“Welcome to the Great White Way! We can’t wait to see you dance.”

Thanks! I’m going to be appearing in the Majestic in a big revue!

“Um, well, actually, you’ll be appearing in front of the Majestic in your big revue.”

Huh?

“Broadway’s not what it used to be, kid. There used to be all kinds of dough in it, all kinds of folks who made sure that acts on Broadway were first class. But that ain’t the way anymore. Before Broadway was a musical destination, it was just a street, and now that it’s no longer a musical destination, it’s once again just a street. Which means that everybody can appear on Broadway. Like you!”

Yeah, but, I’m not talking about the street. I’m talking about the legendary theaters on the street.

“They’re gone.”

What?

“People don’t pay for shows anymore. They want it all free. All on the street. So all these theaters are in foreclosure. You can’t get in them unless you’ve got a hard hat. But good news for you is you can still be on Broadway by just being on the street!”

You mean, like a hobo.

“Course not. Hobos don’t sing and dance. They don’t have got a violin case for people’s change. But that, by the way, is all you get anymore on Broadway—change.”

So, now that the theaters are gone—after I’ve spent 20 years trying getting into them—and now that everybody expects entertainment for free on Broadway—

“Not for free. They give you some nickles if they like how you dance.”

—I’m supposed to be happy about this?

“You’ve been liberated from the system. You don’t have to wait for a director to pick you, for a producer to believe in you. You don’t have to rely on a bunch of marketers who don’t get you, a bunch of reviewers who don’t like you, and an audience who won’t pay to see you. Instead, you become all those things yourself.”

What?

“You hold tryouts, for which only you perform. You are your own director, casting yourself in every role. You write your own script and build your own set and design your own lighting. You do all your own marketing and sell all your own tickes. You sew all your own costumes. You pay yourself to be ushers. You show yourself to your seat. You watch your own show and review it for the papers and interview yourself telling how great you are, and you make yourself your favorite star!”

Seems pretty narcisistic.

“THANK you! That’s the word I’ve been looking for. I knew it had something to do with a beautiful flower, narcissus, and you gave me the word. You’re even your own dictionary!”

I quit. This isn’t Broadway. This is hobos playing on Broadway for spare change.

“But remember: Hobos don’t have your talent!”

If I’m a hobo, they do.

Yes, all of that is true, but it’s only half of the story. Moxyland reads like Lord Byron meets Lady Gaga, Dorothy Parker meets Axl Rose. It’s, in a word, something old meets something new.

Take the first character we meet–Kendra, who is on her way to get tattooed as a living poster girl for a multinational corporation. That’s something new. But she’s also a photo student who uses only “oldschool” film that has to be developed–this after the last Kodochrome processor is long-since dead.

Think of Toby, the familiar lovable stoner, whose rich parents bankroll his degenerate ways. We’ve seen this figure since the ’60s, except that Toby is also a streamcaster with a loyal Web following, whose own chaotic life becomes a reality series for the world. Old meets new.

Tendaka is the inflexible white knight paladin straight out of King Arthur and yet is also a gay activist/freedom fighter/terrorist/tagger–depending on your labeling preferences.

Do you see where I’m going with this? Moxyland is, yes, very new because it speaks to our time and our future, but it is also very old because it speaks to where we have been. Beukes’s writing is new and crisp because she has invented a kind of post-modern patois, but she uses this new language to tell a story that resonates with the narrations of the last thousand years.

And voice is the thing. We read voices the way we read faces. The reason art students have trouble painting faces is that every human being is an expert at reading them. The arm could be six inches too long and we wouldn’t care, but if the face is off–what the hell? People can spot a false face a mile away.

We read voices in the same way. A writer’s voice tells us five critical things: (1) who the writer is, (2) what the writer is trying to do, (3) what the writer thinks of the subject, (4) what relationship the writer has to the reader, and (5) what relationship the writer has to language, itself. People can spot a false voice a mile away.

And so, Moxyland could run aground because it sounds too futuristic, or too modern, or too traditional. But it does none of these. Beukes’s voice sounds simultaneously futuristic, modern, and traditional. That’s no mean feat. And on top of it all, Beukes creates four narrators with four distinct voices.

Snow days are different. They’re not just days without school–Saturdays and Sundays. They’re not just holidays–Thanksgivings and Christmases. No, snow days are special.

They’re days off for no reason but insufficient infrastructure.

But that’s the whole point. A snow day is a suspension of reality because reality has failed. In that way, a snow day is a complete confirmation of what every child believes: The world sucks, and it’s suckiness will end it.

Come to think of it, this is pretty much the belief of every prophet since the beginning of time.

A snow day is rowing from Alcatraz. It’s cashing out before the  dot com bubble bursts. It’s fighting your way out of the shroud and kicking back the stone and scaring off the centurions and chatting up Mary Magdalen on your way to the sky.

Yeah, a snow day is feeling the world crash around you under its own corrupt weight and rising above it all.

It’s a get-out-of-jail-free day.

It’s a jubilee day.

It’s a snow day!

Coming late to this game, I’ll not offer a traditional review. What could I say that hasn’t already been said about this amazing novel? Instead, I’ll offer my impressions as a writer.

After the first hundred pages, I would have to say that reading Moxyland is like riding backward very fast in a convertible. Things come into focus only as they recede away.

And lest you think that’s a condemnation, it was originally said about reading my favorite novelist–William Faulkner.

Weirdly, Beukes is actually very Faulknerian. She loves language and is a master of dialects, both real and invented. Like Faulkner, she constantly creates and conflates words, letting new constructs sound in the ear and resonate in the mind instead of pedantically defining them all. The words come fast and furious, whirling to form, bit by bit, an astonishing world.

Like Faulkner, Beukes tells her story from within the heads of her characters, first focusing on what lies beneath the surface. This  approach requires a kind of ritual involvement with each character, an immersion in that person’s mental world. Each of Beukes’s characters is compelling, complex, and real, and the reader sees them from within and without in an ever-evolving kaleidoscope.

Also like Faulkner, Beukes has created an imaginary world that captures the social realities of our time. As entertaining as Moxyland is, it is also profound and, dare I say, important.

Faulkner said, “Read, read, read. Read everything–trash, classics, good and bad, and see how they do it.” That’s one bit of advice I’ve had trouble following. As a writer and editor, I have a hard time reading bad writing. It’s like listening to people who can’t sing. But I can read Faulkner because every page of his shows me something new and amazing that he is doing with language.

That’s the same feeling I get as I read Moxyland.

That’s right, world. Come ‘n’ git it!

My newest novel, Death’s Disciples, has arrived from the brilliant folks at Angry Robot Books!

Here’s what SF Book Reviews had to say:

“The plot itself is fantastic, full of twists and turns and plenty of surprises. It will keep you guessing right up to the end just what is going on and just who and what the Death’s Disciples really are. The story is played out perfectly, with just the right amount of suspense, action and intrigue to ensure you are absolutely glued to the book. This is one story you can’t walk away from and a book you just can’t put down. Be prepared that once you start reading you have to keep going till the tale has been told.”

Read the whole review here: http://sfbook.com/deaths-disciples.htm

If you found Angel of Death too hard-core, you’ll probably love Death’s Disciples. It has the same darkness, but with humor as well.

That’s what I have to say first, for being gone so long. I’m sorry. Since I last wrote on this blog, I’ve starred as Pseudolus in A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum and failed to get even the part of Repo Man 1 in The Full Monty. I’ve also had two novels published–Edge of Desinty, and Death’s Disciples–both of which are fantastic, despite what the critics say. And my next novel proposal was rejected.

So, all of these are reason for not writing, yes? Except that the other reason is a kind of general, free-floating malaise known as middle age. Middle age is when everyone thinks you have the answers, but you know nothing.

What no one wants to admit is that middle age is adolescence all over again. It’s the same awkward, I-don’t-know-what-the-hell-I’m-doing-but-TA-DA phase of existence. It’s the same everybody-expects-so-much-of-me-but-I-just-want-to-sleep experience. Adolescence has acne and middle age has baldness. Adolescence has “Will anyone pay me to do anything, ever?” and middle age has “Will anyone pay me to do anything, ever again?”

Adolescence is eternal. Certainty is transitory.

But I am choosing to celebrate my second adolescence. After all, adolescence is all about finding out who I am and who I am becoming. I need that. I need to become something more than I am. I’m constantly trying to be more. Transformation: That’s adolescence.

And, I would argue, that’s our truest state. If adolescence is that awkward striving to become something more, then every other state is that awkward decision to  cling to something less.

Awkward as it may be, it’s better to transform than to decompose.

I’d rather be the eternal adolescent.

“I found Angel of Death to be an utterly masterful novel – one of those novels that truly only comes along very, very rarely. And it’s still echoing through my head – I replay scenes, hear the dialogue, see the imagery, feel the emotions… I haven’t read anything quite like this before; it stunned me completely, and I truly hope that this book finds its way into the hands of many, many people.

“It’s the kind of book that changes you on the inside, that really leaves you shaken, but at the same time, brings into in sharper focus that which gives our lives meaning, and as such, I just can’t give this book a rating.

“Do yourself a favour and read this.”

For the full review, click here.

(By the way, my latest novel will be inflicted on America this Tuesday, September 28.)

I’m sick with a cold. Sneezing. Coughing. The whole bit.

I grew up believing that sneezing was the way my body got rid of infection. “Your nose is trying to remove stuff that doesn’t belong in it.”

What nonsense. If that were true, I’d sneeze every time I smelled potpourri. And has anyone ever sneezed him- or herself well? Of course not.

Sneezing isn’t what your body is doing with the virus. It’s  what the virus is doing with your body.

The virus is using you to spread. To reproduce. This virus has a terrific reproductive strategy–getting people to sneeze on each other.

Every sneeze is a viral orgasm, sending millions of itself all over your brother’s ham sandwich and finding in him an all-new human love-child.

Yes, I’m sick, but only because aliens are having sex with my body.

Forget all this nonsense about anal probes. Creatures smart enough to overcome the impossibilities of interstellar travel are not interested in what I ate yesterday. And you don’t have to imagine Andromendans to think of sex with aliens.

No, it happens every day. Alien life forms enter our bodies and reproduce and spread themselves. Sex with aliens is much more about nostrils than anuses.

Don’t blush and turn away. You’re not a virgin either. If you’ve had a cold, an alien virus has had its way with you. If you’ve sneezed, you’ve ejaculated the alien on everyone nearby.

So, what can we do to stop this alien orgasm? We can eradicate the monsters! We can sneeze into our elbows so that those buggers don’t land on our hands. We can sneeze into our armpits if we’re flexible enough. We can wash our hands every chance we get, listening as “millions of voices suddenly cry out in terror and are suddenly silenced.” We can drink fluids, which helps us piss them out, and we can stay home from work (which I’m doing right now) and get rest, so that our antibodies and white blood cells can kill the bastards.

And, best of all, we taunt them. “I am a multicellular organism, the result of 2.5 billion years of evolution. What? You’ve evolved that long, too? Funny! You still look monocellular to me!”

That’s my ultimate victory against the aliens that take over my body and have sneeze-sex with me.

I’m a novelist. They’re just the common cold.

Bison, elk, sloth, woolly rhino–all have fallen before us.

Our spears bite from an arm’s throw away.

Nothing can survive us.

Nothing but them–these skinny, strange ones, these ones who eat bugs and eels and leaves and fish and anything they can get into their mouths. They look like us, but they do not hunt the great game. They chatter always, fritter away their time with beads and shells and epics of nothing. They only half-care about the world and more than half-care about things that aren’t even and could never be.

They do not hunt as we do.

Poor creatures.

Especially in these times.

The glaciers are retreating.

The mammoth herds are thinning.

The earth does not give up her bounty as once she did.

Only supreme hunters can survive.

Only we can kill the few mammoths that remain.

Look at these poor others, who eat their bugs and worms and nibble on tall grass and lick bark. Never did they know how to live, and surely not now– moss-eaters, coal-drawers, song-singers.

They spend days chasing down worthlessness.

We spend every hour hunting the few beasts left to us.

The world is changing. Only the greatest will survive.

I weep for these chattering folk. They talk and draw and make, but what do they kill?

How will they inherit the Earth?

Beneath that skin, though, runs life. Taste of it once, and you can live forever, can send your children out across the eternities.

Here, one passes now—a titan going about whatever business titans have. He has emerged from his palace, which streams light day and night and forbids me enter. He heads toward his chariot.

It, too, wards me.  I have tried to fly to him, but there is an invisible stone that bashes me back.

Not just now, though. Now, he is still walking, and I can reach him.

I rise from the grass and soar to his adamantian leg. I land upon it and cling, smelling the ambrosia of sweat. I plunge my nose through his stonelike skin and feel the gush of blood into my head and down my throat and into the great, swelling sack between my legs.

A tremendous smack comes—the hand of the god. Beneath it two others like me fall crumpled, their abdomens burst in blood.

I drink still. I cannot stop. Even if he should kill me, I must be sated.

And then, in the moment before he walks into the house of chariots, I pull free and fly away, ripe with divinity.

I have done it—what thousands fail to do. I have stolen the life of a god. My children will rise from this life, and they and I will live forever.