The End of the Page

36 for 36: A New List For A New Year

Admittedly, this is not my cat, but I have four at home and all of them would do this in a heartbeat.

Years ago a friend of mine told me about a productivity experiment. It is kind of like a “bucket list” except you don’t wait until you find out you’re going to die to write it up and you make one every year for the coming year starting on your birthday. The number of items on the list are equal to your new age. Yes, this means the list will get longer and longer each year, but the complexity and cost of each item on the list is totally up to you. You could decide to add one saying: “#5 – Walk more” or “#15 – Watch less TV” or “#34 – Dream about ponies” (how you control that last one is a mystery).

I’ve done this for a few years now with varying levels of success. My first year I made it through every item on my list, but this past year I fell a little bit off track. Numerous things along the way took charge of where my focus needed to be and it was all good things, but I ended with only 12 out of 35 from my list completed. I could start this year with a completely fresh list, but I decided to look over those unfinished items and decide which of those I wanted to keep shooting or as is or maybe adapt them a little to change them towards my current tastes.

Here’s what I was able to knock off the list last year:

• Write new TV spec script (will be submitting this next year)
• Catch one show at the Pantages (saw Avenue Q, fantastic show!)
• Book one writing assignment (landed one coverage gig, not quite what I was hoping for, but it technically counted since it was a paycheck)
• Go on two legit hikes (sore legs after each prove either they were legit or I am still really out of shape)
• Get iron/steamer (sounds silly but you’d be amazed how easy it is to forget how handy those are when you don’t have one)
• Consolidate wardrobe (it was just time to toss out all those button down shirts I no longer wore and various other pieces that haven’t come out of the darkness in years)
• Job front: Move up or move on (this was a strong desire of mine, but ended up being taken care of by my contract ending anyway)
• Don’t drink for one year (other than my wedding weekend, which I gave myself a personal furlough, I accomplished this task)
• Donate bone marrow (adapted this one slightly to “Register for Be The Match, bone marrow donation registry”, which is something everyone should do)
• Increase blog to 300 daily visits on average (a couple strong days helped this average and also counting from a very specific stat engine, but it was the same one I based the number off when I wrote the task, so it evens out)
• Finish reading 24 books (I’ll add the list of books at the end, for those voracious readers out there)
• Get dining room table (although this one was accomplished, we ended up not liking it as much and will be getting a new one in the new house. Still counts though.)

So that was the finished items off the old list. Here is the new list ready and set to go on 12/12 (that would be my birthday, for any exceedingly generous readers out there):

1) Exercise more (even as vague as this is, I still didn’t get it done last year, so laaaaazzzzzyyyyy)

2) Submit/self-publish first novel (I was hoping to get this done last year as well. I just need one more spit polish on it and I think we are ready to go.)

3) Bring more writers to The End of the Page (any budding, opinionated writers out there want to contribute? Leave a comment below or write me directly through the contact page.)

4) Get new tattoo (I just got the design in from my good buddy Brandon, so this will be happening in the near future)

5) Perfect one dish to cook (started this last year, my dish is Chicken Tikka Masala. I made it once so far, came out really well, but far from perfection, more attempts this year)

6) Go on cruise (happily this might coincide with long awaited honeymoon plans)

7) Establish better writing habit (all writers need one, I am in need even more so because I have so many damn projects)

8 ) Enroll in Yoga class (been wanting to do this for a long time. Going to wait until we are settled in the new house and see what classes are in the area.)

9) Send out more than 56 Thank You notes (I read an article about a guy who sent out one Thank You note to random people who affected his life each day for a full year. I tried to replicate this, but fell far short. So instead of jumping right back to the full 365, I just want to beat my total for last year)

10) Bring more books down from WA (I have a ton of books stored at my Uncle’s in WA and I really want my library to be fully together. Plus, he’s been wanting those gone for a long time too.)

11) Finish graphic novel issue #2 (yet another writing project in stasis that needs to be resurrected. It’s got alien ninjas y’all!!!)

12) Try surfing (for those who know me well, this will likely kill me, rendering the rest of the list sort of moot)

13) Go to Big Sur (everyone who’s ever been there swears it is one of the most beautiful places in the state, if not beyond. Gotta go.)

14) Donate blood (Actually, I will need to get this done before the tattoo is done, since they ban you for a year or two after getting one)

15) Take train trip to Santa Barbara Zoo (my wife has done this before and it just sounds neat)

16) Write one spoken word piece (I used to perform spoken word and there is a part of writer’s brain still clamoring for it)

17) Take another class (took a one-day cake baking class a few months ago, had tons of fun. I never want to stop learning new things.)

18) Get AT&T credit card under $3000 (could’ve done this in the past year, but all the money got pooled together to get home loan)

19) Reach 12 new states on my donation map (I have a world map and an United States map on my wall which I mark with small colored stickers for each place I donated to a local or focused charity. My goal is to reach the entire world someday. Just started this last year and I have 7 states and 5 countries so far. Tons to go.)

20) Try sculpting (no promises this will be anything more than a swirly mound of clay when it’s finished, but I’ve always wanted to try)

21) Begin learning to play my guitar (I’ve had an electric guitar for years, but never learned to play it. Need to look for a class this year to get me going on it.)

22) Go on one road trip (this is not counting the trip to Big Sur)

23) Put together book of paintings (I am also a painter and I want to collate a small book of what I have so far)

24) Try five new vegetables (if the surfing doesn’t kill me, this surely will)

25) Read 24 new books (had fun with this last year, kept me focused on always having a book going. Recommendations anyone?)

26) Conduct two interviews for the blog (done one so far, although I am still transcribing, which is a real time suck by yourself)

27) Find writer’s group – online or in person (should help with getting that writing habit nailed down as well, if you have any suggestions of good groups, please send along!)

28) Re-energize date night tradition (with all the other stuff I try to keep going in my creative life, I need to make sure I focus as well on my home life and married life)

29) Take part in 2012 Obama campaign (even though his first term has been far from perfect, I think he’s done better than most people think and is surely a better choice than the other options)

30) Retry 365 photo experiment (one photo a day for a year, it creates a really cool visual calendar of your past, I just didn’t keep up with it last year. I just got the iPhone 4S, so the improved camera on that will make this much easier.)

31) Get at least one paid writing opportunity (worked last year, hopefully that will work again. Wanna hire me?)

32) Open CafePress-type store for art/writing inspired items (anyone know of a better online store to use than CafePress?)

33) Go on three legit hikes (adding one to the total from last year)

34) Pick archery back up (use to go to the range twice a week, have my own Olympic bow and nice set of arrows, need to pick up the hobby again)

35) Reach bowling score of over 200 (my personal best is 187, not too far to go)

36) Spend more time with friends (like the one about date night, need to remember to focus on the social life as well, hopefully many of these can also be done with my friends, maybe they will want to work on their own lists!)

So there you have it. My next twelve months of goals. If this has inspired you to create your own list or you are already a practitioner of this nifty listing hobby, feel free to share yours here.

For those curious about the 24 books from this year, here they are:

Love is a Mixtape by Rob Sheffield

Everyone Loves You When You’re Dead by Neil Strauss

A People’s History of the United States by Howard Zinn

The Man Who Loved Books Too Much by Allison Hoover Bartlett

Full Dark – No Stars by Stephen King

The Forgery of Venus by Michael Gruber

Let Me In by John Ajvide Lindqvist

C Street: The Fundamentalist Threat to American Democracy by Jeff Sharlet

Dispatches from the Edge by Anderson Cooper

You Can Heal Your Life by Louise L. Hay

Angel River Falls by Thomas A. Morgan

Bossypants by Tina Fey

Empire of Illusion by Chris Hedges

The Mark by Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins

The Fear by Peter Godwin

Damned by Chuck Palahniuk

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

Chasing Fire by Suzanne Collins

Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins

Nightwatch by Sergei Lukyanenko

Hunter: The Strange and Savage Life of Hunter S. Thompson by E. Jean Carroll

Three Men in a Boat by Jerome K. Jerome

The 101 Most Influential People Who Never Lived by Allan Lazar, Dan Karlan & Jeremy Salter

Charlie Wilson’s War by George Crile

The Fear: Riveting, Eye-Opening and Terrifying Abuses of Power

by Luke Goldstein

Rating: 9 out of 10

Every day when we wake up, we quickly take stock of our surroundings. Is light pouring through cracks in the bedroom curtains? Where is the end of the bed, so I don’t bang my foot against it in the dark again? How long do I have to snooze before I absolutely must get ready for work? These are the types of questions that plague many people each morning. Yet for others, those unlucky enough to be living under the rule of a corrupted and violent government, the only question each morning is more like, “Will I live to see another day?” History has shown many times before how the oppressed can quickly become the oppressor once power sinks its claws in and Zimbabwe, under the rule of President Robert Mugabe, now stands at the pinnacle, waving a flag boasting leadership and unity on one side, but the other a desperate cry for help. Which one will the world respond to?

The Fear: Robert Mugabe and the Martyrdom of Zimbabwe is a harrowing travelogue by Peter Godwin, detailing his trip back to his homeland after an election, which should have ousted their despotic leader, but instead unleashed a paranoid and chaotic fury unlike anything seen before. Peter moves in and out of danger, trying to document as clearly as he can the abuses and tragedies inflicted upon the people who dared to challenge the status quo and spoke their mind in this fledgling democracy.

The set up to this barbarism was a recent national election for Zimbabwe in 2008, where Robert Mugabe, the country’s longtime president, lost to Morgan Tsvangirai in bogus political theater gone wrong (or right, depending on which side you were on). Mugabe and all of his generals had the opportunity to walk away with plumped up golden parachutes and immunity from any number of crimes they committed during his reign. Instead, the madman showed his true colors, not the green, yellow, red and black stripes of their flag, but rather the green of greed and the red of rage towards those who voted against him. With the assistance of his generals, already hardened by previous extreme civil wars, and brutal war veterans who saw Mugabe as the savior and bringer of their true freedom, he set about intimidating, torturing and killing anyone who spoke out against his legitimacy as the one true ruler.  Untold numbers have already died in the struggle for true democracy there and even more are living with the physical and mental scarring left behind by roving gangs of power-hungry war vets and brainwashed youth who have been taught torture and death dealing as a civil trade.

Godwin does an amazing job detailing out these horrors, while posting them up against the background of the natural beauty and serenity Zimbabwe can hold underneath. The country, itself awash with the blood of wars between the tribes and now overflowing once again with the bodies of its people, still manages to capture a sense of timelessness and purity in their countryside and jungles. Godwin tries to show that side of his home and prove that keeping those people and their traditions alive, outside the despotism of Mugabe, is truly something worth fighting for, possibly dying for.

The examples and scenarios of intimidation and murder unleashed by Mugabe go far beyond the pale of human rights abuses, causing the international community to balk at recognizing him as the true leader. The opposing party (known as the MDC) has refused to give up and endured years of assassinations and trumped up prison stays in conditions rivaling those in medieval times. Today, you will find a GNU (Government of National Unity) set up in Zimbabwe consisting of members of Mugabe’s cabinet and those of the MDC, but Godwin pulls back the sheen of stability to show the fallacy of this tenuous brotherhood of man. Heads of the opposition only agreed to stop the continued bloodshed and in hopes of staving off outright civil war, but with a new election coming around the bend, people are once again worried they will be targeted for their votes. Towns loyal to the MDC fear they will once again be burned, looted, pillaged and their women raped by roving gangs of Mugabe conscripts.

The Fear was the nickname given by the people to the blanket of intimidation laid over the country by Mugabe and the book reads like something from hundreds of years ago when countries were conquered and re-settled by vicious landlords. Yet, when you let it sink in that these horrible actions are being carried out even to this very day, it chills even the most disconnected reader. It is an eye-opening look into a world many of us would never know, or care to know, exists, but once you see it, you will not be able to look away.  For those who do read the book and want to help the cause, there are various ways listed out on Godwin’s website.

The End of the Page recommendation: The Fear strikes deep with painfully detailed examples.

Everyone Loves You When You’re Dead: Proof Positive, Strauss is King

by Luke Goldstein

Sir, this newspaper looks awfully like a book. What? You mean…Sorry, didn’t realize people still made non e-books.

Rating: 10 out of 10

Every now and again, if you’re lucky, you come across a piece of craftsmanship that lays it all out for you. For architects, it might be walking up to an old gothic cathedral and watching the lines and foundations intersect. For musicians, it might be hearing a song which stirs their hearts, feeling the melodies and meaning intertwine like strands of DNA. For people like me, the writers, it means laying your hands on a book which illustrates so clearly not only the beauty of words, but also how those words can be used to change people. That rush only gets better if those words are pouring forth from a career on a rise to not just stardom, but mythic status. This writer, this moment — this is something to be treasured.

Everyone Loves You When You’re Dead is the latest in a growing list of “must read” books by Neil Strauss. This new tome is a culmination of years of interviews and all those magical moments that fell on the cutting room floor by way of verbal economy, relevance to the time, or the most egregious of reasons, editorial choice by the publisher. These snippets are peephole windows into the real people behind the fame and fortune, showing in possibly the truest form ever that celebrities are indeed normal people too, dealing with the same insecurities and same life choices as we do. That doesn’t mean they are all good people under the glitter, some are just as vain and superficial as we imagine, but at least we can now be sure they aren’t faking that for the creation of their persona.

The cast of characters span the celebrity horizon like a multi-billion dollar rainbow. Everyone is here and no one is spared from the charm and familiarity that Strauss brings into every interview. Snoop Dogg takes him along to get diapers for his kid, Lady Gaga goes to tears by her first question and Jewel snuggles up under the covers like it’s a high school slumber party.  This book is filled with astounding moments of clarity from the people who spend most of their days hidden behind a persona, whether it be one of hard-edged aggression (like Marilyn Manson and Slipknot) or unstoppable humor (like Jay Leno or Stephen Colbert). Strauss shows in interview after interview his style of getting the subjects to relax, let down their guard and basically not feel like subjects. From reading these passages you not only learn some amazing factoids about these people, but you can also glean how to interact better with others in your own lives, with a sense of honesty and compassion.

As he did before in The Game and Emergency, Strauss has immersed himself over a period of time into a whole different world and come back with a roadmap to the reality he discovered. His choice of questions and how he allows himself to become part of the moment instead of just someone observing from the outside gives him the access and ability to truly describe and detail where these people are coming from. They are not just subjects or an assignment (although you can tell some he was more personally excited about than others). He gives each interview weight, respect and a sense of purpose often missed by the supermarket tabloid phenomena. You get the distinct impression that each person at one point or another looks over at him and thinks with internal surprise and joy, “Wow, no one has ever asked me that before!” So they get to tell their story in a fresh way and not sound like a broken record on yet another press tour, while we the reader get to see a little more deeply into the lives of these people who inspire, excite and often openly confuse us.

The End of the Page recommendation: Everyone Loves You When You’re Dead is a fantastic read. A true must have for fans of all forms of entertainment and good writing.

What do you think? Fans of Neil Strauss?

 

Dispatches From The Edge: The Silver Fox Sadly Shines

by Luke Goldstein

The guy behind me is staring at me, right? I totally feel it.

Rating: 9 out of 10

It is expected now for any member of the political beltway or those who report on it (and other daily news events) to grace the shelves of our local bookstores (or the front page of our eBook apps) with a tell-all/biography/memoir. Most are pushed on them by overzealous managers and agents trying desperately to cash in on their popularity with various demographics, but every now and again one journal will come to fruition from a much more real and meaningful purpose.

Dispatches From The Edge: A Memoir of War, Disaster, and Survival is a touching remembrance from CNN superstar Anderson Cooper. Covering portions of his childhood and the darker moments of his youth, it also details heart-wrenching details of his reporting on Hurricane Katrina and the wars in the Middle East. Filled with honest and frank recollections from not only the front lines of some of our most recent calamities, Cooper also pushes his investigations internally to find out what drives him to consistently drop himself into some of the worst places on Earth.

The first thing that grabbed me about this book was the random similarities I didn’t expect to share with Anderson Cooper. His father passed away when he was ten years old, mine when I was five. It had a dramatic effect on each of our lives. He mentions his inability to fully process the emotional impact of that event, and the later suicide of his older brother, as key reasons for his apparent addiction to placing himself in the literal and psychological cross-hairs of the worst spots in the world.

Some of the most interesting parts, including those about his personal life, are when Cooper reveals many of the things he saw that never made the news, things deemed unworthy of CNN coverage. One scene talks about when he was in the Middle East passing out over 200 gallons of water to locals with the help of our armed forces. No one died that day, no IEDs went off, so no one ever heard about it. Cooper sadly admits the old adage that still holds sway over all news coverage, “If it bleeds, it leads.” Another story mentions gruesome and horrific details about the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. The utter lawlessness committed not only by the locals taking advantage of the chaos, but law enforcement personnel who devolved just as much into primitive gangs of roving warlords. Some of those stories were snuffed out early on because it was deemed too dangerous in risking a possible backlash against all authority, which very well could have happened, but it doesn’t make the reality of it any easier to swallow.

Cooper also eloquently covers his tenuous balancing act between being an unbiased reporter and an opinionated celebrity. Once he made it out the other end of some incredibly dangerous job hunting tactics, landing in the spotlight of CNN forever altered his ability to reach millions of people and also his struggle to keep his sanity. He now was given access to people and events ranging from awe-inspiring to nightmare-inducing. With great skill and strain he has always come from those places knowing he had to wrap those images into a coherent story meant to inform, educate and enhance the world discussion. The Achilles heel for any reporter is to somehow deliver that information without bias and political overtones, which Cooper has managed to do time and time again, making him one of the most respected in the business.

In the last couple of years, Cooper has begun to step out of the middle ground and reposition himself as a true fact finder in a much more aggressive sense. Under the moniker, “Keeping Them Honest”, Cooper began bringing on politicians and other notable news makers when he felt something they were preaching about was demonstrably false. No longer fulfilled by calmly reporting the facts to his audience, Cooper decided to drive the falsehoods out into the light during live interviews. The only down side is if he brings on someone from the right side of the political spectrum and corrects them, Cooper becomes labeled a liberal activist, and if the guest is more left leaning, Cooper becomes labeled a political tool for the right. It seems like a no-win situation for him, but he is taking it in stride, sticking to what he believes is meaningful for people to know and that is what keeps him cemented as one of the best in the industry. Dispatches tries to ride that thin line as well, pointing out the inequities in the reporting that most of the country saw, while not coming down as an outright attack on the media as a whole.

The End of the Page recommendation: Dispatches From The Edge is a harrowing and heartfelt look in front and behind the lens of one of the most notable newsmen in the business, Anderson Cooper.

Kickstart the Future with Prison Break 2438

Just wait until I draw in the thought bubbles. It’ll blow your mind.

For those of you unacquainted with fundraising and self-publishing your own projects, there are a few amazing websites out there which lend a helping hand in organizing and evangelizing your future piece of awesomeness. Kickstarter is one of those where you can list a project and create donation tiers, teasing out bigger and better prizes for people who donate more and more green to the project. There is a wealth of these needy creative ventures out there and for anyone with a few disposable bucks and a desire to feel like you have truly helped the world become more interesting and imaginative, please dive deep into this site at your absolute soonest. Here, I’ll even point you toward one worthy project right now…

Prison Break 2438

In a bleak futuristic world, in which the United States of America has split into multiple countries, a small band of civil rights revolutionaries must save their leader from the clutches of an evil government.

The manuscript has been written, rewritten and rewritten some more and the authors have now connected with renowned Darkhorse Comics and DC Comics veteran artist Brian Ewing for the soon-to-be-impressive cover artwork.

Lend a hand to help another piece of imagination get out there into the hands of readers everywhere. Who knows, if you donate enough, you could even get yourself free copies of the book, maybe even the original cover art itself! Check it out.

Love is a Mix Tape: Musically Powered Prose

What do you mean, “What is a mix tape?” I feel old.

Rating: 10 out of 10

Memoirs are dangerous and tricky things. They can be selfless and selfish at the same time, an expulsion of emotion and memory that you just needed to get out for your own sanity, while simultaneously inviting everyone through the door, basically begging them to ask for even more probing details than those laid out in the book. A common problem that arises in the development of a memoir is that you have to come off as someone interesting enough to read about, while still remaining human and humble enough that people don’t hate you for having an actual book written about your life. It’s an ambitious undertaking, but as Matthew Good points out so eloquently in his song 21st Century Living:

Ambition, ambition’s a tricky thing
It’s like riding a unicycle on a dental floss tightrope over a wilderness of razor blades (Matthew Good – Avalanche)

How much do you give of yourself before turning back from that line in the sand? How far do you walk away from the past to allow yourself to put it all down on paper, leaving others a breadcrumb path to wander back into those days gone by? Most importantly, how do you wrap it all up into a package interesting enough to make others want to ignore their own lives, step out of their shoes and walk a few hundred pages in yours? All of those questions and more plague the writer of a memoir, but now and again one finds the right combination, or in this case, the right mix, and everything flows in and out with the regularity and rhythm of the tides. It becomes relaxing and thoughtful, peaceful and terrifying, ever-changing yet always familiar. These are the ones that you read and somehow feel we all lived in our own way.

Love is a Mix Tape by Rob Sheffield is a musically charged farewell letter to a person we’ve all met at some point in our lives. The one who in normal circumstances we would never have the courage to talk to because the worlds were too far apart, but whether through cosmic destiny or the luck of the draw, that person enters your life and ignites the change you always knew would come. The book follows his relationship with his wife Renee and carves out each section in relation to a mix tape made during those cherished moments in history. This harmonic trip into Rob’s life also reminds us of the true power of music, the passion it can instill, the sorrow it can unfold and the memories it can unearth.

I saw this book a long time ago at the store and was instantly drawn to it because I was in the middle of writing my own memoir. My main reason for not reading it back then was I could already tell it was done well and something I would feverishly enjoy, but I didn’t want to consciously or subconsciously rip-off any of Rob’s devices, so I left it lying on the bookstore display table and hid it away on the shelf in the back of my mind. Years later, with my memoir wrapped up, destiny once again dropped this book in my path while trolling through Borders on the first day of their store closing sale (Everything Must Go!…and I want it all to go home with me.).

Any author of a memoir wants the reader to find something to identify with, one portion of their personality or circumstances that can draw the reader that much farther into their world. While I do enjoy my iPod injected rides to work in the morning, singing my way into the work day, hoping it will hold me through, I definitely do not identify with the level of knowledge or intensity Rob has for music (mine is more on the movie front). But as the pages turned and Rob begins to reveal his loss and how it was to walk through the fog of those weeks and months, the words spoke in an entirely new level of honesty and bravery. Anyone who has come through to the other side of a terrible tragedy will find portions of his story incredibly reminiscent of their own, although probably put in more colorful language and set to a better soundtrack.  Even those who might still be lost in the fog of sorrow would benefit from this tiny playlist of memories, almost an attempt at one person’s “Guide to Life after Life”. Die hard music fans, especially those who grew up in the angsty revolution of the 90′s, will constantly chuckle with recognition at each song listed out on the mix tape covers, but even those less musically inclined will find their heartstrings played beautifully by this story of rambunctious love and loss.

The End of the Page recommendation: Read Love is a Mix Tape to remind yourself there is music in everything, pleasure and pain, and to never tune it out.

p.s. Favorite line: “We were just a couple of fallen angels, rolling the dice of our lives.”

The Backlash: Beneath the Doom and Gloom Lies Money

Boo! Scared you, didn’t I? Now send me money and I’ll tell you how I can protect you from people like me.

Rating: 9 out of 10

There are many things that connect us all, no matter where we live, what color we are and which God we believe in. One of the deepest and most integral of those connections is fear. We all have it, whether it’s worrying about the spread of Communism, the shortage of scientific breakthroughs toward a cure for cancer, or maybe just late night jitters about the foul-smelling thing hiding underneath the bed. Most of it can be boiled down to a simple phrase, “fear of the other“. While some fears can be debated and argued as being justified, the underlying problem with fear is that once someone or something knows what your fear is, it can be used against you as a weapon. People throughout history have made their livelihoods based on that fact alone and it is on proud display here in the present day inside the formation of the Tea Party movement and the outlandish opposition to Barack Obama.

The Backlash by Will Bunch is a well thought out and deeply researched journey into the heart of the fear that sprung forth like snakes-in-a-can upon the inauguration of our new President. While many progressives and liberals clamor from the sideline, poking fun at the Tea Party and their growing membership, Bunch takes the honorable mission of tracing the movement to some of its more humble beginnings and the people actually at the ground level. What he discovers is real people with real fears who are being co-opted by big business and private interests in order to stop the change promised by the new administration.

One of the first things most people were introduced to when they saw the Tea Party crash onto the political scene was their fascination and fervor for protest signs and costumes. While this might have increased their news coverage, it also quickly devalued their message. From the subtle to the incredibly overt, racist slogans and imagery littered the reports of the fledgling movement giving an overall impression that everyone involved had the same color-coded mission, to purify the White House, and by extension, the country as a whole. On one side of the cable news spectrum (MSNBC, CNN, BBC, etc…) the Tea Party was characterized as rednecks that time had obviously left behind, while the other side (championed by Fox News) raised them onto the pedestal of patriots and grassroots revolution hailed as “real America”. The problem here is that neither description is true, but labels are sticky and even removed they can leave a nasty residue behind.

Another factor behind the proliferation of the “real America” illusion was those pundits and political commentators who saw the Tea Party as the lightning-in-a-bottle moment they were waiting for. Once they grabbed onto the coattails of fear inside the Tea Party, people such as radio/TV/internet phenom Glenn Beck wove those coattails around and around into each other until the fear escalated into paranoia, which in the ratings world is a wonderful thing. Beck had actually boiled it down to a simple equation, the bumper-sticker solution to all the fear in the country:

On his November 23, 2009 show, Beck went back again to the theme of a looming economic meltdown and recommended to his listeners what could just as well be a mantra of the right-wing movement in this new decade: “The 3 G system” of “God, Gold and Guns.”

Beck skyrocketed in popularity and influence, like many of the voices from the outer right-wing fringe, preying on the fears of people feeling like their country was forgetting about them. He wheeled out his chalkboard day after day, giving his viewers something familiar from their childhood, a symbol of learning which they all believed would never lie to them. Beck littered the surface of the chalkboard with various historical people and moments, drawing incredibly slippery and weak connections between them to prove any conspiracy theory he imagined that morning. Worse than that were those occasions where he blatantly misrepresented the views of historical figures to grant his own ideas more credence. Bunch illustrates that nicely in this section:

“Beck – and probably many of his listeners – would be turned off by many of the views of the real Thomas Paine. For one thing, while Beck has tried to argue that America’s true roots lie in Christianity, the real Thomas Paine was a Deist who loathed organized religion, writing in “The Age of Reason” that all churches “appear to me no other than human inventions, set up to terrify and enslave mankind, and monopolize power and profit.”

You can be sure that particular quote from Paine never graced the esteemed surface of Beck’s chalkboard.

This is the thrust of Bunch’s message, that much of the Tea Party is being towed along by puppeteers and plagiarizers, purposely mis-informing them to wean the money from their wallets and the devotion from their hearts. The fervent devotees of the Tea Party should not be written off as a joke, especially since some of them actually won seats in our government during the last election. They should be listened to, but filtered through a lens of mis-appropriated fear. If we do not try and understand where they are actually coming from, people like Beck and his cohorts will continue to wield them like a bludgeon against the wall of this country until its inevitable collapse.

The End of the Page recommendation: The Backlash by Will Bunch is a staggeringly human look into the real fear behind the so-called grassroots revolution of the Tea Party and how it has been co-opted, controlled and ultimately, how it will be condemned.

The Joke’s Over: A Savage Love Letter to a Friend

When not acting as a book cover, this image has a side job on anti-smoking campaigns.

Rating: 8 out of 10

In the world of fiction there exists a plethora of dynamic duos — Batman and Robin, Sherlock Holmes and Watson, Timmy and Lassie, but in the more narrowly focused world of quasi-real fact-bending narrative, there stands one couple towering over the masses, Hunter S. Thompson and Ralph Steadman. Originally just a marketing moment for one artist to help illustrate an article for a crazed, rebellious writer on the upswing, what sprung from the meeting of these two wild minds left an impression on the American literary landscape for generations to come. Millions have already turned the legendary pages of Mr. Thompson, while others have memorized the famous drug-catalog listing monologue from the opening of the film, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, based on Thompson’s most famous book of the same name. Yet, as with many famous duos, we are all used to hearing from the front man -Batman, Holmes, Timmy (Lassie was really never the big conversationalist), but now we get to see of those integral sidekicks step out into his own right and tell the world how things looked from his perspective, standing off to the right and half in the shadow of a highly intelligent, self-medicated madman.

The Joke’s Over is a vicious eulogy to a carnivorous collaboration of passion, friendship and art. Dangerous at best, suicidal at worst. Getting connected with Thompson, Steadman found himself plugged into a self-propelled generator of creative energy, one that would steamroll over most other people, but he held on, gnashed his teeth in and went for the ride. The partnership shuttled back and forth between being a connected pair of best friends attempting to take over the world to a pair of artistic geniuses desperately trying not to tear each other’s throats out. The ride through their friendship is terrifying, but the results they found are awe-inspiring.

When I first picked up the book I thought I was only in for more stories about Thompson’s eccentricities and crazy drug binges, albeit from a closer perspective, but what I got was only partially that. The unexpected side of the story is hearing about Thompson’s rage, paranoia and continued ability to try and destroy all the close relationships in his life. Being best friends with him is detailed out like a full-time job that only provides partial benefits, but when that one week of paid-vacation comes each year, it feels that much better due to the work you put in to get it. Steadman lists out numerous occasions when Thompson screamed at him, in person or via phone, fax and smoke signals, decrying proof he recently discovered showing that Steadman was only riding his coattails and subconsciously attempting to destroy the power of his literary ambrosia. But before you can feel our rage rising, decrying the treatment of someone who seems to be a soft-spoken, great friend, Steadman would share other messages, like olive branches across the deep, blue ocean that separated them:

[from Thompson to Steadman]

“…Keep in mind that I am always both ahead and behind you in the same moment (an eerie Truth that we both understood in our blood and which you have, in fact, explained more than once, in print…)”

As much as Steadman battled to understand and accept the tumultuous waves of their friendship, it seemed that Thompson himself struggled constantly not to burn the bridge that kept him connected to the real world and real people.

To be fair, even with the letters and reprinted faxes from Thompson, this is all from Steadman’s perspective and it is his autobiography about those infamous years. At times he paints himself the humble hero, while others creates a much sadder picture of an artist beat down and abused by his muse. Far from the wordsmith that Thompson was, a fact Thompson constantly reminded him of, the book is enjoyable, but suffers from subconscious reminders of a more powerful writer. For true worshippers of Steadman’s artwork, the book does raise its own value by detailing numerous other places beyond Thompson’s books where you can find his maddening and wild imagery (personally, I am looking into buying Steadman’s version of Alice in Wonderland. Now that should be a real trip down the rabbit hole.)

The End of the Page recommendation: An interesting look behind the scenes for the devoted followers of intangible excellence that sprang from Thompson and Steadman.

Crazy For God: More A Memoir For A Real Father, Not The Heavenly One

Isn’t it amazing how lifelike my new puppet looks?

Rating: 8 out of 10

One of our history’s most prized and famous sayings is, “You can’t judge a book by it’s cover.” It’s oft repeated because the truth in those words is evidenced nearly every day of our lives. Sometimes you get something far less than you hoped for, which is a unique and terrible type of disappointment. Yet, on luckier occasions, you just might find something unexpected and surprising under that front facing disguise. On the surface this book seems to be about the dangerous mix of politics and religion, coming from the viewpoint of  someone who was there in the beginning of this recent flare up of the religious right wing, but what you find in these pages is far less about politics and far more about family.

Crazy for God is a memoir by Frank Schaeffer, who grew up in a very conservative religious household, one that physically roamed throughout his childhood until they landed in their own commune for people to come and learn their holier-than-most viewpoints. What began as a evangelical camp for those looking to escape or rebound from the peace & love generation, Frank witnessed his parents become religious dignitaries at a level they never expected, causing internal strife  about what they wanted to be, healers and teachers, and what they had become, weapons.

Having an interest in politics and especially the dangerous mixing of that with religion, the title of this book grabbed me, but politics is merely the context for a much deeper story here, the one between Frank and his family. While finding himself imprinted with his parents views on God, the Bible and the true reason for living, Frank found himself at odds with himself. His internal voice did not match the outer voice he using to appease those around him. Eventually, as his parents find themselves in the middle of this religious revolution in politics, Frank breaks with the family’s creed and has to deal with the consequences.

While I was hoping for more insight into some of the backroom deals made to further the religious right and episodes of hypocrisy in the face of their proposed beliefs, what I got was a profile of a son watching his father lose himself in a movement far beyond his control. The memoir, while being from Frank’s perspective, is more about his father and the toll inflicted on him by the far-right conservative block he helped build with his teachings. It was almost ironic that it grew to something he couldn’t even recognize or control, because that seems to be the fate of almost all religions. I wonder day after day what the early prophets would think of the religions they helped start all those years ago.

In opposition to his father, Frank’s mother revels in the power and glory that the movement grows to and takes each and every chance to bask in the glory of the powerful people in her orbit. The relationship between his parents is another area where the story dives underneath the waves of religious fervor and shows the strain and tension wrought upon people when they are thrust from normalcy into celebrity. What they preach to their followers in the open air of their living room and lecture halls is utterly and totally tossed out the window behind closed doors. It became increasingly impossible for both parents to feel they were doing the right thing when the definition of that was in total contention.

Another chasm that opened widely between Frank’s father and the movement was his treatment of the gay lifestyle. He believed that you can be gay and still love God, but those that rose in the ranks of the religious right alongside him were aghast at the idea. Frank’s father relegated himself farther and farther away from the spotlight, which after many years had begun to burn. By this point Frank himself had turned against the teachings of his parents and while still having his own personal faith had come to the conclusion that his parents’ methods were far from anything he wanted to pass on.

The End of the Page Recommendation: In the end, Crazy for God will resonate less with the political and religious crowd and more with those who have ever had to break the tethers of their parents and blaze a trail in complete opposition to what they were brought up to believe.

Tell-All: A Twisted Hollywood Love Story

Each font you see here can be yours! Sold separately, of course, per letter.

Rating: 7 out of 10

There are a few authors in the world that cause me to make a goal of reading everything they put to paper, or whatever medium they choose. Stephen King, Mark Danielewski and Dave Eggers are some of the top of my list, but included with them is a man who seemingly strives to be known as one of the most twisted and demented minds in the contemporary literary canon, Chuck Palahniuk. His written success was already on the path to fame and infamy, but the spotlight firmly became implanted on his typewriter after the release of the film version of one of his most famous stories, Fight Club. People began diving head first into his sordid tales of depravity, violence and regression of human tendencies to their most primal and animalistic. Palahniuk has mastered a way of detailing believably the worst choices people make every day and their sometimes grotesque ramifications. So, with a slightly nervous and queasy stomach, I took his newest tome off the shelf at my local bookstore and came home to test my nerves on Tell-All.

Tell-All is the story of a classic beauty from the golden age of Hollywood named Katherine Kenton and her relationships with her fans, her lovers and most importantly with her personal assistant, Hazie Coogan. Katherine and Hazie have been together since nearly the beginning of Katherine’s lunar career and Hazie has been the glue that held it all together, the captain that steered the glittering jewel in the tumultuous seas of Hollywood and the artist who used Katherine to not only create a star, but a mold a living legend. Now, a new young buck has slithered into Katherine’s life and Hazie must once again pick up the invisible shield and defend her creation from anyone or anything that would seek to tear her down off her pedestal.

The first thing I should warn returning Palahniuk readers of is this: this is not Fight Club, nor is this Haunted (which personally I don’t think will ever be topped for sheer shock and awe value), this new fable is more along the lines of Rant and Invisible Monsters (another highly underrated book). The violence is quiet here, a slow boil, and things aren’t always what they seem. Yet the twist of the story does reveal itself a tad too early for my tastes. In some cases, like many Hitchcock films, the twist was known to the audience from the beginning and the fun was watching the players stumble around it unknowingly, but here it happens to act more as a weight dragging down the tempo of the story.

What doesn’t falter is Palahniuk’s deviant ability to reach inside the characters and bring out their most wicked and base needs. Even though many, if not all, of the inhabitants of Tell-All and his other stories are deeply flawed people, he peels them down layer by layer with an almost meditative quality rendering each and every one recognizably human in the end. Hazie reflects that person in us all, the one who always stood by while their friend or family member soaked up the spotlight, in some cases, even the sun itself. Being forever relegated to the sidelines can darken a person, gray out their normally bright demeanor and inevitably tip their moral compass due south. Yet the choice is always there, as it is with Hazie, whether to protect the prize by keeping it away from all personal harm or protecting the image of the prize by destroying it before it is tarnished by time and heartfelt folly.

Palahniuk also continues to perfect his personal style of over-detailing brand names and creating a nearly encyclopedic rhythm to his prose with his incredibly verbose and seemingly heavily-sponsored descriptions. No one just wears earrings in this book, they wear Cartier chandelier earrings. He improves on this literary fingerprint in Tell-All by adding an excessive amount on name dropping, rolling out star after star of the silver screen (mainly from the time when the screens were still made of actual silver). For people who don’t know classic Hollywood legends, it can feel a touch redundant and meaningless, but there is a reason behind the madness and you can always rely on the fact that his research of whatever topic has brought him the very tidbit of information you just glossed over.

The End of the Page Recommendation: While this is not close to my favorite of his career, Tell-All certainly fills a stomach momentarily void of sordid stories. Yet, as always with writers like him, I found myself thinking on the last page, “What could he possibly come up with next to shock me?” I have no doubt he will find a way to answer that question, post haste.

Did you read ‘Tell-All’ yet? What did you think? Better or Worse for Palahniuk?