Dispatches from World Horror Con - Ketchum, Keene and Pornstars

Woke up in Austin, Texas and have spent the morning lounging around the lobby of this great hotel. Thirty-foot ceilings with exposed wooden beams, plush but firm western-style furniture. Folks are starting to trickle in.

Last night spent great time with Rain Graves and John, Brian Keene (I would say Sarah Langdan, but she stood us up for Mexican food), Bev Vincent, Kelly and Ann Laymon, Gak, and Vince Chong. Met Jim Gavin and the guys from Deadite Press and spet some quality beer time with Erasurehead Books. Thanks Rose and Carlton.

Shout out to Liz from Bad Moon Books.

See this picture of Jack Ketchum? It's a rare sighting. I actually had to sneak up on him lest he fly away. This normally night-time author made a rare morning appearance. You can tell by the wide-eyed look that he never knew the world was so bright.

Roy Robbins wins the coolest guy on the planet award today. He asked me to write the intro for Clive Barker's new book Candle in the Clouds, to be published by Bad Moon Books tbd. I'm struggling to manage my gushing fan boyishness. I can't wait. For those of you who don't know, Clive is my absolute favorite author. I paid Roy back by asking the girl behind the counter if she recognized Roy, then backed off by saying that she probably didn't watch those sorts of movies. Then I did introduce Roy as a celebrity, better known as the Costa Mesa Machine-- Big pornstar from the 1970s who now runs PornStars for Jesus, a 501.3c non-profit. I thought Liz was going to faint.

Now Yvonne just hit me with a pillow.
..

....

......

Ouch.

....

Gotta run and chase down the wife.

Laters.

Weston's WHC Schedule and Convention Primer

Weston's World Horror Convention Schedule

Friday
10 AM Reading City of Joy in Robertson
2 PM Dark Regions Press (Dealers Room)
3 PM It Was A Dark and Stormy Night in Dezavala
Saturday
2 PM Dark Regions Press (Dealers Room)
7 PM Mass Signing
Sunday
11AM Dark Regions Press Reading


~ ~ ~ ~ ~

THE MOST SECRET AND MYSTERIOUS DAVINCI CODE OF CONVENTION NETWORKING
By Weston Ochse

(Originally published in Storytellers Unplugged)


Why go to writer’s conventions?

Is it the free beer? Is it the free liquor? Or is it an attempt to deplete the vast reservoir of stale chips commonly found at parties at 3 A.M.? Or is a convention merely a reason to get out from behind your computer to interact with humans rather than emoticons?

I say it’s all the above, but most importantly, conventions are a writer’s vehicle for networking. I recently attended the World Horror Convention in San Francisco where all manner of writers, fans, editors, publishers, artists and actors were in attendance. Conventions of this ilk are the pinnacle of networking and allow writers such as myself networking opportunities that don’t normally exist. The problem is that I don’t always take advantage of all opportunities presented me. Together, using four situations that occurred during the World Horror Convention, let’s see if I succeeded in networking.

SITUATION 1. Me and fellow authors Chris Golden, Ed Lee, James Moore and Yvonne Navarro (frequently referred to as my wife) decide that Friday was a brilliant day to take a few hours off from the convention and trek to Fisherman’s Wharf. Chris and Jim leave early, hiking over the San Francisco hills. Yvonne, Ed Lee and I arrive a little later by taxi. We talk over an amazing seafood dinner, tour the wharf, then decide to forego a taxi and walk back to the hotel—at least 20 blocks over some serious hills. Picture this if you will…me happily singing Army cadence with Chris snapping jokes, Jim trying to get his knee to work like they had when he was twenty and Lee inventing curses as he flips me off, the latter of which I have a video of that I will post when I return from Miami.

Pissed Off Ed Lee

The hills get longer, the curses get louder and the knee gets worse. I’m still screaming cadence—
Up the hill,
No sweat.
Ain’t shit,
Better yet.

My zest for the challenge gets the better of me as I scream louder and louder. At first Lee enjoys it, recalling memories of his own Army days, but the more I call cadence, the more he begins to hate me. Yvonne soon begins to give me looks only a wife can give, but I ignore them. The only one unfazed is Chris who’s busy joyously making smart remarks about all of us as he stomps forward. I race ahead of everyone up an impossible incline, ignoring the pain in my quads, belting cadence at the top of my lungs. When I get to the top of that hill, I spin and begin filming. I forget who I am. I forget where I am. I begin filming, feeling like Francis Ford Coppola directing Apocalypse Now San Francisco Redux, screams escaping from my mouth as I get whacked out into it—
Your sister does it
Piece of cake.
Your momma does it,
For God’s sake.

Lee flips me off again. Jim groans but keeps moving. Yvonne’s glare bores into me. Chris continues to chide. And me, I scream—

You can do it,
Or I’m gonna kill.
Get your ass,
Up the hill!

So rate this networking experience. How’d I do? Think I helped my career?

SITUATION 2. Many of you know that for the third year in a row, I’ve been in charge of the Gross Out Contest Bouncers. We don’t really break shins, but we are the judge’s props placed amid the chaos of the contest to create fear and uncertainty about the safety of the Gross Out contestant. This year was no exception. We had a terrific crew—Jim Moore, Drew Williams, Nick Cook, Minh, Steven Shrewsberry, John Hay and myself. Contestants fled before us. Audience members huddled in fear. Everything was great with the world.

Then John Pelan convinces the actor Bill Mosely to do a cold read of Goon as a spontaneous addition to the contest. I saw House of 1000 Corpses. I saw The Devils Rejects. And I was in awe. But I wasn’t going to let that awe interfere with my job. Before Mr. Billy Badass Mosely took the mike, I grab it from him and proclaim to the universe my duty as a bouncer, saying You better entertain and gross us out Mr. Mosely or else I’ll rip that mike from your fucking hands and kick you off our stage just like I’d do to all the other poor motherfuckers.

Bouncing the Gross Out Contest

The crowd roars for a moment and I am god! Bill Mosely gives me the look he gave the old woman at the beginning of Devil’s Rejects right before he kills her.

So rate this networking experience. How’d I do? Think I helped my career?

SITUATION 3. It wasn’t but a few minutes later that the next situation occurs. After Bill Mosely read, the judges had finished their deliberation and Brian Keene grabbed the first Asian in the room to help him count the hanging chads, Rain Graves asked the bouncers to stall. Several bad jokes later, and the crowd getting ugly, John Pelan speaks up from his place at the table. Weston, he says. Show us your tits and I’ll give you a contract. My head twists and my jaw drops into the expression made famous on Looney Tunes for What the fuck did he just say? I knew he was talking about publishing a story I’d submitted to him for the next Darkside Anthology, but what the hell was this need to show my body parts to a ballroom filled with people.

Several thoughts ran through my head—
Why does John Pelan want to see my tits?
How badly do I want to be in the Darkside Anthology?
Why does John Pelan want to see my tits?
Will I respect myself in the morning?
Will my wife respect me in the morning?
Why does John Pelan want to see my tits?

Me and Bill Mosely

I hesitate for a full minute, the crowd cheering me on, John cajoling from the stage, my wife waiting to see what I’d do. Finally, I make my decision. I grab the microphone and say, You all heard it. You are my witnesses. Consider this a verbal contract.

And I did it. I showed my tits to the world, one at a time, side shots, until the whole audience howled.

So rate this networking experience. How’d I do? Think I helped my career?

SITUATION 4. Peter Straub is an icon. He is the most accessible ‘most successful’ writer out there. Since 2002, we’ve been on a first name basis, something that continually blows my mind because of the great respect I have for the man and his accomplishments. Every convention, I make a point of spending a few minutes with Peter. Not because I’m sucking up. Not because I want anything from him. None of the reasons you’re thinking of. I speak with him because I genuinely like him. I think he’s one hell of a guy.

Sunday afternoon, near the end of the convention, Peter sat down beside me and we chatted for a few moments. We didn’t talk about the craft. We didn’t talk about anything of great import. The world was safe from our speculation. We just asked about each other, talking about his health, my dog, and other things personal and private. It didn’t last more than a few moments, then he went his way, and I went mine.

So rate this networking experience. How’d I do? Think I helped my career?

There you have it-- four situations where I was able to network with fellow writers. Did I help my career? Let’s see the results.

SITUATION 1. Ed Lee sent a restraining order. Jim Moore sent his hospital bill. My wife is pissed. Chris Golden loved the whole thing. And my voice is hoarse from all the screaming.
SITUATION 2. Bill Mosely promised me later that if I ever set foot in Hollywood, he’d introduce me to the real cast of Devil’s Rejects and eat my spleen for lunch.
SITUATION 3. A warrant is out for my arrest for lewd and lascivious acts.
SITUATION 4. This seems to be the only thing I did where bodily harm wasn’t promised me.

What do we learn from this? Tone it down? The road to success is paved with calm and collected stones? Even with Peter, I didn’t help my career; I was just a friend talking to a friend. Maybe I’m in the wrong business. Maybe I just don’t understand what it takes to successfully network. Or maybe, just maybe, networking at conventions is an unconscious process we undertake that requires nothing more than us being ourselves. Some people try too hard and you can see it. Some people become stalkers instead of friends. Some people use their ego as a shield keeping everyone of less worth at bay. I’m glad to say that in my circle of friends, this isn’t the case.

And in the end, as I sit here in Miami nearly a week after the convention Ed Lee, Jim Moore, Chris Golden and my wife have fond memories of our Bataan Death March across the city. Bill Mosely told me how much fun he had. Every other author was jealous of me, admitting that tit-showing would be a small price to pay for being in the anthology. And Peter is still my friend.

There is no Davinci Code of Secret Cabal Networking. There are no secret handshakes, or mysterious meetings in room 312. There are no passwords or He-man-woman-hater-high signs. There are no satanic rites to success. If anything I did WHC weekend helped my career it was by being myself and by writing well. All else was osmosis.

Multiplex Fandango Book Trailer

I black mailed you and asked you to join my newsletter and you came through. The least I can do is present my book trailer.

Pass it on if you like it.

First Review from Paperback Horror

First off, thanks to Paperback Horror for clearing their stacks to fit this one in at the last minute. When I read the review I was struck by the fact that the reviewer totally seemed to understand what I was trying to do, even when I didn't understand what I was trying to do with a particular story at the time of writing. Such incisive reviewing is welcome and probably why Paperback Horror is such a rising star in the Review World.

Here's a couple of excerpts. You can keep reading, or if you want to go to the entire review you can go here.

Multiplex Fandango. Say it. Multi-plex Fan-dan-go.

It's beautiful, isn't it? Just rolls off the tongue.

It’s almost as beautiful and satisfying as the book you may now be holding in your hands, or reading a review about. What we’re seeing here is quite possibly the most comfortable, relaxed, and expert takeover that the horror genre has ever seen.

With Multiplex Fandango, Weston Ochse has created an incredible collection, and has given the reader one of the smoothest, most satisfying reads they could ever come across. To drive the point home, Joe Landsdale says in the intro that "This is a book that could almost have been written for me.", but I disagree - this book was written for anyone looking for imaginative, intelligent, and thoroughly awe-inspiring, but strangely uplifting scares that force the reader to think more than react.

And then there's this. I've written quite a few original stories for this collection, so it's nice to hear people talking about them since I can count on one hand the number of people who have read them thusfar.

There are 16 short stories and novellas presented herein, 6 of which were written for this volume, with each and every one just as, if not more, impressive as the last. Ochse's words read like the poetry of a madman - urgent and direct, at the same time as being beautifully timed and designed to evoke emotions from deep inside. The reader can't help but be absolutely enthralled by this wordsmith's grand visions and engaging dialogue. This is a book that is virtually impossible to put down.

 Pieces like Tarzan Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, Fugue on the Sea of Cortez, The Sad Last Love of Cary Grant, and Catfish Gods speak of the choices we make that define who we are in the end, and directions we take in life that lead us to those instances. Ochse really blasts the reader with a keen blend of realism, tainted with a strange and unrelenting sense of unease that shows exactly how much of our lives is spent choosing between what is right, and what just comes naturally - regardless of whether or not it hurts or hinders someone else. The characters in these pieces are all people that the reader can instantly identify with, as Ochse finds the essence of what it is to be human, and gently exploits it for the purpose of proving a point. The point being, in most cases, is that we are all responsible for what we create in our own world, regardless of the outside influences and how strange they might be.

 To find out when you can order this book, sign up for my Living Dangerously Newsletter (top right) so we can live dangerously together.I promise I won't spam you.

Take Care

Weston

Steve Rasnic Tem Fandangos!

To have Steve Tem give me this blurb means the world to me. I could go on and on about how good he is and how much a master of the form he is, but in this case Wilipedia got it right, so I'll quote from them:

"Steve Rasnic Tem's short fiction has been compared to the work of Franz Kafka, Dino Buzzati, Ray Bradbury, and Raymond Carver, but to quote Joe R. Lansdale: 'Steve Rasnic Tem is a school of writing unto himself.' His 200 plus published pieces have garnered him a British Fantasy Award, World Fantasy and a nomination for the Bram Stoker Awards."

"MULTIPLEX FANDANGO is a remarkable collection of stories. I read a huge amount of short fiction, and a lot of great stories, but it's rare that I come across a collection so cohesive, whose obsessions mirror and build in combination such that by the end we have this haunting vision of our cultural iconography at the beginning of a new century. This is aggressive work, boldly creating new metaphors and language out of its violent juxtapositions of the imagery from our recent cinematic past. Using such unique settings as a reproduction of the Last Supper painted on the bottom of a pool, a repurposed Disney World of the future, a hundred foot statue of a fisherman astride a giant shrimp, and a melting Hiroshima, and populating the stories with characters with names like Hemingway, Homer, and Cary Grant, Ochse explores the difficulties involved in finding your identity when it lies buried beneath layers of cultural scrim and Hollywood dream. The metaphor of the multiplex is an apt one: these concepts are movie large, if only the right eccentric, talented auteur could be found to film them." Steve Rasnic Tem

If you haven't had the chance to read his work, or Melanie's for that matter, take a dive into their fiction. Reading it I get the same raw summer awe that I do when I read Bradbury for the first time, but often with the serrated edge of Aimee Bender in Faces or Flammable Skirt.

Thank You Steve!

            

To find out when you can order this book, sign up for my Living Dangerously Newsletter (top left) so we can live dangerously together.

Steven Spruill Fandangos

Cross-posted from Multiplex Fandango Site

 

Steven Spruill is the author of more than sixteen novels, including Daughter of Darkness, The Psychopath Plague and Ice Men.

I’m pretty excited about Ice Men. I haven’t read it, but I want to. The Korean War has always been of interest to me, and if Steven brings as much research and passion into this book as he has all of his others, then I'm in. It just got tagged on my wish list.

He’s also a discriminating taste. I gave him a pre-look at Multiplex Fandango. Here’s what he said:

"Multiplex Fandango will stretch your mind while giving you a great ride.  The core definition of creativity is "the combining of two formerly unassociated ideas to produce a product that is both novel and useful."  That is also the core definition of Multiplex Fandango.  From the title onward, Ochse will amaze and dazzle you with characters that leap off the page and situations you've never thought of before, guaranteed.  Get Multiplex Fandango today and prepare to disappear into the intriguing and fascinating world of Weston Ochse's imagination." - Steven Spruill

Thanks Steven! Glad you liked it.

To find out when you can order this book, sign up for my Living Dangerously Newsletter (top left) so we can live dangerously together.

Quick Hits

Had a great weekend with Eunice  and Greg Magill. Eunice is a terrific writer and former editor/reviewer for Dark Wisdom Magazine. I've known her for at least ten years. We're also Haunted Mansion alums.  Had a great time.

Created a website for Multiplex Fandango. I have to feed the hype machine for this, my only solo short story collection. It doesn't become available for pre-order until May. There will be come special edition copies available at world horror.

Butterfly Winter is doing awesomely. Got a couple of emails from people who love it, but strangely no reviews yet. Now how can I give out a special prize for being the first to review it if there are no reviews?

Last. Wife told me that Scary Rednecks got a five star review from a South African reader. Not that the five star isn't way cool, because it is. But a South African reader? WOW!  Talk about globalization.  Rednecks must be everywhereI'm just saying!

Are you a Reviewer?

Are you a reviewer? Would you like to review my new book Nancy Goats?

Delirium Books has its own dedicated online review portal where you can access their books.

I always invited reviews and I can guarantee there's no other book like this out there.

If you want to review or you are already a reviewer, go to this link to sign up to become a Delirium Books Reviewer.

If you want to get a copy of Nancy Goats the regular way, there are still a handful of copies left. They are almost gone.

NANCY GOATS is HERE!!!

NANCY GOATS by Weston Ochse (Limited Edition HC)

Product Is Not Available Yet. Preorder Yours Today! A young man headlines at Leather Kitty in West Hollywood. He’s on top of the world, discovering more about himself day by day. But on the eve of his greatest success, he is kidnapped, thrown in the trunk of a car and taken to a house somewhere along the California Coast. He’s become the property of Family Pain. His life is no longer his own. All he has left is to somehow survive this psychotic world of mixed martial artists run by a crazed former Special Forces medic, who is using young boys as goats for his fighters to bend, bruise and sometimes break. Welcome to the pain-filled universe of Nancy Goats THIS WILL SELL OUT IN A MATTER OF DAYS!! ORDER NOW BEFORE YOU MISS YOUR CHANCE

Introducing MULTIPLEX FANDANGO

I am proud to announce that the hype machine has been turned on for my first ever short story collection. This went out on the Dark Regions Newsletter today:

Available for preorder in May is a best-of collection from Weston Ochse with an introduction from Joe R. Lansdale and cover artwork by Vincent Chong!

(Check out the amazing cover)

Multiplex Fandango is subtitled "A Weston Ochse Reader" for good reason. This collection contains a comprehensive representation of short fiction and novellas by the Bram Stoker award winner and Pushcart Prize nominee, including his recent powerful Stoker finalist short story, "The Crossing Of Aldo Rey" and his brilliant Stoker finalist novella, Redemption Roadshow, as well as acclaimed favorites, "Catfish Gods" and "Big Rock Candy Mountain". Also included in this omnibus volume of sixteen short stories and novellas are six original new works of short fiction written especially for this collection including such future classics as "Tarzan Doesn't Live Here Anymore", "Low Men Weeping", and the stunning, "City Of Joy".


"This is a book that could almost have been written for me."
- Joe R. Lansdale on Multiplex Fandango

The Great Dane Railway to Yuma

 The Yuma Book Tour went awesomely. We survived the dust storms and the driving rain. We outlasted my GPSs decision not to work. And we met --again-- a slew of extraordinary people, not to mention the Nazi Gold Hunter.


Let me tell you about it.

Liljana, Steve, Rudy, Landi and Lucas at B&N

They'd prefer to sit in the front seat with us

It's a six hour drive from our house in southeastern Arizona to Yuma in southwestern Arizona. Normally that wouldn't be an issue. Yvonne would kick back and I'd put the car on cruise, zone out until aliens or highway patrol provoked a response. But this was no ordinary trip. Ordinarily we don't bring any dogs with us, much less three Great Danes. So the 375 pounds of dogs in the back of our SUV provoked me to be vigilant that they didn't decide to play fetch, fight with each other, chase mailmen, or chew the SUV from the inside out. The Mitsubishi is NOT a chew toy!

But alas, this is about a book signing, not the dogs. Or is it?

Like a barrel of monkeys

We'd arranged the book signing back in January. The assistant store manager of the Yuma Barnes and Nobles, Sarah James, took it upon herself to take last years inventory of zombie goodies and provide them as giveaways. Zombie tattoos. Adopt a Zombie Kits. Zombie bookmarks. Etc. She also, with the encouragement of the staff, contacted the local zombie club. (who knew?) Press releases went out the the local newspaper, the army base and the marine corps base, and National Public Radio. Word of mouth had it that two horror authors were coming into town.

This is how it's supposed to look.

Back to us on the road. The dogs were actually great. Ghoulie, our blind Great Dane, tried to chew the car only a couple times. Without sight, it's one of her tactile outlets. We got through Tucson without a hitch. We got past Picacho Peak and Eloy. We stopped to get gas. Then we turned on to I-8. For those of you who don't know about Interstate 8, it is proof that there is gold at the end of the rainbow. There is nothing, and I mean nothing, along the road. Empty swirling masses of desert only interrupted by the occasional tree and the ever-present and ever-optimistic border patrol agent. By the time we passed Gila Bend, the weather started to change.

Yuma is known as the sunniest city in America. It's on their brochures. They're proud about it. But when horror authors come into down, there is no sun. As you can see from the pictures, we hit not one but two dust storms. At least 40 mph winds. The dust was so thick we couldn't see 20 feet in front of us. A tumbleweed (yes my East Coast peeps who've only seen them in Roadrunner Cartoons) the size of a Fahrvergnügen-trumpeted VW Bug hit us broadside. He hit another and carried it on our grill for 50 miles. The sunniest city in America my ass.

This is NOT how it's supposed to look.

But we got there. And we checked into the flea bag motel that allows great big dogs with no extra cost. And we took the dogs to their Great Dane Mafia Hook-up. Thanks right now goes to Amy Breckenridge Smith for her Great Dane Mafia connections. I contacted her and asked if she knew someone who had Danes in Yuma. Turns out she did and they own the kennel Urban K9. I contacted the kennel owner, Victoria Dixon, who offered to watch our dogs for us while we were at the signing. Saved us tons of money and gave the dogs the chance to play and bark with other dogs.

So we hit the store. After we navigated the city using Kentucky windage because my GPS decided AT THAT FREAKING MOMENT to stop working. Still, I'm pretty good at not getting lost so we found it. I'd like to say there were lines out the door, but there weren't. We got inside and found our set-up in the back of the store beside the sports books and in front of the bathroom. It was a good location because of the proximity to the bathroom. Most people used it. The problem is that they were so intent on reaching the bathroom, they didn't even see us. So we adjusted the location twice, ending up near the front door in the end. And the minute we did, we sold six books in five minutes.

Beth taking the Zombie Test

Sarah had created a Zombie Test for people to take. Shown here is Beth taking the test and Acing it. She loves zombies and had no trouble with it. It asked questions about the nature of zombies, what would you do if you are being chased, etc. I made each person take the test. We treated it like a master's thesis. I'd ask them the questions out loud and they'd have to defend their position. It was a lot of fun.

Representin' Zombies Worldwide

Cafe Manager Holding a Zombie Heart Cupcake

We probably sold 20 books for the store that day. We had a lot of conversations. The zombie club came. They all bought books. A lot of folks just wanted to chat and that's always cool and encouraged. Yvonne went to look for something for a moment, and when she was gone, two diminutive retirees came up to me. One sat down in Yvonne's chair and the other, the woman, stood patiently. I, of course, offered her my chair, which she took. They were unfazed when someone asked them for an autograph. They frankly didn't understand. They were from Ukraine and didn't speak great English. So when I signed a book, they finally noticed something was going on. I explained to them what I wrote and it scared them. (Of course it did) Turns out, Ivan was looking for a book on buried Nazi gold because he'd heard that there was treasure in the surrounding desert. He's so lucky. I could have sold him the Brooklyn Bridge to the Seven Cities of Cibola where I know Hitler personally buried his stash of gold, but I refrained.

Yvonne Can Find Great Danes in Bookstores

When Yvonne came back they moved on. My the force be with them.

The guys at the Cafe were awesome. The Cafe Manager took it upon himself to create a special menu of drinks and cupcakes. They sold like Doritos at a post smoking festival. Everyone was ordering Zombie Blood, Graveyard Dirt, Ghostly Mist and The Cure. I had Graveyard Dirt with was an oreo cookie drink with a gummie worm on the bottom. Yum. Then they had the cupcake called Zombie Heart. It looked amazing!

Three hours and it was all over.

We truly had a blast.

The hotel room later with the three Danes was crowded but doable.

The authentic Indian food lamb dishes were actually beef (you can't fool a Welshman), but they were tasty.

Good Looking Author Seeks Booklovers.

It was good news all around.

Thanks to Barnes and Nobles. Thanks to Sarah and the crew at the store. You all were awesome. Most of all, thanks to the People of Yuma-- you Yumanites were great hosts to us.

Until next time.

Steve eating a zombie heart

Danes in the hotel room

Note the zombie drink and food menu

The rest of the pictures (there are about 70 of them) can be found at this location.  CLICK TO SEE. 

Yvonne and I will be at the Tucson Festival of Books this coming weekend. CLICK HERE to see our itinerary so you know where to find us.

On Sherman Alexie

Allow me to introduce him to you, if you've never heard of him... or have heard of him but don't know exactly who he is or what he's about.

Taken from The Best American Short Stories, 1994.

But before I start, let me make an admission.

So here’s this thing that’s kind of freaky. I always thought Sherman Alexie was an old guy. Maybe the mistake came from me going back to get my Master of Fine Arts in my early forties. Although I’d seen Smoke Signals and read his poetry in short fiction, no one had ever made me read his work. Once I’m made to read someone, it lends a sort of supernormal importance to the work and the author. My own ageism caused me to assume that Sherman must be older. After all, someone can’t be that successful and actually be younger than me, can they?

Of course they can. I am a victim of my own ageism. Shame on me.

As it turns out, Sherman is a year younger than I am.

I heard him on the radio while driving to work recently. He was on Radio Times, being interviewed by Marty Moss because one of his books was selected by Philadelphia for their One Book Program.

http://whyy.org/cms/radiotimes/2011/02/21/sherman-alexie-war-dances-2/

From NPR: Two books by Sherman Alexie, "The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian" and “War Dances” have been selected by the Free Library of Philadelphia as this year's One Book One Philadelphia. A returning guest to Radio Times, Marty Moss-Coane interviewed the novelist, poet and film-maker about “War Dances” after its publication in 2009, which went on to win the 2010 PEN/Faulkner award for fiction. Alexie grew up on an Indian Reservation fifty miles north of Spokane Washington and "War Dances” is a collection of short stories filled with characters dealing with complex issues as wide reaching as a failed marriage, alcoholic death, hate crime, obituary writing and courtship. Alexie has received many awards including the Native Writers' Circle of the Americas 2010 Lifetime Achievement Award, the O Henry Award, the PEN/Hemingway Award, and the 2007 National Book Award in Young People’s Literature for "The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian."

I thoroughly enjoyed the interview. Sherman is clearly a political animal, a creation of his reservation upbringing as a member of the Spokan Indian Nation, and has the ability to get to the point using beautiful and deadly arrows.

I was first introduced to him through his short story “Tonto and the Lone Ranger Fistfight in Heaven.” It discusses the popular beliefs whites have for Indians* in such a terrifically metaphorical manner, it had me laughing out loud (Sherman uses the term Indian rather than Native American because he believes that they should own the word that was once used to demean them).

Since then, whenever I have the chance, I read Sherman Alexie.

“Writing has liberated me from poverty, liberated me from fundamentalist thinking,” I remember him saying in the interview. Frankly, I think his success rests in that he has so much to say. There are significant problems with Indians and reservations. We look at Casinos and wave this away saying, they’re rich, they’re fine. If it were only so.

Here’s one of his poems from Slipstreampress.org.

Poverty of Mirrors

You wake these mornings alone and nothing
can be forgiven; you drink the last
swallow of warm beer from the can
beside the bed, tell the stranger sleeping
on the floor to go home. It's too easy

to be no one with nothing to do, only
slightly worried about the light bill
more concerned with how dark day gets.

You walk alone on moist pavement wondering
what color rain is in the country.
Does the world out there revolve around rooms
without doors or windows? Centering the mirror
you found in the trash, walls seem closer
and you can never find the right way

out, so you open the fridge again
for a beer, find only rancid milk and drink it
whole. This all tastes too familar.

Copyright ©1992 Sherman Alexie

The sense of laconic loss is so palpable.

What I also learned in the interview was that Sherman is passionate about basketball.  He has argued before the court to keep the Seattle Supersonics in Seattle and watches the game like it is his second life. In this poem he paints a visual picture of Indians and basketball:

From The Unauthorized Biography of Me

Late summer night on the Spokane Indian Reservation. Ten Indi-
ans are playing basketball on a court barely illuminated by the
streetlight above them. They will play until the brown, leather ball
is invisible in the dark. They will play until an errant pass jams a
finger, knocks a pair of glasses off the face, smashes a nose and
draws blood. They will play until the ball bounces off the court

and disappears into the shadows.

This may be all you need to know about Native American literature.
(Borrowed from the Brooklyn Rail)

Daniel Grassian in his book Understanding Sherman Alexie says that this description suggests that “perhaps the fierceness, commitment, and drive with which they play basketball represents the larger, centuries-long struggle against colonialism that still exists today.”

I suddenly want to watch Indians playing basketball.

After listening to the interview, I sat down and wrote a complete short story called "Boot." I was so inspired by listening to him, so energized by his honesty and art, that I couldn’t help but do so. I wasn’t raised on a Res, and I’m not downtrodden or underprivileged, but I have been in situations. So I took one of those situations and wrote it thinking of Sherman Alexie. I chose boot camp and the cadences they use to brainwash us.

And it’s good.

Read an Ebook Week with Weston Ochse and Live Dangerously

Three eBooks from Weston Ochse for you this week-


Butterfly Winter. Inspirational thriller. Sort of science fiction. Sort of military. Just 99 cents.

A bomber crew crash lands in a remote area of China after dropping their bombs on Chinese cities in a terrible future war. The survivors are embraced by a hamlet filled with children, only to learn that doom might have come to claim them all.

Excerpt: Pearson stared down at his hands as they shook above the small keyboard. This was his moment. He had a choice. He had the power to make a difference. A statistic flashed through his mind: Shanghai has 861 regular secondary schools with 795,400 students and 76,600 teaching staff. Shanghai has 1,021 primary schools with 788,600 students and a teaching staff of 61,300. The attendance rate of school-age children is 99.99%. What got him every time was the attendance rate. 99.99 percent. Every time he remembered this fact he couldn't help but imagine that the one tenth of one percent who didn't go to school must surely have felt left out. And in the Xu Hui district, in the southern part of Shanghai west of the Huangpu River, primary target of the Morning Star and sister city to Irvine, California, 451,000 students were just waking for school.

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Tomes of the Dead: Empire Of Salt Zombie fiction. Character driven. The mass market paperback sold out in USA stores. Just $4.79

A DREAD TIDE! The Olivers have a chance to make a new home by the Salton Sea. Looking forward to Californian fun, sun and adventure they are unprepared for the ecological devastation they find. The sea is rotting, the town of Bombay Beach is dying and the citizens are like bait, waiting to be plucked from their homes by what comes from the sea. For just off the coast something lies in wait, a government secret gone wrong, a deadly experiment that has created a breed of zombie like no other.

Beware the coming of the green, the townsfolk say. Beware the coming of the night! 

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Scary Rednecks & Other Inbred Horrors. I know the title sounds crazy. This is the book that broke us on the map and was immensely popular when it first came out in 2000. Just $2.99.

Review

"This is better than the hype.  I don't want to go overboard, but stories in the book will remind many readers of the good stuff by Edward Lee and Joe Lansdale and probably Bill Faulkner."  --Richard Laymon

"Once a year, the field of horror literature produces a short story, novel, anthology or collection that pushes the limits, breaks new ground and raises the genre to new heights. This is such a book." --Brian Keene

SCARY REDNECKS collects twenty-three stories of horror, madness, and humor set in the rural south of America’s heartland. The stories run the gauntlet from terror to outrageousness. Packed with everything from abusive parents, cannibals, deer hunters, demonic catfish, UFO abductions, voodoo priestesses, vampire moonshiners, and other Appalachian monstrosities; it will amuse you, disturb you, and leave you hungering for more.

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About the author: Weston Ochse is the Bram Stoker-winning author of five novels, including Scarecrow Gods, Empire of Salt and Blaze of Glory. His short fiction has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize. His work has appeared in comic books, magazines and Writer's Digest How-To guides. He lives in southern Arizona.