poetic

Walk The Vanished Earth by Erin Swan

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PREMISE: The year is 1873, and a bison hunter named Samson travels the Kansas plains, full of hope for his new country. The year is 1975, and an adolescent girl named Bea walks those very same plains; pregnant, mute, and raised in extreme seclusion, she lands in an institution, where a well-meaning psychiatrist struggles to decipher the pictures she draws of her past. The year is 2027 and, after a series of devastating storms, a tenacious engineer named Paul has left behind his banal suburban existence to build a floating city above the drowned streets that were once New Orleans. There with his poet daughter he rules over a society of dreamers and vagabonds who salvage vintage dresses, ferment rotgut wine out of fruit, paint murals on the ceiling of the Superdome, and try to write the story of their existence. The year is 2073, and Moon has heard only stories of the blue planet–Earth, as they once called it, now succumbed entirely to water. Now that Moon has come of age, she could become a mother if she wanted to-if only she understood what a mother is. Alone on Mars with her two alien uncles, she must decide whether to continue her family line and repopulate humanity on a new planet.

I absolutely loved this book. So much so, that it’s made it into my Hall of Fame. But before I get to why and spurt a load of superlatives to back it up, let’s hold hands and have a quick skip through the Goodreads 1-starrers’ garden. Some corkers for this one:

Torza couldn’t be arsed to finish the book but wanted to add a one-star review anyway, and said, “didnt finish it. idk, maybe it was good, but the multiple child pregnancies was kinda putting me off.” There was one and it was fairly important to the plot. Colleen Carroll (4 lots of double letters in that name…lazy-ass parents…there’s plenty of other letters out there) continued with the ‘let’s make up some bullshit about this book’ by referencing the “obvious/probable forced alien impregnation of a 14 year old”, which didn’t happen. At all. Anywhere in the book. Two reviewers mentioned the term ‘TERF’, suggesting that the author, Erin Swan has an issue with transgender people. Where the fuck they got this from I’ve no idea as there are no transgender characters in the book. Unless that was their problem, in which case they can fuck right off. Why does every author who doesn’t include a trans character get accused of being anti-transgender? For fuck sake.

My favourite review, however, was this baby by Coastalshelf (obviously has an even more embarrassing name than my middle one): “Found the focus on women as vessels for childbirth extremely off-putting”. Ho-lee-shit. This is a book that spreads across centuries and features characters that are related to each other. The only way for that to happen is for women to give birth. That’s not my opinion, that’s just a fact. You know, Coastalshelf, like your mother did to bring you into the world. Women ARE vessels for childbirth, thankfully. Otherwise none of us would be here. Coastalshelf, you’re a fucking moron.

This book is staggeringly good. Absolutely beautifully written, a complex, inter-weaving story with a gargantuan scope. And this is the author’s first book. Mind-blowing…

Beasts of Extraordinary Circumstance by Ruth Emmie Lang

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PREMISE: Orphaned, raised by wolves, and the proud owner of a horned pig named Merlin, Weylyn Grey knew he wasn’t like other people. But when he single-handedly stopped that tornado on a stormy Christmas day in Oklahoma, he realized just how different he actually was.

That tornado was the first of many strange events that seem to follow Weylyn from town to town, although he doesn’t like to take credit. As amazing as these powers may appear, they tend to manifest themselves at inopportune times and places. From freak storms to trees that appear to grow over night, Weylyn’s unique abilities are a curiosity at best and at worst, a danger to himself and the woman he loves. But Mary doesn’t care. Since Weylyn saved her from an angry wolf on her eleventh birthday, she’s known that a relationship with him isn’t without its risks, but as anyone who’s met Weylyn will tell you, once he wanders into your life, you’ll wish he’d never leave.

Thank you, Goodreads, thank you. I know I should stop going on there and actually be creative and original enough to come up with new and exciting perspectives on these books I read, but why bother when Goodreads is such a fertile ground for such absolute tosspots? And there’s a word I’ve not used in a few decades…

Again, let me reiterate that I’m not having a go at people who don’t like the book. All those 1-stars from people who just didn’t like it are all fair enough. We don’t all like everything. One man’s Jimmy White is another man’s Jimmy Saville. No, I like to search through and find the complete twat muffins that bask in the joy of anger and negativity. Oh, and utter stupidity.

Talking of which, let’s start with Patricia who came up with one of my favourites straight away: “A little far fetched” stated Patricia. No fucking shit, Sherlock…it’s a fictional fantasy book. I can picture you watching Star Wars: “Seriously…how many robots do you know that are fluent in 6 million forms of communication? Ridiculously inaccurate”.

Barbara Shoop (stupid fucking name) gave it 1 star after only reading 18 pages. Well done Babs, you really hung in there. Alberta gasped “Finished, but barely”. How do you barely finish a book? Do you physically struggle to turn over the last few pages? Crabbymama (assuming that’s a reference to her lady garden) started her short and pointless review with “Worst Superhero book ever”. WTF? That’s like commenting that Cujo was a poor guide dog. This wasn’t a superhero book, Crabster.

Jennifer, a native of Montana where the book is set is “sick of others writing what they think Montana is like” and lumps Yellowstone in with this. She goes on to say (about wolves, which feature heavily in the book) “Wolves are savage animals! Ask the ranchers in the northwest! They kill just to kill! Not just for food which is what some would like you to believe. Look up wolves kill over two hundred sheep in one night eastern MT, leave them lying dead”. This may come as a shock to you Jen-babe, but this book is fiction. None of it is true. That’s what the word fiction means.

My favourite ‘review’ by far is from Scott, who wrote this baby: “This book was utter crap. Most people who would share my opinion probably would not bother to pick up this book in the first place, so my one-star review is a minority opinion here”. The level of big-headed fuckery on display here is astounding. What I think Scott is trying to say is that all the people who are exactly like him (i.e. opinionated wankers) are too smart to pick the book up in the first place, but if they did and then read it, hated it like Scott does and then reviewed it, would also give it a 1-star rating, hence increasing the number of 1-star reviews and their relative percentage against the 2-, 3-, 4- and 5-star reviews so that that percentage would actually be accurate, and not currently skewed as Scott thinks it is due to normal and sane and people not having read it, hated it and 1-star reviewed it. You with me? In summary, Scott hates the book so much that he thinks others exactly like him would also hate it. What Scott is likely forgetting is that there’s not too many twats like him and therefore the numbers are all about right.

As I think with all books, you might like it, you might not. I loved it; loved the story, thought the writing was beautiful, was able to suspend my disbelief for long enough to realise it’s a fantasy story and very likely not true and thought the book was pretty magical if I’m honest.

The Long Take by Robin Robertson

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PREMISE: Walker, a young Canadian recently demobilised after war and his active service in the Normandy landings and subsequent European operations. Suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, and unable to face a return to his family home in rural Nova Scotia, he goes in search of freedom, change, anonymity and repair. We follow Walker through a sequence of poems as he moves through post-war American cities of New York, Los Angeles, and San Francisco.

I have a thing for poetry, albeit an annoyingly fleeting one that comes and goes every few years. For example, around five years ago I decided to start a poetry blog containing a few poems I’d written and was writing at the time for no reason whatsoever. So I did this – https://davegoldingpoetry.wordpress.com/ – and have done nothing more with it since. A true artist…

Similarly, I haven’t read any poetry since reading this book and now I’m talking about it here I can’t understand why I don’t do more of both. There’s something pretty magical about stories being told through poetry and The Long take is a fantastic example of that. Note to self (which I hope to remember and do a lot more with than my poetry blog): find more of this stuff out there and enjoy.