Customer Reviews

Peckinpah

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In 1994 Alan Moore wrote a short story about a woman named Maureen Cooper, a bartender who slowly comes to realize she exists only as a character on a popular TV soap. The story was dense, verbose, brilliant metafiction, blending the story of Maureen with that of the actress who played her (who was herself not who she seemed) with a vicious polemic on television and its effects on society. It was called "Light of Thy Countenance" and there are two reasons I bring it up: first, because I feel that it is the spiritual predecessor to D. Harlan Wilson's amazing "Peckinpah", and secondly, because of Alan Moore himself, who felt strongly enough about this book to provide a blurb on the cover.

"Peckinpah" is difficult to categorize, a satirical meta mash-up of microfiction and microcriticism into something that maybe resembles a novel but is, I think, something much more interesting.

The back cover blurb does its best: it tells us "Peckinpah" is about Felix Soandso, the husband of a murdered woman who must wreak righteous vengeance on her killer, Samson Thataway, the hyperviolent leader of the Fuming Garcias, a Reservoir Dogs-esque clone army. Sure thing, back cover, but I'd argue that the story is just as much about a man who tears pigs in half or a shoe store clerk witnessing his coworkers disappearing beneath a stampeding tractor or corn stalks that open to reveal chainsaws.

Amidst all the absurdity, a wide variety of film motifs come under fire, such as rape scenes, lazy endings, and the fetishism of weaponry and violence. But it's the oversized role of film and television in our lives that seems to be the biggest target: pay attention to the chapter in which Felix Soandso is introduced to the single worst moment in his life through the screenplay excerpt that we have just read. Or the only chapter in which a book makes an appearance, the cover depicting an alien riding the blast of a nuclear explosion.

Throughout its entirety Wilson manages to keep the language terse and punchy. It is a brief novel made briefer by the force of its language, but if you're like me, you'll pick it back up and read through it again, slower the second time. And once again it will entertain and, more importantly, once again it will get you thinking.

D Harlan Wilson's Peckinpah is one of his best works, and that's saying a lot. Wilson takes his own flare for high-minded weirdness and jacks it up a billion notches. The book is structured in jagged bits and pieces, and it covers a wide variety of topics. Only about half of the chapters involve the actual story and characters. The rest of Peckinpah includes theories on the nature of ultraviolence and short essays about Sam Peckinpah himself. It can be daunting if you don't know what you're in for.

Part of Peckinpah is a classical revenge tragedy starring Samson Thataway and Felix Soandso. Thataway is a surreal character. He and his Fuming Garcias are almost the living embodiment of ultraviolence. They carve a trail through the earth with their LeBarons, performing gruesome executions and epic acts of random destruction. Felix Soandso's wife is killed during the massacre, and naturally he sets out to take revenge on the Fuming Garcias' insane leader, Samson Thataway. Along the way we learn more about who Sam Peckinpah was and some sophisticated theories on ultraviolence.

In my opinion, Wilson really flexes his muscles when he shows us his violent scenes using film references. Peckinpah is like a literary version of Natural Born Killers, Kill Bill, and some of the more violent anime out there. Certain scenes are described with camera angles, moving shots, close-ups, fade-outs, and sound effects. These scenes are some of the most vivid stuff I've ever read. Overall, D Harlan Wilson isn't content to write a revenge story. Instead, he uses his sharp and colorful style to examine and dissect a dead director and his love affair with ultraviolence. Truly, Peckinpah is an ultraviolent romance.

D. Harlan Wilson's fantasia of good ol'boy bloodletting and slapstick surrealism reads like a smoldering, sentient crack pipe being passed back and forth between the ghost's of Maurice Blanchot and William S. Burroughs while they watch an eternal marathon of Sam Peckinpah films. Tersely written, and visually outrageous, this book is a must for film fanatics and avant-noir enthusiasts...

After Blankety Blank, I had to read more of this guy, just to be sure his brilliance wasn't a one-off thing. I'm ashamed to admit I haven't yet seen a Sam Peckinpah film, as much as I want to. However, I could still make enough sense of the book without being overly familiar with his work. The book is short. The chapters are short. And while it doesn't feel as intricate or as clever as Blankety Blank, it's still a fantastic book. It's filled with scenes that are at times ultraviolent, surreal, strangely awkward, absurdly exaggerated, and occasionally filmic. And it's got illustrations. Flicking through the book just now, I came across a page that had something startlingly appropriate written on it. "It was as comical as it was dead serious." It's awesome. I love the way D. Harlan Wilson writes books.

When a psychopath named Samson Thataway and his gang, the Fuming Garcias, ride into Dreamfield, Indiana, it means trouble for the small town. During an orgy of rape and murder, they made two mistakes: they raped and murdered Felix Soandso's wife, and they left Felix alive...

Peckinpah is an absurdist tribute to the films of Sam Peckinpah. While my summary makes it seem like a fairly standard revenge tale, it's not. It's so weird that even though it was less than 110 pages, I couldn't have taken much more.

Peckinpah seems to take place in the same world as DHW's SciKungFi trilogy. Amerika was mentioned a few times, as were the goat-headed men. Since the book was a tribute to Peckinpah films, I knew how it would end but it was still fun getting there.

That's about all I can articulate about Peckinpah right now. It's slightly less weird than Dr. Identity and way less weird than Codename Prague. It's an enjoyable little book and a good way to spend a couple hours.

Reading PECKINPAH felt like visiting a weird, equally charming and creepy small town full of socially awkward people all trying introduce themselves to one another. The "novel" is essentially a series of short stories that tie together into a larger, cohesive story. I'm a huge fan of D Harlan Wilson, but PECKINPAH just might be my favorite. The writing style is definitely not a run of the mill, traditional style, but rather "experimental" in an accessible fashion.

I always feel like I've survived a Psychic War after reading one of D. Harlan's books. They are exhausting, but good for the [mental:] economy.

Peckinpah plays out like the manifestation of the collective conscious of the Amerikan Midwest if it were, at times, being raped by the collective unconscious of the same region after absorbing and integrating the mind of a man who is good with words.

If you've seen Frank Booth's intro in Blue Velvet, and thought "huh, that's weird," you've never tried to visualize the people of Dreamfield... or Pseudofoliculitis City, or Vulgaria... I have to imagine that it's what Hell must be like, though at the same time, I feel like it's always lurking behind the every-day faces in our every-day world.

Though Peckinpah seems like a quicker read than D. Harlan's other books, it's no less demanding.

Fantastic. He takes the life and on/off screen character of Sam Peckinpah and inserts it into an absurd redneck town full of pig-obsessed town folk and a gang thirsty for blood. A brilliant take on society's reaction to violence both on and off the screen-- reading this book is like watching layers of violent, absurd acts on spliced celluloid while police sirens and gunshots fire all arond.

D. Harlan Wilson is one of my favorite writers-- for fans of surreal, absurd, speculative fiction, he is King.

D. Harlan Wilson is one unique individual. This book was spot on with what I've come to love about his writing. It's absurd at times, thoughtful, semi-educational if unfamiliar with the subject matter, and just downright strange. He defies the "rules" of writing and who doesn't love a rebel. I think this would be awesome if turned into an animated movie...not sure if real actors would do it justice, not without a lot of computer work at least.

Anyway, rambling aside, this book is awesome, well worth the money, I won't go into details about the story because there would be no point in buying the book if I gave it all away in a review.