Byuck: the true tale of the mysterious 40

.

This tweet perhaps deserves a bit of context:

Btw—if you are one of the lucky few who purchased & read Byuck! 10 years ago, you should know that the text ~has been slightly updated for the re-release (there’s a different chapter 40, for instance.) 👀 https://t.co/royoZebNhG

— BCC Press (@BccPress) December 7, 2022

Chapter 40, aka "An Expiration Date," is the Billy Joel chapter. The chapter that makes such an impression on people the rerelease's marketing campaign includes stuff like this:

(The full list.)

But what I say there is true. The Billy Joel chapter is what people most often want to talk to me about. So the fact that it is the largest difference between the 2012 publication and 2022 publication deserves some comment.

Comment One : Backstory

The year is 2003 or maybe 4. I'm making good progress understanding Byuck's shape but there's one plot point I can't make work. My protagonist is pretty dumb when it comes to certain aspects of life and I can't see how to shake him from his torpor. Lady Steed and I are shopping at Macey's when they begin playing the solution to my problem, one of Billy Joel's best. It all falls in place for me instantly.

And then we leave the store and I promptly forget the solution. I know I had one but I cannot remember what it was.

Then: we need groceries. Once again, Macey's plays the song and this time the solution becomes permanent. Thank you, Macey's!

Writing the chapter is difficult. Not because I don't know what to do or because the characters are fighting me, but because I want the song to be timed to the conversation in a completely realistic way. Each pause in conversation needs to naturally last the correct length yet end at just the right lyric. When people talk, it needs to cover exactly that many lyrics. I obsess, playing the song over and over, acting the chapter out as I  make sure everything is just as it should be. How long would it take Dave to do this? What part of the song would be playing when he finishes? Et cetera. I may have spent more time finetuning 40 than I did the rest of the book put together, even though I already knew the more important beats and even some of the lines my characters would say.

Comment Two : 2012 and a new 40

Strange Violin publishing Byuck after years of Beckett-level absurd correspondence with Deseret Book, a powerfully unpleasant moment from another MoLit publisher, and absolute silence from everywhere else was huge for me. Seeing Byuck in print made it possible for me to move on to other projects. I was free!

But something they wanted me to do was rewrite 40 so as to quote waaaay less Billy. They were worried I'd left fair use behind and they'd get slapped with a lawsuit. I was resistant. I had worked so hard on this chapter and I did not want it changed. But: I did it. Byuck needed to be in print and I wasn't letting 40 stop me.

I found narrative solutions to make things shorter and Byuck moved into physical reality.

Comment Three :  2022 and a new 40

When BCC Press agree to take Just Julie's Fine they also agree that it would be a good idea to republish Byuck since its 2012 rollout was rendered lackluster as its publisher plywooded its windows just before releasing my novel. It would be, that's right, synergistic if both books were available from the same publisher. Matching covers and so forth.

But I also saw a chance to pitch the original, longer 40. BCC legal looked and it and said, yes, sure, no problem. But then I reread it and . . . was the 2012 version actually better? I couldn't tell. Some BCC people gave me feedback and, in the end, 2012 became the skeleton with some original 2004 flesh grafted back on. Thus, 2022 has a new 40. Similar to its parents but not the same.

I'll admit I didn't agonize as much this go-round about getting the timings right, but I like to think all that effort poured in almost twenty years ago is part of the reason the chapter still has such a big impact. It is the right way for old Dave to become new Dave, and the honesty of his epiphany is part of what makes his journey worth reading.

Anyway.

I'm looking forward to many more Billy Joel conversations in the future.

So, when you're ready, tell me about it.

Finally reading the Apocrypha: Svithe #1—Tobit

.

I first heard of the Apocrypha while reading the D&C as a teenager. That served to entice me but it also kept me away from reading it myself all these years. It sounded awesome and interesting but to read it was essentially saying to God that I knew all there was to know about the Bible, Book of Mormon, D&C, and the Pearl of Great Price. Which, at minimum, was arrogant.

However, I was reading plenty of other nonscriptural stuff. The idea that I can read Piers Anthony but not Apocrypha because I don't fully understand Isaiah yet is the sort of broken thinking that can happen when you only engage with your religion so far.

I still don't know the canon as well as I could (not shall I ever) but, for some reason, today, December 4, I decided once again to start and, because I was not trying not to annoy my wife, I sat and started reading it. Then the 5yrold asked me to read to her and, as Lady Steed finished her task, I read the first half of the first book of my Apocrypha outloud.

This is the version I'm reading.

Note: I'm not really doing research here, other than finding a painting of Tobit. Just reacting to ancient tales. This is one in a probably superoccasional series. But someday I will have read the apocrypha!

The Book of Tobit

What a fun story! Sort of a fairy tale, really. It starts with Tobit telling us about all the righteous stuff he does, but one of the righteous things (burying his fellow countrymen—they are in exile, in Nineveh—whose bodies have been thrown outside the city walls) gets him in trouble more than once. Eventually, he even goes blind and gets grumpy, even accusing his wife of stealing a goat, until he cries out in the darkness to God.

Then we switch to an omniscient narrator who quickly tells us about this woman Sarah who has been married but, each wedding night, when her husband comes unto her to consummate, a demon kills him. She lost seven husbands this way and it's making her hella depressed and the same moment Tobit is crying to God, she is too, begging for death. And, the narrator says, they both get blessed by God.

I was a bit thrown by suddenly Tobit being blind again (?) but he was. Ends up, this is the story of his and Sarah's miraculous savings and, in other words, this is where the fairy tale begins, and the hero is not Tobit but his son Tobias who has nothing but a name in common with Mr Fünke.

One day, Tobit, being blind and broke, deciding he needs the fortune he left in another city long ago, decides to send his son to pick it up. First Tobias needs a traveling companion, so he walks outside and there's this dude there who knows the way and is even related to the guy keeping Tobit's money. Fun fact: this guy is actually the angel Raphael. But the humans don't know this.

Anyway, Tobit gives Raphael a job interview and send them on their way.

One day, this fish leaps out of the water and almost eats Tobias's foot. He's scrambling to get away but Raphael tells him to catch it. Ends up, the heart and liver, when you burn them, can cast out demons. And the gall, when smeared in someone's eyes, will cure the exact form of blindness Tobit has. This is very lucky! They toss the fish's intestines, but the book doesn't state what they do with the rest of the fish. I hope they at least got a meal out of it.

They continue traveling and Raphael introduces Tobias to Sarah's parents, explaining that they're his relations and Sarah needs to get married and Tobias has the right by blood and he'll end up inheriting everything.

But, even more importantly, get this:

Do not be afraid, for she was set apart for you before the world was made. You will save her, and she will go with you. (Tobit 6:18)

Okay. That is remarkable. If Tobit were in the Old Testament proper, Saturday's Warrior would still be the law of the land. Did you know this was in the Bible? Preexistance and romance both in a single verse? Hooza.

Anyway, they show up, the marriage is on, the fish's heart and lung give them a jolly wedding night with prayer and sleeping (and, one imagines, sex), Raphael goes and picks up the rest of the money himself, eventually they head home, Tobit is healed, they try to give Raphael a ton of money and he reveals himself as an angel (ends up he never actually ate or drank, that was just a tricksy vision you were seeing!) and ascends to heaven. All the principals live to be over a hundred. It's great.

The fairy tale aspect could have been over in half the time except for the characters' prayers of lamentation and thanksgiving, and the times Tobit or Raphael preach good old-fashioned gospel principles like giving alms and taking care of people. Although they also own slave so, you know.

Fun story though. Not really like anything in the Bible as I inherited it. But the preaching was on point and the characters were likable. As fiction goes, I think I liked it better than Jonah or Job. But it's risky canonizing fairy tales.

Recommendation: Read for pleasure and edification but do not treat as literal history.

Painting: Tobias and Sarah pray on their wedding night while Raphael binds the demon. (Jan Steen)

previous svithe on thutopia
previous svithe on thubstack

Novilmber

.

HOME
library dvd

La belle et la bête (1946)

So I totally get why this is a movie that has moved many people and entered deep into the subconscious of as many more. The dreamlike sequences, the simplicity, the horror, the refusal to explain anything but the most basic bits of story—it's as fairytale a movie as any put to celluloid. No wonder it's the standard!

But half the stuff that make it powerful are also things that make it problematic. The 5yrold and I just watched it, then we shuffled through all the photos on IMBd and this was her favorite.And that's not getting into the awful relationships in the film. I don't think there's a single one that's #goals!

None of which is to take away from the film's accomplishments, but with so many excellent films to show a child, the why one shows a particular film becomes important.

But, man. Belle's introduction to the castle—I think that'll stick with me.

HOME
our dvd

WWJD (2022)

Finally showed it to the 15- and 12yrolds and they thought it was great. Which is great. The movie is funny and I like to think sticky.

Maybe it'll become an occasional Sunday tradition.

(First viewing.)

HOME
library dvd

Boss Baby: Family Business (2021)

I love how these films unashamedly embrace cartoon logic. They aren't alltimegreats or anything, but they're fun and they work on several pleasure centers and, really, what's not to like?

If you want to watch Shawshank or Citizen Kane, watch Shawshank or Citizen Kane. If you want to watch heartfelt silliness and pure cartoon madness, try this instead.

HOME
our dvd

A Serious Man (2009)

Lady Steed and I tried to have our second viewing of this film about a year ago but the kids returned from the grandparents before we were ten minutes in. But now our film group picked it and so we finally had our second chance and it's great. The shock of the ending, time one, displaced the rest of the experience, but I knew it deserved a secondchance. For one thing, Kohl often mentions its excellence and value as exemplar. But it's also smart and moving and absolutely unwilling to tell you what to think or what to believe or what to take away.

Which I guess is why so many people call the Coens nihilists. But how bad at reading do you have to be to find nihilism, even Larry Gopnik's miserable week?

He said with way more confidence than is reasonable, given he was speaking about a movie who's only clear thesis is no one can know anything.

HOME
Disney+

Dan in Real Life (2007)

This came out fifteen (!) years ago and at the time we were poor and the reviews were lackluster and so it passed us by. But my younger brother loves this movie (which you might not believe from his first impressions) and talks about it regularly. So of course I had to watch it some day. And someday was today.

On first watch, a couple of the beats feel slightly clumsy, but I'm convinced those (mostly teenager bits) would be better on second viewing because I believe the characters more by the end.

I love the set-up though and it could resolve many different ways. We could all write novels solving this problem different ways! What fun!

But perhaps the most remarkable thing about it was the way it handled a large extended family. Lots of trust in the actors and the audience to put the pieces together. And the result is a loving chaos that sings true. You don't see that much in the movies.

HOME
Disney+

While You Were Sleeping (1995)

I saw this with my sisters in theaters long, long ago. At the time, I thought it was pretty so-so as a romantic comedy. But I understand it better now than I did when I was 18. It means something to be that lonely. It all makes sense now, all these years later. I have a lot more sympathy for Sandra Bullock's situation. I believe it now.

Also, in a fun connection to the last movie I associate with my brother, this movie too creates a larger family with simple strokes that's easy to believe in. Not as strictly realistic as in Dan in Real Life but wondrous and true all the same.

Great doublefeature! Thanks for tricking us into watching another, Disney+!

HOME
library dvd

The Addams Family (1991)

I haven't seen this in a very long time, possibly since 1991 at the Hitchin' Post, but I've long remembered how much I loved it. (And it's pinball machine is among my favorites.)

And so when it started out like a hamhanded Scissorhands knockoff I was deeply concerned. But it came around. It was funny and fun.

And Christina Ricci deserves all the acclaim we immediately gave her. She holds her own.

I remember reading about her at the time, probably in an Entertainment Weekly at the doctor's office, about how impressed everyone was with her, that she already understood the craft of filmmaking and was expected to be directing at any time. I don't know if her interests evolved or if Hollywood^*, but she still has not directed. This makes me a little melancholy.

The film's most jarring moment is the ending credits when MC Hammer's voice suddenly appears. Do you remember this? I did not. Apparently, they even played the video before the movie?? I most certainly do not remember that. If you'd asked me, I'd have said that Hammer was passe by 1991. (Maybe he was but the suits didn't know it?) Anyway. Um. It's not bad or anything, but a strange, strange choice.

HOME
Roku

Weird: The Al Yankovic Story (2022)

Son #2 calls it the best movie we've watched in a loooong time.

But no question it was hilarious. We all laughed from go. And I'm certain it'll only get funnier on rewatches. Will we rewatch? Eventually. I mean---we're a big UHF family, so . . . yeah?

Also, I WILL WATCH THE OSCARS if, as the closing-credits song claims for itself, it "is technically eligible for Oscar consideration," is nominated because that means Al will perform it and that IS EXACTLY WHAT THE OSCARS NEED.

P.S. Has anyone interviewed Madonna yet?

HOME
library dvd

Suburbicon (2017)

The first thought anyone has when beginning a movie written by the Coens but directed by someone else (in this case George Clooney) is . . . how did they do? One would think this regardless, but I think regularly about that question as framed here.

Within the Coens' ouevre, I suppose the nearest thing is probably Fargo although this movie has no Marge to make us feel better about the world. It does have moments of sterling humor (Matt Damon on that bike) and the film is extremely Coeny (the biggest help here is probably using the same casting directory; the cast is filled with striking character actors), but I can't think of a movie where our ultimate protagonist is a child. (Well, True Grit, but she's a very grown-up little girl.)

The movie works okay. It has a bifurcated format with the kids being really the only connection (though the beginning of their connection seems strangely forced), but the heightened suburban paranoia (which is a real vibe of late) basically works. I'm not sure it wouldn've have been a better movie had it just stuck with its primary tale, but, overall, it is good.

UPDATE: Originally, there were two scripts.

THEATER
AMC Bay Street 16

Glass Onion (2022)

I, like Daniel Craig, will keep doing these movies as long as Rian Johnson keeps making them. This was so much fun to watch—and so much fun to watch in the theater with a great audience.

That said, I look forward to watching it again at home with the kids. So smart, so funny, so cutting.

I really want to read that New Yorker profile.....

ELSEWHERE
Kanopy

An Honest Liar (2014)

This class is nearly impossible to get to talk. But the Amazing Randi broke down a couple walls for me and we almost (almost) had a conversation.

ELSEWHERE
Prime Video

CRYO (2022)

Just assume a lotta SPOILER WARNINGs in this review, mkay?

I've been meaning to watch this since before Barrett Burgin argued even harder for my probably liking it. And now I finally have.

Funny thing, my heightened expectations worked against the film at first. I so smugly assumed that I understood how things were unrolling that I was disappointed with some clunky moments. But then, as the film was ending, it did not end. I had days to go, in fact. And slowly I came to realize that I had fallen for the lies of the adversary.

The teeny budget of this film does not show in the sets or props or camerawork. And the actors are skilled, but the budget does reveal itself a few times in some lines that could have used a few more takes. But even with that caveat, I feel no need to complain.

Unless it's at myself I really wish I had watched CRYO before recording the latest episode of Face in Hat (look for 5.4 which has not yet posted as I post this). At least I watched it before the next issue of Irreantum hits! It's not too late to watch it yourself! Irreantum won't drop till the end of December (watch for 19.4)!

Previous films watched

MOST RECENT POST

2022
jan feb mar apr may
jun july aug sep oct nov dec

2021
jan feb mar apr may
jun jul aug sep oct nov dec

2020

jan feb mar apr may
jun jul aug sep oct nov dec

2019

jan feb mar apr may
jun jul aug sep oct nov dec

2018

jan feb mar apr may
jun jul&aug sep oct nov dec

2017

qu1 qu2 qu3 qu4

2017

qu1 qu2 qu3 qu4

2016

qu1 qu2 qu3 qu4

2015

qu1 qu2 qu3 qu4

2014

qu1 qu2 qu3 qu4

2013

th1 th2 th3

The long strange story of making love to my wife (slash writing a book about celibacy)

 

.

So the exciting news is that on December 6, Byuck will be out in a fresh new edition from BCC Press. Check out Matt Page’s latest and greatest cover:

One thing that’s great about working with a company entering its prime rather than a company boarding the windows as you enter (not a knock on Strange Violin, whom I deeply appreciate, but a fact all the same) is that there is marketing. You may have seen some of this if you follow BCC Press on Twitter—the nostalgic playlist—which I am listening to right now as I write this because it is great—and the chance to help build it, for instance—but one thing they’ve been asking me for from go is photos of thme from the Byuck era.

The novel takes place over the 2000–2001 school year and, um, I don’t really have any photographs from that time period. Not really.

Lady Steed and I were wed the summer of 2000 and, outside engagement/wedding photos, there ain’t much of then-Theric (certainly not of me in Provo). But there are a couple, including this amazing photo:

If you have a close eye for detail, you’ll note the following:

• This is Christmas 1999.

• Instead of her usual Waterhouse-heroine-ness, She has more of a Rosetti expression here.

• In fact, were this a painting, it could well appear in this thread.

Something you can’t tell (and neither can I) is who in the world took this photo. We’re at my parents’ house but what the heck else is going on in this room? I mean—this is the trip in which Lady Steed met my parents! How did anyone put up with us?

Anyway, I was able to deliver that photo to the BCC Press marketing team with this helpful suggestion:

Mm. Ends up smallifying jpgs for Thubstack

Subscribe now

renders that text at the bottom borderline illegible. Just think of it as the pixelated portion.

I started writing Byuck as a play shortly before this photo was taken and my professor told me I wasn’t ready to write it yet. Considering how quickly it rolled out of me 2003–2004, I think she was right.

Being a year older than Dave wasn’t enough. Maybe this photo proves this as well.

Anyway, more sales from me in the near future. I should have a preorderlink to share next week!

Share

A little dystopic fun for everyone

.

It's reasonable to say that everything here is either dystopian or includes dystopia or contains recipes for dystopia. In one case, a recipe we have already followed. Isn't that fun!

.

119) What If? 2 by Randall Munroe, finished October 28

This book is so delightful. Like all of Munroe's work. I believe I am a completist.

But how else will you learn that t-rexes and elephants weigh roughly the same? Or that even touching a room-temperature star will kill you?

And constant undercurrent of humor leaves you not quite ready for the big laughs that suddenly appear. (My favorite might by a dry citation for—where were you in 1999?)

But I especially enjoy reading xkcd and family because Randall is clearly a decent human being with a burgeoning curiosity and a love of knowledge that bubbles out into selfless sharing.

I mean, I say "selfless" but he must be loaded by now. Good for you, Randall! You deserve it!

over a week


120) The Utopia of Rules: On Technology, Stupidity, and the Secret Joys of Bureaucracy by David Graeber, finished October 28

I keep hearing about The History of Everything which this author cowrote with his friend David Wengrow. As they worked on it, the project grew and grew to multiple projected volumes. Then Graeber died. The project's future is now unknown.

I checked History out from the library when I saw its size (704pp) I knew it was dangerous to try to read it as a library book. This is a book I would need to buy.

So in the meantime, I went back to the library site, intending to put a book or two from each of them on hold. I had plenty of Graeber books to choose from but nothing by Wengrow. This volume was the first to arrive and boy oh boy is it excellent!

Graeber is an anthropologist by training and he has trained his anthropology on the boring nonsense of our own world. And he's brilliant. I wish i had not been a library book because I wanted to mark it up like a madman. One read wasn't enough to completely rejigger my political outlook, but this is an intellectual exploration of the politics I've been looking for. The Millennium will be anarchy.

Speaking of anarchy, I assume it is because Graeber is an anarchist that you can read this book free online.

Among the worthwhile things this book explores will be the purposes of imagination, the damages caused by capitalism, why the future we were promised had to be suppressed, why the third Nolan Batman movie bit rocks, the relationship between language and play, how come grammar books are lies, why it isn't the least surprising police are terrible, how bureaucracy is simply a way of managing violence, and why we like it anyway.

Reading something like this makes me wish I was an academic, that I could spend all my time thinking thoughts with the great thinkers. But in the end, I'm still a storyteller.

This book, incidentally, will also tell you how our stories enforce the power structure even when we don't want them too. Alas.

most of the month
 

121) Disquiet by Noah Van Sciver, finished November 3

I didn't buy this when it was released because I figured I'd already read most of it. Not so. I'd ready maaaaybe half. Probably less. But "Punks V. Lizards" is too memorable to forget, no matter how many years have passed.

Anyway, it's a solid collection by an excellent artist. But if you're starting off, I recommend something full-length. His shorts are good, but he found mastery in the long.

a week or so
 

122) Rickety Stitch and the Gelatinous Goo: The Road to Epoli by Ben Costa and James Park, finished November 3

When I opened to its first page I was startled and delighted to see the story was in black and white? Could it be possible? I was thrilled!

Ends up it's only some . . . flashbacks? that are in black and white. The rest of the story is good, but I didn't realize how tired I've become of the current crop of color comics for kids.

My favorite aspect of the book is the title characters—a skeleton and a blob and yet so expressive. Even surrounded by other (soulless) skeletons and without his distinctive costume, Rickety can be recognized through subtle touches to his skull. It's terrific.

My 12yrold read all three currently-out volumes before I even picked up the first one (when does he read? I never see him reading?) and wanted to know if the library also had the fourth as, goldarn it, #3 ended in a cliffhanger. The answer, incidentally, is no, but I imagine we'll see it soon.

As for me, I dunno if I'll read on from one. It was entertaining, but I have a lot of books on my to-do list, and I don't know. I just don't know.

Maybe just so we have something to talk about.

And maybe I'll like it more as it rolls on, myself.

under a week
 

123) 2 A.M. in Little America by Ken Kalfus, finished November 8

First, I disagree that this is a dystopia. It will give you many of the same feelings, but there's no design to this world, no power striving to make some version of perfection that, surprise!, is awful.

No, this is just a distressing realistic imagining of what might happen to us Americans after our country has devolved into a borderless civil war, bloody massacres and constant suspicions—where we run to and how we try to live and how our new host nations are not happy with our presence.

And it's excellent at that. It feels real. It feels plausible.

One thing I don't like about the book is the side effects of how Kalfus represents his main character's trauma. That he has a hard time recognizing people, especially women, fine. I can accept that. But he uses that as an excuse to make everything uncertain. No city or nation is named, few people get names, his dog has a name but it's a placename so we don't get that either. I get that he's trying to make everything on the American side more universal and everything on the not-America side less graspable, but it requires some rhetorical stretches that get too artificial for their own good.

All that aside, I recommend reading it. If we do devolve to war (a less insane prospect by the month) it would be a war apt to awfulness. Perhaps a reflection of that future may give us pause.

how long goes here


124) All's Faire in Middle School by Victoria Jamieson, finished November 11

This is by family-favorite author of Roller Girl (first reading) and it's similar—girl with an unusual sidelife managing the travails of early adolescence—but it's a very different book all the same, tackling new concerns in new ways.

This time the girl's family works at a Florida renaissance faire and she has decided to leave behind homeschooling for schoolschooling. Things go wrong, she makes mistakes, she grows up, lessons are learned, etc.

I didn't like it as much as Roller Girl (most recent reading) but it's a satisfying read with earned emotional beats. What else are you asking for?

almost twenty days


125) The Lathe of Heaven by Ursula K. LeGuin, finished November 16

I didn't know much about this 1971 novel coming into it, except that it's dystopianish. The first half I wasn't sure that was true. But it became true as reality is piled atop reality.

I see a couple low-budget adaptations have been filmed, but post-Dr Strange movies, I think we're ready to really visualize this. I'm not sure it's a good idea, but it can be done.

In short, what if your dreams could recreate reality? What responsibility would this lay upon you? Would you strive to dream intentionally? or not to dream at all?

a week


     

get these things in your email
in a slightly different form

     

Previously . . . . :

Like one light to daring heights

 .

The death of Mimi Parker has shook me a bit more than I anticipated. I mean—or course I now regret even more missing Low's last Bay Area show, but it's not like I am a Low completist or even know their work all that well. I love C'mon, and Christmas is deeply important to my annual traditions, but I'm still justabouta buy their latest.

(In a stupid way, they're still one of those 90s monosyllabic l-word bands [Len, Lit, Live, Low, Lush]—although they were the one I never heard on the radio but that I've come to know best—a band whose albums I saw for sale but never took the leap on. I sometimes wonder . . . if I had bought Secret Name a couple decades ago, what else might have been different?)

But I have been listening to them regularly for over a decade now and they were good enough to let me include them in Fearreantum and everything I saw or read endeared them to me as human beings.

And so, while I can't write anything as lovely as what Jacob wrote, I did read and appreciate what he wrote and ever since I've had this song in my head:

But it's a great song and it although it's Alan's part that's stuck in my head, I can feel Mimi haunting the background.

Add that to Jacob's analysis and it is the song for our mourning.

God bless Low, together forever.