Uzee's speech

Below is a speech by Uzma Aslam Khan, which she wrote for the Day of Resistance rally here in Honolulu last week. I thought it was a pretty good speech and deserved to be more widely heard, so here it is. You can also find it and her other writings at uzmaaslamkhan.blogspot.com .

"In 1977, native American writer Leslie Marmon Silko wrote a book called CEREMONY. This is a quote from the book, in which a World War II veteran is reflecting on why he cannot explain the war to an elder of his tribe:

"‘In the old ways of warfare, you couldn’t kill another human being in battle without knowing it, without seeing the result. But the old man would not have believed white warfare – killing across great distances without knowing who or how many had died. It was all too alien to comprehend, the mortars and big guns; and even if he could have taken the old man to see the target areas, even if he could have led him through the craters of torn earth to show him the dead, the old man would not have believed anything so monstrous.’

"Killing across great distances without knowing who or how many had died. Silko was speaking about a war sixty years ago. Now we have become so used to this kind of warfare that killing across great distances without knowing who or how many have died is perfectly ordinary. Neither US presidential candidate has indicated anything other than a complete endorsement of continuing with such killing. One of them may want an end to the war in Iraq, but he has said repeatedly that he believes in shifting the war to Pakistan ‘to get Al Qaida’, as if Al Qaida rests on the shoulders of 160 million Pakistanis. It does not. And if 160 million Pakistanis fail to find and hand over the bogey man Al Qaida, he has threatened repeatedly to take ‘direct action,’ including direct military action. When this action is taken – it is not a question of if this action is taken but when – whether by McCain or Obama, it will be yet more killing across great distances without you knowing who or how many have died.

"I would like you to know the cost of this war to Pakistan so far.

"Since 2001, the Bush administration has regularly been launching missile strikes across the Afghan border and into Pakistan. This particular year, this election year, the US strikes in Pakistan have increased alarmingly. There was one just yesterday. Eleven people died. As with all the other strikes, this one was ostensibly to take out a Taliban leader, but the leader got away, while innocent people died. The American missile strike in Pakistan last month killed 23 innocent men, women, and children. Between August 23 and October 10, at least eleven missile strikes killed more than a hundred people. This is according to Fox News, by the way. So if Fox can acknowledge it, the numbers must be even higher. This is in addition to the thirteen people killed on January 29. The twelve people killed on February 28. The eighteen people killed on March 17. The twelve killed on May 14. The eleven killed on June 10. And the numerous faceless, uncounted others killed this year, because as I’m sure you know, this is only a very partial list.

"Aside from the bombing of villages and the killing of innocent civilians, there are other ways in which this war is ruining the lives of ordinary people you are not meant to see. It is estimated that around 5,000 Pakistanis suspected of being 'terrorists' have been illegally detained in military torture cells both inside and outside the country. Any one in Pakistan will tell you that most of those who've disappeared have nothing to do with Al Qaida. They are being held either for no reason other than as evidence of 'peformance' for the US Empire, or because they threaten the internal interests of Pakistan’s rulers.­ Most of those who’ve been illegally detained come from poor, rural areas that are rich in natural resources, particularly in minerals and natural gas. Among those who’ve gone missing are journalists, poets, political activists and their families, and students and their families. Only 200 have been taken to court. None are proven terrorists. A few are released: all tell horrific stories of torture.

"What happens when you routinely see US drones flying over your home and watch entire villages being bombed and your families killed and your siblings kidnapped and tortured?

"Well, when I left Pakistan a few months ago, I knew peace-loving folks who didn’t even know any Taliban but who were beginning to gradually and grudgingly suppport them. That is in the cities. In the rural areas, more and more young angry men and women are taking up arms. Many of them had never even held a gun till the US ‘war on terror’ began. As one Pakistani recently put it. "This is the biggest gift of George Bush to al-Qaida." A country that as a child I knew as ethnically and intellectually dynamic, spirited and for the most part, peace-loving, now has a suicide-bombing just about every day, resulting in more deaths in Pakistan this year than in Afghanistan or Iraq. There were no suicide bombings in Pakistan till this war began.

"If we want change, shifting the war to Pakistan is not going to accomplish it. Peaceful, democratic, secular, tolerant societies never grew from intimidation, missile strikes, kidnappings, torture. Change will only come when the United States acknowledges who and how many Iraqis, Afghans and Pakistanis it has killed since this war began and commits itself to engaging with our countries as partners not targets."

Pats move to 5-2

Even without Tom Brady, the New England Patriots moved to 5-2 yesterday with a squeaky win over the Rams. Woo-hoo! Interim quarterback Matt Cassell is doing okay, third-string running backs are doing their best, the defense is bending without breaking. Next week come the hard-luck Colts, so let's see what happens. But seven weeks after Brady went down for the season, the team is rising to the challenge better than I had expected.

For what it's worth, I had predicted a 10-6 season and a first round exit in the playoffs. That could still happen but, this assessment now seems a little harsh. Given the relatively easy schedule down the road, 11-5 or even 12-4 seems possible.

Of course, this season, everything is going bonkers, so who knows. My original picks for Super Bowl XLIII (after Brady got hurt) were Dallas and Pittsburgh, which is looking increasingly unlikely, at least insofar as Dallas goes. Pittsburgh, hmm, maybe...

Remakes and Retreads

I've been watching a lot of old sci-fi movies lately. (Actually, that's not strictly true. I watch a lot of old sci-fi movies more or less all the time.) For a while now time I've been watching reakes of old classics from the '50s--The Thing From Another World (1951) remade as The Thing (1982), Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) remade in 1978 and 1993 and 2007, It! The Terror From Beyond Space (1958) remade as Alien (1979), Earth Vs the Flying Saucers (1956) remade as Independence Day (1996), and The Fly (1958) remade in 1986. There are plenty of others--The Blob, attack of the 50 Foot Woman, Cat People, War of the Worlds, and on and on.

Now they've redone one of the absolute landmarks, The Day the Earth Stood Still, from 1951. It's due out in December and stars--agggghhh!--Keanue Reeves, of all people.

I'm not opposed to remakes on principle--astute readers will notice that, for my first three books, remakes are pretty much what I did. But when watching the new movies, a number of ideas come to mind. Apart from obvious improvements in technology and technique, it's interesting to see how the conception of characters has advanced. For example, the role of women in most of the 1950s versions was laughable, and non-whites was nonexistent. Women were, in general, wives and secretaries and not much else; blacks and other minorities were absent. In the remakes, you would think, things would have gotten somewhat more interesting. Right?...

Well, for non-whites, the answer is yes, at least some of the time. Alien featured a black ship's engineer, Independence Day has Will Smith as a fighter pilot who saves humanity, The Thing features a couple of black characters who are as integral to the plot as anyone else. The outlook for women, though, is more problematic. Yes, Ripley in Alien is the classic icon of a powerful woman who overcomes odds, keeps a cool head, uses her brains to outwit a threat that kills everyone else. Fine. But Independence Day features three women, one of whom is a stripper who stands by her man, while another fails to stand by her man and dies, and the third has left her man but returns to him (and so doesn't die). The men, meanwhile, solve the mystery of the alien ships, figure out their weakness, destroy them and save humanity, while the girls look on. It's a lot like the 1950s.

1982's Cat People is, if anything, even worse than the original, in which the central female character dies because she can't control her animal nature; in the newer version, Nastassia Kinski is tied up and ravished, then locked in a cage as a panther and patted on the head by the guy who put her there. Ouch. The remake of The Thing eliminated women from the story altogether (there was a fairly interesting character in the 1951 version), and Spielberg's War of the Worlds did virtually the same (women are onscreen for something like 6 minutes of a 110-minute film).

I haven't seen the 2007 version of Body Snatchers yet (called The Invasion), but I'm curious to see what they've done with it. The 1978 version had a couple of reasonably interesting and thoughtful women characters, although Donald Sutherland was pretty much the center of the movie. The new version stars Nicole Kidman, who's been trying to be taken seriously as an actress ever since The Hours. So let's see what this one looks like.

And Keanu? As Klaatu? We'll see. The earth standing still indeed...

Susan Nathan

Last night I heard a talk given by Susan Nathan, author of The Other Side of Israel. Nathan is an Israeli Jew who, upon growing increasingly concerned about the treatment of Israeli citizens of Arab descent, moved from Tel Aviv to a small Palestinian-Israeli village called Tamra in 2003. (I say "village" but it's got 30,000 people crammed into a tiny allocation of land.) There she lives, as an Arab citizen of Israel lives; it's not an easy life. I won't try to paraphrase her talk, because I think her book should speak for itself. I will say, however, that conditions are appalling. You can read about it on Amazon, here:

http://www.amazon.com/Other-Side-Israel-Journey-Across/dp/0385514565/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1224795846&sr=8-1

Nathan was an ardent Zionist originally from Britain, who lived for a time in apartheid South Africa before moving to Israel. (In South Africa she was a member of the ANC, Mandela's party, and served jail time for her activism.) She's not someone who had an ax to grind or who set out to prove something about the country, which, I believe, makes her ultimate disillusionment with it that much more powerful. She was a true believer, until she got there and experienced what was happening.

Last night's talk was, predictably, interrupted by a loud, angry outburst, as an elderly couple stormed out in the middle of the lecture, hollering about "one-sided bias" and "hate speech." I guess hate speech, in this case, is defined as questioning the policies of the Israeli government towards its own minorities. But given that Nathan has lived in Israel for years, while the people who noisily interrupted the presentation last night were residents of a quite comfortable Hawaiian island, I think I will accept Nathan's observations over theirs.

She did have some good news, hinting that social pressure is building within Israel itself, from both Jewish groups and Palestinian ones, to try to redress what she calls the "second-class citizenship" of the Arabs. We'll see what happens.

IN ENTIRELY UNRELATED NEWS, today is my nephew and godson Paul's birthday. Happy birthday, Paul!

The Ayatollah Begs to Differ...

...is the name of the book I'm currently reading. I first heard about it on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart (hooray!) and it's pretty great. It's written Hooman Majd, an Iranian who grew up in the States but who has retained ties with Iran and visits often. This book is, more or less, his attempt to de-mystify the country for the many Americans (and other Westerners) who view the place, and its president, with feelings of alarm, if not horror.

And there's plenty to be horrified about, but there's also plenty to appreciate. Iran (as Persia) is a culture that goes back a couple thousand years, has its own aesthetics and traditions, a lively social life, and a government which, although not a democracy in the western sense, nonetheless contains elements of representative democracy. This is all interesting. It also contains plenty of dissenters, atheists, opium smokers, free love advocates and diehard true believers. These groups are not mutually exclusive.

Majd doesn't try to whitewash Ahmadenijad's silly denial of the Holocaust, nor does he defend his threats to destroy Israel. On the other hand, he makes the point over and over that these comments carry far more weight in the west than with Iranians, who are mainly concerned with economic issues. Most Iranians, he points out, learn little European history in school (about as much as the average American learns about Iranian history, heh heh) and so cares little about WWII or the events surrounding it, except insofar as those events somehow led to the creation of Israel and the displacement of Palestinians. So barking about israel gets Ahmadenijad points on the street, while denying the Holocaust doesn't particularly resonate (but annoys the west, which he enjoys doing). Nuclear power, meanwhile, is seen by most Iranians as an example of haq, which can be translated loosely as "rights." Given that the west, and the States in particular, has literally thousands of nuclear warheads--and Israel has a couple hundred, too--it strikes Iranians as hypocritical that they are being pressured, under threat of sanctions and war, to drop their program.

Whatever your thoughts on Iran may be--good, bad or indifferent--this is an interesting and engaging book to pick up. Majd's style is anecdotal and conversational; he's not out to belabor his points or pile on the statistics, and he is just as likely to make snide remarks about government ministers or religious zeal as he is to take a stand that some would describe as "apologist." Given that Iran is very likely the next country that we will bomb (if you take it, as I do, that Pakistan is already being bombed), it seems like the least we can do is learn something about these people before we proceed with killing them.

New book finished

Okay, so that's my excuse for not posting anything new, exciting, or even marginally intriguing for the past oh month or so. Been busy beavering away at the new book, which I have recently (tentatively) finished and sent off to mein uber-agent, Scott. So we will see what he has to say, and then think about it a while, and go from there. In the meantime I will try to be a better human by posting more blog entries.

Remember "sovereignty"?

Ah, those were the days.

Please read this essay by an American Muslim of Pakistani origin. For those of you who haven't been keeping up, the Pakistani army was recently issued orders to fire upon American soldiers who cross into Pakistan. This followed many raids, bombings, missile strikes etc inside Pakistan's territory, which resulted in the deaths of hundreds of Pakistani civilians. One of the latest killed something like 50 villagers, none of whom were, um, terrorists.

This little bit of brilliance puts it all in perspective.

http://crossingthecrescent.com/?p=117

On the other hand, who cares? It's just more "collateral damage" in the "war on terror"...

My favorite place on Earth

The island of Maui is made of two ancient volcanies that rose up out of the sea and more or less melted into one another. The bigger of these volcanoes is Haleakala, which means "House of the sun." It is, without question, the most breathtaking place I've ever walked through. I thought this in 1995, when Uzee and I first hiked there, and I thought this again last month, when we revisted the place.

These pictures are laughable in their attempt to convey Haleakala's scale and sheer otherworldly weirdness. This is the only volcano crater I've ever been in, and the colors, the erosion and the size of it all--it's I think twelve miles down to the bottom--are just staggering.

When I die, I would like my ashes scattered here.

Yes, I still exist.

Hello. On the off chance that you visited this blog sometime in the past five weeks--sorry, I haven't been around much. No excuses, except that I've relocated to Hawaii for the time being, and that pretty much monopolized my attention. The good news is that I'm somewhat settled in now, so maybe I can maintain this blog somewhat more regularly. Maybe...

Some heartening news

Sea turtles are coming back to Hawaii.

In 1995, Uzee and I went to Maui for a week, snorkeled 3 or 4 days and saw tons of fish, squid, coral... but no turtles. I had seen them the previous year in the Caribbean, but the word was that they had largely disappeared from Hawaii due to hunting. In the '80s, they were still being served at restaurants (ugh) and were severely overhunted and depleted. But then they were put on the protected species list, though by the mid-'90s, as I say, I still wasn't seeing any.

Cut to 2008, and Uzee and I have been back in Maui for a week, snorkeling almost every day, and have seen sea turtles on three separate occasions. In fact I've seen turtles more often than not, which is a rather boggling concept to try to comprehend. This morning I went out at about 8am and saw no fewer than four within an hour. A foot-long baby, a couple mid-size models and one monster that I would guess at about four feet long. Pretty darn impressive...

The nice folks at the info station on the beach confirmed what my eyes were telling me: that yes, the turtles are making a comeback in the islands, and over the past several years their numbers have been steadily increasing. Or as the guy put it, "Go out at seven in the morning you'll see six, eight, ten of them out there. There's more every year." This is the best news I've heard in some time.

Definitely time to get an underwater camera, I think. (I wish I could claim credit for these photos, but no, they're just snatched off the net, from letsgohawaii.com. Sorry. I did, however, see the very thing pictured here: a big ol' turtle ascending to the surface to grab a gulp of air before descending again. It's fun to pop up out of the water at the same time s/he does to catch a glimpse of the face in the sunlight.)

These are, I believe, Hawaiian Green Sea Turtles, for you classification fiends out there.

Much franticness occurring in my life just now.

It's been a fine fine few months here in western Mass., but the time has come to shuffle along. Next week sees Uzee and myself relocating to scenic yet perversely expensive Hawaii for a period of several months in our ongoing "circle the globe" tour. I'm fairly excited about it, as I think anyone would be, especially since swimming in the ocean and snorkeling are easily on my list of 5 favorite things to do. Some mild anxiety accompanies the move, in terms of "Will I be focused enough to continue writing books while living in such a beautiful place?" Only one way to find out, I guess. Wish me luck.

The annual miracle

Here's what's growing on my back porch at the moment.

I've had mixed success with growing vegetables over the years, but these tomatoes look like they're coming along nicely. Of course, I may never taste them, since Uzee and I are relocating once again and leaving the continental US, in which case my mom will inherit them. But whatever. It still amazes me that you can stick a plant in the ground, and wait a few weeks, and have food. Okay so I'm easily amazed. What can I tell you.

Ramblings

Hello, it's Monday, nothing much happening. I will be going to the library later to work on the new book. Aren't you glad you know that?

1. Went to Provincetown Mass recently and had a terrific time. May I recommend the Somerset House Inn if you're heading that way anytime soon.

2. Hillary dropped out of the presidential race, which is okay, leaving Obama (motto: "Let's bomb Pakistan!") to fight it out with McCain (motto: "Let's bomb everybody!") Excuse me if I'm not terribly excited about the election this year. Yes, we must elect Obama, but I wish he was a trifle less bloodthirsty regarding the country in which I live and about which he knows nothing.

3. David Cook won American Idol. How do I know this? Lord knows. I believe it happened while I was in Provincetown, however. (For the record, I was rooting for Syesha.)

4. Uzee and I recently watched Chinatown for the first time. Great movie. We may be going through a vintage-Jack-Nicholson phase; Five Easy Pieces is sitting on top of the TV.

5. Celtics are in the process of hosing the LA LAkers, currently ahead by 2-0 in the finals. Now I don't care a great deal for basketball, but I'm enough of a local boy to like it when the New England teams win. Tomorrow they play in LA and, hopefully, extend the streak. Go Leon Bowe!

PLEASE TAKE THE POLL AT THE BOTTOM OF THIS PAGE!

Bettye ROCKS

Okay, somehow a week has slipped by since Uzee and I drove down to Long Island to hear Bettye LaVette. (Where exactly does the time go? Please let me know when you figure it out.) Anyway, that concert was, if not the greatest I ever heard, at least one of the three greatest I ever heard. And I've been to a lot of concerts.

For the record, the other two standouts that leap to mind are

Jane's Addiction, Tucson, AZ, 1989 (following the release of Nothing's Shocking); and

Baaba Maal, Rabat, Morocco, 1996 (in an outdoor arena that his big voice completely filled).

Honorable mentions include Koko Taylor in a jammed club in Tucson; Lucinda Williams, ditto; and The Tragically Hip, ditto again. These were all in the early '90s, which is when I went to the bulk of my concerts. The Black Keys were also great, last month in Boston, as I mentioned in an earlier posting.

But Bettye... oh man that woman can rock. She also came out to the lobby after the show (in a tiny theatre, 400-odd seats) and signed CDs and called everybody "honey" and was generally adorable.

Here's another clip from YouTube, just because I can't resist, from a TV appearance a few weeks back.

Current musical obsessions

A couple weeks ago, Uzee and I slipped into Boston for a night to catch The Black Keys, a 2-piece blues/rock duo out of Akron, Ohio. I'm not ashamed to say that these people are probably my current favorite band, even if I discovered them late. I downloaded a couple songs off of download.com a couple years ago, but never saw their records in Lahore--now that I'm temporarily in Mass., I've picked up just about their whole catalog. But in concert is where they truly rock the free world, as this clip perhaps demonstrates:

That clip wasn't one I took, but it does get the idea of the show (at the Orpheum, May 17 2008) across pretty well.


Tomorrow, we're heading down to Long Island--a place I've never been to--to see the one & only Bettye LaVette, a soul singer from the '60s who's undergone a real revival over the past few years, since she's started releasing records on the intriguing Anti- label. She can holler with the best of them, and in my admitted valueless opinion she blows the competition out of the water (including the revered Aretha, who really hasn't been doing much of interest for the the past, oh, 3o years). But don't take my word for it...




Bettye was born in 1946, which means she's 62 now... I can only hope I rock half as much when I'm her age.

Comic Books

After mentioning David Hajdu's book The Ten-Cent Scare last time, I thought I would briefly discuss some comics that I'm reading these days.

I've read comic books since seventh grade, which is what, 32 or 33 years ago. I read them through high school, Marvels mainly, then stopped in college when I became (ahem) serious, then picked up again in my late twenties (around 1990) and kept up for about five years. When I left for Morocco in 1995, I stopped, and only started again recently, as I'm in Massachusetts for a few months with a couple good shops nearby.

But man--stuff has changed since Kamandi, the Last Boy on Earth (Jack Kirby's Planet of the Apes riff, with talking tigers, rats and seafood as well as monkeys) or even Frank Miller's Daredevil. When I left the country, Image was the hottest publisher going, with Spawn and Savage Dragon selling in big numbers (essentially, these were superhero books with a "dark" edge and/or some supernatural content to lend them an air of gritty seriousness). Make no mistake, there are still piles of superhero comics out there, but there's loads of other stuff too. The market has fragmented hugely, much like TV. Instead of three channels plus PBS, these days there are now hundreds of cable options, and in the same way, instead of Marvel and DC and a few undergrounds, there are now loads of small, independent publishers putting out quirky books. This is, I think, great, although I wonder if there are still one or two huge titles out there that everyone reads, more or less. Probably not, just as there's no longer a TV show like MASH or The Mary Tyler Moore Show that everyone watches, more or less. (I read somewhere that the only sitcom I watch, The Office, draws something like 9 million viewers. In the 70s, this would have gotten it cancelled; today, it's in its fourth season as a huge hit.)

But, comic books.

WASTELAND is an ongoing series written by Antony Johnson and drawn by Christopher J. Mitten. It's currently at issue 16 or thereabouts. As soon as I figure out what the hell's going on, I'll let you know. We are, apparently, about 100 years after some huge cataclysm called "The Big Wet," which destroyed civilization and left everything, paradoxically, a desert. A group of people abandon their town Providens and make their way to Newbegin, a fabled city somewhere to the west. There are zombie-like ghouls out there, and mysterious wanderers called Ruin Runners who live off the land, salvaging trinkets to barter at the towns, and a group of priests--mutants maybe?--who have their own elaborate set of rituals and theology. You'll notice I've barely mentioned the story, partly because it's extremely intricate. The folks from Providens eventually make it to Newbegin, where various disasters ensue. Adding interest is the narrative strategy of concurrently telling different threads of the story from different times. This is what baffled me for a while; you'd see people X and Y doing something in Newbegin; then turn the page and there would be X talking to Z in Providens. A nifty way to restructure time and present a narrative in a nonlinear mode. But I wasn't ready for it; geez man, it's a fucking comic book.

The art is good, sometimes very good, and getting better. It's a black and white book.

NORTHLANDERS, written by Brian Wood and drawn by Davide Gianfelice, is a much more traditional book from a more traditional copany (DC/Vertigo). It's set a thousand years ago, and it's about this guy Sven who returns to his Viking home in the Orkneys or thereabouts to claim his heritage (his Dad used to run the place, now he's dead, evil uncle has stepped in, shades of Hamlet). We're 5 issues in and there's already been plenty of swordfights, moody landscapes and (gasp!) sex, and we're starting to get the lowdown on Sven's background, why he left home all those years ago and why he's come back now. There's a shape-changing witch, if I'm not mistaken, and various dark secrets from the past. It's lightweight stuff compared to Wasteland but it's a quick read with great full-color art (muted tones that well serve the twilight-y environs) and a certain endearing earnestness to it all.

PAX ROMANA, written and drawn by Jonathan Hickman, is my favorite book out there right now, maybe ever. There are only 2 issues out so run out right now and buy them. Talk about a premise: 50 years from now, the Catholic Church is in deep trouble, faced with dwindling congregations and competition from atheism and Islam. So the church does what any self-respecting religious organization would do: it invents a time machine and sends a platoon of genetically-altered Marines (good Catholics all of them) to A.D. 300, in time to prevent the split of the Holy Roman Empire, and then hang around the next several hundred years, specifically to knock off Mohammad before he can gain political influence. Any other unforeseen developments threatening to challenge the primacy of the Church are also open to intervention. Sadly for the holy fathers, the Marines sent back in time have a slightly... heterodox understanding of their mission. Once successfully transported back (with a certain amount of materiel) they do indee prevent the Empire's split. However, after that, things very quickly go to shit.

Hickman is a very text-dense writer; there's always plenty of conversation in his books, most of it well done; sometimes entire pages are devoted to type. It can taken an hour to read one of his books, a rarity these days. The artwork is killer too, and rewards lingering. If there's one book out there that demonstrates the potential of the form, as well as potential lived up to, this is it. He has another book called TRANSHUMAN, about genetic modification of human beings, which is lively too, though not quite as bleedin' warped.

Have fun, kids.

The thing about having a blog...

...is that there's a certain pressure to keep maintaining it, even if you don't have that much to say. Such is the situation in which I now find myself. I think maybe some people kepe blogs because they really really like to talk, chatter, spred the word on various things they care about, and so on; the blog is their forum, in a way. That's not really the case for me: I write all day long, more or less, so don't feel like I need a forum in which to write. The other thing is, the day-to-day life of a writer really isn't all that fascinating; you go somewhere quiet, sit around for most of the day writing stuff out in notebooks or on a computer, look at it again, write it over, type it up, write it over, set it aside, look at it later, write it over. I'm not complaining, by any stretch, just trying to explain why the lags between blog entries seems to be getting longer...

So anyway, that's what I've been doing--various projects which are now in various states of semi-done-ness, or barely-started-ness, or spilled-out-in-a-rush-ness. But there's not much I can really talk about yet, which maybe gives the impression that I'm not doing a great deal... when actually I'm doing about five things at once. Oh well.

Current read: The Ten-Cent Plague by David Hajdu. A history of early comic books, from the appearance in the early 1900s through the 1950s, when they came under increasing attack from various quarters, notably the Catholic Church and opportunistic politicians who wanted to be seen as enacting meaningful legislation agsinst social ills (juvenile delinquency paramount among them) without actually having to experience any of the side effects themselves--because none of them read comic books. It's an interesting window into 1950s America in all its McCarthyesque myopia, and the descriptions of book-burnings, orchestrated by numerous Catholic schools and presided over by the nuns, are quite chilling. (Contemporary commentators pointed out that the Nazis had orchestrated similar events 10 or 20 years earlier.) All in all it's a lively, readable book, appealing I think to anyone with any interest in this art form.

Been a while...

As my mom reminded me yesterday, it's been a while since I updated this blog. There's been plenty going on though, so allow me to update.

First, thanks to everyone who came out to Border's in Farmington on April 20. There were maybe 15 people there who came to pepper me with tough questions ("So... why was it backwards, anyway?") and I had a good time answering them. I had an even better time not reading from any of my books; reading is okay but I'd rather just have a conversation, which is what I did. People asked about movie and TV sceenwriting (which I haven't done, yet) and about my thoughts on the current state of the publishing industry... I met a gentleman who is keen to start a writing career, and another who is getting back to one he set aside in order to make some movies. Perhaps most bizarrely of all, I met a police officer named DAVID MAINE, who said he gets pages of results for me, every time he googles himself. He was kind enough to set his annoyance at this aside (I'm joking) and asked me to sign one of my books, which I did: "For the real David Maine..."

The following weekend I was in Newburyport, Mass., reading this time to a group of about 40 people who also asked interesting questions. Then I went over to listen to a cheery woman named Lauren Weinstein talk about how she makes comic books, which we're all calling "graphic novels" these days, but which are actually comic books. She's very bubbly and great fun to listen to, and her stuff is unique (take a look at Girl Stories on Amazon). In between my own reading and Lauren'd talk I met an old roommate from Oberlin College--yes, that reunion-23-years-later thing, with the formerly D'Artagnan-haired but now quite respectable-looking Eric. It was nice to see him, and to meet his partner Kim, and to sit around discussing screenplay ideas (he has a great one) and 9/11 conspiracy theories. He also inspired me to go home and put in some time on my own screenplay idea, which I've been doing since then, so thanks, Eric.

So at this point, there are no further publicity events on my horizon. This could change, so stay tuned. This could also change if someone reading this contacts me and requests an appearance somewhere... It's not guaranteed, but it's possible, especially for a festival-type event. So don't be shy.

In other news, it was 88 degrees in western Massachusetts a couple weeks ago. Yesterday it was 48. I don't know if this is global warming, or just global weirdness.

My hometown (almost) newspaper decides it loves me after all

A few years ago, when my first book The Preservationist was published, it received some very nice reviews from several unexpected quarters, including Time magazine, the Washington Post, the NY Times, and others. One place which did not give it a nice review was The Hartford Courant, the paper I grew up reading, which said, in essence, "This book blows dead bears." (I'm paraphrasing here.) Ever since, the Courant has kept its distance from my other books, which was believe me just fine as far as I was concerned...

...Until their very kind review of Monster, 1959, which I mentioned a couple of days ago. Now the paper has followed up with a brief interview of me, complete with photo. Here's the link:

http://www.courant.com/features/booksmags/hc-oneonone0417.artapr17,0,3987623.story

They were kind enough to mention the event at Border's bookstore in Farmington, next to Westfarms Mall, which is happening Sunday (April 20) from 2:00 to 3:00. Be sure to swing by if you are so inclined: I'll be happy to sign books and answer any questions you might be able to dream up. And even if you can't make it, but an extra copy or two of the Courant. They've earned it, heh.

Pressure Drop, Monkey Man, Time Tough, 54-46 Was My Number, etc.

So the other night Uzee and I went out to hear Toots and the Maytals, one of the best reggae bands of all time. Toots in fact was the guy who coined the term "reggay" in his song "Do the Reggay" from, I think, 1962 or thereabouts. As it happened, that was the first song he sang in concert, along with a pile of great songs, including many from Funky Kingston, which gets Dave's rating at The Greatest Reggae Album of All Time and If You Thought It Would be Something by Marley, You Just Haven't Been Paying Attention. He played "Time Tough," "Pomps and Pride," "Take Me Home Country Road" (yes the John Denver Song), "Pressure Drop," and "Love Is Gonna Bring Me Down"--that's half the album right there. Other highlights included "Monkey Man," "Reggae Got Soul," and a blistering hot "Hallelujah" to end the show. Plus some long groove thing called, I think, "Roots Rock Reggae," though I don't know if that's the name of the song or just all the words he could remember at the moment, as he repeated them over and over for about ten minutes. Plus a couple new songs from the album last year but you know, none of us went for that.

To get an idea of what you missed (unless you were there and didn't bother saying hi), here's a 90-second clip of "Monkey Man" taken by one other than myself. I like to call it "Dave's Earthquake-Cam." Pop a Dramamine and enjoy.

The sound quality maybe isn't so hot. What can I say, I used this tiny little digital thing. And in case you're wondering, I am definitely NOT the guy who jumps up on stage and, um, "dances" along with Toots. I've got nerve, but not that kind of nerve.