Out of Touch

http://www.amazon.com/Out-Touch-Brandon-Tietz/dp/0982649479/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1359396824&sr=8-2&keywords=out+of+touch

Before I begin my little blog here, I just want to get one thing out of the way.

This is me prioritizing.

This is writer-speak for “a disclaimer”.

The only reason I want to read the rest of Brenden Teatz’s Breakthrough Ripoff Porn of a Novel is to see how bad it really is. It’s kind of like watching Here Comes Honey BooBoo or something with Snooki in it. You hate yourself (and whoever you’re watching) but you want to hear whatever dumb shit Snooki says or see whatever nasty nasty thing comes out of or goes into one of the Honey Booboo peoples’ bodies.

This is TV Producer-speak for “train wreck”.

But before I begin, for those of you just tuning in, you might want to go do something else instead. This is disaffected cynic-speak for “I have something better to do. I have anything better to do than read Out of Touch”. Is this thing on? Are you still reading? In case you’re a dumbfuck, this is me talking down to you. Much like Tweetz does throughout said novel.

But let’s disconnect from the writing and have a Sentence By Itself first.

Here, too, is another Sentence By Itself.

This is pretentious lit-fag speak for “post-post modern”.

I’m having a little too much fun with all of these platitudes and condescensions (Tautz does them so well in Out of Touch) so I’ll get on with my review.

But first, let’s go back. This is the “before” picture. Because at some point in everyone’s lives, they are a before and after picture.

Once there was an author. Let’s call him chuckpalahniuk. chuckpalahniuk was at one time a literary maverick. chuckpalahniuk had a style that was all his own. chuckpalahniuk pushed boundaries and shirked literary merit to write some refreshing and progressive reads such as the seminal Fight Club, its fantastic followup Survivor, the instant classic Choke, and the manic and enjoyable Invisible Monsters. chuckpalahniuk had a unique, casual voice that struck a chord with a new generation of readers. chuckpalahniuk was relevant for a time. I’ve been a reader my whole life and I was getting tired of the same old crap everywhere I turned. chuckpalahniuk got me reading again.

Then chuckpalahniuk got cocky. chuckpalahniuk fell under the artist curse of “I made a classic so now I can experiment with my “art” and do whatever the hell I want and people will buy it. See also: The Strokes, Saw movies, Radiohead, U2, several other bands and directors. All of a sudden, chuckpalahniuk sucked. That’s not the unfortunate part, however. The unfortunate part is that chuckpalahniuk’s writing was so casual, every numbnuts hipster with a pack of Parliaments and a lack of adequate fatherhood from Portlandia to Massachusetts thought that they too were writers.

They came in troves, these chuckpalahniuk clones. Each one was a copy of a copy of a copy, the next more degenerate and untalented than the last. A big contributor to this influx of shit writing was chuckpalahniuk’s then workshop, which taught its denizens how to Write Like Chuck. Enter Brondon Totz. I don’t know the man personally but I’m assuming that the first draft of Out of Touch was nothing like the “published” version, rewritten after Tootz discovered chuckpalahniuk’s workshop.

This is offended phony hack-speak for “This guy really does his homework”.

For those of you just unsticking your balls from your leg, I’ll continue with my review.

Synopsis time!

That’s exclamation point-speak for “exclamation point”.

Man, now I see why Twatz does that so much, it’s pretty fun. Anyspelunk, Out of Touch is about this dude named Aidin. He likes to part and debauch. He’s a “club-god”, whatever the hell that is. I don’t know why anyone over twenty three would want to be in a club anyway, much less become a “club-god”, which is probably similar to having a vast collection of STDs. Welcome to 2013, where clubs are fuckin’ lame. It seems to me that Tetzuo’s only grasp of nightlife is what he sees in the city that always sleeps, Kansas City. I think the novel is actually set there too. In the words of my girlfriend’s dad: “How unfortunate”.

Okay, damnit. The twist here is that Aidin can’t feel anything. Now, we’re never told exactly how much of anything Aidin can’t feel because he can’t feel himself getting full when he eats or gets his ass kicked but he is apparently addicted to the taste. So whatever this weird “Out of Touch” thing is, it doesn’t affect his tongue. How unfortunate. Wait, get it?? The novel is called Out of Touch because the protagonist is numb and the theme of the novel is probably that the protagonist becomes “out of touch”. Dang. I might be wrong about Browndong Tightazz.

The beginning of the novel (after the douchey part in italics that was added in after Tinkz read chuckpalahniuk) introduces us to Aidin’s therapist, Dr. Paradies, who I can only assume DIES near the end. Also, SPOILER ALERT. Dr. Paradies is Aidin’s mom. You can see it yourself in the Amazon preview because some idiot put the epilogue in the preview.

Anycrunch, this is where we’re first inundated with “doctor-speak” and “This is me” and “In case you’re just tuning in” and more chuckpalahniuk ripoffs like Aidin tonguing a wound in his mouth (Fight Club). Then Aidin “can’t feel a damn thing” but waits for the taste of copper (that’s a show-don’t-telling of blood) when he needs to stop tonguing the wound. There’s that magical tongue. This novel should have been about a magical tongue inztead.

Then Tonzils bafflez the reader by zharing zome ztrange bitz of wizdom. Like anytime you see someone who’s handicapped, there’s always this little part of you that has doubt. WOW. Such insight into the human condition, Brandon Tietz. That drooling cripple who’s always smiling and grunting is surely a fraud, you insignificant, reprehensible douche. The part of you that has doubt, Mr. Tietz, isn’t a small part at all. It’s a giant part. And it’s your douchiness. I’m talking to YOU, not the proverbial you that’s us, the unfortunate readers. People don’t need to see evidence, you asshole. That’s not why blind people have seeing eye dogs and that’s not why deaf people have sign language, you rabid cunt. Those things aren’t “proof objects”. Christ, Tietz, you. are. a. royal. douche.

I’m judging from the epilogue in the preview that Aidin has become some sort of government tool who does their dirty work or something, like Tightz is setting up for some sort of bastardized superhero serialized nonsense. It’s so dumb, you guys. Don’t bother with it, really. I had more to say but I’ve only grown angrier and angrier at Tietz while writing this one.

This is me telling you to retire, Tietz. This is writer-speak for “fuck right off”. Your book suckz. You, sir, are

…wait for it…

…This is you waiting for it…

…That’s waiting room-speak for…

..wait for it…

Out of Touch.

The Raie’Chaelia

http://www.amazon.com/The-RaieChaelia-ebook/dp/B00534QD18/ref=pd_rhf_gw_p_t_1_KR4T

There are a few issues this week but I’ll get to them after I get done with Miss Melissa Douthit’s Epic Work of Fantasy, The Rachel’Leah. It’s a series, you see. If it’s a series, then someone’ll make it into movies, correct? JUST LIKE HARRY POTTER AND THE HUNGER GAMES. What a sad sad philosophy to have. Anysplat, enough bullying, on to the novel.

I’m not even sure where to start here. The entire fantasy genre is rife with world-builders and unpronounceable names. It’s a bit too easy to me. Anyone can create fake races and magical creatures and give them crazy names with apostrophes and umlauts. Draw a map! Great idea too! There shall be kingdoms and dragonslayers and elements not found in our current realm! Hurrah for LARPing and World of Warcraft! Hurrah! Hurrah!

Okay okay my bullying is out of control, I’m sorry. I’ll just start with the preface of Doutshit’s Epic Work of Fantasy. Yes, there’s a preface. Is there a non-pretentious self-publisher? Hello? Anypoop, the aforementioned forthcoming preface. Our brave “author” informs us in the foreword (shit, I forgot to mention that there’s a foreword first, THEN the preface)  that this is a work of fiction, fabricated from the “author”‘s imagination. Well no shit, Murloc. It’s a fantasy. I’m pretty sure there’s nobody named Chalice, who’s greatly offended that Doumshit may be writing about her in her Epic Work of Fantasy. That’s right, our main character’s name is Chalice. It’s ancient Greek for “really big cup”. That’s a bummer, I’m writing a fantasy too and now I have to change Tulip Glass’s name to something else.

Damn you, preface. I’m so busy bitching that I haven’t even talked about you yet. So this guy died and he was a big-time fantasy writer or something. Brandon Sanderson took over his book series and I’ve actually heard of him. I’ve learned a lot from his Podcast. Anysplooge, that’s why our brave “author” decided she could be an “author”. Now, her “first novel has been ‘published'”. BY HERSELF.

In the words of my brother, who isn’t much of a reader and knows nothing about the publishing industry: “That doesn’t count.” There. I said it.

Oh good! A prologue is next! So it’s Forward, Preface, Prologue, then the Epic Work of Fantasy. Somehow I think there’s a step missing here. Ah yes, Editing. That should go first.

The Raeiou’Cholula is 325 pages long when it could have easily been 200 pages long and I’ll tell you why. The descriptions. Dear heavenly Jesuses (Get it? That’s a Game of Thrones reference because everyone in that universe says “Dear gods or Oh my gods” instead of Oh my god. That’s how you know it’s a fantasy.) the descriptions go overboard in this book. Examples? I thought you’d never ask. And you didn’t, so here are some examples.

Waves pounded the shoreline, spraying mist into the wind that stirred white sands glittering in the moonlight. A dark ship with dark sails, anchored in the reef, swayed with the movement of the water and the wind.

Is it just me, or does something else need to be pounded like that shoreline? If you’re thinking what I’m thinking, the answer is “yes” and the thing that needs to be pounded is Melissa Douthit’s vagina. Hey-oooooo. Amirite?? Damn my foul bullying. On to some more descriptions.

It was a magnificent storm that was approaching.

WAS it, brave “author”? WAS it? This brings me to an important point. If her book was properly edited or even workshopped, she would have known this. That sentence is a limp, boring failure. It starts off “It was”, first of all. Then comes the second half of the sentence. “Was approaching”. K-SNORRRRRRRRRE. I learned a long time ago to eliminate “ing” words from my writing. If anything, putting “ing” words in your writing confuses the tense. And while you’re at it, get rid of the word “was”, especially anywhere near the beginning of a sentence. Melissa is basically redundantly telling us in this sentence that she’d just described a storm at sea. That’s all fine and good but to make it even MORE annoying, she bogged down the sentence with was’s and ing words. Try this instead:

A magnificent, black storm approached.

There. Efficient. Effective. Effervescent. MORE.

A man in black stood just above him facing the front of a ring of spectators who were lingering in the shadows. The man in black was tall and broad, with thick black hair that was sleeked back from his brow and reached just under his ears. His dark eyebrows slanted menacingly and his thin mustache curled slightly upwards at the corners of his mouth. He appeared anxious. His eyes combed the light of the torches that spotted the mantlet wall of the ward, as if he were looking for minute cracks in it that held the answer. The man on the altar appeared calm but his fatigue, to his great relief, could mask even his fear. He was dressed in white robes.

Once you go black, etc etc…

Christs, I’m lost already and we’re still only in the prologue. I think. We haven’t even met Chalice yet! She must be a beautiful cup. Wait…Is her name a euphemism for boobs? Tits? Funbags? Breasts? Two Skittles in the middles? This book has just taken on a whole new meaning.

I’m going to skip past lines like “From a distance a rapid pounding of feet hit the marble announcing Ivan’s arrival” and “Above him, Duquaine saw two hands exchange a dark object. The strong hand with long fingers seized it impatiently and placed it on the prisoner’s chest” (Just like Transformers! PUT THE CUBE IN MY CHEST, SAM) and try to find the heroine of this Epic Work of Fantasy.

Finally.

…Many months later…

It was freezing. The latch of the gate was like ice on her fingers as she lifted it and let herself into the courtyard that she knew so well.

Who? WHO?? And we were just told that it was freezing, of course the gate was like ice on her fingers. But WHO?? Is it Chalice? Collins Glass? Ben Stein?

Finally. No really, I mean it this time. Finally.

Chalice heeled Sunny down the cool, dark road.

Yay! Chalice is here but what the fucks does that sentence mean?

Up next is paragraph after paragraph of explication and info-dumping and world-building. Ah, world-building. The great mark of many a failed novelist. I know a guy who’s been working on a fantasy novel for seven years because he “keeps getting stuck world-building”.

Man, you should see the paragraphS (THAT’S PLURAL) that describe how beautiful Chalice is. She has golden, butternut curls. More redundancy? I’ll TAKE it. A red, rosebud mouth. A button nose. Those are the best kind of noses, we ALL know that. Large sapphire eyes, straight out of an anime. In the words of Adam Sandler from the infamous Zagat’s sketch on Saturday Night Live: DEAR GOD, PLEASE KILL ME NOW.

RIP Chris Farley. You are sorely missed, good sir.

Am I still in the prologue? This is the longest Amazon preview yet. Is this how my blog will go? Get halfway through the preview and give up because it’s so pointless and bad? I feel like I’m dying here but I won’t give up. I CAN’T give up. I’m doing this for the greater good. Which brings me to part two.

Part Two:

Melissa Douthit here runs a website of her own. It’s about something called “Goodreads bullies”. It can be found here: http://www.myvaginaneedsagoodpounding.com. Anycunt, back to these “bullies”. If I’ve learned anything in my Epic Journey as a blogger, it’s that I’m not alone. I didn’t want to start this blog for the longest time because I didn’t want to be one lone writer complaining about something that might not have been a big deal. But it is a big deal. Bad writing is the very bane of my existence.

It seems like self-publishers and indie writers are somehow immune to criticism. They’re showing it to the man, aren’t they? DIYing it until the industry collapses under their wordy weight. Don’t criticize THEIR work, save it for the mainstreamers. You’re just bullying them. You’re just mean. You’re just jealous. HA.

Have you heard of sock puppet reviews? These are fake rave reviews by shitty authors to boost their ranking or to boost sales. This is a much bigger detriment to writing than “bullies” like me. I’m being honest here, and if I want to have a laugh while I’m at it, guess what? I’m gonna make fun of the author too. It’s my job. We’ve raised a generation of pussies. Every time I turn around, someone’s crying “not fair!” or “stop the bullying!” or someone’s apologizing. I’ve had enough. I don’t give a shits about political correctness or operating under a “thumper policy”, i.e. only writing good reviews.

I’m tired of this generation thinking they’re somehow more special than everyone else and that all of a sudden, we need to stop doing things we’ve done all our lives because it might hurt someone’s feelings. “Stop the Goodreads Bullies” is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard of. Huffington Post even did an article on it. This is what the French call “Le siiiiiiiiiiiigh”.

I marvel at all of the hate-mail I’ve received. All of the forums I’ve been banned from. All of my posts that have been deleted. All of the angry tweets I’ve been sent. I’m not gonna stop. Especially not now that I see how much writers need me, need my criticism. Especially not now that I see how much I’m already hated. I love the opposition. If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the fucking business.

Now, If anyone needs me, I’ll be posting this review on Goodreads.

Broken Piano For President

http://www.amazon.com/Broken-Piano-President-Patrick-Wensink/dp/1621050203

Don’t you hate it when authors write their own product description and use phrases like “a comic masterpiece” or they compare themselves to whatever author they’d read before working on their novel? I know I do. Mr. Reznor does it here to great aplomb. Wait, I meant Mr. Wensink. Sorry, I thought he was the guy from NIN. Just like I thought his novel was a bottle of Jack Daniels. Color me dying for a drink of whiskey. Especially after reading this Amazon preview.

It’s every indie author’s dream, innit? For something they write to go viral, as John Rzeznik from the Goo Goo Dolls’ novel did. Ah, did it again. Patrick Wensink. Him. He’s the guy who received the “World’s Nicest Cease and Desist” from Jack Daniels (it says so in bold letters right at the beginning of the product description) because the cover to his novel too closely resembled their frankly mediocre whiskey. Said novel, Broken Dreams For Breakfast, would have otherwise been just another unremarkable small press waste of time. Anyway, if your crappy little indie novel goes viral somehow, your book sales will skyrocket into the triple digits instead of the fifty or so you sell to your family, friends, and whoever is on that forum you post in. But they’ll buy anything.

Broken Condom For Prom Night isn’t exactly a bad book, it’s just not very good either. At all. There’s another thing it’s not, and that’s funny. But blogger, you may say, what about all of the reviews and blurbs purporting it to be “A laugh out loud, thought-provoking novel.” or “Like Christopher Moore on very strong acid.  In Broken Piano For President, he’s created a Pynchonesque universe…A rollicking good time of a novel.”? Well, dear reader, they’re “lying”. Then there are five star reviews from people named Pterodactyl Samurai or Sir Ethan of Potatolamp, who are obviously his absurdist bizarro buddies. Damn you, bizarro, you’re a subgenre I’ll get to another time.

I think Broken Nose For Rihanna is about this guy who gets blackout drunk (LOL) and creates revolutionary, groundbreaking cheeseburgers and now the fast-food mafia is after him or something. Ah the fast-food mafia, arch-rivals of the Amish mafia. The novel starts off talking to us, the readers, which I suppose should be clever but it’s not. It’s annoying and kind of a filler. In fact, this book is full of fillers. Did I mention it’s nearly 400 pages long? Anyhonk, the book moves on to chapter two (I think it’s chapter two) and we’re still not done being spoken to by the novel. Apparently we’re hungover, which is why we chose to read a FOUR HUNDRED PAGE LONG “comedic” novel.

Next we finally meet Deshler Dean, a truly original archetype in modern literature. He drinks a lot (absurd!), he’s a smart-ass (truly avant-garde), and he woke up next to a corpse (never heard that one before, said no detective novelist ever). There are some strange turns of phrase and some perplexing metaphors here. Christ, can there be a college class specifically to teach metaphors and similes? They’re all so bad and nobody knows how to write them.

“That thin sheet of ice gets watery at the edges, white crystals evolving to something invisible.”

Like what? Everything that’s invisible looks like everything else that’s invisible. It looks INVISIBLE.

“frisking his zipper”

I don’t know what that is and I don’t want to find out.

“He rubs both eyes like a mirage, but this isn’t the desert.” 

I’m not a writer, but I play one on Amazon.

“The drums are roadside bombs and the guitar squeals like 747 tires touching down.”

Does anyone else hate themselves yet? Remember, this goes on for FOUR HUNDRED PAGES. I hope somewhere in all of those pages, humor makes an appearance. I certainly don’t see any in the preview and I’ll apologize on the author’s behalf if you actually bought the entire book.

Inbetwixt all of those metaphors and similes are equally mind-grinding descriptions of Dean being hungover, obviously written by someone who’s never been TRULY hungover. Or never been TRULY a writer. Author Pete Wentz has accomplished quite a feat in writing several novels though, something most indie authors can’t claim. So I’ll give him credit for that one. Ah! Sorry, that’s the hot one from Fallout Boy, not Mr. Wensink, who wrote this book.

How about some more strange descriptions and shitty metaphors? YOU GOT IT, DUDE.

“Our hero is a sliver of gristle and a mushroom cloud of hair.”

I’m sorry, what? Is that a physical description? What is a “mushroom cloud of hair”?

“Dollar beers are how people wake up next to dead people.”

Yeah, maybe if you live in West Virginia or Missouri or something. But that might have been a joke? I don’t get it.  Anybody?

“Dean’s teeth attack his fingernails.”

You know, sometimes it’s okay to just write what someone’s doing. Every sentence doesn’t have to be clever and original. “Dean bites at his nails” would have been more effective and less pretentious.

Then guess what? The dead woman next to Dean isn’t actually dead. I think. The author switches to someone named Henry next, who hopefully is funny. Hold on, I’ll check for you. Nope, not funny. He just wanders around a room or something, excruciatingly describing everything in a strange and shitty way, much like the first of the book. But his cheeks glow like jellybeans, apparently. Aw, how cute. Jellybeans. This is what I mean when I say there should be a college course specifically about writing metaphors. There has to be one. Please let there be one. Otherwise this will NEVER end.

“Once a bun, always a bun.”

Truer words have never been spoken.

Henry kills this burger baron he was interviewing with and then things get truly kooky. A burger baron being assassinated?? But why, that’s so silly! Also, Henry is disgusting and needs a shower. I think?

Then we’re back to Dean dealing with the dead woman who’s not dead anymore. This is a device that could have been hilarious, if it were in the hands of a more deft writer like Christopher Moore or Pynchon. Instead it’s written away by pretentious metaphors and lengthy, daunting descriptions that only serve to show off Herzog’s immeasurable talent. Silly me, I meant to say Wensick. Wensink. I give up.

Look, I think you get the point here. There are too many characters and too many things going on for one author to handle. This draining prose goes on in Amazon’s preview for page after page (it’s a long preview, I couldn’t get through it) and then it goes on even longer if you purchased the whole book. I really hope you didn’t. I know this book shot to the top of Amazon because of a little bit of press but that doesn’t mean it’s worth reading. Do yourself a favor and buy yourself some Maker’s Mark instead. Get it? Maker’s Mark is symbolic of a better novel. Because of the original cover to the book? Get it? The cover Jack Daniels politely didn’t like? HAhahahahahahahhaha……

Gateway: A Story About Chaotic Harmony

Look! You don’t even have to read the book to know how bad the writing is. Just have a look-see at his self-written bio. I’ve emboldened the choice bits.

Throughout my life I’ve had a passion for writing stories. Writing stories from my imagination and letting my words flow through my hand on a blank sheet of paper let me create my own worlds. In 2007 I attended a fiction class at the University of Missouri. Most of the people in my class were only worried about their grades and weren’t passionate about writing. My teacher quickly saw that I stood out from the class after reading a story I wrote called ‘Chemicals’, the story of a lost boy in a lost generation. The fiction teacher helped me pursue my talent and arranged for me to take a couple honors classes at the Pierre Laclede Honors College at UMSL. The classes I took in the honors school pushed me to create new stories each week, and also gave me the chance to read other students stories and critique their work. I loved having my writings critiqued each week; it helped me grow as a writer. There was always this calling in my heart to show my stories I created to the world. The concept of writing a book seemed impossible; I was always unmotivated by the negativity around me. When I’d tell people I was writing a book they didn’t take me seriously or they figured it’d never amount to anything. I loved writing stories and creating new worlds; it was my escape from my day to day life. Even with the world around me telling me the book would go nowhere; I continued my journey and finished Gateway. Everyone has a dream of where they want their life to take them; my dream is to become a successful author.

Your best bet is to go back to sleep, Mr. Erlichson. Or go back to your day job stocking shelves at Wal-mart. Just kidding, I’ve never been in a Wal-mart.

Did you zone out after the first “couple sentences”? I know I did. Good God, reading that was worse than hearing him speak. You know that episode of The Office where Michael imitates Toby? That’s what Joel sounds like. This sharp young talent was featured on MTV’s True Life in an episode titled “I’m Working With My zzzzzzzzzzzzzz”. To be honest, the only reason I watched the episode was for Joel, a brain-dead, emotionless Aspergers victim. Are they “victims”? Aspergers folks?

Anywhat, I just wanted to see more of Joel pushing his little novel here. He first somehow convinced his relatively attractive ex girlfriend to go out with him in the first place. Then he somehow convinced her to help him self-publish something that reads like his high school journal. Take a look at the cover. Really look at it, I’ll wait.

All I want to know is, me-OW, who’s the model on the cover? It’s definitely not our Joel. But onto his chaotic, harmonic…stuff.

The first mistake is switching from past tense to present tense for no real reason at all except that in the first paragraph, our intriguing protagonist must vaguely describe himself as douchey and built. He really uses the word “built” too. That’s all we get, he’s a built wanker with gauges in his ears like that asshole who lives upstairs from me and plays guitar on the balcony at 3am.

Then he’s got a bag of blow. Blow blow blow. There are other words for cocaine, Mr. Elrichson. Well, he thought it might be meth but to his understanding, it’s BLOW.

Are you a writer yourself, dear reader? Is your story not interesting enough? Well have I got a solution for you. Put some drugs in your story. You’ll be amazed at the level of intrigue this will add to your tale. But wait, there’s zzzzzzzzzzzz

Next, our narrator (let’s call him “Joem”) is going to a birthday dinner at Olive Garden. Olive Garden. But Joem first has to overcome his first obstacle in Gateway: A Story About Chaotic Harmony: should he do some BLOW first? He struggles with this for about a second, then the BLOW enters his nasal passage “like a fresh gust of air”. Ah yes, that’s EXACTLY what diesel fuel/baby laxative-cut cocaine feels like entering the sensitive cavity of your nostril. Fresh air.

Then his heart “begins to echo”. Here’s what it sounds like: “Thump thump thump!”

“Thump thump thump!” his heart echoes.

“Thump thump thump!” his heart screams.

Then Joem the Douche sits and pouts at Olive Garden because his dad always has to be on time. This just RUINS Joem’s birthday dinner at Olive Garden. They didn’t even sing to him!

“Thump thump thump!”

Is there and echo in here?

Finally, Joem gets home and gets to do more BLOW. This time it enters his nose with an adrenaline push that opens “the world of rush” into his veins. Now we meet “Lex”, Joem’s gay pornstar boyfriend or something, I wasn’t really reading. But Joem’s body screams “more more more!” and his heart echoes “thump thump thump!” and they do some more BLOW.

“NOW ENTERING A WORLD OF RUSH!”

Then there’s a guy named Bruiser. Some more BLOW. Something about a community college. Lex sips vodka and cranberry and misses being young.

Good God. Joem’s heart echoes some more and everyone speaks to each other using exclamation points! Like this one! And this one!

Let’s not forget the dialogue like “WHERE ARE THE FUCKING GOODS?!?” or “Shut the fuck up holmes! I’ll cut your fucking eyes out and you won’t see shit again if you say another fucking word I didn’t ask you to speak!” but the thing is, that line was spoken by Joem, WHO HAD JUST ASKED HIM A QUESTION.

“HA HA HA!” we laugh hard.

So finally our intriguing protagonist meets a girl. They watched a movie but lost track of the plot because they were talking to each other. I’m betting Joem was doing all of the talking though, because WAPNER IN THIRTY MINUTES!

Joem was wearing a shirt with a funky design and funky writing on it (I have one of those!) and his future rape victim “starred” at it with her neck “perked”. Then they made out but “it never lead to anything more”. Ooga booga. Joem wants to take it slow and just do some BLOW.

I could make all of this criticism constructive and show Joel Elrichson how to improve on his craft but I think a better option for him is to give up on “that whole writing thing” and focus on being a reality TV star instead. Then he can do all of the BLOW he wants to do.