Scars on the Face of God

C.G. Bauer has a gift for conjuring memorable characters and creating a subtly-textured sense of place. His new novel, Scars on the Face of God (Drollerie Press, 2008) is a first-class example of this skill. The narrator and protagonist, Johannes "Wump" Hozer, is an expert at all things menial. For example, he knows, among other things, that "Dog shit has a natural chemical in it that helps soften animal skins during the leather tanning process." Of course, Bauer doesn't just insert such bits of trivia for fun (though they are, in fact, fun). They serve a purpose -- they make Wump's world come alive for the reader. And come alive it does. The plot of Scars on the face of God kicks into gear when a brick wall unearthed at the site of a restaurant collapses and a flood of raw sewage carries forth hundreds of human bones. Drawing heavily on his knowledge of Catholic arcana, Wump takes it upon himself to solve the mystery of the bones... And to rid himself of the haunting childhood memories that plague him. Overall, Scars on the Face of God is a fast-moving, highly engaging paranormal mystery with spooky undertones and a haunting aftertaste -- the perfect read for a winter evening by the fire!

tomorrowland

The good folks at Dogzplot have just published the latest title in their Achilles Chapbook Series (whose slogan is a quote from the wrathful one himself: "Let no man forget how menacing we are... we are lions.") It's a flash-fiction collection called Tomorrowland, it's by Howie Good, and it's the most fun to be had anywhere for the paltry sum of $4.00. Throughout the chapbook, Good envisions a chaotic world of lost jackets, pyromaniacs, insomniacs, secret police, and search dogs, but this isn't just a post-modern exercise in "weird for the sake of weird" (apologies to Moe Syzlak). Good seems to be grasping at something throughout this collection, feeling around in the maddening crush of texts, images, myths, legends, and other mysteries that make up our world to get at some larger truth about the human condition. One of his biggest concerns, it would seem, is the issue of identity. When asked for "some identification" in a piece titled "Late Innings," the narrator wonders whether the socket of a missing tooth trumps a driver's license. Likewise, in "Witness Box," the author notes that we never choose our own names, while in "Ancestors," a little girl asks her father who she looks like, only to elicit from the father a string of angst-ridden familial associations. We are what the world makes of us, this collection seems to say, even as we try desperately to make the world what we need it to be. Good stuff!

The Night Battles

M.F. Bloxam’s debut novel, The Night Battles (Permanent Press 2008), uses a nuanced blend of history, legend, and mythology to explore the ways in which the past will always haunt the present. On the run from the wreckage of a career in academia, the novel’s protagonist, Joan Severance, escapes to Valparuta, Sicily, where she expects to put her skills as a historian to good use. The town’s archives are a treasure-trove of minutia from the lives of the long-dead, and while the records she uncovers reveal much about the lives of those who have gone before her, it’s the peculiar absences of information that lead to the biggest mysteries surrounding Valparuta. As her investigation deepens, Severance learns that the town has been the scene of an ongoing battle between the forces of good and evil for countless generations—and that this battle has taken place not on the physical plane, but on an astral one.

One thing that makes this novel stand out is that while its heroine is a historian, she neither falls into the Dan Brown Da Vinci Code mold of adventurer-historian, nor is she a female Indiana Jones. That is, Bloxam doesn’t attempt to wow her readers with vaguely scandalous information about the true identity of the Mona Lisa, and she’s not especially interested in giving the world yet another action hero. Rather, Severance is more in line with James Axton, the protagonist of Don DeLillo’s The Names who, like Severance, discovers hidden, haunting meaning in the forces of history and ruminates upon that meaning in intelligent and thought-provoking ways. Emotionally stunted in many respects, Severance is not just on a quest to discover the truth about Valparuta; she’s on a quest to discover her own humanity.

None of this, of course, is to say that the novel is purely a character study. Indeed, The Night Battles takes many unexpected twists and turns, and what drives it forward is both the sense of mystery that Bloxam has given to the town of Valparuta and the silent longing for some kind of emotional depth that she has given to her protagonist. In short, The Night Battles is a work of beauty, a curious cross between Umberto Ecco and Neil Gaiman-—mysterious, moody, and highly engaging.

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Dogzplot

I had the good fortune of running into Barry Graham, one of the editors of Dogzplot magazine, at the Push to Publish writers workshop at Rosemont College earlier this month. Focusing on flash fiction, the magazine is a gem of a publication whose latest issue features somewhere in the neighborhood of sixty authors. Pushing the inner-limits of word-count, the current issue opens with a six-word piece titled "Trash" before launching into a fast-paced journey across the physical, emotional, and psychological landscapes of America. Each piece in the collection is under 200 words, and each, in the immortal words of Spider-Man, really packs a wallop. Among the standouts are two by Florida author Dawn Corrigan titled "Nemesis" and "The Pin," which deal with pathological uncles and unrequited love respectively. Another highlight is Scott Garson's "Accounts Payable," which asks the immortal question, "Why does the ham and cheese croissant cost less than the ham and cheese sandwich?" Rounding out the issue is Graham's "All Together," which arguably presents the definitive ultra-short version of Dostoyevsky's Crime and Punishment. All in all, Dogzplot is a great little magazine to have on hand while you're waiting in line at the grocery store or for those late nights when you know you want to read something good but won't be able to stay awake for more than a few paragraphs of text.

Baby Jesus Pawnshop

About two-thirds of the way through Lucia Orth’s latest novel, Baby Jesus Pawnshop (Permanent Press 2008), protagonist Rue Caldwell experiences an epiphany. As Ferdinand Marcos is being inaugurated to the office of President of the Phillipines, Rue realizes that her position as the wife of an American counter-insurgency specialist renders her a willing conspirator in the political system that is responsible for all of the injustices, economic and otherwise, she has seen throughout her stay in that nation. In the author’s words, Rue “felt a dread, unnameable, that by not objecting, following life lived on an iron track, she was also a part of the farce and the horror.” This sentiment nicely captures the position of Rue throughout the novel and underscores the tension that drives this insightful and intensely humane political thriller forward.

Throughout the novel, Orth demonstrates not just a strong familiarity with early-1980s Phillipine politics, but a solid understanding of the relationship between the members of the rank-and file who live history as it occurs and the larger movements that get recorded in the history books. This gift is especially clear in the novel’s opening pages. As Rue wanders through a marketplace in Manila, she is forced to come to grips with the poverty that surrounds her, and the extent of this poverty comes across almost viscerally when a vendor offers to sell the protagonist an infant described as having “the unhealthy color of raw gray dough.” Juxtaposed against the festivities surrounding the aforementioned inauguration (not to mention the silk scarves and high-heel shoes favored by Imelda Marcos), the poverty that Rue witnesses underscores the absolute injustice of the economic disparity between the haves and have-nots—and, needless to say, serves as a telling explanation for why revolutions occur.

All of this is not simply to say that Baby Jesus Pawnshop is ripe for all manner of Marxist interpretation. Politics aside, it’s also a great read. Orth’s gifts for character and setting are apparent throughout the proceedings, and her political “agenda” (for lack of a better term) never tarnishes the story. Indeed, where a lesser novelist might stoop to the errant didacticism of moral high-handedness, Orth revels in parsing the complexities of ethical gray areas. Overall, a compelling and thought-provoking read.

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Broad Street

The first thing I noticed about Christine Weiser’s debut novel, Broad Street, is the cover. Hot pink with an iconic Roy Lichtenstein-esque illustration of a woman in a blue evening gown rocking out on a bass guitar, the artwork struck me as fresh and bold—more Mexican wrestling poster (and I mean that in a good way!) than staid book cover—which, it turns out, makes it the perfect match for Weiser’s fresh, bold literary voice.

The novel opens with the recently-single protagonist Kit Green making a drunken pact with her friend and partner in crime, Margo Bevilacqua, to start an all-girl band with the express purpose of pissing off the musical men in their lives. From here, the novel is a roller-coaster ride through the ups and downs of life in the independent music scene. As the author’s bio notes, Weiser herself played bass in a Philly girl band called Mae Pang back in the nineties. The experience obviously left a lasting impression, for all of Kit’s struggles come across as genuine and heartfelt. In short, the woman has walked the walk, so she knows exactly what she’s saying when she talks the talk—and this fact comes across on every page.

While the Philadelphia music scene circa 1994 provides a brilliant backdrop for this novel (and Weiser imagines that setting vivdly), Broad Street is about so much more than Kit and Margo’s adventures in the music industry. It’s about their individual struggles to find their respective places in the world at large. Indeed, it’s a quest for identity. Both women desperately want to declare independence—from the men in their lives, from their families, from the dead-end jobs they work just to make ends meet—and in so doing, to emerge fully into adulthood. And if they have fun while they’re doing it, then so much the better!

Bottom line: Broad Street is a great, fun book about coming of age in the often seedy and always exciting world of rock ‘n’ roll. Imagine the women of Sex and the City strapping on guitars, and you’ll get a sense of what it’s all about. The perfect survival guide for anyone considering a career in the music business.

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Head Wounds

Perhaps it’s the passing of legendary voice actor Don LaFontaine last Monday, but I can’t help wondering what the trailer for Chris Knopf’s latest mystery, Head Wounds (Permanent Press 2008), might sound like if the book were made into a film. In fact, I can almost hear the so-called “Voice of God” tantalizing us with the following: It was just another day for Sam Acquilano when his whole life suddenly turned upside-down.

As with many great Hollywood thrillers, Head Wounds follows a familiar pattern. The grizzled hero with a shady past is framed for a murder he didn’t commit. Yet while the pattern is certainly familiar, at no times does Knopf appear to be re-treading old ground. Indeed, his prowess as a storyteller allows Knopf to apply Ezra Pound’s mandate to “make it new” to the detective genre. Thus while the novel certainly hits many recognizable marks as Knopf weaves his version of a classic trope, it also takes a number of unexpected turns, most significantly with regard to setting and character.

Knopf’s facility with setting is apparent. The novel is set in the fabled Hamptons, summer playground of the exceedingly well to do. At the same time, however, Knopf’s vision is of the seedy underbelly of the Hamptons. To put it bluntly, I seriously doubt anyone will ask Knopf to write a travel brochure for the region anytime soon.

With regard to character, Knopf does a wonderful job of populating his fictive world with memorable and exciting characters who do everything they can to resist the bonds of cliché. Yes, protagonist and narrator Sam Acquilano is a dark, brooding chain-smoker who enjoys a good drink, but he’s also a pragmatist at heart. When asked why he never drinks in the vicinity of power tools, he replies matter-of-factly that it’s “hard to maintain a respectable drinking habit without fingers or thumbs.” Similarly, while Acquilano abhors the “plague of sophistication spreading through the Hamptons, infecting even indigenous dive bars,” he’s still not above (or perhaps below) brewing a pot of gourmet Viennese cinnamon coffee to fortify himself against the peril and deception that besiege him from all sides. In many ways, the man is a walking contradiction, yet it’s this inherent and ongoing state of contradiction that makes him so interesting to watch as he goes about trying to clear his name while simultaneously doing everything within his power to destroy his own life, such as it is.

Throughout Head Wounds, Knopf proves himself as a superb writer who is highly adept at taking the old tropes and making them new. His characters come to life vividly, his sense of setting is spot-on, and, last but not least, the man can craft a real page-turner. A great read for the fan of hard-boiled mystery.

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