By Alex Ness
5/7/2023
I am still writing the article in depth about one of my very favorite series ever written. But I thought while you are waiting and I am writing you might like something quick to view and consider.
Sometimes you just don't know what life offers. Other times you know exactly what it offers and you get exactly that. In February a doctor/oncology unit assumed I'd had a lymphoma growing for many years, and that at that point my life expectancy was short. But then was told I don't have cancer. My own doctor thought this was BS, and my infectious disease doctor said, go to the MAYO NOW, you have cancer. And after a bunch of tests, and blood draw, I was so light headed I near walked into a wall, and into a glass sculpture and wall of glass. I still don't know what is going on. And why should I, life is hard, and having my brother and sister die in the same year, 2022, was a torpedo in my gut. Learning I might have four months to live, didn't worry me, but I had begun many projects, and wanted to finish them. I'm truly not afraid to die, at all. However I've at times been afraid to live. So, this brief article is meant to share some work people would like if only they tried it.
BOOKS:
I am not suggesting anyone try something out of their preferred genre. But if you like fantasy, sci fi or true crime, each of these books or series are worth trying. You obviously don't need to agree with me, we are all born different, and that is the beauty of the human race. We are a myriad of difference in a similar form, but with absolutely no one alike, even identical twins.
FANTASY: Karl Edward Wagner THE KANE SAGA
I am a fan of the art of the covers of the Kane Saga. I think they evoke the epic power and violence to be found within the covers. Now, I know people who think Kane fails in ways, because he is the most powerful warrior, the greatest mage, and seems invincible. It is the same problem some people have with Superman. But I think that's where the best Superman stories and Kane stories meet. Give a flawless ultra powerful person something he can't beat from the outside look. Make him reach deep inside, and find the ability to do what must be done, to find his victory or solve his quest. Another reason some people do not like Kane is that he isn't an altogether likeable lead character. It might, therefore, be difficult to call him a hero. Well that is why the word Anti-Hero was invented. He isn't exactly evil, but he certainly is self interested and well used to violence and using violence to acquire what he wants. But,... I think there is a difference in him, in that there is a sense of his being more than a human who achieved these powers and abilities, rather, he is of the lineage of Lilith, a being some call a demon, others the first wife of Adam, first human creation of God on Earth. This is rather powerful because it reminds one of the tale of Beowulf's deeply hidden rumors but there for the search and implications that Grendel is descended of or the actual child of Cain, first murderer, and living son of Adam. It is a character with a destiny trying to avoid a simple fate. Compared to Elric, I don't think it is nearly so well written as Moorcock's work, but Moorcock's characters are for me, mostly all unlikable without the deep hidden secret origins.
SCI FI: Ursula K. Le Guin THE LEFT HAND OF DARKNESS
Now Ursula K. LeGuin owned my heart after her Earthsea Trilogy. She wrote fantasy that did not rely upon violence. It was rich in language, beautiful and you cared for the characters, in ways that for most modern fantasy is rather unusual. The Left Hand of Darkness features an entirely different sort of work, it is not fantasy, but science fiction, and there are revelations, that are shocking, for the day, differently thoughtful. Genly Ai, is a human from earth sent to the distant planet of Gethen.
He works as something like an ambassador or a minor representative of a confederation of planets called the Ekumen, who are not a military or trade union, but a collection of different species who try to hold to a set of principles that unite them in ultimate common cultural goals. Gethen is a cold place. In fact, the name of Gethen means winter in the native tongue.
The humanoid alien species on Gethen seem to be similar to humans, and are so in look, but not in their physical natures. For 3/4 of the month they are one gender, and for the other 1/4 are another. But they are able to shift at will it seems, but I might be misremembering. Individuals on Gethen are ambisexual, with no fixed sex. Gender has such a role in language, in power, in behavior that Ai must try to solve this strange, to him, way of life, before he can unravel the culture and make it understandable to the others in his organization.
The book was life changing for some people I know, and it was a fascinating look at anthropology done as a narrative, and how gender can influence interaction, and everything we do. Or how it doesn't at all, and when you place a inflexible view of it, it loses some of its value.
CRIME: John Gilmore SEVERED
It has been argued by some that the Black Dahlia slaying (or slayings) is emblematic of the late 1940s/1950s of Los Angeles. It seems to be about someone with marginal looks, very little schooling, but a dream to be a movie star, or live like one, might lead someone to living in a very dangerous sort of existence. But during the time of the Elizabeth Short's life as the Black Dahlia, illegal abortions, drug rings, prostitution all took advantage of women like her, who lived only to be on camera, to marry a war hero or a movie star. She took advantage of people, didn't have a stable place to live, and her father, long separated from his wife, Short's mother. She came from the East coast, but her father worked at the ship works on the West coast. Soon enough, though, she violated whatever rules he had, and was again, on the streets.
She went missing, but was eventually found dead, she was naked, cut into pieces, and posed so that those who found her would be shocked, offended perhaps, or given notice that a killer was in town displaying his work. Her body was washed, cleaned of evidence, drained of blood, this was a killer who had knowledge of what police look for, fibers, finger prints, other sorts of proof and evidence. Police were moved immediately, trying to find and follow leads. But while the police did make some assumptions and create a pattern of killings, of both women like Short who had spent time on the street, and other women strangulated or killed in other violent manners they could not find enough evidence to prove any sort of suspect was responsible.
John Gilmore was a friend of James Dean, dated briefly Brigitte Bardot, acted in films, and wrote books, but probably his most powerful and important work was Severed. He worked the streets, found information the police never knew, and hunted for a suspect based upon the knowledge he gathered. And what he found was likely the killer. A man so used up and mentally exhausted by the acts he performed, the immorality and violence of his life, left him living in a cheap hotel, where he drank booze and kept momentos of his acts. By the time Gilmore got the LA Detective unit lead to go investigate, the suspect had died in a fire. The suspect had fallen asleep, with a lit cigarette in his hand, and it started a fire, one that consumed the suspect's souvenir collection as well. This work, read by me last in 2005 or so, left an impression on me. I read every other important book on the subject, and while for a while I believed a detective Steve Hodel solved the case, he ended up using the fame acquired, and his new perspective as someone who may have solved the Black Dahlia, he then suggested his suspect (his own father) was also the Zodiac killer, and who knows who else. Which is really baloney.
PERSONAL INFO:
Someone apparently read a post I made on facebook and/or twitter wherein I posted about taking a break from a my hiatus upon drinking alcohol to post about a ritual I have to say goodbye to loved ones and asked me what made me quit, was I an alcoholic?
I have a number of answers here, and really no one's business, but I try to live transparently as a poet, and reflectively as a historian. So here it goes...
I am on many meds due to the many things I've been through. Since 2013 I have had two frozen shoulders, microfractured tailbone, cancer, dislocated hips, a broken neck, now cancer again... and more. If I were forced to not have any meds for any reason, I'd end up doing something permanent to end the pain. Yes, I said that and you know what I mean by it. I am not an addict, have never been, but I have to take meds or my life would be worthless. So why not drink? I'm a walking medicine cabinet. Any new sort of chemical added, only makes things worse. I used to have a stalker who sent me posts about being an addict. Well, I was on a med that said I could take four a day, I took two pills every other day. That hardly being an addict. And since I found out the person who sent those letters, she drinks a fifth of bourbon a day. So, take the log out of your eye and don't bug me about my speck.
And the reason I broke my hiatus, was to toast my sister and my brother, who both died of different causes, in 2022. I toasted them with a Viking toast, and promised to meet them in Valhalla where we'd once again fight side by side. SKOAL!
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