The Mysterious World of A.J. Lezak

A.J. Lezak’s untitled story of an old man’s realization that both he and his story will not last forever, is an unexpectedly powerful insight into the fear of growing old.  While the overall plot is simple enough – a grandfather and grandson take a walk through the woods – the underlying fear of both the world ahead and the past left behind is what truly carries the story to greatness.

Lezak’s work seems to serve a dual purpose.  On one hand we are given subtle insights into a mysterious world that while similar to our own, also has an underlying sense of dread to it.  The grandson warns his grandfather that “It’s too dangerous, to be out there alone, grandfather…there are dangerous beasts in the forests at night.”  Lezak’s use of “dangerous beasts” leads one to believe one of two things, either it’s not just bears and wolves out in the woods, or the world of the story is one far different from our own.  The story concludes in a manner that seems to corroborate the latter option.

Once the grandfather and grandson reach a clearing they pause both to rest their feet and to share a moment of introspection.  The grandson asks, “Grandfather, you still come here, so often.  I know the story, but I don’t understand why, after all these years you still come.”  The grandfather simply replies, “I’m the only one left that remembers, Lucas.”

Remembers what?  What world is this in which society is so young, so fragile, that it’s history is left to one soul?  The story ends just as enigmatically.

The old man reached up and touched Lucas on the shoulder.  With the other hand he pointed up at the sky.  “Look.”

Maybe the mystery of what is in the sky itself is not what is important about A.J. Lezak’s story, maybe it is the underlying message that is meant to be taken and held and kept somewhere safe by the reader.  The grandfather fears the true legacy of his people will be lost upon his death.  While his grandson claims that both he and his generation will share the story of their people, how much truth will be lost over time?  How much of our history has been lost or transformed or straight up lied about?  Is this what Lezak is in fact challenging the reader to question?

As the grandfather says, “How can you be so sure?”

 

Cool Story Bro – A Brief Look at Palmer Fritschy’s “Die Sammlung”

“The entire century is down there, information that people don’t know, mysteries yet to be revealed. There’s more than just music in those records.”

I resisted going down there for two weeks but the temptation and knowledge of the collection was too much to resist.

When reading about the massive subterranean record collection in P. Fritschy’s Die Sammlung, I was reminded of a favourite novel of mine, Gabriel Garcia Marquez’ One Hundred Years of Solitude. In particular, I drew comparisons to the mysterious volumes of parchments left behind by the old gypsy Melquíades. In the book, generation after generation of the Buendia family struggles to find some meaning in the gypsy’s labyrinthine notes, which are written using a cipher. Some members, like Jose Arcadio Segundo, end up locking themselves within a room for years in an attempt to uncover the secret of the words, refusing to leave even to eat or defecate.

The protagonist of Palmer’s story seems to be on the precipice of a similar journey.

There was so much to explore and the reality of the records was so much larger and consuming than my existence that my own reality became secondary. I lived through the records by listening to them, and by doing so, they lived through me.

Although he is not yet entirely lost in the record collection, the character’s rapid descent from fascination to obsession indicates that he may well be on his way.

I like this story a great deal, in part because of its brevity. In a relatively short amount of time Palmer manages to entice the reader with an intriguing mystery wrapped in a kind of urban mysticism. This isn’t the uncovering of some cursed tomb in ancient Babylon, nor the gateway to some mirrored, paradoxical universe. It’s a record store in Berlin (which in itself is interesting enough), yet the way that the author reveals details and hints at secrets is compelling enough to make it feel foreign and magical.

“Don’t lose yourself down there.”

“I’ve got in under control, I think. I’ve got another friend now, from work. We spend time together often now.”

In my opinion, the story is strong enough to have existed with the enigmatic record collection being the only force driving the plot. This would, however, result in a much shorter and perhaps less fulfilling tale. To combat this, Palmer has introduced an additional character, Elke, to tie our protagonist to the “real world.” The extent of her role in the story is unclear at this point, but I think her inclusion is smart. It kicks open to door to a number of additional possibilities, and that’s never a terrible thing.

It’s difficult to suggest – or even guess – where this story will end up. It’s very clear that there is something special, and perhaps even sinister, about Die Sammlung. What that extraordinary quality is, however, is left to be discovered.

 

*** Palmer Fritschy is a Winnipegger of Dutch descent. Other works include “The One About the Guy who goes to Space,” and “That One Where the Guy Gets Hit by the Gay Porn Truck.”

 

It’s all in the details: AJ Lezak’s “What am I doing here?” (posted by Lita Hnatiuk)

It’s all in the details. A story that’s slow paced can build lots of suspense and set the scene for something big to happen. It can also allow a more in-depth view of the characters as the story unfolds. And the best way to create believable characters is through details.

In the opening of this short segment, the girl is rushing through the snow of a cold blizzard. The scene goes on for two paragraphs of explaining how she’s not dressed for the weather.

​Her skirt wasn’t that short. Some people might even consider it conservative. Some might, most wouldn’t. It offered her legs little protection. Her fishnet stockings offered even less. Her leather boots came up to her knees. Once smooth, shiny, and black, now cracked, dull and grey.

The descriptions are so detailed it makes the character more real in the reader’s mind. It creates a more believable story. Francine Prose, in ​Reading Like a Writer,​ says that our whole lives are made out of details and that the details make a story more trustworthy. I think the most perfect example of this is the last sentence where he describes her washed out boots and how they used to be a “shiny black.” this is a nice detail that makes the reader think about how much snow she must have walked through to get them to be so grey.

Another description that’s effective is alliteration in describing the snow sliding ” It sucked and squished as her high heels scraped over the pavement. ” the alliteration of “sucked and squished” creates a nice image and sound of the snow while she’s walking.

​The story moves along slowly, without much plot until another character is introduced, a mystery man also out in the cold. When this happens we are intrigued and want to learn more about the situation. This clearly isn’t a story on it’s own, rather it’s the opening to a longer story. The one thing that could be suggested to the author is to move the plot a long. Add something of what is coming while building the characters. This can be added once the direction the story is going has been established. But overall this is a great start to a promising story.

 

Cuss words, Drug use and a Sad Man by Chuka Ejeckam

It starts off simple, “it was a gut rot morning.” But Chuka Ejeckam’s piece, which is currently untitled, quickly becomes anything but. The vivid imagery and at time disturbing themes give Ejeckam’s writing both a feeling of impending dread but a yearning for warmth and hope.

This piece follows a previous storyline in which an unnamed character introduces the reader to his neighbour Jameson. A drug addicted alcoholic, Jameson frequently invites young girls into his apartment, an activity that seems to sicken and at the same time intrigue the main character. He states, “I wanted him to tell me. I wanted to sit, the sanitary civilized among his perverted empire.” I can only think that he wants to sit in the company of a rapist to feel clean by comparison. Ejeckam makes us feel for the character is a way that is tragic, and makes the reader feel like they are already losing a character they have yet to really know. One such scene is as follows:

“… I stood there, smoking, her feet pattering on with the tireless excitement children have. That absolute undying optimism that goes away when you wake up one morning and realize that you’re awake, and what that means.”

The introduction of a small girl into the depressing world of the main character is the light in the dark. A small section of words that tells more about the character than “a gut rot morning,” tells about his last evening. Ejeckam continues:

“She had the smallest little hands, so tiny I could break them both in one of mine. And in her tiny hands, a twinkling Slinky, brand new and silver and aching to be played with.”

The imagery of this powerful man realizing he could break something so small and delicate is wonderful and humanizing. His description of the small toy and how it ached to be played with reminds the reader that the main character has a past and, I think at least, he still yearns to recapture youth in his world of decrepid sorrow.

A beautiful piece in my mind. The only question I feel in not answered is one that will only come with time, where is our main character going? Who is he really? Concrete details have yet to be divulged. But I believe that with the use of more details this story can become the perfect balance of beauty and storytelling.

 

Reflecting on the work of Dylan Hughes – posted by Albertine Watson

In today’s post I’ll be discussing an untitled story by Dylan Hughes from our March 2nd Advanced Creative Writing class. The aspect of this story that really caught my attention was the dialogue. Just like the story, it’s very peculiar (a descriptor peppered liberally throughout the story itself), fast-paced, and possibly most surprising of all, filled with human emotion.

Although I initially had a difficult time understanding the two men at the beginning of the story, their conversation felt very real, almost as though I was part of this strange world, sitting not so far away from these two strange old men. They don’t speak in perfectly accurate or complete sentences, and so they shouldn’t, because that’s not how two odd old men from a “historically peculiar peninsula” would speak.

For example, at one point the two men go on rambling about their despise for the Welsh and eventually forget what it was that they were discussing in the first place. The following example shows how Hughes has really given these men a very distinct style of speaking, even when we don’t know who is who:

“Tender Joseph! You asked me what I’d do if I had but an hour to breathe! And then you proceeded to yammer on about filthy Natterjacks.”

“Horf! I did not!”

“Blimey, you’ve got the recall of a Welshman.”

“Ack! The Welsh!”

“Fooey, fooey!”

“Take me down and tape me trousers! I hate the Welsh!”

“Awful bunch they are. Just awful.”

“Dribble! What were we talking on?”

“Life I think.”

We can’t tell quite who specifically is speaking here, but the line “Dribble! What we were talking on?” immediately shows the reader a few things. 1) These men come from a small town and are very old, so their grasp on modern sentence structure is loose at best. And 2) They’re forgetful, hot-headed old men.

I like the fact that Hughes hasn’t given these two men names. It makes it seem like they’re very similar to one another, perhaps they’ve been best friends for decades and are growing old together.

The story at first is heartwarming. Two old men, jabbering on about little in particular. Then, by page 3, the story takes a sudden twist. One of the elderly gentleman mentions a piece of paper a friend of his had that mentioned a love film.

As the story goes on, we discover that this is no love film, and what these men are talking about it some kind of gameshow-style pornography.

They don’t go into much graphic detail and one simply tells the other he thinks he’d like the film. They drop the subject quickly, and then reminisce about how much they love the town of Bumbershoot.

The story ends abruptly, and I found myself left with a sense of longing. I wanted to know more about these men. The story starts off by telling us that the ocean swallowed up the peninsula long ago, and I’m jolted back to this fact when I reach the end of the story. I realize that these two old men met their not-so untimely demise along with those crashing waves. In this way, the story acts as a magnifying lens into the lives of these two men, presumably best friends, sometime before they were washed away.

 

Blumbershoot by Dylan Hughes

Blumbershoot is a terrific exercise in dialogue. There is little to no plot. Two characters have a back and forth discussion for nearly the entire piece. The content of their dialogue goes no where and is for the most part superficial. Below is an excerpt from Blumbershoot (warning extreme language):

“When I was twelve I read a very good book about Natterjack Toads.”

“Go on. Tell me.”

“Well it starts with a wee little tadpole right? Real cunning sleeveens those are. And then you give them a while, munching and wandering and what have you. A while more. And then slameram! They’re Natterjacks!”

“Jesus Christ. Me arse and Katty Barry if you aren’t a liar!”

“It’s the truth. I read it in a book when I was twelve.”

“I’ll let you have it. Though I’m still not sure what any of it has to do with your original question.”

“What question?”

“Tender Joseph! You asked me what I’d do if I had but an hour to breathe! And then you proceeded to yammer on about filthy Natterjacks.”

“Horf! I did not!”

“Blimey, you’ve got the recall of a Welshman.”

“Ack! The Welsh!”

“Fooey, fooey!”

“Take me down and tape me trousers! I hate the Welsh!”

“Awful bunch they are. Just awful.”

“Dribble! What were we talking on?”

“Life I think.”

“Ah right! Well I still name you a fibber, but it’s a good babbler, so I’ll ask it in honest this time. What would you do you had but one whirl of the hands to live?”

“Oh my. That’s a stickler. All I can think about are Natterjacks and the Welsh.”

“Culchie basterds the Welsh are!”

“Fooey, stinking Welsh!”

“…”

“I’ve got it!”

“What have you got?”

“An answer to your question.”

“Well get on with it! I could down a pint of plain in the time it takes you to chirp!”

“Settle it. About two years ago when Declan O’Donoughue was still with is…”

“Mary, Mary! Keep his soul!”

“Aye. As I was saying, when O’Donoughue was still with us he found a piece of gray paper that had blown on the breeze from County Clare. I asked him for a peep, but he wanted to hoard it for himself the basterd!”

“Damn his soul Mary! A bigger bollox never put his arm through a coat!”

What makes Blumbershoot so interesting is the two characters and their voices. Blumbershoot works as a kind of abstract story, yet it seems it could also continue on with the two characters leading the narration of a story about someone else. The characters are both very funny and could be used to tell a story they heard of a local rumour. This gives the writer a terrific chance to play with multiple voices retelling stories. This could result in the two characters working as an excellent filter for the reader to get a story though.

 

A review of an untitled tale by Dylan Hughes

My review of Dylan’s Hughes untitled short story coincided with my reading of the chapter on Dialogue in Francine Prose’s book Reading Like a Writer, which was quite perfect as Hughes story, aside from the opening paragraph, is entirely dialogue.

In this story of two old men who are about to meet their final demise in the form of a tsunami-type wave, talking about what they would wish to do in their final hour of life. Of course the irony of this doesn’t escape me. Hughes does a great job of portraying the Irish and Welsh accents through the characters dialogue, and without description, paints a picture of two bitter old men is creating in this dialogue.

“Awful bunch they are. Just awful.”

“Dribble! What were we talking on?”

“Life I think.”

“Ah right! Well I still name you a fibber, but it’s a good babbler, so I’ll ask it in honest this time. What would you do you had but one whirl of the hands to live?”

“Oh my. That’s a stickler. All I can think about are Natterjacks and the Welsh.”

“Culchie basterds the Welsh are!”

“Fooey, stinking Welsh!”

“…”

“I’ve got it!”

“What have you got?”

“An answer to your question.”

“Well get on with it! I could down a pint of plain in the time it takes you to chirp!”

And even though not much is actually said throughout this short story, aside from reminiscing about a soft core porn that one of the men had taken a shining to, the dialogue is entertaining and lets us get to know the characters.

 

Alex Rohne’s “Waiting” (posted by Anrea)

Alex Rhone displays passion and intensity in her piece called Waiting. Right from the introduction, I felt Alex gave a detailed description about her character and that is what intrigued me to want to read more.

Here is the introductory line I am referring to:

Waiting for the trains to pass by and blow hair, tangled in eyelashes and slicking to red lips.

I think of you.

I find this introduction mysterious, sultry and sexy; it is full of little details that make me want to read on. I also find Waiting to be poetic and lyrical all at once. The words seem to bounce off in my mind like they would off my tongue if I were to read it aloud.

It is refreshing to read Alex’s words of passion and to think that someone could really love another person as much as her character does. It is inspiring to know that love as intense as this still exists.

Though part of this could remind me of the beginnings of simple love poem, I don’t think its intent is to go that route. I think this writing is dramatic but still innocent and pure. I almost get the feeling it is a burning sensation from within Alex as I can hear her voice in this piece. It makes me wonder if she loves this intensely.

I really like how Alex has used subtle little details and descriptions to give a feeling for when the piece is supposed to take place. The fact that the character is waiting for the train to pass by, tells me this is in a different time perhaps because now a days it is very rare to take trains as the main form of travel. Plus she uses the description of people being weighted down by carrying heavy briefcases and wearing long trench coats. With technology these days, I see very rarely see people carrying briefcases, I just see them carrying their electronic devices.

I am a bit confused about the line:

They will sing the deep song of life that echoes around us every day, in every place we meet, the deep rumble of the world without you.

Though it sounds beautiful and there is a definite rhythm to it, I wonder what Alex means by the deep song of life. Is it a reference to something or a metaphor? The more I think about it I wonder if the deep song of life actually means the feeling of love.

There is a pattern in Alex’s writing with how she breaks down her paragraph style. The paragraphs are in little chunks. There are mostly one sentence phrases on each line. In my opinion, this does make it easier to read and lend itself to the lyrical feel of it.

I love the description Alex uses in this sentence:

Steam ruffles my curls, blowing my hat deep into the fog to land in some unknown world beyond you.

I love steam ruffles my curls. This is a good use of descriptive gestures and how gestures can really give you a feel for what a character is like.

I get the feeling that Waiting is from a woman’s point of view and a man’s point of view. I feel like they are each talking about how they feel for each other, they are also in love with each other.

Alex also connects these two distinct voices with themes such as magic and strength. This really ties the two scenes together and shows the characters connections to each other. I especially get this feeling within the following sentences:

You once asked me where I kept my strength. The truth couldn’t me more simple. In you.

You also said something about reality once that believing in magic makes it easier. I rolled my eyes and brushed you away. I hope I get the chance to tell you that I do believe.

To tell you my strong arms haven’t failed. For they have found their purpose.

I think Waiting is very abstract and unique and has the potential to become a larger piece. I can see it even being a movie or a play of some sorts. I think Alex is a very talented writer and should continue developing this piece further. I look forward to reading more about Waiting.

 

Waiting: An insight to an Alex Rohne short story

Alex Rohne has written a beautiful poetic prose called Waiting. With the use of her sentence structure choice words and cadence she fills her readers with the feeling of being in love, even if that part of our own lives are currently empty

An excerpt:

“To always keep your name on my lips , it should be pushed past my teeth; so the letters can play on my tongue. I’ve grown to love how your name tastes and the way it makes my lips move, slowly, my tongue gently licks the roof of my mouth.”

“My tongue longs to call you, Such a simple love.”

Rohne is a poet writing prose in her short story waiting. It has a timeless aura on it. It reminds us, even if we are currently jaded, what it is like to be in love with some one.

How the love of that one we are in love with is like no other. How we love to say that name and hear ourselves say it. That simplicity becomes instant bliss.

I loved this piece because I haven’t felt this way for a long time, but for a brief moment while reading her piece I remembered what it felt like to again.

It made me want to feel that way again and made me feel anxious while “waiting” for the next time I will.

Rohne asked in a recent workshop how her peers thought about her line breaks making her prose more lyrical and poetic.

It is in my opinion that this, is what makes he piece unique and more beautiful while really setting the tone and mood that I assume Rohne was hoping her readers would settle in to.

While he piece could be self contained, I felt she could continue with it and she decides to make into a larger piece, as to read something that battles the darker side I have been drawn to lately was very refreshing.

 

Untitled Chuka Ejeckam Project

The thing about Chuka Ejeckam’s writing is that it casually walks the line that separates vivid writing with dense writing. Maybe it doesn’t even walk it; it flirts with it, teases it, pushes and pulls it around until it’s too loose and bent to be considered a line anymore. It’s wrought with imaginative and off-kilter phrasings, so much so that cursory reads might render it as chewy. But spend a little more time and his words will have a way of working their way under your skin: while you’re busy trying to make heads or tails of what he’s trying to tell you, he’s already cast a set and placed the scenery from right beneath you, pulling you in without your knowing it. This all comes to form within moments of his first Advanced Creative Writing Seminar submission, which explores the seedy sides of nightlife through the eyes of one particularly cynical, nameless protagonist.

***

She smoked Djarums, the bitch. Like I didn’t love her enough already. I watched the smoke slip from her lips, that crimson-lined cavern of sex letting the blue-tinged billowings crawl toward the ceiling. She tossed an empty matchbook onto the table, shook her hair loose, and set her eyes to roam about the room. I watched the naked orange light dance in those curious emeralds. Watched them slip ever nearer me. I ducked her gaze, hiding my avoidance in a sip of sweet fire. There’s a pestilent fucker named Jameson that lives beside me. I seen girls coming out of there maybe 15, 16, can’t even stand. You always know when Jameson has a date, because of the blood on the floor. A pestilent fucker to be sure, never cleans them up after they shoot. They trip and stumble their way out of the building, the nigh imperceptible perforations in their arm leading a steady stream. Half of them don’t know where they been, where they are, but he shoots ‘em up and fucks ‘em and the he’s good and done.