Sunday, December 10, 2017

More Books Worth Your Time

It's been a while and I've read some books. Plus you might have bibliophiles to shop for. So here we go.

Scythe
Neil Schusterman is one of my favorite authors in part because he's waging a one-man war to increase the vocabulary of Middle Grade and Y.A. readers. Also, his work is daaaaaaaaaark. In Scythe, all of the world's problems have been solved by the Thunderhead, which is like the Cloud in that it exists and no one knows how it works or what the fuck it actually is. The last remaining problem is overpopulation, and so "Scythes" play the role of grim reaper. Eventually it evolves into the classic problem of who regulates the regulators, but Schusterman has a gift for outstanding world building, original scenarios, spot-on pacing, finding original ways to present the mentor-student dynamic, and characters that transcend the whole young girl vs. grey patriarch dystopian thing. Bruiser and Unwind are previous Schusterman books that share Scythe's strengths.
 

Antifa: The Anti-fascist Handbook
I was probably already on a watch list, being left of center as my government oozes to the right of Meng the Merciless, so I had nothing to lose by buying this book. It was an impulse purchase, as I was originally looking for Fantasyland to scratch my "How did 70,000 of my countrymen elect this unqualified racist game show host?" itch, and I stumbled on this book by Occupy Wall Street organizer Mark Bray.

Like many people, I hadn't heard of Antifa (Anti-fascists) prior to Nazis marching openly and committing murder in the streets of Charlottesville last summer. Seeing the footage I was curious about the people in all black who took it upon themselves to mace the knuckle-dragging, mother's basement-dwelling, white hate douche brigade as a public service. The stated purpose of Antifa is to meet the far right wherever it gathers and make life miserable for the Klu Klux Klownz until they renounce their beliefs, crawl back under the rocks, or move somewhere else. The book makes a case for Antifa gathering under the following circumstances: when white supremacist groups are emboldened, when the police can no longer contain them or become contaminated by them, and when these groups threaten the safety of already marginalized populations (people with pigment, gays, Jews, Muslims, people who read, and, eventually, everyone they find inconvenient).

Antifa organizations are listed as terrorists because they destroy Starbucks windows rather than protesting politely, and crimes against money are blasphemy as long as we insist on wealth being our unofficial national religion. Most Antifa are anarchist or communist in nature, which remains my only real objection to their existence, since neither of these philosophies actually work. One thing the book convinced me of is there is an argument to be made for these organizations. They have always disbanded shortly after white supremacy has been pushed back underground. (In other words, they aren't a slippery slope to an equally bad far-left dystopia.) They were a big part of keeping England from falling to fascism as Italy and Germany did in the 1930s. We defeated European Nazism with overwhelming violence the first time, not by taking the high road. And the free speech/free assembly rights of white supremacists should probably be secondary to the right to life and safety of actual human beings. After all, when have Nazis ever gathered for peaceful reasons?

Bray also does a fine job skewering the false equivalency responsible for so many of our current problems. The line of the book (paraphrased): Antifa are not the same as the extremist groups they repress because the firefighter is not the same as the fire. The easiest thing in the world is to dismiss these groups, if you happen to be white, straight, and centrist or conservative. Of course, these are the same people who abandoned their gay, immigrant, and minority friends when they voted Trump in the first goddamn place. We have to remember that compromise with genocidal goose-steppers is neither possible nor advisable. Racism and homophobia need to become deal-breakers again. As one of the people who would be loaded on the trains, I think Antifa has become necessary at this sad, shameful fucking moment in our national history. This book convinced me.

(Side note: If you're a Republican who prefers lower taxes and fewer government services, I disagree with respect but love to engage with people like you. We should still be able to have the taxes vs. services debate without losing our minds in the process.)

Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk
I think I coined the phrase "bumper sticker support" to note how we mistreat our soldiers in one of my short stories, but this book explores that idea in abyssal depth. Comedy provides readability as the soldiers of Bravo company come home for a celebration of their heroic efforts to win a battle amid the triple civil war in Iraq. They enjoy themselves to the degree it's possible, watching a Thanksgiving Day Dallas Cowboys game, knowing they have to head back to the confused front lines after the game. The people they encounter during the game offer all the verbal support possible, but the treatment they receive from their Hollywood agent and the vile Cowboys owner reveals a lot about our cynical, criminal use of soldiers.

Following Vietnam, our government realized it could never institute a draft again without widespread civil discord, especially if the need for war was questionable. The answer they found was to force roughly two percent of the population to fight endlessly while the remainder of us lived lives so unchanged by war that we would be unaware a war was even happening. It's never fair to ask any portion of the population to sacrifice disproportionately during times of war, and this book does an excellent job of handling this issue with both humor and dignity. Bonus points for misspelling currj, nineleven, and turrurr to highlight the ludicrous group-think of the Dubya mid-aughts.

The Nix
This is one of those rabbit hole situations where a character does something hilariously bizarre and then the next chapter is about the surreal existence of one of the side characters and before your know it all the weird has just cocooned you in. This was Entertainment Weekly's book of the year last year, and it's appeal is pretty obvious from the start.

So those are some books worth putting the phones down for. Every now and then, we need to say fuck celebrity gossip and reality show politics for a night and re-activate some a them there brain cells.

Also, check out some of the latest from my publisher, Parvus Press. Scott Warren recently passed the 10,000 sale mark with Vick's Vultures, which I'm currently enjoying, and Mareth Griffith's Court of Twilight has lots of buzz in the same fantasy circles I'm hoping to borrow, once they're questing for their next fix of swords and sorcery.