death, heartache and betrayal are not the antithesis of happiness, but are actually its cause.

The collection starts strong with The Intruder, the only entry in the series that follows the norm of using character and plot to build a story. Young Kenneth Girard struggles with the angst filled "inbetweeness" of adolescence. Dubus portrays this agonizing time through the boy's forbidden love of fantasy, imagination and story, rather than focusing on sexual awakening like most stories in this vein. Kenneth's powerful and slightly awkward love for his worldly sister pales when compared to his love of imagination, and both forces - the child like wonder and the adult like lust - work together to drive the story to its perfect conclusion.

The rest of Dubus's stories veer slowly away from this structure, dipping further into the realms of deep character development rather than plot.

In Falling in Love, Dubus chronicles the lives of Ted Briggs (a wounded war vet) and Susan Dorsey (a disillusioned actress from Boston). As the title indicates with its present tense, the two fall for each other, struggle, and fall apart with equal passion and no sense of permanence. Dubus writes with an uncomfortable clarity and frankness, willing to sacrifice his characters to fate no matter how loveable they are. But just before the reality becomes unbearable for fiction, the characters unfold themselves and reveal their true thoughts, and it is in these moments the Dubus displays his real talent; weaving human emotion and cold logic into poetry.

Not to say that Dancing After Hours is hopeless . Ted Briggs makes a later appearance in All the Time in the World, this time playing the heroic knight to a working woman with no roots, no passion or agape. Although the fate of this second relationship is unknown, Dubus ends the story positively, in his trademark poetic prose, "She was hungry, and she talked with her friends and waited for her steak, and for all that was coming to her: from her body, from the earth, from radiant angels poised in the air she breathed."

This technique of abrupt endings, of loose ends and unfinished lives, is jarring at first. As a reader you may hop from one tale to the next feeling strangely unsatisfied. But ultimately, this style is essential to Dubus's work. For him to tell you the secrets of love, happiness and pain would ruin the ethereal magic of his work.

Emo Angst

Sorry for the delay. I'm getting back into my writing groove and working on a book review. In the meantime, enjoy this painful emo music video that my misguided friend made in college:

Escaped from L.A.

Got back from L.A. on the 26th and promptly fell into bed and made long, glorious love to the Flu Virus.

Will post again soon.

Harry Potter and the Sniveling Babies of Bitcherton

I'm right there with you. Waiting and waiting for the new title to be released, only to find that it doesn't meet my expectations: Deathly? Hallows?

These are not words! This is British snobbery! They are not nearly as cool as previous words in the Harry Potter title series, like Goblet and Order . . . and they are certainly more awkward than Azkaban and Half-Blood.

I don't know what I expected - maybe because Rowling keeps surprising me and all her other readers with clever plot twists and character development - but I have to say, this title does not meet my unknown expectations.

I'm going to go write the seventh book myself, then think of the title . . . then masturbate. What can I say? I like to be satisfied.

RUETERS: International Conflict

December 21st, 2006, 3:31 PM EDT

HUNGARY ATTACKS TURKEY

In a startling political move, the country of Hungary has attacked Turkey, for the stated reason of “extreme irony.”

“The irony shortage in Hungary has long been overlooked by the Bush Administration,” said Princess McQueen, political advisor to the mayor of San Francisco and three time champion of the Dairy Farmers of America Drag Queen Competition, “three years ago we proposed to send volunteer workers from Anorexics Anonymous, but no one listened.”

Meanwhile, the attack on Turkey continues. Civilians were pleasantly amused when Hungarian planes began dropping mashed potatoes and hot gravy over major cities, but soon ran inside after becoming “sufficiently annoyed.”

Countless reports indicated hundreds of innocent people are suffering minor scrapes and abrasions after slipping on cranberry sauce. H.E. László Sólyom, president of Hungary, has failed to claim ownership for any of these events. When he met with Condoleezza Rice yesterday afternoon he refused to answer questions, and when pressed by our Secretary of State he motioned to an intern who promptly threw a stick of butter at her head.

“Rice,” H.E. László Sólyom chuckled under his breath before escaping in a catering truck.

President Bush snapped into action, immediately sending troops into the area of conflict and earning immediate criticism from the Democratic Party.

“It’s much colder over there than in the desert,” said Al Gore. “My informants indicate that dozens, no, hundreds of U.S. soldiers are suffering from runny noses. It’s like the plague, my god people we’re living in the Dark Ages!”

The U.N. has taken its usual course of action by supporting the aggressor country; a television weatherman named Raine McCloud has flown in from Scotland and a man from France announced that he “sort of cares about what was going on over there.”

The outcome of these events is unclear, but experts believe once Hungarian troops have refilled their country’s irony supplies, they will return to their own borders.

“This is an act of terrorism,” said President Bush on vacation in Punjarra, Australia. “And it will not end until Hungary has filled its appetite for destruction.”

Young Hot Lesbian Babies

Last night at a Greyhound Bus hub I was sitting and waiting and reading when I heard a duo of giggles erupt below my chair. I found two young girls lying in a "P9" position, fondling each other's hands and each one whispering things that had the other erupting in loud giggles and the resonating "outside voice" that is usually found in trailer trash women.

Both "girls" were dressed in pink pants that hugged their baby-fat butt cheeks and black hooded sweatshirts that bore an effigy of Jack from A Nightmare Before Christmas. One was Caucasian and the other was real Asian. Both shared about three braincells, two vaginas, and one wardrobe. They tickled and poked and sang in a kind of manic daze, high on hormones that had no place to go but to their heads. These were the girls that would never look for or notice a man over five feet eight inches tall. These were the girls that would rather explore each other's nether regions or date smooth bodied emo-boys than spend ten minutes with any sick macho that dared to grow real facial hair.

Along came the mother . . . .

She was blond (faux real) and had spent the better part of an afternoon squeezing into jeans she stole from her daughter's closet; shifting and sucking until they clamped shut and left a circular life preserver of fat around her waist (perfect for rebounding off dank alley walls on a long walk home from the local biker bar).

She gathered the two girls, imploring them to behave, to stop singing, to stop freaking out the world . . . but to no avail. They swaggered onto a bus for Phoenix and I never saw them again . . . until I arrived in Los Angeles for Christmas.

RUETERS: Archeological find

December 17, 2006, 4:11 PM EDT

INTERN STUNS ARCHEOLOGICAL COMMUNITY

Kathryn Borman was finishing her first week at an archeological dig just outside the French the town of Vergeinal, when, despite protests from instructors, she lit a cigarette near a newly discovered gas line. The resulting explosion killed Kathryn and three paleobotanists, but resulted in the most amazing archeological find since the resting place of Pontius Pilate's dog and, some are saying, the greatest scientific discovery since Hektor Lonzo’s theory on the disappearing non-absence of anti-non-dark-opposite-non matter in the electro fields of quark molecules.

The explosion unearthed three previously unknown dinosaurs, all completely intact and all shedding new light on the pre-historic world. Scientists have already classified the new creatures.

(1) Lacanadon: a tiny reptile with a spiny back and thirty foot tail.
(2) Camillian: a frail creature with two sets of female genitalia.
(3) Freudosaurus: a dinosaur with no eyes and boney plates on its spine that keep it in a rigid, upright sitting position at all times.

“It’s not just the creatures themselves,” says Frank Lee, paleopsychologist from Berkley. “From a fragment of a partial toe bone we were able to estimate the exact emotional and psychological state of each one.”

The fossils were discovered in what appears to be a pre-historic therapist office. The Lacanadon and Camillian were found on the floor near a granite chaise lounge. These two dinosaurs were in what scientists are calling a 69 B.C. position.

The Camillian was found carrying a gun made entirely of bones. The Lacanadon was shot through the head while, oddly enough, the Camillian appears to have died of loneliness.

A few yards away, the Freudosaurus appears to have watched the attack while wearing skimpy women’s undergarments, which might be the earliest known example of a Freudian slip.

Scientists from around the world are converging on the spot, and unsubstantiated reports indicate that Steven Spielberg is incorporating these new scientific finds into his NC-17 rated Jurassic Park 5: Attack on Party Beach.

Spielberg was unavailable for comment.

Fishin' in the Mornin'

Today I got up early, like I did when I was little and living with my dad on The Island.

I have no snow anymore, but I had snow then. It would pile on the cedars and wait until you passed underneath, then the winter birds would take flight, looking back over their winds with a beakish smirk to watch you dig melting ice out from under your collar.

We would trudge to the lake, a glorified pond in the center of The Island with three frozen tributaries like Winterland Slip 'n Slides. Dad would make me swear not to tell the mom, and he'd go down first, his block and tackle on his chest. He always told me to count to twenty, but I always got nervous when he disappeared behind the stumps and wilting ferns and snow mounds so I jumped to follow and usually rammed into him before he had time to clear the path.

He always got mad, but he loved it.

The shack was always there; I never questioned how, even though with age I can imagine him sneaking out of our three-room house in the pre-dawn and trekking to the pond, in the dark, alone, and pulling the tiny wood shanty inch by inch onto the frozen water.

I pretended to help him chip the hole and he waited until I got tired, then finished the job. We would fish then, rarely catching anything and never ever speaking. Then the sun would peak and we'd pack and be home for supper with mom.

Now I fish alone on the rocks. Barefoot and dirty with a single long pole and the waves that are warm and move and not nearly as mysterious or old or wise as a cold wall of ice.

I caught a fish though, which for most people is a fair trade for cold. It was small and of unknown variety, so I tossed it back into the waves and wondered how for it could swim, wondered if it would ever look up at my father through that cold, solid wall.

RUETERS: New Name for Celebrity

December 15, 2006, 4:46 PM EDT

BONO CHANGES NAME TO SOMETHING LESS AWKWARD

At a press conference this afternoon, U2 band leader Bono announced he will lose his socially embarrassing moniker and return to the name given to him at his christening.

Bono said at the conference, “I am forever grateful to my stage name, and to the countless drunk women that have found it humorously cute and arousing. But I have found that sex, much like eating, takes away from my important work as Differences Uniter Specialist. I am changing my name to be true to myself. In the Bible - which I haven’t read but I based a lot of my early lyrics on what some homeless guy told me about it - names held a certain power to shape the life and define the inner spirit of an individual. Therefore I am changing my name back to Wussy McPreacherbitch.

“Oh, and I’m hiring an illegal immigrant to hold my microphone during concerts so I can save my arm muscles for giving the peace sign.”

Supporters of the super-band front man have embraced the change, while some fans are worried that this obvious attempt to reconnect with his Irish roots will hobble his plans to break down racial barriers.

“The world’s greatest philanthropist wants everyone to see him as more Irish?” wrote u2me3 on the U2 message board. “Why doesn’t he just shoot an Ethiopian child and change his name to Shyster von Jew?”

Bono was quick to respond to the public debate. His PR representative released this statement just a few hours after the story broke:

Wussy is aware that various people groups will have a hard time adjusting. So he will once again take strides to bridge the ethno-gap by tattooing his flesh with every possible shade of human pigmentation, leaving room, of course, for patches of ape fur so we do not offend our Evolutionally Challenged Eco-Brothers.

In the meantime, Bono’s follow band members are taking notice of the debate. During an interview with Touched Magazine, The Edge expressed interest in changing his name to Won Note, and, even though Adam Clayton and Larry Mullen, Jr. have declined to comment, paparazzi in Berlin snapped photos of the duo spelling out possible names with Scrabble pieces.