Reading

“No bigger than a calf’s skin”

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The internet was down most of the day at work today, so a number of things I wanted to do either didn’t get done or didn’t get finished. Sometimes I wonder about this whole computer thing. Imagine an office in 1927, and somebody comes to the boss and says, “I’ve got great new office machine for you. It’ll allow you to do your bookkeeping in a fraction of the time. It’ll streamline your correspondence and printing in ways you won’t believe. It’ll provide information from around the world before the local newspaper knows it.”

And the boss, being no fool, says, “What’s the catch?” (No doubt he’d take a drag on a cigarette before speaking, because everybody smoked in the office back then.)

“Well, the machines will break down every down and then. Fairly regularly, really. And when that happens, your business will basically grind to a standstill. And even when it’s working, your employees will waste a lot of time playing with it”

Would he be willing to invest in something like that? Maybe he would. But I bet he’d think long and hard first.

Dirty Harry over at Libertas speculates amusingly on how “The Yearling” would be handled if it were filmed today.

Dr. John Eidsmoe, author of Christianity and the Constitution, is at our school teaching a seminar just now, and he dropped in to my office today. We got onto the subject of Snorri Sturlusson’s Heimskringla (the sagas of the kings of Norway), one of our mutual favorite books. I mentioned to him one of my favorite stories from the book, one which is included in the Everyman edition, translated by Samuel Laing, but not in the other two translations I own (this is due to a difference in the source texts used).

It comes from the saga of the sons of Magnus Barefoot: Sigurd the Crusader and Eystein the Good. Eystein, being good, died young, but Sigurd lived to an overrripe old age, and appears to have suffered from dementia. Toward the end he announced that he was going to divorce his faithful and much-beloved queen, and marry a younger woman.

The bishop of Bergen at the time was named Magne. Bishop Magne went to confront the king at his hall, and brought along a younger priest, also named Sigurd, who would eventually become bishop himself, and who reported what happened.

Bishop Magne sent word for the king to come out of the hall and speak with him. The king came out, with a sword in his hand.

The bishop refused the king’s invitation to come in and dine. Instead he condemned the king’s decision and told him he forbade “this wickedness.”

While he thus spoke he stood straight up, as if stretching out his neck to the blow, and as if ready if the king chose to let the sword fall; and the priest Sigurd… has declared that the sky appeared to him no bigger than a calf’s skin, so frightful did the appearance of the king present itself to him. The king returned to the hall, however, without saying a word….

Then the bishop went to his own house, and Father Sigurd noticed that he seemed extremely merry. He asked the bishop if he wasn’t frightened, and if he didn’t think it would be a good idea to get out of town.

Then said the bishop, “It appears to me more likely that he will not act so; and besides, what death could be better, or more desirable, than to leave life for the honour of God? or to die for the holy cause of Christianity and our own office, by preventing that which is not right? I am so cheerful because I have done what I ought to do.”

If you’re wondering how it all turned out, the king got his wedding in the end, by going south to Stavanger and bribing the bishop there with a lot of gifts.

But I love that story about Bishop Magne, and particularly Father Sigurd’s description of the sky appearing “no bigger than a calf’s skin.”

I’ve never read a better description of the psychological effect of fear. That man was a storyteller.

Non-fiction, Writing

Eloquence: Most Powerful When Mixed with Truth

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In the Wall Street Journal, Ian Brunskill writes, “Eloquence is a quality as much mistrusted as admired.” He goes on to review Denis Donoghue’s book, On Eloquence. “Mr. Donoghue, as teacher, essayist and author, has often been in the front line of the resulting “culture wars.” “On Eloquence” is his latest broadside. . . . [He believes] the main attribute of eloquence is gratuitousness: its place in the world is to be without place or function, its mode is to be intrinsic. Like beauty, it claims only the privilege of being a grace note in the culture that permits it.”

Non-fiction

Alan’s Seven Books

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Alan of Thinklings recommends seven books he read last year, including this one from Wendell Berry:

The Unsettling of America. There are certain authors about whom I have to say, “but of course I don’t agree with everything he says.” Wendell Berry is one of those guys. He probably wouldn’t approve of the time I spend commuting in my truck, my fancy phone that keeps me hooked up to the office 24/7, or my fondness for frozen pizzas. By the same token, I think he could stand to read a few books on economics. But he is a good corrective to many of the more/faster/now obsessions of contemporary life.

Goofing, Religion

“Don’t go it alone,” says the loner

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Probably the most famous New Zealander in the world, Sir Edmund Hillary, died today. He was a major hero when I was a boy. We all heard the story of how he conquered Mount Everest in the company of his faithful Sherpa, Tenzing Norway. (It’s not generally known that Tenzing Norway was a cousin of the author Neville Shute Norway.*)



I finished Dean Koontz’ The Taking today. This one was pretty much straight horror, so I didn’t like it as much as some of his other stuff. (That’s personal taste. I find horror oppressive.)

Nevertheless, I ought to add that The Taking appears to be a somewhat different take on a topic covered more extensively (and not as well) in some recent fiction on the Christian market (I won’t mention any names). This book handled the subject far better, and without preaching. There was also a twist at the end that I liked a lot.

In slightly related news, this awful story has been reported all over the web. A man in Idaho, apparently convinced that he bore “the mark of the Beast” on his hand, cut the hand off with a circular saw and cooked it in his microwave. A literal reading of Matthew 5:30 is to blame, I suspect.

I hate it when things like this happen. Not only because it makes Christianity and the Bible look bad, but because of the tragedy of a man who (apparently) sincerely believes, but has gone far off the rails.

I don’t know the man’s spiritual history, but I have a guess. I’d bet he’s not involved in any kind of consistent Christian fellowship. I suspect he’s a loner, reading his Bible alone and interpreting it alone, relying on his personal feelings.

I know—I don’t have a right to criticize. I’m a loner myself, and getting more alienated with each passing year. But perhaps that makes what I’m saying “testimony against interest,” and more valuable.

The Bible is very clear. We aren’t meant to be Christians alone. Every Christian should study 1 Corinthians 12. Verse 27 says, “Now you [in the plural] are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of it.” We were meant to function together as a body, doing together the things none of us can do alone, and restraining one another’s excesses.

Going it alone is like—well, it’s like being a hand that’s been cut off with a circular saw.

May the Lord have mercy.

*This is a gag. And a very tasteless one.

Writing

How To Write a Book. No, No, For Real

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H.S. Key blogs, “Everybody wants to write a novel or a screenplay. If you don’t, you’re lying to yourself. And if you lie to yourself, you might just make a great writer.” He cites an article by George Singleton on what to do if you want to write.

Writing

Writers on Film Strike Try Kid Lit

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Some of the writers locked out of their film and tv jobs by the Hollywood union strike are working on children’s books for a more personal creative outlet. Steven Zeitchik reports:

“It’s kind of a nice way to do something creative at a time when we’re having a hard time doing our bread-and-butter work,” said David N. Weiss, a “Shrek 2” and “Rugrats” writer who recently turned in a first draft of “Carl the Frog,” about a cannibalistic amphibian. . . .

The writers are realistic about the financial rewards of a children’s book . . .

“I don’t think anyone thinks they’re going to make a lot of money on it,” Weiss said. “But creatively and emotionally, the chance to work on something that’s personal without the presence of a massive corporation is special right now.”

Goofing

Neville Shute Norway!

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Hey! Did you know that Neville Shute Norway is an anagram for Easy Hull vote-winner? It is! Not only that, but “Norway, the land of the viking” is an anagram for “Heavily farted know-nothing!” Can you believe it?! My source, for our friends in the press.

Reviews

The Good Guy, by Dean Koontz

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Sorry to do another Koontz review. But Koontz is who I’m reading just now, and the day hasn’t produced any other subject material—at least none that I noticed. If I were James Lileks, I could get a couple thousand words out of how I avoided eye contact with the guy trying to sell Strib subscriptions in the grocery store tonight.

Oh, I had my dialogue worked out. He’d say, “Interested in subscribing to the Star Tribune?”

And I’d be like, “No.”

And he’d say, “Why not?”

And I’d be like, “I can get my beliefs and politics insulted for free any time I like. Why should I pay the Strib to insult them?”

But in real life those exchanges never work out like you’ve scripted them, so I just rushed by, pretending he wasn’t there.

Anyway, to the book. The Good Guy begins with the hero, Timothy Carrier, a master mason, sitting alone in his favorite bar. A man takes a stool near him and starts a conversation as if he knows him. Assuming the man has confused him with someone else, Timothy plays along for a few minutes, just as a lark.

It stops being funny when the man hands him an envelope containing ten thousand dollars, along with a photograph of a woman he wants him to murder, and then rushes out.

Not only is Timothy not in the least interested in murdering anyone, but he finds the woman’s face extremely attractive.

So begins an odyssey in which Timothy locates the woman, a novelist named Linda Paquette, and goes on the run with her, fleeing a murderer who is a talented professional as well a total, narcissistic sociopath.

But there’s hope. Because Timothy isn’t just a good guy. He has considerable resources of his own, and the conspirators made a very big mistake when they stumbled over him.

The Good Guy is one of Koontz’ recent books, and he’s become as good at building a story as (we’re informed) Timothy is at laying bricks. Timothy is just the kind of guy the reader wants to be, and Linda just the kind of woman he’d like to fall in love with (or vice versa if the reader’s a woman. If I know anything about women. Which I don’t). I put the book down from time to time, because I had to sleep and work, but it was a struggle. The villain was interesting, frightening and believable, but Timothy and Linda caught my full sympathy and held it.

I’m kind of glad Koontz doesn’t do a lot of sequels. That means Timothy and Linda will probably live happily ever after, without running into any more ruthless serial killers. That’s kind of nice to think about.

Writing

A good year coming? Good/Bad writers?

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I can’t (in spite of myself) shake the idea that 2008 is going to be a good year. It seems to me that any year in which you’re able to fix the usual beginning-of-the-calendar problem of writing the wrong date in the checkbook, by just making a squiggle on top of the mistaken digit, has to be a good one.

Hey Phil, you live close to Tennessee. Did the recent storms knock out all the phones? It’s book ordering time at the bookstore, and I got “all circuits down” messages when I tried calling both Thomas Nelson and one other house (I forget which. I was thinking it was Moody, but that’s in Chicago, isn’t it? But maybe Chicago had storms too. I should follow the weather news more closely).

Roy Jacobsen of Writing, Clear and Simple, suggested, in a comment on my last post, that we talk about the question of Good Writing vs. Good Story.

It’s possible for a writer to be a poor stylist but a good storyteller—grabbing your attention with his narrative and invention, even as he appalls you with his writing technique. It’s also possible for a writer to be an elegant stylist but a lousy storyteller (this, I think, is a good way to be nominated for literary awards).

Any examples from the audience? Authors (or works) you can lift up as examples of Good Storyteller/Bad Writer, or Good Writer/Bad Storyteller?

Reading, Reviews

The Door to December, by Dean Koontz

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I’m becoming a fan of Dean Koontz, almost against my will. As I familiarize myself with his body of work, I’ve developed a theory about him, which I’ll share at the end of this incisive review.

The Door to December is one of Koontz’ earlier works, first published under a pseudonym. It exhibits the usual weaknesses you expect from early Koontz. And yet… I loved it.

As the story begins, Laura McCaffrey, a psychologist, is summoned by the police to a house where her ex-husband has been found horribly murdered, along with two other men. Her concern is not with her ex, but with her daughter Melanie, whom he kidnapped six years ago. Besides the bloody corpses in the house, beaten beyond recognition, a room is found containing a sensory deprivation chamber and an electro-shock aversion therapy chair. Of Melanie there is no sign at first, but the little girl is soon discovered wandering naked on a nearby street. She is physically unharmed, but appears to be autistic.

At the crime scene Laura meets police detective Dan Haldane, who immediately takes an interest in the attractive doctor and her vulnerable child. As they look at the evidence, it becomes clear that Melanie has been the subject of a heartless, long-term psychological experiment.

And the horror isn’t over, because whatever killed the men in the house is killing others connected with the project. And Melanie, in her rare lucid moments, expresses her certainty that when the Thing is done killing the experimenters, it will kill her too.

I found lots of things to complain about in the writing here. The dialogue in particular was clunky. There’s one scene where Det. Haldane has a long argument with his greatest enemy in the world, his police superior. At one point he starts explaining himself to the man, sharing his deepest fears and motivations. This is ridiculous. Men hate to bare their souls to their closest friends. They don’t voluntarily point out their own weak spots to people who are likely to use the information against them. I know why Koontz did it. It’s a temptation for an author—you need to insert some exposition, explaining why your character acts the way he does. You’ve got a passionate dialogue scene; your character’s emotions are up. It seems to be just the place to throw the exposition in. You willingly ignore the fact that your character is expositing to the wrong person.

It’s easy to do. I’ve been tempted to do it myself (and have probably succumbed). But it’s bush league, and it damages credibility. (I’m reading the more recent The Good Guy now, and Koontz’ craftsmanship seems to have improved a lot.)

In spite of my criticisms, I liked this book exceedingly. And I think I know why (here comes my theory). Koontz is different from the average thriller writer. The average thriller writer is interested in examining the Problem of Evil. That’s an important question, and well worth looking at.

But Koontz prefers to examine the Problem of Good. When you consider it, the problem of good is just as puzzling, and certainly as important, as the other problem. And there’s the added advantage that there’s a whole lot less being written on the subject.

From that point of view—the point of view of looking at why people do good things, why they love and sacrifice and care for one another—I found The Door to December very moving. The climax, in particular, surprised me completely (it would probably not surprise a more virtuous reader as much).

I won’t say I like Koontz as well as Andrew Klavan, even now. But I’m liking him better and better. And he has a lot more books out there for me to find and read.