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Wednesday, November 21, 2007
Me on DoorQ
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Tuesday, November 13, 2007
Even Better Than The Real Thing
Confessions of a Literary Streetwalker: The End of Erotica
(the following is part of an ongoing series of columns I did for The Erotica Readers & Writers Association on the ins and outs and ins and outs and ins and outs of writing good smut)
In an interview on ERA, William Dean asked me "From your experience, what are we, as erotica readers and writers, apt to see as trends in the coming year?" After answering him I got to thinking about the future of erotica and where it could go - or, since it is my column after all, where I want to see it go.
Our genre may disappear, could utterly and completely go away - but we will have accomplished something remarkable: We changed the world.
Friday, November 09, 2007
The View From Here: Vanessa Verdugo
Sipping a flute of shimmering crystal – the unspoken cost of which would have kept a lesser republic financially solvent for a decade, and thus, for the not mentioning, made it’s prescience so much more powerful – she simply looked striking, not at all the beautiful threat of a woman who had entranced the entire city, and also unspoken, unannounced, and thus immensely more powerful than any priceless champagne flute.
“Great pleasure,” Robur Oberon said, lifting a tankard of frothy brew towards their guest. “Great, great pleasure, to have your company, sir."
Wing’s dark eyes slowly lifted from his glass, where he seemed fascinated by the hesitant streamers of minuscule bubbles in the vintage to stare intently in the direction of Robur Oberon. “I was asked.”
“Well, of course, sir. Absolutely, sir. Could I not have? How could I have turned my back on the plight of a stranger to these shores? I could not have rested if I did not do my duty as a Steward of this City, a Lord of this House and have not at least offered you a hand of friendship?”
“We’re always willing to make new friends,” Vanessa Verdugo said, lifting her own glass slightly in a soft toast.
Wing looked to her, angry puzzlement across his brow. “You and he make people?”
Robur Oberon laughed, holding himself in a tight knot of aborted muscles, the reflex to thump the stranger across the back. “The lovely Vanessa make many things, but we’ve yet to perfect that skill.”
“Fortunate,” Wing said, relief evident. Taking a sip of the vintage, his face lightning-quick changed to shock and disgust. With a smoothly practiced gesture he blew the liquid into his tightened fist, then loudly clapped both hands together.
Vanessa Verdugo noticed, turned slightly away – then raised an immaculately sculpted eyebrow when no champagne flew. She looked inquisitively at Robur Oberon to see if he’d noticed.
He hadn’t: “In fact, we were just discussing how important it is to develop new … relationships shall we say, when one is in unfamiliar lands. Helps the shock, you see, of the strange, the shock of the new, to have a personal landscape of familiarity. This world you’ve found yourself in must be disturbing in its peculiarities, but knowing that certain people - such as the lovely Miss Verdugo and myself – are as stable within it as the earth beneath your feet might give you a comfortable feeling of stability. Not that I would be so bold or arrogant as to imply that we –“ he indicated with a raise of his tankard Vanessa Verdugo “ - are the only ones qualified for such comfort. To be honest, however, Miss Verdugo and I do reach rather extensively through the Territories, so we, or by proxy our influence, would always be near.”
Wing held his flattened palm up to the setting run, examining the tight skin with wide-eyed concentration.
“I do not know how such things are done in … where is it again, friend, that you hail from? I know you’ve spoken of it, but – well - sometimes it does take a few repetitions to get things to stick in an aging mind,” Oberon said, tapping his huge cranium, accompanied by a deep laugh.
Without looking away from his dry hand, Wing said, “Russia. From there I Navigate.” Sadness on his face with the saying of the noun and the verb: a longed for home, and a talent that had betrayed, stranded him.
“Oh, yes, that’s it. ‘Russia’ such an exotic sounding land. Some day when the no-doubt pain of your departure isn’t quite so fresh you will have to tell us of that land: the foods they partake, the strength and duration of the seasons, the music your people enjoy, the mechanisms they may perhaps create. Ah, yes, another reason to join another friend to one’s life: the gaining of knowledge of other places, other lives, other devices and processes. An alliance, if you will: the partnership of two into a stronger one. Would that appeal to you? You with the need for friend in this new world, Miss Verdugo and I with the need to sate our curiosity about your far-flung land? Does that sound appealing to you in any way?”
Wing lowered his hand, blinked once, twice at Oberon – impending tears making his dark eyes shine. His mouth opened, preparation for speech, revealing brass teeth polished to a glowing shine.
But before their guest could expel a sound into the growing darkness of the night, a trio appeared at the far side of the house, rounding the columns. Their soft blue glow, their rolling, liquid gait, their simple shapes – everyone in PSV knew Robur Oberon’s Cell Men, his congealed servants and handymen: low aptitude, chemically dependent, smelling of kerosene and fusil oil, never far from their Master.
They exploded. One, two three – all gone in a wash of shockwave, a balls of fire rolling up into the dark sky. A column, a purple rose bush, a section of hedge crackled and smoked.
Robur Oberon stood and stared, too shock to speak or move. His tankard, held in a suddenly weakened wrist, poured onto the immaculate lawn, foaming at his feet. Vanessa Verdugo slowly lowered her hands, instinctively thrown in front of her legendary face.
“Not good. Making people bad - opposite of good,” Wing said, his dark eyes lit by twirling lights of gold and silver. Turning to that year’s beauty, and the most powerful man in the Territories, he repeated himself, in case they hadn’t heard: “Not good. Making people bad - opposite of good” then, without looking back, he walked through the still lingering flames and away into the soft darkness of that summer night.
“Guess we’ll have to make new friends,” Vanessa Verdugo said, slowly turning her legendary smile at the wide-eyes of Robur Oberon. (with thanks to s.a.)
Friday, November 02, 2007
Confessions of a Literary Streetwalker: Commitment
(the following is part of an ongoing series of columns I did for The Erotica Readers & Writers Association on the ins and outs and ins and outs and ins and outs of writing good smut)
I don't believe in talent. Sure, I think some people have a touch more hardwiring in their brains that lends them to be artists, musicians, scientists, and even lowly writers but I think that having this turn of mind never guarantees being able to utilize this towards a satisfying pursuit. When someone uses that word, 'talent,' I think of something that makes a person have a kind of special dispensation, a phenomenal leg-up on everyone else. I use an analogy to explain this supposed hypocrisy: just because you're a good driver doesn't mean you'll be a great driver - and not all great drivers started out being good drivers.
Maybe it's because I think of myself as a Liberal and believe that everyone is created equal, or they at least have equal access to making themselves a better person. I don't like the idea of someone, by virtue of luck (good or bad) having an edge over anyone else. I also think the idea of talent is what a lot of people use to give up on something. They put pen to paper and when it doesn't work out perfectly the first time, they toss it to the floor, saying, "What's the point? I just don't have it."
There is one thing, though, that's true of great drivers as well as great writers: commitment. To do anything well you have to practice, you have to get up and do it even though you'd rather do anything else in the world. It's easy to hang your hopes on tales of first story sales, first book sales, and think that such events are common, expected. But the fact is they are alarmingly rare. For every one phenomenal success, there are thousands of other writers who sit in front of their machines every day and work, work, work. Sure, those flashy first timers often deserve their praise and fat checks, but they often vanish as fast they appear. Without determination and a willingness to be there for the long haul, they suffer from expecting the next project, and the next project, and the next project, to be as easy as the first. Someone who's battered and beaten their way up, however, knows that for every five stories, only one will be any good – it's part of the game.
Here's another analogy. If you go out and just circle the track, drive the same car at the same speed, over and over again you may be a better driver but you'll never be Tazio Nuvalari. Writing the same story over and over, never stretching, never trying new things, will have the same affect. Same with writing page after page after page but not taking the time (sometimes very painful times) to sit down with your work and really, honestly read what you've been writing. Determination and commitment is one thing, useless thumb twiddling is quite another.
You have to look really had at what you're doing, to look at it and face the fact that sometimes what you're going to write is going to be crap. Some stories deserve to be thrown in the trash, but what separates the casual dreamer from the person really in pursuit of their destiny, is when you can look at what you've written and say: this is crap, but I know how to make it better.
Personal confession time. Does ten years sound like a long time? Sure, it might be an eternity if you're in a prison cell sometimes, but maybe only the blink of an eye if you're a parent watching a child grow up. For me, ten years is what it took for me to become a published author. I started writing very seriously just out of high school. Ten years later I sold my first story. Though I honestly feel that selling something is not the signpost of quality for writing, this was a defining moment in my life. Ten years of trying finally yielded results.
Nine years after that I have a pretty respectable resume of projects. Sometimes I think I took too long to get where I am, but other times I think maybe it would have taken much longer – or never happened at all – if I'd never sat down and done the work; word after word, page after page, story after story. Those words, pages, or stories pushed me along part of the way, but I believe publishing success came because I tried to be better, tried to improve what I was doing, and was willing to look at what I was doing.
Saccharine sentiment notwithstanding, I really do believe dreams can come true. It can happen, but it too often requires a huge amount of difficult, time-consuming, heart breaking work.
Is it worth it? Ten years is an awfully long time, true. But when I think of the stories I've written, the fun I've had, the things I've learned about myself and the world, I would do it all again in a second.
The choice is yours. But it's better to really, truly try, then pass on regretting you never even made a first step.
Thursday, November 01, 2007
Meine Kleine Fabrik: This Is Why We Are Here
Meine Kleine Fabrik is about the things we've found, the stuff we cherish, the wonders that might otherwise be forgotten that we want to share with the world.
One of the greatest treasures we've always adored since it first appeared a long time ago is the following, having just recently emerged on YouTube:
Created by Tony White (interview here), Hokusai: An Animated Sketchbook is one of those things that seems to constantly sit in the back of our minds, a beautiful haunting of art, passion, humility, and creation.
Wednesday, October 31, 2007
The Incredible World of The Amalgamted Erotica Corporation
As reported by the brilliant and vivacious Sage Vivant, the Amalgamated Erotica Corp blog is a fascinating examination of the personalities, politics, and general day-to-day world of the professional pornographer. Readers will be entertained and illuminated, their creative and sexual imaginations more than sated, by her reporting of the personalities and trials and tribulations of putting one skillfully crafted dirty word after another.
However, I have to report one issue with Amalgamated Erotica Corp. and Sage Vivant: while I respect her professionalism and mastery of both her literary craft and business conduct I must take exception to her rather disappointing failure to identify the impostor “M.Christian” who she has apparently hired to work for her company. While I have nothing but respect and fondness for Sage I am alarmed that she has aided this disreputable thief of my identity to further usurp by professional existence. Rest assured that my lawyers will be in contact with Amalgamated Erotica Corp. and Sage Vivant, even though I wish her and her business endeavor no ill will.
Talk, Talk, Talk ....
Here’s an intro taste:
If you read short erotica in book form -- gay, straight, bi, queer, trans, mixed or just about anything else -- you've read a story by M. Christian. As one of the English-speaking world's most widely-published authors of erotic fiction, he's seen his short stories in literally hundreds of anthologies. But he's also known as an author of science fiction, fantasy and horror, most recently with his gay San Francisco vampire mystery The Very Bloody Marys. Though he's straight, he writes some of the hottest and filthiest gay -- and lesbian -- erotica around, as well as telling the gay coming of age story (as in Marys) with moving inspiration, proving that the erotocreative impulse is nature's guaranteed genderfuck, a font of imaginative subversion that crosses, blurs and at times obliterates all gender and orientation lines.
As if that weren't enough, Christian, Chris to his friends, also blogs extensively and writes uproarious articles about weird history, science and the arts, exploring a list of obsessions that ranges from robots to Japanese culture to classic film to spy novels and Victorian crime fiction, publishing hundreds of articles in addition to his fiction output. If any writer out there can keep up with M. Christian, I'm betting they sport a chrome skeleton and radionuclide power source crammed up their ass.
We caught up with Chris for a long-overdue chat about writing, sex, history, death, and perversion.
Thursday, October 25, 2007
Welcome to Weirdsville: When a Hoax is a Hoax
Back when I used to write a variety of columns on the weird and the wonderful, like the Welcome to Weirdsville posts that have been going up here on Meine Kleine Fabrik, I came across what I thought was perfect fodder: one conman + lots of gullible people + a wild story = trying to save the island of Manhattan from sinking by sawing it free, towing it out to sea, turning it around, then putting it back. It was good. Too good, in fact, because I've since learned that the story of this hoax was ... a hoax. So, for a few laughs at my own expense, here's the original piece and a few comments but more more reliable sources about what really happened. Enjoy!
It seemed such a logical thing-after all, this was the 1800s and construction, development, and industry were everywhere. The United States was exploding like a runaway locomotive. Why, it seemed like practically everyday something new was being invented; the world was full of engineering miracles, and it was all, more than a little, frightening.
It also seemed like every day that new projects-some almost insane in their complexity-were being started. This was the era of bridges, tall, taller, and tallest buildings, transatlantic cables, and bigger and bigger steam engines.
And so it made perfect sense that a kind of mechanical Tower of Babel was lurking right around the corner-God sneering down on those damned industrial Americans and their hubris. Something, a lot of people felt, had to happen. Things were just going too well.
Then came their answer, and it was so simple-and, even better, the solution played right into the attitude of the age. The disaster was immanent, Biblical in its proportions, and the solution almost as grand. Why, those taken by the idea believed it was just too perfect: a punishment for our engineering pride, solved by our own mechanical brilliance. Irony can be so captivating.
As can insanity ... or a well-laid hoax.
Whether or not he was insane or just a mischievous craftsman of great hoaxes is a matter of conjecture. While the incident he sparked continues to amaze us to this day, the facts surrounding its mastermind are frustratingly obscure. His name, we know, was Lozier, and in New York City of the early 1800s he was known for being a persuasive, if eccentric, orator. Spouting off on all manner of subjects from his soapbox in Centre Market, Lozier was mesmerizing-to a degree, in fact, that will astonish you.
One day he spoke of something that seemed to resonate with the people of Manhattan. Lozier spoke of the new buildings that seemed to spring like brick and mortar mushrooms overnight on their tiny island-down at the Battery in particular. One day he told a rapt group of Manhattanites something he'd observed while looking down from City Hall, something that had shocked him to the very core of his being. The Battery was sloping down hill.
The situation was obvious, at least for Lozier. Luckily for the possibly doomed citizens of that great island, he had a solution as audacious as the impending disaster.
Manhattan, he said, was sinking, methodically slipping under the waves of the bay. What was needed to be done, he put forth in all his zealous brilliance, was to get a massive workforce together and systematically, precisely cut the island in half.
Once freed of its submerging half, the rest of Manhattan could then be safely towed out to sea, turned about, and then reattached to better reinforce the imperiled island.
I'll wait while you either laugh, or shake your head in amazed disgust.
Ready? That was the plan-but what separated Lozier's plan from, say, the idea of beaming up to an alien spacecraft clinging to the ass-end of the Hale-Bop comet is what happened. Yes, Lozier preached his insane, ludicrous disaster to the citizens of New York. But what's truly insane, truly ludicrous is that the fine, intelligent, cultivated citizens of the Big Apple... believed him.
Over the next few days Lozier organized a massive workforce-over 300 men signing up to help the first day, alone. Burly and eager to save their precious island, these men recruited others who then perpetuated the mad scheme/hoax. Supplies, Lozier deduced, would be needed, and so he dispatched many to various suppliers all over the island. With no money or backing, he managed to acquire bids for the construction of a headquarters, chain (for the towing), the manufacture of the massive saws, boats, and even food and necessities for his workers.
The dangerous part, he explained, would be handled by a very select cadre of men-for these masterful workers would have to be placed under the island, to help guide the massive saws. Since this required them being underwater for a considerable amount of time, Mad (or devious) Lozier held auditions for these so-important positions with a stopwatch in his hand to make sure the candidates could hold their breaths for the necessary amount of time.
Finally, it was zero hour. Finally, it was time to rally his troops and begin the actual construction and implementation of his all-important scheme. Manhattan was in danger! Manhattan could-and would-be saved. On that fateful day, several thousand showed up at the selected location, eager and willing to save their island.
But no Lozier. No sign of him anywhere. Those thousands lingers for hours, puzzled and confused. Eventually, they drifted off, back into the hurl and the burl of their constantly growing island. Insane or with just an insane sense of humor, Lozier was never seen or heard from again.
However, it is important to note, in Lozier's defense, that a recent study conducted by the US Geologic Survey calculated that the island of Manhattan is sinking at approximately the rate of a half-inch per year. Whether or not the US government has any plans to halt the submersion of this all-important trade and cultural Mecca is not known-but it's at least comforting to know that there was someone, once before, who not only foresaw this problem, but also dreamt up an elegantly simple solution.
But here's the truth behind the myth:
From HistoryBuff.com
What you just read was a hoax of a hoax. Several books about journalism history have retold the above story as fact. It originated in 1835. A business partner of the man named Lozier in the story claimed Lozier had told him the story much earlier. He related the story to his son and grandson many times over. the truth finally came out in the 1870's. The entire story was made up. Despite the truth coming out, many journalism history books continued to retell the story as being true well into the 1950's. Despite being lower educated, people living in New York in the early 1800's WERE NOT that gullible!From Wikipedia:
The sawing off of Manhattan Island is an old New York City story that is largely unverified. It describes a practical joke allegedly perpetuated in 1824 by a retired ship carpenter named Lozier. According to the story, in the 1820s a rumor began circulating among city merchants that southern Manhattan Island was sinking near the Battery due to the weight of the urban district. It was believed that by cutting the island, towing it out, rotating it 180 degrees, and putting it back in place that Manhattan would be stabilized, and that the thin part of the island could be condemned. Surprisingly the main concern was not the futility of the idea but of Long Island being in the way. Lozier finally assembled a large workforce and logistical support. At a massive groundbreaking ceremony, Lozier did not show up but hid in Brooklyn and did not return for months.
The story did not appear in any known newspapers (although the press supposedly did not report on such pranks in that era) and no records have been found to confirm the existence of the individuals involved. This has led to speculation that the incident never occurred and that the original report of the hoax was itself a hoax. The hoax was first documented in Thomas F. De Voe's 1862 volume The Market Book, and was told again in Herbert Asbury's 1934 title All Around The Town. Another condensed retelling occurs in the 1960's Reader's Digest book, Scoundrels and Scallywags. The term has taken on new meaning since the 1980's when upstate New York entered a regional economic recession that it has yet to recover from. Many upstate residents joke or believe that New York City itself is a huge drain on the state's economic resources and ever increasing income and sales tax rate over the last several decades. Some believe that New York City should be a separate and distinct district, like Washington, D.C., and rely on its own economic and tax infrastructure while allowing the rest of the state to adjust its own accordingly to try to bring back jobs and businesses.- and be sure and check out the absolute source for telling truth from fiction: Snopes.
Wednesday, October 24, 2007
Possible headlines include, but are not limited to: Don't Ask, Don't Tell; Be All That You Can Be, etc.
MediaBuyerPlanner: Because gays are barred from military service if they are open about their sexual orientation, visitors to GLEE.com (Gays, Lesbians & Everyone Else) may have been understandably confused by the fact that there were thousands of recruiting ads for the Army, Navy and Air Force on the site.
When informed earlier this week by USA Today that they were advertising on the site, recruiters were surprised, and ordered the job listings to be removed, USA Today reports.
Maj. Michael Baptista, advertising branch chief for the Army National Guard, said the military did not knowingly advertise on the site. The Army National Guard will spend $6.5 million on internet recruiting this year.
Most of the more than 8,000 positions posted on GLEE were tough-to-fill jobs that require in-depth training. Others sought to fill combat slots.
The ads came via Community Connect, GLEE's parent company, as part of an alliance with Monster.com. The military services purchased Monster's so-called diversity-and-inclusion package. The Navy's account manager at Campbell-Ewald says that GLEE had been added to the package when the site launched in March, and that the agency had never been informed of the addition. "It was an internal goodwill effort on their part to give added value," she is quoted as saying.
Monday, October 22, 2007
I (Heart) Mencken
I believe that religion, generally speaking, has been a curse to mankind - that its modest and greatly overestimated services on the ethical side have been more than overcome by the damage it has done to clear and honest thinking.I believe that no discovery of fact, however trivial, can be wholly useless to the race, and that no trumpeting of falsehood, however virtuous in intent, can be anything but vicious.
I believe that all government is evil, in that all government must necessarily make war upon liberty...
I believe that the evidence for immortality is no better than the evidence of witches, and deserves no more respect.
I believe in the complete freedom of thought and speech...
I believe in the capacity of man to conquer his world, and to find out what it is made of, and how it is run.
I believe in the reality of progress.
I - But the whole thing, after all, may be put very simply. I believe that it is better to tell the truth than to lie. I believe that it is better to be free than to be a slave. And I believe that it is better to know than be ignorant.
- for more on H.L. Menken check out his Wikipedia page
The View From Here: The Walk
Puzzled, indecisive, after much thought I came to only one conclusion, which had nothing to do with my quandary: maybe a walk would help.
Outside everything was as it should be: sun up high, earth down below, air all around, and city everywhere else.
Towards me, down the street - flip, flop, flip, flop - bare toes slapping on the warm cement, webs between cupping the descending air, popping them sideways. On his back, twin glass bottles full of bubbling fluids, sweeping around from and to his mouth via twin black plastic hoses. Closer, then passing, a gurgle and burble breathing and possibly communication, though I didn't have much to say to someone who preferred under water to over land.
What to do? What to do?
Rolling sideways across my vision, from one avenue to the other, tits and tits and breasts and breasts: a spherical boobie ball, nipples tractioning on the ground, firm As to rolling DDs flopping and slapping by. If it had eyes, I didn't see them, so I didn't know if he or she, she or he, or both, neither or more than one saw me.
I could or I couldn't. It boiled down to that. One or the other.
Slow and stately, Dandy Longlegs passed me, coming from behind, alongside, and way beyond in three steps of his slickly tuxedoed legs. Civil chap, though, as he strode by, waistcoats flapping from the action of his stride, he looked down from his heights of elegance and tipped his topper with a gentle smile.
But do I or don't I?
She saw me long before I saw her, but she she'd always seen me before I saw her. In my silly way, I named her the instant she crossed the street, a name ridiculously perfect for such a brown-eye girl. Gleaming and glistening, she took it all in with one glance from her giant bare orb, her singular huge oculus. I nodded to Iris as she passed.
Pros as well as cons swirling in my head, flipping back and forth, back and forth -
Across the way, standing on the corner, I could tell they also couldn't make up their mind. They also were weighing their choices: pro or con, left or right, but at least in the case of this enraptured couple, this two off for a walk as one, their decision wasn't as profound. After all, they already fused their bodies into four arms, four legs, two heads, dick and two breasts -- so the rest was simply a matter of which way to walk.
So which was it? Do it or not?
Fucking dickhead. Hate those guys, the ones who think just because they've a giant prick they can do what they want, when they want, to who they want. Jack-offs. Stepping into a greasy puddle of his come, oozing from the eye in the middle of his huge helmet I sneered. He responded with a stiff salute, telling me in his own special way to fuck off. Not in the mood, I kicked him in the balls, which was perfect revenge and remarkably easy as they were dragging on the ground right behind him.
It was big decision - which made it all the harder. It wasn't like I could have it undone very easily.
I couldn't help but stare. Don't see many of those nowadays. Still, I tried not to make it too obvious. Used to be hundreds of them, darkening the sky with their beautiful flights of fancy. Now, though, the only thing in the sky is the sun. I guess I wasn't as subtle as I could have been. His slim, pupil-less eyes noticed mine and his mahogany beak curled into a wistful grin. I returned it, hoping that he would know that it was okay for he, and his lovely-plumed kin, to return to dance among our clouds.
The problem was I had to make up my mind pretty quickly. That made it all the harder to decide.
Sitting on the stoop before a perfectly maintained house, whittling a whistle, tying and untying various knots, playing with a yo-yo, flipping a coin, shuffling cards, twirling a ring of keys, juggling some rubber balls, scratching himself, crackling various sets of knuckles, and many more things with many more hands my first and only thought walking by was: Handy.
No more dithering, no more hemming, hawing, or dawdling. Time to decide -- so I did.
I'd get the nose job.