the rolsch blog

Post-apocalyptic stories appeal to me.  I’m not exactly sure why they do, but they really do.  Maybe it’s the possibility of prophetic vision in such stories or just the dream (or nightmare) of what may lie in wait around that next corner that sets my mind a-spinnin’.  I don’t much care for the same old fare though.  Viruses, nuclear holocausts, asteroids, etc.  These scenarios seem too convenient and much too short sighted.  I much prefer to think in harsher, longer terms.  Remember the movie Red Dawn, (not that great of a movie, but a pretty good story).  The United States is invaded by globally connected communists and Americans are rounded up and forced into the “red” way of life.  With a few brave souls heading to the mountains to keep fighting for peace, justice, and the American Way, blah blah blah…  I want to know what the (former) USA is like 10 years, 100 years, 500 years after the events like those in the movie.  That’s the kind of story I’d like to find… hmmm… 

Eternity Road is not that story.  It’s a basic virus-wiped-out-society-1000-or-so-years-ago story.  Beyond that, there is little in this book that makes a whole lot of sense at all.  I know, I know, this is Science Fiction, it’s not based in facts, but I would argue good Sci-Fi at least, at the very least, has to make sense.  I agree we as readers must put our imaginations to work, we need to set aside a good bit of, if not all reality, we need to accept certain unbelievable things in order for the story to work.  But it has to make sense, right?

So, without getting into too many details I’ll point out a few things that just didn’t work for me, but first the few things that did.  I like the setting in America.  I like the familiar names of places and geography…. but that’s where everything starts to go awry.  Sure, there’s the Mississippi and Ohio rivers, but the Great Lakes have become The Inland Sea or something like that.  The ruins of highways are still called highways, but cars are called hojiis and no one has ever in 1000 years figured out how to use them or how they worked or how any of the bridges or buildings or roads or anything was built.  They have not re-discovered electricity yet they use coal, steam power, gunpowder, they manufacture firearms, ammunition, and build ornate structures.  I mean, the things that are remembered and not remembered, just didn’t make sense to me.  Oh, and one other thing, the awesome and fantastic society (our society) that this future quest searches to find more about decided the best place to store its histories was on paper, in a wet tidal cave, somewhere off the northeast coast… Ok, don’t get me started… before I ramble on too long, I’ll just go ahead and spell it out for you:

I read this book with great anticipation.  I was immensely disappointed.

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Ps.  Can anyone recommend any good post-apocalyptic type stories out there?  Suggestions?  Recommendations?  Anyone?

FINALLY!  I finally finished this book last night.  Now, if you read my last post written more than a month ago in the Las Vegas airport, you’re wondering how 200 pages left stretched into a month of reading.  Me too.  Not really, I know exactly where my most of my time goes!

Just so you’re clear on this, the amount of time it took me to finish Heart-Shaped Box in no way shines a dim light on the book.  It was pretty great.  I like the badass hardcore hard living rock star (even if he’s an aging rock star) main character with an attitude to match.  The concept was great:  buy a ghost on the internet, get haunted for past “indiscretions…” only, wait, the hardcore Mustang driving badass is the hero here, so the ghost has got to go.  I enjoyed just about every part of the book, and believe me, I re-read a lot of sections at least twice after falling asleep without marking my page then trying to find where I was the next night.  (again, reader’s fault, not the writer’s)

Some of the descriptive prose in this novel is wonderful.  I’d love to give an example of what I think is wonderful stuff, but… oh hell, here, this is great stuff:

 ”…pulling himself out of his father’s gaping mouth.  Craddock’s face was contorted with strain, his arms reaching down, one hand on Martin’s forehead, the other on Martin’s shoulder.  At the point of his waist, his body was crushed into a thick rope–Jude thought again of a great mass of cellophane, wadded up and twisted into a cord–which filled Martin’s mouth and seemed to extend all the way down into his engorged throat.  Craddock had gone in like a soldier leaping into a foxhole but was hauling himself out like a man sunk to his waist in sucking mud.”  -  Heart-Shape Box, by Joe Hill

There is a little love story buried in the book too, and actually *hush hush* a ghostly threesome (of sorts).  This was a new spin, at least for me, on a good old ghost story.  Which I tend to think are just old, and not very good.  Maliciousness, terror, love, a good dose of some serious supernatural elements (ghosts not withstanding) Rock n’ Roll, cool cars….

I haven’t read Joe Hill’s 20th Century Ghosts yet, and for some reason, I am still hesitant to do so.  Ghost stories are not usually my thing, but then again, I branched out with this book, so who knows… maybe I’ll get to it soon.  I’m not a comic book/graphic novel fan at all, (and Joe writes Locke & Key), but for sure, I will keep an eye out for his new novels and stuff:  www.joehillfiction.com. 

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Uh, I’m sitting in the Las Vegas airport writing this getting ready to go home.  I can’t wait to get home.  I was so busy on this trip I didn’t have time to read anything unrelated to my business.  I did however start writing a neat little story about an air traveling man literally going crazy with fear headed to Las Vegas for a “business”  meeting.  Taking care of business I guess would be a better description.  Not an autobiographical story at all, just something that popped up in my mind while I sat on the ground during a layover in Albuquerque staring out the window over the wing waiting for take off.  

Anyway, I’m looking forward to 2 1/2 hours of reading time on the plane to get deeper into Heart-Shaped Box by Joe Hill.  So far it’s pretty good but I’m only 100 or so pages into it.  If I can stay awake (not the writer’s fault but Las Vegas’s fault) I should get through most if not all of it soon.  Or, I may write.  Stay tuned…

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PS.  (added 5/11/08)  Look, I’m famous!  Ok, not really, but I do have a picture of me at our RBMA booth on the business’s website…  here. 

Rating:  2**
“Pretty bad, but…”

This book is full of some well written bad men, a few ”good guys”, and one tremendously underdeveloped character central to the story that could have been so much more.   At the beginning of the book, in fact in the first sentence of the book (not the extensive prologue), this character is introduced.  You see, he’s a giant… literally.  And the opening few pages should  be an extremely intriguing hook set in the lip of the reader with which the author adjusts his drag and reels the reader in for a great ride.

But.  But.  But… that’s really the only good thing I can say about the story, and that isn’t all that great, is it?  The main character could have been so much more but the story collapsed around him.  He actually collapsed within the story too.  What we have here is a story about a runaway wife of an abusive and bad man.  He hunts her down and lots of people die at the hands of lots of really bad men and some really good guys too.  Nothing new here.

Oh wait, I forgot…  The really bad man is some kind of reincarnation evil who dreams of his former self blah blah blah.   And his wife moved/ran to a “haunted” island off the coast of Maine that has a terrible and evil past blah blah blah.  The island had such an evil past that it now absorbs evil and will stop at nothing to eliminate any evil from its shores blah bla blah.  The giant is the keeper of the island’s secret blah blah blah. 

This was a cop/detective thriller that the author must not have thought too much of.  So he sprinkled some supernatural fairy dust elements into it… and made it worse.  I won’t give away the ending other than to say it was disappointing.  I really wanted to get to know the giant better.

Oh yeah, I can’t let this go without mentioning.  John Connolly must have found a hidden surplus of commas somewhere in his literary mind that he just felt obligated to share with the world.  There are more commas in this book than would be necessary to write three equal length books.  Pet peeve of mine?  You bet… 

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Thoughts from the Past:

I was an eleven year old boy reading a collection of short (yeah, and not so short) stories by the totally cool Stephen King called “Skeleton Crew.”  It’s really neat how Stephen King puts notes and insights about his stories in his Introduction and Afterword.  Here are all the stories and what I think I thought about them… the 2 cent version anyway…
The Mist-  Awesome!  Really cool story about a (duh!) mist that hides lots of creatures and traps a dad and his son in a local supermarket with a bunch of crazy people.  This story is about their escape and the fate of the world.
Here There Be Tygers-  Really a neat story about a little boy going to the bathroom at school where a bully and a teacher get eaten by a Tiger in the bathroom.
The Monkey-  A wind up toy  monkey killer…
Cain Rose Up-  Wow, this is cutting edge break-out stuff.  All I can say is, whoa, this is hardcore cool.
Mrs. Todd’s Shortcut-  Too long and boring, never finished it.  People in Maine talk funny and I didn’t like how the story was told.  Kind of a neat idea though.
The Jaunt-  Horror and SciFi all wrapped in one amazing story the ends in a shocker.  This is one of my favorites in this book.  (this story will haunt me for years… see Part 2 of this review soon…)
The Wedding Gig-  Too long and stupid, I started it but never finished it.
Paranoid: A Chant-  Uh, no.
The Raft-  I liked this story about a blobby oily patch on the water that eats people alive (there’s some sex in this too, which was pretty cool!)
Word Processor of the Gods-  Pretty neat idea.  I wish I had one so I could control stuff like in this story.
The Man Who Would Not Shake Hands- Didn’t read it.
Beachworld-  Not very exciting at all.  I’m not a SciFi fan (my short lived SciFi phase won’t come for a few years when I discover Asimov’s ”
Foundation” series, and it would end shortly after that.)
The Reaper’s Image-   Don’t remember reading it.
Nona- ditto
For Owen- ditto
Survivor Type-  Completely out of this world and totally cool!  This is my favorite story of all time.  Man eats himself! Completely gross and cool.  WOW!
Uncle Otto’s Truck-  Pretty cool, but I don’t remember much about it.
Morning Deliveries (Milkman #1)-  Twisted and cool story about a twisted Milkman.
Big Wheels:  A Tale of the Laundry Game (Milkman #2)-  Don’t remember reading it.
Gramma-  ditto
The Ballad of the Flexible Bullet-  Too much too long pretty boring stuff.
The Reach-  Man, do people in Maine talk weird or what??  I couldn’t get past that and the way it was told. 

Part 2:  Coming soon…  Thoughts of a 30-something year old rereading something he mostly read as a kid…  I’m about halfway done rereading these stories and I’ll post the details soon.

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