10 Sep 2021
Today’s prompt: “Write a scathing review of a classic book.”
I suppose there are some folks out there who would call The Monster at the End of this Book: Starring Lovable, Furry Old Grover by Jon Stone a classic of children’s literature, but I must say, I found it incredibly disappointing.
Let’s start with the title. “The Monster at the End of This Book” is fine, calculated to leave readers in suspense. But that subtitle, “Starring Lovable, Furry Old Grover”? Show, don’t tell, Jon Stone. Don’t tell me how to feel about Grover. Don’t just tell me he’s lovable – develop his character enough to make me care about him as a reader.
The interior flap of the cover and opposing page are illustrated to look like a brick wall. So is the title page, with the addition of the title, credits and copyright information. No wonder Grover, who is also depicted on the title page, says “This is a very dull page. What is on the next page?” You’re right, Grover, it is dull. Whole lotta bricks, not a lot of monsters.
On the next page, in letters that take up half the page, Grover shouts, “WHAT DID THAT SAY?” Grover is being overly dramatic here. If he’d paid more attention, he could have read it before I turned the page, for crying out loud.
On the opposite page, Grover asks, “On the first page, what did that say? Did that say there will be a Monster at the end of this book??? IT DID? Oh, I am so scared of monsters!” Jon Stone clearly doesn’t trust his storytelling to get across the dynamic tension his character is feeling, because I would say the lettering does a lot of the heavy lifting for the emotional arc of this book. The letterer writes “Monster,” “scared,” and “Monsters” in pink in order to provide emphasis, and repeats the massive font trick multiple times throughout the book, including here with “It did.” Relying on manipulating the font to establish Grover’s fear is a weak choice, when this could have been accomplished by fleshing out the character a little more. The reader is left wondering, “But why is Grover scared of monsters?”
On the next page spread, Grover comes up with the idea that if we simply stop turning pages, we will not get to the end of the book where the monster is. He asks the reader not to turn the page. This instance of metafiction fails, because while Grover realizes that he is in a book, he apparently does not realize that he is in a children’s book. Have you ever read a book to a young child, Grover? If you had, you would know that they dictate whether a book will be finished or not. Sometimes they insist you must read the same book you have read to them 47 times before, all the way through, even though they know all the words by heart. Sometimes, they will toss a book away when you are five pages into reading it, and you will not get to finish it, even if you were dying to know how it ends. So you don’t get any say in whether the page will be turned or not, Grover. That’s the kid’s prerogative.
The next page spread shows Grover screaming, “YOU TURNED THE PAGE!” while throwing back his head and holding the back of his furry hand to his forehead. Good lord, Grover, get hold of yourself. Go lie down on the fainting couch and I’ll see if I can find the smelling salts. I’ve seen less melodrama in your average soap opera.
On the following page spread, Grover says, “Maybe you do not understand. You see, turning pages will bring us to the end of this book, and there is a Monster at the end of this book….” I shudder to think that for many young female readers, this may have been the first time someone mansplained to them. Oh, we understand all right, Grover. Maybe we want to see the monster.
The next several pages depict Grover trying to tie the pages together, board them up, and build a brick wall in front of them to prevent readers from turning the page, but his workmanship is so shoddy that the narrative, such as it is, moves quickly forward. During these pages, Grover complains that the reader is making a terrible mess of the broken wood. Grover once again fails to understand his audience. Kids love making messes.
In the penultimate page spread, Grover warns the reader that the monster is on the next page, and begs them not to turn the page. But when the reader does turn the page, what are they greeted with? “Well, look at that! This is the end of the book, and the only one here is … ME. I, lovable, furry old Grover, am the Monster at the end of this book. And you were so SCARED! I told you and told you there was nothing to be afraid of.” Readers would have every right to be fuming at this execrable instance of gaslighting! We were the ones bravely turning the pages while Grover cowered at every turn. To be so treated by a self-proclaimed “lovable” creature like Grover is unforgivable.
I have one other major complaint with this book. Really? You call that a monster? Grover is no Cthulhu. He is no chupacabra. And he certainly can’t hold a candle to the nuckelavee, a skinless, horselike creature from Orcadian folklore with a single giant burning red eye, finlike appendages on its legs, and a legless male torso growing out of its back. One other thing worth noting about the nuckelavee is the toxic fumes it breathes out, which killed you when you encountered a real-life nuckelavee that was not, sorry to say, confined to a book.
08 Sep 2021
Today’s prompt: “Jot down some notes about a long-ago family event. Then interview a family member about the event. Now write a piece featuring the differences between the two memories.” [I’m taking a few liberties with this one.]
As the killer chases you, your brother, and your two cousins through the cornfield, you pant, “Damn, I wish Grandma and Grandpa hadn’t been necking at Lookout Point all those years ago. Then we wouldn’t be in this mess.”
“What do you mean?” your cousin Tori asks.
“That’s where the killer first found them,” you say. “They barely escaped. They heard a report about a killer with a hook hand on the radio, and they decided to go home. They heard some scraping noises on the door just as they were leaving. They got home and they found his hook on the door handle. They thought they’d gotten away, but fifteen years later he tracks them down and murders them with his new hook. And he’s been killing his way through generations of our family ever since. My dad. Your mom. Aunt Marta. Uncle Joe.”
“That’s not how it happened,” your cousin Dane says. “It wasn’t a guy with a hook for a hand. And it wasn’t when they were dating. They were still kids when they first encountered the murderer. They were part of a whole group of children who were drawn to the forest by a mysterious, tall, slender man with long arms and a white, featureless face. Some of the kids in the group felt compelled to kill each other. Grandma and Grandpa were two of the only children who had the strength of will to escape his influence, and their trauma drew them close together. I remember one time when I was eight, I got a bloody nose, and Grandma freaked out because she said it reminded her of that day. I think somehow she always knew he would return for her and Grandpa and their children and grandchildren.”
“Okay, it definitely happened when they were kids,” Tori says. “And I’m not sure how tall or skinny she was, but the killer is definitely a woman. One of Grandma’s friends summoned her from a mirror by chanting ‘Bloody Mary’ thirteen times. The killer then appeared behind her in the mirror, slit her throat, and began drinking her blood before terrorizing all the other girls at the slumber party. Grandma was one of the few to escape, but without any way to put Mary back in the mirror, the killer eventually came after her and everyone else in the family. What about you, Jeff?” she asks your brother. “What do you know about the family legend?”
Despite the rhythmic back-and-forth of his arms as he runs, Jeff manages to convey a shrug. “I always heard it was a guy with an axe wearing a bunny suit.”
“That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever hear–” you say, when a tall, slender woman in a bunny costume sinks her hook hand into your shoulder.
06 Sep 2021
Today’s prompt: “Describe your demographic group. Describe the stereotypes of your group that you confirm. Describe the stereotypes you subvert.”
When I first heard of the concept of the micro-generation Xennials, it immediately made sense to me. I’m part of the cohort that grew up without the Internet, got our first email addresses in college, and didn’t get a cell phone until we were in our early 20s. We remember life before the Internet, but we adapted to technology easily. I used dial-up modems, rotary phones, dot matrix printers, Ask Jeeves, typewriters, analog library card catalogs, 1-800-COLLECT (from the pay phone at the mall when I didn’t have a quarter), and floppy disks that were actually floppy. I had a Walkman. I made mix tapes. But there are a few things that, though they were a big deal for my generation, didn’t really fit me. I was never really into New Kids on the Block, didn’t have a crush on Corey Feldman, and was not a loyal viewer of My So-Called Life. I didn’t use AOL or anonymous chat rooms. And, despite the fact that I’m part of the Oregon Trail Generation, I never actually played Oregon Trail. But I was at least aware of it, so your death from dysentery this week made me oddly nostalgic.
03 Sep 2021
Today’s prompt: “What is public and what is private? What should be public and what should be private? What do these terms mean now?”
Wow, this prompt poses quite the conundrum. We’re approaching the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks and just wound down the war in Afghanistan, both of which came hand in hand with unprecedented government encroachments into privacy via the PATRIOT Act, a Newspeak name if there ever was one. And just this week the Supreme Court legitimized a Texas law allowing citizens to report on and sue women who receive abortions and anyone who helps them, breaking with decades of precedent protecting abortion as falling under inherent rights to privacy. And that’s just a couple of turds in the fetid punchbowl that is Facebook, which encourages its users to divulge all kinds of personal information they can serve up to their advertisers, all while the platform itself undermines our democracy and spreads disinformation.
So what should be public? What should be private? I’ll tell you one thing. That snuff film that was broadcast of you should not be public. Your death deserves more privacy and dignity than that.
01 Sep 2021
Today’s prompt: “Write an X-rated Disney scenario.”
“You’ve been very bad. Very, very bad,” Ariel says, tapping her cat o’ nine tails against her palm.
Sebastian’s left claw clamps your right wrist, and with his right claw he grabs hold of the coral wall. Sebastian’s three equally sexy crab brothers do likewise with your remaining wrist and ankles, spreadeagling you with your back to the Little Mermaid.
Just as Ariel draws back the whip, Ursula finishes casting the spell transforming each of the whip’s flails into an electric eel.
30 Aug 2021
Today’s prompt: “She was crazy that way.”
She was crazy that way. No, not the diagnosable-mental-illness-that-can-be-treated-with-drugs-and-or-therapy-and-that-we-should-all-have-a-lot-of-sympathy-for-because-haven’t-we-all-suffered-from-anxiety-and-depression-sometimes way. No, not the less-easily-treatable-but-it’s-not-like-it’s-their-fault-so-could-we-not-fucking-stigmatize-them-for-fuck’s-sake-they’re-perfectly-harmless way. Not the synonym-for-wacky-that-we-use-when-we’re-speaking-carelessly way. No, she was crazy in the Lovecraftian way, where she probably just read The King in Yellow, or maybe watched it performed, and oh holy cats, did you and she just come out of that same theater, and good god Bast, what’s that on the marquee? “Le Roi En Jaune?” Wow, okay, here’s the thing, sanity works different here in the Lovecraftian universe than it works in real life. It’s more like something you can lose when you look at something too scary or weird, and once you lose it, you basically turn into the living embodiment of Edvard Munch’s The Scream. “Mad,” per the Lovecraftian universe, means you run around paranoid, vulnerable, and incapable of protecting yourself, like any second you could dart into traffic and – hey watch out THERE’S A BUS.
27 Aug 2021
Today’s prompt: “Start a story with the line ‘Everyone whispered about _____, but no one had the courage to talk to her.’”
Everyone whispered about Shub-Niggurath, but no one had the courage to talk to her. Or the ability, really. Her Dark Young serve as her proxies. You want to talk to Shub-Niggurath, to pledge yourself to her, to worship her? You talk to them. Human peons don’t get to talk to the Black Goat of the Woods with a Thousand Young. They get to talk to this kind of slimy, tentacly, tree-looking thing that smells like a corpse. And they’re real hard to get hold of, too. When someone wants to summon them, they have to look up the summoning ritual in the Book of Eibon, go to the woods at the darkest of the moon, and sacrifice a victim on a stone altar. It’s both barbaric and maddeningly inefficient in a day of instant communication. It’s like, they’re going to all this trouble – kidnapping you, tying you up and gagging you, marching you out to the woods, and slaughtering you – just to use you like some kind of human pager for one of Shub-Niggurath’s stinky, oozing lackeys.