I just updated the “Purchase the Novel” web page of the web site to reflect the updated price of $16.95, shipping rates outside the U.S./Canada and the new private mailing address for mail orders and written correspondence. Thanks to an alert buyer who pointed out to me the old web page was out-of-date and inaccurate!
Web page updated
January 26th, 2012London calls again!
January 17th, 2012This is a follow-up to my Dec. 6 post about Watershed Television, a British production company which wants to do a documentary on zoophilia for broadcast in the UK. Here’s an official e-mail from them reaching out to the zoophile community for people willing to speak out for our orientation:
My name is Sam and I’m a Researcher at UK-based production company Watershed. At present, we’re in the early stages of developing a sensitive documentary on Zoophilia for a UK broadcaster. We’re interested in talking to young people, in their 20s or 30s, in the US or the UK about zoophilia. We currently have three people who are keen to participate but we’re keen to talk to more people to explore the subject.
At Watershed, we specialize in producing factual programmes with purpose. Our aim is always to shed light on issues and subjects which perhaps have been misunderstood in the past. The broadcaster is a pioneering channel in the UK who champions unheard voices, with experience of sensitively dealing with similar issues. We would like to reassure anyone that is interested in talking to us about the programme, that the subject matter will be treated in a sensitive and discrete manner.
If you’d like to find out more, please e-mail researcher@watershedtv.co.uk
My contacts so far with these people have been very straightforward and positive. They are planning to post this message to several zoophile and bestiality forums, in hopes of finding suitable subjects. I will also be forwarding this message to my several zoo friends.
My intention in writing Wet Goddess wasn’t to promote zoophilia, it was hopefully to promote a new way of looking at dolphins. But although I’ve been married twice and I’m a father, I cannot deny that my original and primary sexuality is zoophilic. As zoophiles, we know that our actions are at worst harmless and at best beneficial to our partners, yet we must often contend with the conflicting interests of the State in what ought to be our private matters, who we love and how we love them, sexually or otherwise.
I don’t want to sound like a preacher, but if we are ever to achieve legitimacy as a sexual orientation, we must take control of our own media image and show “normal” people that we are not that different from them. (We may be surprised by the results!) If we do nothing, then surely the regressive forces in society will continue to pass laws like the one they just passed this year in my home state of Florida, authored by a Democratic senator and signed by a Republican governor, one of the few bills to pass without a dissenting vote!
On the cautionary side, I would say, look at my own example. When the ruckus about Wet Goddess and my relationship with my dog got too loud on the Bubba the Love Sponge show, the magazine I was working with dropped me like a hot potato and wouldn’t even publish the two stories I’d already submitted. I don’t want anybody else to run into any trouble like that or, godz forbid, something worse because they came out of the goat pen, stable or kennel. So please give Watershed’s offer careful consideration, along with your own safety and security.
Book review: “Mayan Calendar Girls”
January 16th, 2012
Lin Robinson, the nominal and public author of the group novel “Mayan Calendar Girls” is an old friend of mine from 30 years ago. When I had a small photo lab on Capitol Hill in Seattle, Robinson, who was trying to be a photographer while making a living writing catalogs, would frequently stop in and after work we’d often share a smoke in the back of the shop, which I’m sure used to drive my straight-laced business partner crazy. We’d chat about our lives and our plans to someday become real writers, you know, writing books and stuff like that, not advertising copy.
Well I am happy to say Robinson has finally achieved his goal with “Mayan Calendar Girls,” a novel which is probably best described as a metaphysical romp through the tourist wonderland and squalid underground of Mexico’s Mayan Riviera. The plot, which has more offshoots than a Brazilian pepper bush, loosely revolves around competing quests for a couple of Mayan artifacts, a crystal skull and a stele or plaque that may contain hints as to the future after the final Mayan calendar ends this year.
Robinson and his co-authors, who are only credited as “Team 2012,” give us a plethora of characters, 12 in all, although the major ones are Aphra, a black, Lesbian private investigator on the trail of the plaque, Curtsy, a blond skin diver who loves dolphins a little too much, and Mei-Mei, a Chinese-American archaeologist. Through Aphra’s machinations the three of them attempt to steal the prognosticative plaque from a Mexican drug lord’s yacht, and things get very dicey from there.
This might give you the idea that “Mayan Calendar Girls” is a heist novel, but only superficially. The loosely tied-together plot swings wide and wildly through a confusing narrative arc involving politics, dope, relationships, metaphysics and Francis Ford Coppola, who makes a cameo appearance at his Blancaneaux Lodge at the climax (which really is a climax of a most unusual sort).
Along the way, Team 2012 displays an intimate knowledge of every hotel, restaurant and bar in the Isla Mujeres locale, of customized jet skis and scuba diving gear, Mayan history, Mexican culture and dozens of other authentic-sounding details. In some ways the book is like a fruitcake, a jumble of tasty ingredients combined with the hope of producing something delicious.
Robinson’s stated ambition in co-authoring the book was to write a novel that was neither autobiographical nor derivative, and in this he has succeeded. ”Mayan Calendar Girls” is original and… different. The narrative is unceasingly clever, full of puns, satire and double-entendres.
But a good novel is more than just a series of scenes, or chapters, strung together, and this is where “Mayan Calendar Girls” fell apart for me. Perhaps if I had read the book more swiftly it would have made more sense, but it took me over a month to read. Rather than sucking me in, the way a good novel will, I found the book difficult to pick up. The narrative is jagged and inconsistent, and the plot has a couple of holes big enough to drive through, and the ending a major letdown. If it’s any consolation to the Team 2012 authors, I had the same complaints with “Naked Came The Manatee,” another book group-written by a bunch of very popular and well-known Florida-based authors. It seems to me what was needed here was a guiding editorial hand, or oversight, and that is sorely lacking in the narrative.
Any book that tries to follow a dozen major characters is difficult to pull off for an experienced author, and I wish Robinson and his team had set their sights on something a little less ambitious. But perhaps I am taking it all too seriously. ”Mayan Calendar Girls” isn’t trying to be “War and Peace,” after all. It’s probably ideal beach reading, a mindless and often muddled piece of entertainment with a lot of giggles along the way.
And the word from New York is…
January 12th, 2012… wait a while longer. I hadn’t heard back from the editor at Big NYC Publisher since the end of September, so I dropped her a short note this morning wishing her a happy new year and hoping she would get around to reading my book soon.
In response got an apology for being so busy – “It’s just one thing after another,” she said, and don’t I know how THAT goes?
However she said she’d delegate the first reading of Wet Goddess to somebody on her staff, which is fine, anything to get the process moving. ”Just make sure it’s somebody who likes dolphins, huh?” I asked her.
To which she replied, “Who doesn’t?”
Stay tuned! 
Inertia
January 11th, 2012I really wanted to write something about the three Australian guys who boarded the Japanese whaling vessel, but what can I say about them? They’re heroes. Me, it’s all I can do to keep my little piece of property halfway decent.
For some reason it took me days to work myself into a state of mind where I could pick up my chain saw and cut down some Australian pine saplings that were threatening to intrude on my driveway. I don’t know why I was suffering so much inertia except that when dealing with things like chain saws, which I did not grow up around, I only like to proceed when I feel very confident of my abilities. Mistakes with power tools are painful and unfortunately permanent.
It took so long to get the damn thing running I gave myself a blister trying to start it. I finally gave up and took it to my next door neighbor, who happens to be a small engine mechanic. He had just repaired it about a month ago, but he ended up taking it apart, cleaning the carburetor and replacing the diaphragm. It’s a Poulan; I can’t recommend them. Lousy little saw that doesn’t want to run. The neighbor finally got it going and I went and sawed down about a dozen or so saplings along the driveway. The neighbor said I can throw them on a pile on is property, which will save me having to bundle them up for Waste Management. He composts them.
I must confess that while I value every sale, I no longer get a thrill out of packing and shipping copies of Wet Goddess. It’s become sort of routine. I wish more people would write me with their reactions to the book as I do get a charge out of what they have to say. Feedback is very welcome.
Dodging a paper bullet
January 4th, 2012My printer Tom is a wonderful guy. Not only has he given me top quality, but reasonable prices on printing Wet Goddess, and the only reason I don’t mention his last name or the name of his business is that I don’t want him taking flack from any other clients (or even, say, his minister if he’s a churchgoing guy) for publishing my controversial work. In fact, I didn’t even name him in the book’s info page until this last printing.
I approached Tom quite early in the process, long before I had the manuscript ready for publication, to sound out his feeling about publishing a human-dolphin romance novel. He wasn’t opposed to it, which was encouraging. I wanted to use him for two reasons: 1) I believe philosophically in using local suppliers whenever possible, 2) no shipping charges – or rather, the shipping charges were merely a little more mileage on my already well-amortized 1997 truck. Tom’s shop is just on the way to the local Wal-Mart, as it happens! 
So imagine my surprise when I walked into Tom’s office last week to pick up the latest press run of 50 copies of my novel, presented Tom with a money order for what I thought was the balance due, only to be told I owed the balance in full – roughly twice as much as what I was handing him.
I gulped. Not that Tom was angry or anything, he was quite pleasant about it. But I was equally certain that my balance due payment was all I owed him. ”Let me check this with my bookkeeper, if you don’t hear back from me, everything is OK,” Tom said cheerfully, and I left with my order, which he helped carry out to my truck. Driving off I swallowed a lump in my throat. But I didn’t hear anything later that day, so I slept well.
Yesterday, the phone rang. ”Malcolm, this is Tom. I went over this with my bookkeeper, she’s my wife, and you still owe me another $150.”
That would just about wipe out a life-saving $200 loan I’d just gotten from a generous and well-employed friend. I literally felt my heart starting to pound, but I said “Tom, I’ll be down there to settle this” in a very upbeat tone and got off the phone. I felt sick, but I knew I was in the right. The question was, how to break it to Tom that his accountant (who remember is HIS WIFE) has made a minor boo-boo, as it were?
Now, I am admittedly the world’s worst bookkeeper, and I make no pretense otherwise, but I am also an obsessive-compulsive character type, which helps me to save things like invoices. So I was able to pull every invoice Tom had given me this year. Then, by going to my bank’s web site, I was able to pull up and print out photocopies of the accompanying checks. Thus I assembled a catalogue of each order and its accompanying payment or, in the more recent instances, payments, for this is where we had gone wrong.
I was very, very diplomatic. ”Malcolm, I’m not trying to screw you out of anything,” Tom said as we shook hands. ”I know that, Tom,” I said, “and I’m prepared to settle up, but before I do that can we spend a couple of minutes going over some records?”
“Sure,” he said. Long story short, after consulting first my records, then his own records, Tom realized that what he had thought was two orders was in fact really one, stretched out over a month because he was busy right before Christmas. ”You might be right,” he finally said, “Let me photocopy all your documents.” So he did. And now I’m waiting to hear back, fingers crossed… because right after I got done with Tom yesterday, I ran down to Wal-Mart and spent most of it as quickly as I could on mailing envelopes for the book and other minor niceties, like food. Stay tuned and I’ll let you know how this plays out.
Back in stock again
December 30th, 2011The trade paperback novel Wet Goddess: Recollections of a Dolphin Lover is back in stock again on Amazon.com, through ZenCart or by PayPal. Thanks to my printer for his prompt service. I’d mention his company’s name, but I don’t want him subject to any local pressure, so he will have to remain anonymous, at least until I can find a publisher to take these production and distribution chores off my hands.
Best wishes to everyone, especially my readers, for a peaceful, prosperous and happy 2012. May this winter season be the birth of some kind of guiding light for humanity on our woeful planet, we certainly seem to need it!
Movie review: “War Horse”
December 28th, 2011
(WARNING: Plot spoiler, but it really doesn’t matter.)
Imagine “My Friend Flicka” meets “Saving Private Ryan” and you have some idea of what “War Horse” is all about. Since this is a Steven Spielberg movie, you know you’re going to be treated to a lush visual spectacle, and “War Horse” is all that.
Spielberg is also Hollywood’s biggest iconophile – he loves fulfilling our expectations – so you know instinctively that whatever twists and turns the plotline takes, things will turn out all right in the end. In spite of this incipient knowledge, “War Horse” doesn’t disappoint except perhaps in a few places where things could have moved a little faster. At almost two and a half hours, this movie qualifies as an extravaganza. Fortunately, Spielberg keeps the pace pretty lively.
The story: As a young English boy, Albert Narracott (Jeremy Irvine) watches a high-spirited colt being born, and a few years later his father buys “Joey,” the unruly horse, as a draft animal. It is up to Albert to train the horse, which he does against all expectations, and save the family farm – almost. His father must sell the horse, which he does to a cavalry officer, who takes him into battle in the early days of World War I. The movie follows the horse through various adventures and misfortunes, including some truly horrific battle scenes that expose us to the mindless brutality of trench warfare. I wouldn’t take anyone younger than 13 to see this movie due to the very realistic portrayal of battle, with explosions flinging bodies in the air and men dying like flies as they charge bravely but hopelessly against machine gun fire.
All this while, poor Joey’s fate goes from bad to worse as he is put into service as a German army draft animal, with an estimated lifespan of about one month. Over and over again throughout the film, various characters recognize something special about the horse that keeps saving him from one perilous situation to the next. Of course, Albert has come of age and enlisted in the fight, and in the end, through a series of coincidences, he is reunited with his beloved stallion – but since this is a Spielberg film, you knew that would happen, didn’t you? The real story here isn’t the ending, it’s the journey Joey makes, the people whose lives he touches, the many threats against his own life and his close escapes, over and over, from death.
Spielberg paints all this on a lush canvas that contrasts the verdant beauty of the Devon countryside with the devastated, muddy battlefield of WWI. Some scenes of Joey fleeing riderless across no man’s land and getting tangled in barbed wire are truly gut-wrenching to watch, but it leads to a remarkable scene, true to the spirit of that war, where an English soldier and a German soldier leave their respective trenches to cooperate to untangle him.
In the end, “War Horse” left me exhausted but satisfied. I stayed until the end of the credits to make sure the Humane Society had put their stamp of approval on the movie, which they did; in spite of how things look, no horses were harmed during the making of the movie. I think it’s amazing nobody died during the filming of the cavalry charge scenes, with the British riders slashing their way through a German encampment. A lot of credit goes to the horses and their trainers; the horse (or horses) who plays Joey actually seems to be able to act sometimes, a tribute to its trainer who I’m sure was just off-screen. My only quibble with the film is that it could have been half-an-hour shorter. It seems to drag when Joey and another horse fall into the hands of a kindly German farmer and his daughter, but Spielberg gives us a rationalization for this at the movie’s end.
My rating: Four out of five stars. If you love horses, animals in general, sentimental stories, Spielberg films or are a WWI military buff, “War Horse” will probably fulfill your expectations, but be appraised this is NOT a young children’s movie.
Temporarily Out
December 20th, 2011First and foremost, thank you to all my readers who have made Wet Goddess the self-published success it is. Almost 450 of you, and I say “almost” only because a few of the complementary copies I sent out may not have been read.
Due to a remarkable sales spurt of three copies a day for the past week, my current stock ran out as of this afternoon. My printer has promised me more books before the end of the month. I will be heading for 500 copies with this next printing, a sales figure many a self-published author would envy!
I am also happy to report what may be my first legitimate media review due to a sale to someone from a national media network. I don’t want to say anything to give away which network this might be, prior to the review being published, but I will give you one hint: it’s not Fox!
The other three broadcast media contacts appear to be on hold until at least through the holidays.
As always, whatever your beliefs at this time of year, or lack of them, I wish you a happy holiday (even an atheist like me can celebrate the winter solstice, after all!).
More media interest…
December 15th, 2011It seems as though my fifteen minutes of fame is expanding to half-an-hour. In addition to the interest in my story from the other side of the Big Ditch, I recently got a call from a Hollywood casting agent who wanted to know if she could pitch me to a series on a well-known cable television channel. The subject: obsessions.
Me? Obsessive? Really?… what a fascinating concept! ;-)
Of course I told her yes. ”Do you still have pictures of her on the walls? Do you have a lot of dolphin knick-knacks around?” she asked. No to the first, but I do have a lot of dolphin knick-knacks and figurines on the bookshelves… Cay left them here when she moved.
The casting director thought it was a big plus that I’ve got movies of the dolphins, especially the one I refer to as “Ruby” in the novel. She asked if I was in them. ”No, I was behind the camera,” I explained.
There is a small stipend involved, for which I’m grateful. I wonder what effect this is going to have, assuming they actually accept my obsession?
