Wednesday, July 30, 2008

On this Tween Mormon Vampire Bullshit Fad

I really hope Stephanie Meyers gets cancer. No, that is not a joke. There is no punchline there. I wish nothing but ill fate on the bitch and hope her and her shitty teen fiction lame ass writings (note: before I ever call another writer out, I at least graze their shit to see if there is any potential. I've been more than fair with this cunt and she is worse than James Frey) will go away forever.
But, that exposes the fallacy of hope. It's nothing more than a penny dropped in the mall fountain and will remain in that state until some bum scoops it up or nature takes its course.
When I first started slinging self help and bestseller novels about 9 months ago, I still had some bit of faith in the reading habits of America. I can't figure out why but I always thought that human beings would actually read, in general, for substance or understanding instead of just trash novel reads on vacation. Sure, those would obviously be included in the diet but I had naively believed that avid readers balanced out the bacon with spinach. I was so fucking wrong.
I could continue that tangent well into eternity (if you even ask me to look at The Last Lecture, fuck you. The inevitability of death is not a unique experience. Even when it is premature. There has to be some heavy narcissim dwelling deep inside you to feel the need to tell everyone else who doesn't know when they'll shove off how to live and what to prioritize. Fuck you for feeling like the only expert on the subject. And for profiting off of the damaged human beings clinging to the last thread of hope that their dreams will come true if they only pursue them. They probably won't and "living everyday to the fullest" and other such Hallmark dribble is only going to hinder their enjoyment of existence with blind faith in miracles) but instead will lend my current frustrations to the teen lit resurgance that has even adult authors like James Patterson and Nick Hornby (et tu, music nazi?) joining the frey. Fuck, even Dr. Frank from the Mr. T. Experience is horning in on the racket.
It's easy to say that Harry Potter was the first big bang in this universe. And it's probably right. College students at Ivy League universities fucking pretend to play Quidditch for christ's sakes. It's not like the genre had ever been without depth or merit (The Outsiders, The Wave, Roal Dahl, etc.), rather, it had just never been the sure shot it has now become. There will always be sales for Louise Sachar books but no one past 10 will be reading them. That is what J.K. Rowling accomplished. And now, the genre is pot-bellied with authors who generally work in adult realms (et tu, music nazi?) simply because it is a fucking goldmine. Enter Stephanie Meyers who is now being hailed as the next Rowling.
There are multiple problems with this assesment. First, Rowling was a struggling single mom who was living off the government before she got uber-rich. Meyers daddy was a fucking CFO. And, hey, I'm no Potter fan or anything, but there is actual depth and real life implications to the series of novels. Rowling wrote from personal, jubilliant and painful experiences whereas the Tween Mormon Vamp Queen had a dream and decided to type it all out. While she was a stay at home mom in a palacial estate. And while Rowling has a tendency to become very distracted at times, at least she can write. Meyer can barely punch out vacant teen dialogue into her iMac. Seriously, the bitch is that bad.
Now, I can excuse and ignore bad writers. Have you ever heard me rant about Clive Cussler or Danielle Steele? My problem is with PRETENTIOUS bad writers. Those who feel they have actually contributed something valuable to the world by doling out trash. Lisi Harrison's Clique series is pretty much Sex and the City for girls who just got their period but you never hear her talk about the struggle to create, the intense depth of her stories (probably, because she knows there is none) and the unique ability to type shit out and have it printed on paper. Meyer does all that and so much more. My favorite quote, "If you say, 'I"m gonna write a novel,' you never will. You just have to sit down and write it." Great insight, cunt. However, some of us can't stay at home all day and dream up high school fantasies out of boredom and have the time and financial resources to devote to finding some schmuck to publish the fucking thing. Celine was never offered that luxury, neither was Kerouac or Bukowski. They all had to balance art with meticulous, soul crushing brain dead work and while they may have pissed away their considerable talents on booze and excess, they were still able to write circles around your overprivelaged ass.
The video interviews we play on TV at work are so mind numbingly dull, self-infatuated bullshit, over explained horse shit it makes me wonder how people don't pick up on how lame her whole scene really is. After all, it is nothing but a Harlequin romance novel for 14 year old girls without the fucking. It just so happens to factor in vampires and werewolves to spice it up, and make seem not so bland, is my guess.
And the most frustrating thing about it all is Meyer's lack of respect for the mythology of the creatures she is writing about. Look, vamps are a sad, tired sub-genre on the horror scene (zombies are next) but if you're going to utilize the group at least follow the rules. In the Twilight universe, vampires can walk around in the sun and only glisten. What the fuck? Oh, and the good ones eat animals not people and blah blah blah. It's just too retarded to type out.
Pop culture fads come and go and this one might head into the realm of the forgotten as well, but something tells me that just ain't so. Aside from the undeserving celbrity, wealth and accolades handed to a talentless hack it serves another blow to people actually trying to make art or literature mean something. Or at least offer a little more insight into the human condition away from youthful lustings. I'm more angered and disgusted with the whole Twilight phenomenom that Miley Cyrus (oh yeah, that rant is coming) thing because tween music is an obvious sell. Getting kids to read for fun is a lot more difficult. Well, the whole teen lit shabang has changed that but just because a kid is reading is not enough to justify the trash they consume. We offer our kids McDonald's, they get addicted, become obese and die early. Introduce something like lobster or even fucking a quiche from La Maddeline and their tounge gets curious. It wants to experience more of the awesome flavors coating the receptors. It yearns for and experience like the first that awakened their dormant senses. The kid learns to try more, experience all it can in order to replicate that initial, awesome encounter. The brain, and moreover, literature have the same impact. All Meyer has done is force more health threatening, non-nutritional, grade-Z circus meat down our throats.
Will the next Joyce, Acker or Hemmingway be spawned from the Twilight series? Likely not. And we are all the worse off because of it.

18 comments:

Inquisitive Nymphet said...

THANKYOU.

Inquisitive Nymphet said...

THANKYOU.

Anonymous said...

I don't disagree with you that Twilight is written horribly, and that the author is below average but do you really need to use such strong language? You could say the same insulting things in an entirely more intelligent and mature manner...

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Anonymous said...

Have you ever HAD cancer? If you had, you would never wish that on someone. It's cruel. Think about it. What kind of person are you?!

Anonymous said...

Yes, I agree the book is shit. All the people posting for more moderate vocabulary are moronic political correctness Nazi's. Like anything written by that twat Meyers could compare with Dumas, Dostoevsky, or Hemingway.

Anonymous said...

Wow. You're funny but kinda mean. I'm going to take a wild stab in the dark and guess you're generally a miserable person.

Anonymous said...

No not miserable in the slightest. I got a lot of great friends, an awesome family including a nephew and I can still drink Jameson and smoke cigarettes while listening to good rock 'n' roll. What I am is frustrated with the low bar set by ourselves as what is worthy of devoting our psyche to. Maybe if you read more than one post on this blog you'd get the idea.

Anonymous said...

`excusee mee buhh is their any need for that?
you seriousliee do need help!
ii am a twilight fan, i lovee iit, and if people wanna love it then fine, no need for language like that!
let us do what we wanna do!
P.s. James patterson is preety cool:)

Anonymous said...

"Anonymous said...
`excusee mee buhh is their any need for that?
you seriousliee do need help!
ii am a twilight fan, i lovee iit, and if people wanna love it then fine, no need for language like that!
let us do what we wanna do!
P.s. James patterson is preety cool:)"

FAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAG -- Tayla smells -- >:D

Dwrek the Benevolent said...

Love your style. Keep it raunchy and on target. Language choice has nothing to do with intelligence.

What these novels have done to the vampire genre is unforgiving. Don't get me started on the not so hidden Mormon messages people are digesting without realizing it either.

I raise my glass and tip my hat to you sir.

Someone who works in publishing said...

You should blame publishing houses for the flood of shit. There are a million crappy writers like Stephanie Meyer (she has an English degree?!? WTF) writing shitty tween novels with terrible prose. Somehow she got lucky and found a agent with bad taste who liked her manuscript. Somehow the agent got lucky and convinced an editor at a major publishing house to print this dreck. Why wish cancer on the author when you could wish it higher up the chain?

Anonymous said...

I do blame them and even other authors I actually dig (Hornby). But if the work hadn't been written in the first place then would I really need to issue a hypothetical Fatwa on their homes? Hell, if she even self published at first like the Eragon hack I could give her a little credit. But, no the conduit isn't the essence of the problem. Especially with the nice little cult The Mormon Hog has carefully built.

Bob Sakamano said...

Everything you have said is basically meaningless, and that is being polite, which is something you don't quite comprehend.

What is intriguing is that if you only posted the last two sentences you wrote, you would have said something with a certain amount of validity, and credence. You may have read Hemingway, but you most certainly didn't understand what you were reading.

Maybe on your way to Junior High School everyday for the next 5 years you can stop off at McDonald's, get fat, and die just like you wished on someone else. Growing up is hard, but you are making it way to difficult on yourself.

Anonymous said...

Hey shitbird who likes to ape Seinfeld for internet handles: Read backwards.
I'd like to know just what I wrote makes you think I don't understand Hemmingway while you you let me pass with Celine, Foucault and Joyce being dropped.
Chuck your Cliff's Notes and go fuck yourself. And then look up hyperbole and Lester Bangs.

Anonymous said...

I agree with you that this whole Twilight fad is ridiculous and that the books are terribly written, but watch what you say about certain things. Cancer is a serious issue;I've lost my father because he became terminally ill from brain cancer. Also, please do realize that Stephenie Meyer has a husband and kids of her own: saying something like you wish for her to get cancer is completely immature. Now if you were to say that her books needed to be burned and that she should stop writing, I would wholly agree with you on that point. :)

Anonymous said...

I fuckin love this guy. Well said sir. Criticizing the profanity used in the language of this post makes me wish I had two stomachs so I could vomit from both of them. It is exactly the moment when someone realizes they are either losing an argument or have no substantive rebuttal for truth that they resort to attacking not the meaning of what someone says but the way in which they are saying it. I could go on and on about well, many things the success of this coiled-up, warm pile of goat shit is indicative of in terms of society itself and the state of human sociology in our time. But for now I will just say, and I guess again, well done!!

Anonymous said...

I agree with you about the "twilight" pandemic. However, why limit yourself to criticizing only this one select token of chaff? You really should have included everything in the modern-day vampire genre. That would include "true blood," "vampire diaries," the "underworld," and all of that shit. I know a lot of people will furiously try to argue that "true blood" is omg like totally waay more badass than "twilight" for whatever generic reason. Bullshyte, I say. The whole genre is played out, tired, flaccid, and worn out its welcome.