The story is pretty grim: 3 year-old Desiderio (Dez) Martinez moves with his divorced father from Sangritos to Clearwater to escape his violent ex-wife. When he remarries, Desiderio finds himself in a bitter battle of wills with his abusive stepmother, a contest in which the two prove to be more evenly matched than might have been supposed. Deception, disguise, and illusion are the weapons the young child learns to employ as he grows up.
Somber though this tale of family strife is, it is also darkly funny and so artistically satisfying that most readers come away exhilarated rather than depressed.
Take a peek at the first chapter :
www.dezmartinez.blogspot.com
Monday, September 17, 2007
Sunday, September 2, 2007
Wood Buffalo
Power, wealth, sex, glorious extravagance. One place has them all - Wood Buffalo.
The story of petroleum magnate Tycho Keats, illustrious son of Fort Mac whose life revolves around oil, family and power. A man whose pursuit of, in no particular order, money and clout knows no limits.
Take a sneak peek at:
www.woodbuffalo.blogspot.com
The story of petroleum magnate Tycho Keats, illustrious son of Fort Mac whose life revolves around oil, family and power. A man whose pursuit of, in no particular order, money and clout knows no limits.
Take a sneak peek at:
www.woodbuffalo.blogspot.com
Danny Alarcon (author "Lost City Radio") : L.A. v. Miami
What do you think of L.A.?
Each time, I like it more and more. In this weird way, Oakland exists more in the orbit of L.A. than it does San Francisco. It’s something about the lifestyle of Oakland, I think. Maybe the driving culture, the fact that it’s a little more spread out, it’s more of the arrival point for immigrants. I think of L.A. right now as being the capital of Latino culture in the United States, in the way Miami might once have been if it weren’t so . . . wack. I feel like Miami is where the ruling classes of our various countries go to shop, whereas L.A. is the place where the working classes come — to work and pursue the American Dream. Like L.A. is a necessity and Miami is a choice. That’s why I love L.A., and I think Oakland has more of that than San Francisco.
The city is really active in this book, almost taking the form of a character. What do you see happening in cities today?
I see them as places of real cultural exchange. Necessarily, people are having to blend, having to decide what is vital and what is not about their culture and their identity, having to take on new identities, new languages, new customs. You also have this overlay of globalization happening now, and that just makes everything stranger. You have kids coming from the Andes who won’t listen to any of the music their parents listen to, who won’t listen to the quote-unquote traditional music of the past. They won’t even listen to salsa, the pan–Latin American sound. They’ll only listen to electronic music. It’s like skipping over entire centuries.
Why did you choose to write Lost City Radio in English, or not put any Spanish in it?
Tough question, I don’t know. I thought about it. I think to give it that kind of it’s-not-placed-anywhere feel. It’s very realistic, but it’s not entirely grounded in this world. There’s no TV, you can tell it’s Latin America, but it also could easily be lots of other places. I wanted it to exist just above this commonly agreed-upon reality
Do you write in Spanish?
I don’t. I read it. I write e-mails. A lot of the work I do for Etiqueta is in Spanish. [Alarcón is an editor for the Peruvian journal Etiqueta Negra.] If anything, if in English I have five or six ways to say something or express an idea, in Spanish, only two or three will come. It just takes much longer to learn Spanish. That said, I think of it as an accomplishment that I can read a novel and enjoy it in Spanish. When I decided I was going to get my Spanish up, the first book I read was Amor en el Tiempo de Colera [Gabriel García Márquez’s Love in the Time of Cholera]. It took me like two and a half months, but I did it.
Are you American?
You mean what kind of passport I have? I don’t think there’s any contradiction in saying I’m American and also Peruvian. I think Peruvian-American is not a set of words that exists, not the way you say Mexican-American or Chicano, and people understand that. But the fact is, we’re going to need a much broader vocabulary to describe types of Americans that exist. I have a lot of affection for those two words that mean nothing basically, for the word “Peruvian” and the word “Latino.” I don’t think I would be able to really explain what those words mean or explain to you, or why I have such cariño for those two ideas.
It’s a weird word, “Latino.”
It’s a bizarre word. What does a recent immigrant from Guatemala have to do with a fourth-generation boriqua from East Harlem? Or those folks from Colorado who don’t speak Spanish? But it’s still an idea that I find somehow broad enough to say something about who I am.
What do you think is going to happen to Latin America next? They’re still working through all this, right?
Yeah, but we’re working through something different now too. The U.S. has been ignoring Latin America since 9/11. And then it seems like last year the U.S. snapped and was like, “Oh shit, we have to pay attention now.” Chávez is, of course, the prime mover of this. They look down, “We got Lula [in Brazil], we got Kercher [in Argentina], we got Evo [Morales in Bolivia], we got Chávez.” Peru could have gone to Humala, easily, easily. If Chávez had just kept his mouth shut, it could have gone to Humala. You have Ortega back [in Nicaragua]. You have this entire sea change.
What Chávez is saying is making perfect sense to a lot of people. You’re like, “Maybe I don’t like the way he says it, maybe his style is not the most couth, maybe he’s a little rough around the edges.” But a lot of people are like, “Well, he’s clearly not lying. Look at what they’re doing abroad.” Chávez is not popular in Peru at all. Mostly because he won’t just keep his mouth shut. He interferes a lot, throws his weight around in a way that Peruvians find unseemly, or in a way that offends our own sense of nationalism. There’s many things about Chávez I admire, but the fact that he’s, like, not ever going to leave bothers me a great deal, makes me very sad for institutionality.
Is the U.S. a Latin American country?
Increasingly. California is. I always say this: There's something about L.A., even the white people are Mexican. I was trying to teach my niece Lucia to say, No mames, guey [which is an affectionate phrase tossed around male friends, but roughly translates to “Don’t be a dickhead, dick”]. It’s not Peruvian at all, but it’s totally Californian, it’s totally Mexican. [Laughs.] “You know, you’re going to be a Latina in Oakland, you better learn how to say it.” She’s 2½ years old. But she’s going to get it.
But now, Alabama, Iowa, Minnesota, New York City is even Mexicanizing.
It’s funny it is causing this kind of nativist uproar. To a certain extent, that’s natural, but I don’t understand the nativist anxiety, because I’m not native.
But the shifts freak people out.
I remember my dad took me to New York to go to school; the waiter would come by and speak Spanish, and my dad would be like, “I’m from Peru, where you from?” And the waiter would be like, “Who the fuck is this guy?” You don’t have that natural intimacy when you see another Latino like we did in Alabama. Finding another Latino in Birmingham was always an event. It’s gone by the wayside, like the way people used to clap when the plane landed. They don’t do that anymore. They do in Latin America.
Why is it important to keep writing fiction in the media age, where we’re saturated with information and text and media and signals?
If you’re a writer, you believe there are certain things that fiction can accomplish that can only be accomplished in fiction. There are certain things that movies can’t do, that music can’t do, certain things that Web sites can’t do, radio can’t do. If you believe that, then you’re a writer. If you don’t believe that, then you should do something else. I think that a novel is the closest you can get to walking in someone else’s shoes, both as an artist and as a consumer of that art. I think of art, all of art, as running around the question of what it means to be alive now. A novel allows a reader to commune with other people’s experiences in a really intense, really real way, and I don’t think that other media can do that exactly in that same way.
Each time, I like it more and more. In this weird way, Oakland exists more in the orbit of L.A. than it does San Francisco. It’s something about the lifestyle of Oakland, I think. Maybe the driving culture, the fact that it’s a little more spread out, it’s more of the arrival point for immigrants. I think of L.A. right now as being the capital of Latino culture in the United States, in the way Miami might once have been if it weren’t so . . . wack. I feel like Miami is where the ruling classes of our various countries go to shop, whereas L.A. is the place where the working classes come — to work and pursue the American Dream. Like L.A. is a necessity and Miami is a choice. That’s why I love L.A., and I think Oakland has more of that than San Francisco.
The city is really active in this book, almost taking the form of a character. What do you see happening in cities today?
I see them as places of real cultural exchange. Necessarily, people are having to blend, having to decide what is vital and what is not about their culture and their identity, having to take on new identities, new languages, new customs. You also have this overlay of globalization happening now, and that just makes everything stranger. You have kids coming from the Andes who won’t listen to any of the music their parents listen to, who won’t listen to the quote-unquote traditional music of the past. They won’t even listen to salsa, the pan–Latin American sound. They’ll only listen to electronic music. It’s like skipping over entire centuries.
Why did you choose to write Lost City Radio in English, or not put any Spanish in it?
Tough question, I don’t know. I thought about it. I think to give it that kind of it’s-not-placed-anywhere feel. It’s very realistic, but it’s not entirely grounded in this world. There’s no TV, you can tell it’s Latin America, but it also could easily be lots of other places. I wanted it to exist just above this commonly agreed-upon reality
Do you write in Spanish?
I don’t. I read it. I write e-mails. A lot of the work I do for Etiqueta is in Spanish. [Alarcón is an editor for the Peruvian journal Etiqueta Negra.] If anything, if in English I have five or six ways to say something or express an idea, in Spanish, only two or three will come. It just takes much longer to learn Spanish. That said, I think of it as an accomplishment that I can read a novel and enjoy it in Spanish. When I decided I was going to get my Spanish up, the first book I read was Amor en el Tiempo de Colera [Gabriel García Márquez’s Love in the Time of Cholera]. It took me like two and a half months, but I did it.
Are you American?
You mean what kind of passport I have? I don’t think there’s any contradiction in saying I’m American and also Peruvian. I think Peruvian-American is not a set of words that exists, not the way you say Mexican-American or Chicano, and people understand that. But the fact is, we’re going to need a much broader vocabulary to describe types of Americans that exist. I have a lot of affection for those two words that mean nothing basically, for the word “Peruvian” and the word “Latino.” I don’t think I would be able to really explain what those words mean or explain to you, or why I have such cariño for those two ideas.
It’s a weird word, “Latino.”
It’s a bizarre word. What does a recent immigrant from Guatemala have to do with a fourth-generation boriqua from East Harlem? Or those folks from Colorado who don’t speak Spanish? But it’s still an idea that I find somehow broad enough to say something about who I am.
What do you think is going to happen to Latin America next? They’re still working through all this, right?
Yeah, but we’re working through something different now too. The U.S. has been ignoring Latin America since 9/11. And then it seems like last year the U.S. snapped and was like, “Oh shit, we have to pay attention now.” Chávez is, of course, the prime mover of this. They look down, “We got Lula [in Brazil], we got Kercher [in Argentina], we got Evo [Morales in Bolivia], we got Chávez.” Peru could have gone to Humala, easily, easily. If Chávez had just kept his mouth shut, it could have gone to Humala. You have Ortega back [in Nicaragua]. You have this entire sea change.
What Chávez is saying is making perfect sense to a lot of people. You’re like, “Maybe I don’t like the way he says it, maybe his style is not the most couth, maybe he’s a little rough around the edges.” But a lot of people are like, “Well, he’s clearly not lying. Look at what they’re doing abroad.” Chávez is not popular in Peru at all. Mostly because he won’t just keep his mouth shut. He interferes a lot, throws his weight around in a way that Peruvians find unseemly, or in a way that offends our own sense of nationalism. There’s many things about Chávez I admire, but the fact that he’s, like, not ever going to leave bothers me a great deal, makes me very sad for institutionality.
Is the U.S. a Latin American country?
Increasingly. California is. I always say this: There's something about L.A., even the white people are Mexican. I was trying to teach my niece Lucia to say, No mames, guey [which is an affectionate phrase tossed around male friends, but roughly translates to “Don’t be a dickhead, dick”]. It’s not Peruvian at all, but it’s totally Californian, it’s totally Mexican. [Laughs.] “You know, you’re going to be a Latina in Oakland, you better learn how to say it.” She’s 2½ years old. But she’s going to get it.
But now, Alabama, Iowa, Minnesota, New York City is even Mexicanizing.
It’s funny it is causing this kind of nativist uproar. To a certain extent, that’s natural, but I don’t understand the nativist anxiety, because I’m not native.
But the shifts freak people out.
I remember my dad took me to New York to go to school; the waiter would come by and speak Spanish, and my dad would be like, “I’m from Peru, where you from?” And the waiter would be like, “Who the fuck is this guy?” You don’t have that natural intimacy when you see another Latino like we did in Alabama. Finding another Latino in Birmingham was always an event. It’s gone by the wayside, like the way people used to clap when the plane landed. They don’t do that anymore. They do in Latin America.
Why is it important to keep writing fiction in the media age, where we’re saturated with information and text and media and signals?
If you’re a writer, you believe there are certain things that fiction can accomplish that can only be accomplished in fiction. There are certain things that movies can’t do, that music can’t do, certain things that Web sites can’t do, radio can’t do. If you believe that, then you’re a writer. If you don’t believe that, then you should do something else. I think that a novel is the closest you can get to walking in someone else’s shoes, both as an artist and as a consumer of that art. I think of art, all of art, as running around the question of what it means to be alive now. A novel allows a reader to commune with other people’s experiences in a really intense, really real way, and I don’t think that other media can do that exactly in that same way.
Tom Gomez : Emperor of Mars
(based on Ray Bradbury´s "Night Meeting")
Tom Gomez stops for fuel at the station. Looks up at the Cydonia Hills in the distance. The twin Martian moons glowing, suspended high in the purple twilight sky. The hills seem to gobble up the dusty old Martian highway that stretches far off into the distance.
"Folks say its been there for a million years. Dang! Them Martians sure knew how to build to last. Sorta creeps you out dudn´t it?" says the old fuelling attendant as he slowly walks out from his dusty living quarters onto the hydro fueling pad. The old man gives Tom´s pick-up a sharp-eyed glance. He sees the Martian Institutes of Science logo on the door.
"Going out to the ¨towns¨ I see"
Tom smiles politely and glances at his watch.
"From the ¨institutes¨ are you, son ?
"50 - 200 D-H2O in her please" - Tom interrupts
"Some young folks from the ¨institutes¨ come a rollin´ by here couple of months ago, never saw ´em again" the old man snorts wrinkling his nose as he looks up at the purple twilight now blanketing Mars.
Tom´s face crumples into a frown. His stare does all the talking now : No Q & As thank you. Stick to your pumping sir.
"Fresh deuteruim ?" asks the old man snapping the pump gun from the holder
"Fill ´er up" orders Tom as he pulls out his micro-tablet. Fingers doing an elaborate tap dance as the touch-screen lights up.
-If only people stuck to their jobs- Tom thinks - and not asked stupid questions al the time. I wouldn´t be here on this so called ¨mission¨. No, I´d back in Constant City, in my office grading papers on Martian terraforming -
It was 20 years ago today that Tom Gomez had landed on Mars aboard the USS GODSPEED. Came over as a construction worker. Helped build New Town, the Shimago-Dominguez settlement, and even a few suburbs in Constant City herself.
-20 years ago- He pauses , looks out at the empty Martian road. An icy shiver runs up his back. Still remembers that night well : 19 going on 20, headed to the New Town Festivals that evening. Not a care in the world. His trusty old Shimago pick up rumblin´ down the same Martian road, kicking up a storm down what the locals now call The Lost Highway...
Tom Gomez stops for fuel at the station. Looks up at the Cydonia Hills in the distance. The twin Martian moons glowing, suspended high in the purple twilight sky. The hills seem to gobble up the dusty old Martian highway that stretches far off into the distance.
"Folks say its been there for a million years. Dang! Them Martians sure knew how to build to last. Sorta creeps you out dudn´t it?" says the old fuelling attendant as he slowly walks out from his dusty living quarters onto the hydro fueling pad. The old man gives Tom´s pick-up a sharp-eyed glance. He sees the Martian Institutes of Science logo on the door.
"Going out to the ¨towns¨ I see"
Tom smiles politely and glances at his watch.
"From the ¨institutes¨ are you, son ?
"50 - 200 D-H2O in her please" - Tom interrupts
"Some young folks from the ¨institutes¨ come a rollin´ by here couple of months ago, never saw ´em again" the old man snorts wrinkling his nose as he looks up at the purple twilight now blanketing Mars.
Tom´s face crumples into a frown. His stare does all the talking now : No Q & As thank you. Stick to your pumping sir.
"Fresh deuteruim ?" asks the old man snapping the pump gun from the holder
"Fill ´er up" orders Tom as he pulls out his micro-tablet. Fingers doing an elaborate tap dance as the touch-screen lights up.
-If only people stuck to their jobs- Tom thinks - and not asked stupid questions al the time. I wouldn´t be here on this so called ¨mission¨. No, I´d back in Constant City, in my office grading papers on Martian terraforming -
It was 20 years ago today that Tom Gomez had landed on Mars aboard the USS GODSPEED. Came over as a construction worker. Helped build New Town, the Shimago-Dominguez settlement, and even a few suburbs in Constant City herself.
-20 years ago- He pauses , looks out at the empty Martian road. An icy shiver runs up his back. Still remembers that night well : 19 going on 20, headed to the New Town Festivals that evening. Not a care in the world. His trusty old Shimago pick up rumblin´ down the same Martian road, kicking up a storm down what the locals now call The Lost Highway...
Saturday, September 1, 2007
Hittin´ It Hard : A Stage Play (II)
Megan : I gotta agree with Linda on the tampon issue. Most of the women I talked to here were actually freaked out by the mere idea of using tampons, so yeah, they can be hard to find. I prefer o.b., but had to switch to tampax and playtex while I was there.
Linda : Weird eh ? I wonder why that is ?
Caleb : Religion...
Mitch : huh ?
Caleb : Y´know. Virginity hang ups.
Linda : Oh please!
Megan : Whaddya mean ?
Caleb : Damaged goods, you know...
Mitch : And peanut butter!!! ridiculously expensive !!! One of those small jars of Jiff costs something like 6 bucks.
Caleb : Another one of those things my friends here just didn't understand my craving for...They keep pushing that Man-Kar stuff on me...
Linda : Oh ! That condensed milk, caramel stuff ? I wonder how the whole country isn´t diabetic.
Megan : They´re gonna hafta start dousing entire neigborhoods with insulin...
Mitch : Insulin trucks
Linda : (imitating street vendor) Come get your insulin boys and girls...
Linda : Weird eh ? I wonder why that is ?
Caleb : Religion...
Mitch : huh ?
Caleb : Y´know. Virginity hang ups.
Linda : Oh please!
Megan : Whaddya mean ?
Caleb : Damaged goods, you know...
Mitch : And peanut butter!!! ridiculously expensive !!! One of those small jars of Jiff costs something like 6 bucks.
Caleb : Another one of those things my friends here just didn't understand my craving for...They keep pushing that Man-Kar stuff on me...
Linda : Oh ! That condensed milk, caramel stuff ? I wonder how the whole country isn´t diabetic.
Megan : They´re gonna hafta start dousing entire neigborhoods with insulin...
Mitch : Insulin trucks
Linda : (imitating street vendor) Come get your insulin boys and girls...
Hittin´ It Hard : A Stage Play (I)
ACT I : FOOD n STUFF
( TV room in a typical South American “pension” – Beat up couches, old arm chairs, frayed area rug. Cracked bulletin board. Tiny beat-up color TV - busted speakers. Mitch, Linda, Megan, Caleb talking.)
Mitch : ...i'm wondering how easy it is to get American goods in this town, y´know toiletries,Crest toothpast...
Megan : Clinique products, bigger shoe sizes. I'm just curious because I spent two years in a smaller city in Japan where it was difficult to buy things.
Linda : You should be fine getting nearly all of the toiletries you need. Clinique is readily available. I don't know how the prices compare to the states tho, but apparently it's cheaper than it is in Europe. I'm not sure about Crest per se, but there is Colgate, Sensodyne and Aquafresh (I think). Dove soap, nivea cream, etc. I have never seen Neutrogena shampoo down here, or at least not the one that's supposed to strip all the residue off your hair. There's a lot of Pantene, Fructis, and that Sedal, which might be l'oreal.
Caleb : The one thing that can cause problems to find are tampons.
Linda : Caleb!!!(shocked)
Caleb : What is it ? How many times have you had me running around town looking for those things, Huh ? I´m like " Tampons " ? The guy´s like " huh ?". So I do a quick off the cuff translation "tampones" ? I always end up at some hardware store checkout with a bag full of rubber bathtub plugs.
Linda : Oh shut up(pretends to slap him)! They sell them in some stores, usually in the nicer areas, but they are wicked expensive, and the brands are limited, and they are all applicator-only. If you're an OB gal, you'll need to bring from home, or take a quick dip over the border to Argentina (easily done in a weekend) to get some.
( TV room in a typical South American “pension” – Beat up couches, old arm chairs, frayed area rug. Cracked bulletin board. Tiny beat-up color TV - busted speakers. Mitch, Linda, Megan, Caleb talking.)
Mitch : ...i'm wondering how easy it is to get American goods in this town, y´know toiletries,Crest toothpast...
Megan : Clinique products, bigger shoe sizes. I'm just curious because I spent two years in a smaller city in Japan where it was difficult to buy things.
Linda : You should be fine getting nearly all of the toiletries you need. Clinique is readily available. I don't know how the prices compare to the states tho, but apparently it's cheaper than it is in Europe. I'm not sure about Crest per se, but there is Colgate, Sensodyne and Aquafresh (I think). Dove soap, nivea cream, etc. I have never seen Neutrogena shampoo down here, or at least not the one that's supposed to strip all the residue off your hair. There's a lot of Pantene, Fructis, and that Sedal, which might be l'oreal.
Caleb : The one thing that can cause problems to find are tampons.
Linda : Caleb!!!(shocked)
Caleb : What is it ? How many times have you had me running around town looking for those things, Huh ? I´m like " Tampons " ? The guy´s like " huh ?". So I do a quick off the cuff translation "tampones" ? I always end up at some hardware store checkout with a bag full of rubber bathtub plugs.
Linda : Oh shut up(pretends to slap him)! They sell them in some stores, usually in the nicer areas, but they are wicked expensive, and the brands are limited, and they are all applicator-only. If you're an OB gal, you'll need to bring from home, or take a quick dip over the border to Argentina (easily done in a weekend) to get some.
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