Parallel Dimensions and A Flying Psycho with an Umbrella

I always get sick at the end of the year, which makes the time between Christmas and New Years a bittersweet thing.

2010 was an interesting year. I finished Kill The Dead, the second Sandman Slim book and my first sequel. At the time it was the hardest book I’d ever written. I thought Sandman Slim three, Aloha From Hell, would be a breeze in comparison. Ha. It’s turned into it own kind of Jersey Devil. However, since I’ve already survived one sequel I’m not as panicky about this one. It’s just a process of working through the problems. Figuring out what works and what doesn’t and fixing it or at least scrawling Banksy wall art on top so no one will notice.

I also did my first book tour. I’d never done anything like it before. It was both odd and fun. It two weeks on the road by myself. See, I rated a tour promoting Kill The Dead, but I’m still a very small fish in an incredibly large pond, so I didn’t rate a handler. This means I was on my own 99% of the time (some kind locals helped me out from time to time when I truly lost). I get the feeling this being thrown into the touring fire is a common sort of publishing dues paying/hazing ritual. Can we send you out on your own and can you survive without getting arrest, killed, mauled or breaking any book reps legs by demonstrating the figure-four leg lock you saw on WrestleMania at your hotel?

One aspect of the tour that I hadn’t counted on was how easy it was to become displayed in the world and feel like you’re traveling in a parallel dimension. After four days on the road (I was gone for two weeks) I lost all sense of time and place. I didn’t know what day of the week it was or what time it should be in any given time zone. The weirdest part was going days not knowing what city I was in. I had both a paper schedule and digital itineraries on my phone and iPad. I lived by those times and addresses. It didn’t mater if I was in Minneapolis or Portland, Oregon, all I knew was that I had to catch a certain plane at a certain time, land and find the rental car, go to the hotel, check in and then hit bookstores or distributors. All that mattered were the times and locations on the list. I know I saw friends at the comic con in New York. I know I talked to a bookstore rep about Aqua Teen Hunger Force somewhere in the Midwest. I know some nice models gave me their zombie pin-up calendar and I know it was raining in Portland. I know that sometimes telling the car’s GPS system to show me the shortest route could lead me down back roads that reminded me way too much of Deliverance. On the other hand, on one of those random rural excursions, the nav system took me through a forest blazing in fall colors. I don’t know where that was, but it was a great drive. When I flew home from San Diego (I remember SD because it was my last stop) I remember thinking that I now understand why bands go insane and do outrageous things on the road. I felt utterly removed from normal daily life and I was only gone for two weeks. Going on the road for a year? You’d be a Martian by the time you were done.

In 2011 I want to get better at everything I do. Writing, taking pictures, everything. I want to travel more. Not in the disembodied way you travel on tour, but like an actual human being. I want to make it to Trinity site and the Creation Museum. I haven’t traveled abroad in years, so I’d like to get out of the country, even if it’s just a short trip to somewhere easy. The UK or Mexico. I hope I get to tour the south more when the next book comes out. I’d like to at least hit Houston. I don’t have many fond memories of the place and consider it the dullest big town I’ve ever spent time in, but I also have a strange connection to it that I can’t put into words. Each time I go back I hope that the connection becomes clearer, but that hasn’t happened yet.

2010 was full of learning experiences and I hate learning experiences. They’re just pains in the ass dressed up in Mary Poppins drag. Right, and fuck Mary Poppins too. She’s like a Freudian fever dream, the after effects of an opium and Vin Mariani binge. Chase the dragon, Mary. Right out the window and keep going.

You can find my Top 10 Books Read in 2010. They’re not all new books, just good ones I enjoyed.
http://www.omnivoracious.com/2010/12/kill-the-dead-richard-kadreys-top-10-books-read-in-2010.html

Here’s a list of my Top 10 SF and fantasy films. Some were produced in 2009, but not readily available until 2010. In no particular order:
Inception
Monsters (I think it helps to have traveled in the 3rd world to really appreciate this one.)
Human Centipede
Vampire Girl vs Frankenstein Girl
Cinematic Titanic: Danger on Tiki Island
Metropolis Restored
Night Mayor (A Guy Maddin short. You can see it online
http://www.nfb.ca/film/night_mayor
[REC] 2
Scott Pilgrim vs The World
World on a Wire (Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s 1973 pre-VR take on reality morphing, unavailable until now.)