Allen Ginsberg: Selected Poems

If you’ve heard Howl, the long-form poem that made him famous you get the idea. Kaddish assigned to Naomi Ginsberg, his mad Mother, seems only appropriate in its convoluted wanderings to the madcap woman to whom it is dedicated. ECT, Insulin Shock Treatment, and Lobotomies were all performed in her day. Passing an electric current via electrodes through the brain to cause an epileptic like seizure seems barbaric but is still done in modified form today because as a last ditch solution for extreme depression it works. Decreasing the brain’s higher functions via lobotomy is no longer practised nor is inducing insulin coma, a procedure also used on Mrs Ginsberg. The fact that his mother was severely paranoid would seem to have had a lasting effect on Allen. I can’t imagine what it was like to have a person you loved react in this way.  More than a few of these poems give one the impression that the writer was high on one mind-altering drug or another. Attempting to make sense or dissect many of these wandering lines would tend to render the reader more than a little mad as well.

To say that Ginsberg is a dirty old man begs the question. Many of these poems are homoerotic in the extreme. A couple decades ago I decided I wanted to learn about the beat poets. Having read most of them I’m no closer to a definition of what that is. Most seem to have been gay and were active in the Vietnam War era inveighing against that involvement. There’s an environmental component but most seem to be more consumers than protectionist. In the second half of this collection the poems start having a rhyme scheme and are set to music which is supplied. No I haven’t tried to sing them.

Bad Apple 1:Sweet Cider

What can I say? Like so many e-Books I've read lately this one could use
more careful editing. A girl named Neal lives in an extremely
dysfunctional family. The book begins with the murder of the most
significant person in her young life. All these negative vibes are
relieved somewhat when she comes into the embrace of a caring loving
family but the lass has been raised to expect negation at every turn.
This freebee is a teaser for the books to follow in this series. The
book is highly readable if predictable but leaves the reader feeling
rather unsettled. The title comes from Aunt Mabel's cider press.

Girls Love Travis Walker

Nineteen-year-old Travis has that charm that women find irresistible but
sexy isn't everything; his father's a jailed felon, his mother a
deadbeat, and they're about to be evicted from their crummy apartment.
Work is messing with his schooling. Travis is an amoral love 'em and
leave 'em kind of guy who suddenly becomes rather confused when he meets
a gal who can resist his charms. But the past has a habit of catching up
with one. How does he persuade this gal he wants more than a roll in the
hay with her? In the meantime he needs to finish school and find a
permanent job before he faces life on the street.

I keep reminding myself that this book was written by a woman. There is
a great deal more here than a high school romance. My only complaint is
that the storyline wraps up in a supposed happy ending all too quickly
and easily. Life isn't that simple and generally doesn't come with
fairytale endings.

The Boy I love

Set among working-class people in the English Midlands in the wake of
WW#1 there is only one woman in this love quadrangle. Paul, blinded in
one eye left medical school to go to war. After returning he marries his
dead brother Robbie's betrothed pregnant with his brother's child and
daughter of the local Anglican Priest. Child of the town doctor whose
wife died giving him birth Paul has had a life-long closeted
relationship with Adam and is being stalked by the local butcher Phil
who returned from war to take over the family business after his parents
died in a car accident. Phil has an identical twin brother Mick
invalided to a wheel chair by the war whom he cares for and a
counter-girl Hetty who has designs on him. Who knew so much intrigue lay
under the surface of sleepy little town?

Call the above spoilers or necessary background it is the execution that
makes this book worth reading. If good writers could bottle the formula
that makes for good writing and dialogue they'd make a fortune. Not only
does the book engage the reader from the opening pages but the editing
is excellent as well. The free preview is far more generous than most so
try it and you'll be hooked as well especially at the price. Alas, the
story drags somewhat in the middle. This is book one of a trilogy. The
Boy I Love is a song one of the men in the trenches sang.

The Graveyard Book

A book only Neil Gaiman could have written. Think Harry Potter, a boy
who survived the annihilation of the rest of his family is given into
the care of the ghosts in a graveyard. Not as ghoulish in the execution
as it first sounds. Still it is a tale that could only have come from
the pen of Gaiman who remains one of the most original fantasy writers
of our age.