Dear Necropolitan Liver (hmm, somehow that doesn’t sound right):
You love the disturbing, vaguely nightmarish roadside attractions out there in the middle-of-nowhere hellholes of America, right?
I know I do. To me, it’s not a road trip if it doesn’t involve stopping in some godforsaken spot for some oddball site or bizarre experience. And one of the most memorable was running into THE THING.
Ever see THE THING?
Few roadside attractions are MORE bizarre than The Thing — that grand-daddy of southwestern gas station stopovers that blows away the rest in its sheer weirdness and twisty corridors.
When we drove with friends across the desert one Christmas holiday, we stopped at the nearly-unavoidable roadside attraction.
Now, the southwest is full of bizarre, unusual and downright messed-up little roadside attractions with snakes, scorpions, two-headed babies in jars…but The Thing was something more impressive than most — for all the right reasons.
The rule of a Roadside Attraction is:
The exhibit can never be as disturbing or creepy as imagining the person — and the deranged mind — that put the attraction together in the first place.
The Thing satisfies on oh so many levels.
First, the entry fee (back then — several years ago) was about 75 cents . Good price! I believe the price has only gone up very slightly in the intervening years.
Then, you have to walk down these hallways full of Tim Burtonesque desert driftwood — and it predates Tim Burton — until you come to the most bizarre exhibit I’ve ever seen in my life:
A torture chamber, with women being whipped and people being beheaded (or at least, that’s how I remember it) — all carved from tree stumps. Creepy! And yet compelling. And yet…creepy.
And then, like the cherry on this bizarro sundae — right next to the crushed nuts — there’s the Nazi car.
This vehicle is made all the more disturbing because someone put it in this collection with the wood-stump torture chamber and The Thing itself and those Tim Burtonesque mangly desert-wood creatures.
What old crazy desert rat spent a lifetime amassing this collection? It’s not the current owners. It was someone who had a dark imagination, and maybe the kind that spilled into daily life. The Nazi car did it for me. And I hadn’t even seen The Thing at that point.
And it’s disturbing to have gone through the corridors to that goal — that Thing — but when you get to the Thing, it’s not shocking as much as it is just another spoonful of “Danger, Will Robinson!”
Should I reveal what it is?
Naw.
You’ve got to see it for yourself.
After visits to The Thing and to some other roadside attractions, I decided to write a horror version of this kind of place when I wrote my story, The Attraction.
Which, coincidentally, has one of my least favorite covers on the paperback and digital edition.
Take the video tour:
The Thing is off that odd stretch of the 10 Freeway between Phoenix and Tucson — in an area of the desert with the strange name: Dragoon, Arizona. Plan your next vacation around it! It has earned its spot among the Places of Eternal Darnation.
Here’s the Book Trailer for The Attraction — made by COSProductions.com. Nice ‘n’ creepy. Be sure and turn up the sound, too.
Best,
Douglas Clegg
p.s. In the next episode of Necropolitan Life, look for “Drug Deal With the Devil, or Why Great-Great-Grammy was a Junkie.”
If you’re going to some weird, unusual, off-beat place –
Take a photo, email it to me at DClegg@DouglasClegg.com, and if I post it here at Necropolitan Life, I’ll run a photo credit and link to your blog or website.
Where you going, down that desolate road to nowhere?
Well, I couldn’t stay away for 7 days from the Web.
I made it to day three and then faced the fact: for better or worse, the internet is my office, my media library, as well as my news and information bureau. It also saves a lot of time when shopping around.
In the days away from it, I filled the gaps of time with watching TV news (not very thorough and not the news I’m generally looking for), and not really writing much more than I normally do. I didn’t exercise more (I do two hours a day of either walking, biking or some other activity), nor did I read more.
In fact, I read less during this time.
I guess I’m disciplined as a writer as it is — my output has been the same whether I’m websurfing or not.
Also, being able to research subjects online is a huge benefit to a writer — and I missed it on those days.
Social media, for me, is a conversation now and then at the water cooler in my office. I do most of my tweets, facebooking and scribding while on the treadmill. I’m not neglecting anyone at home in favor of the internet.
Well, maybe the mouse. But she sleeps during the day, anyway.
I rarely leave my home or office much during the week when writing, so the internet provides me with a quick way to find information, read the news, and see what’s going on in the world — all during the little breaks in my writing schedule.
So, what I learned from a few days of separation from the www:
The internet actually reduced the time I would spend doing the same things.
As an example, not too long ago we needed to buy a car. Via websites, we found the car we wanted. Through a company online, we managed to get the best price possible for the car, got the financing fast, and really just had to go test out the car and decide if we wanted to add any additional options at the dealer lot.
Without the web, the time (and annoyance) for me would’ve made it daunting.
In total it took three hours and twenty-five minutes (this includes the trips to the dealers — which were an hour away).
The access of the web allowed us to save a lot of time and money on the car purchase. We still went to two dealers to try out two different cars before making the final decision, but everything else was done within twenty-five minutes online.
Compare this to our previous car purchase, not done online: three weeks of driving around to various dealers in the state, knowing what car we wanted and what options, but wanting to find the right dealer and price, the negotiating, the paperwork, all kinds of stuff.
This is one recent example, but I can find many more. Contrary to what I was concerned about, the internet actually isn’t a time-suck for me.
It’s a time-booster.
It’s true that if I’m avoiding something, I’ll web-surf and think I’m accomplishing something — but I suspect this is my “turn-off-my-mind” time. I’d probably fill it with bad T.V. shows, or some other time-wasting activity that’s actually about allowing the mind a little bit of a goof off. I think goofing off time is important.
But I don’t spend time getting caught up in message board soap opera or arguing in comments areas (well, except maybe here on my own website — we’ll see!) My facebook time is productive — I’m nearly always on the treadmill or exercise bike or waiting in a parked car when doing it, so that I specifically feel that I’m not wasting the time so much as distracting myself from what otherwise might be a boring moment or three.
Plus, I value these conversations with readers and writers.
So, I am on the side of the internet as a time-saver and in many cases, a wallet-saver, too.
I work at home and the internet is both my office and my water cooler where I can hang out with others in the middle of a busy work day. But part of me wonders if I’d enjoy my week more — as I did in the olden days — if I unplugged.
So as of today — June 16, 2010, at about 2 p.m. in the afternoon — I’m going to go commando with the internet. NAKED WRITING.
No security blanket of checking sites, updating status bars, dropping in comments.
I’ll check private email (for specific business reasons), but no websurfing, no social media, no googlefests. Just for a week.
It’s an experiment to see if I find that creativity and writing zooms — or if it’s just about the same as when I do check facebook & twitter & scribd, google stuff, and keep up with the news via the internet.
It’s my version of going to a cabin in the woods, only this cabin is my home with all its various amenities and usual distractions and obligations.
Because I’m a writer, the internet is a tool for communicating with readers, friends, colleagues, agents, editors and others — as well as for research.
But can I enjoy the process and thrive without it?
That’s what I want to know.
I’ve been on the internet continuously since the early 1990s — although I trace 1995 as the banner year when I got into the Prodigy Bulletin Boards (and made many friends that I still have today and with whom I’ve visited and gotten to know well.) Prior to that, I was on GEnie, and I never quite worked out that system.
I’m a bit nostalgic for the days when it was just me and the typewriter or me and the computer screen, with nothing to surf, nothing to check out — other than long walks and seeing friends for coffee or lunch.
I’ll use my iPhone for email, but won’t use my work computers for anything internet-wise for a full week. If I find that I’ve rediscovered a well-spring of creativity and focus from it, I’ll push it for another week.
I’ve got to keep email open because I don’t love the phone that much for talking, and I’ve got business going on so I need to hear from various people at times in order to get information. But I’ll limit my email to a few times per week rather than every day.
I’ll report my findings here, in a week, when it’s done.
Do you unplug? Are you rarely on the internet? Or is it fairly constant? I’d love to hear from you about this subject — just leave your comments here, or if you prefer, at Facebook, Scribd, or Twitter.
I love Carl Jung’s writing and thought for many reasons.
I just came across this, and I absolutely feel this, as well (although I’m not quite to 83). Here’s what Jung wrote, from Memories, Dreams, Reflections:
“Thus it is that I have now undertaken, in my eighty-third year, to tell my personal myth. I can only make direct statements, only ‘tell stories.’ Whether or not the stories are ‘true’ is not the problem. The only question is whether what I tell is my fable, my truth.”
I’ve been fortunate that Difference Games has created two games around my two recent books — Isis and Neverland — and I want to thank the unsung hero of these games.
Want to know why both Isis and Neverland have an aura of the “classic” about them? Glenn Chadbourne. His interior art for Isis and Neverland elevated those books. I can’t thank him enough.
Glenn and I have known each other for awhile, but it’s only been in the past two years as he created the stunning illustrations for Isis, and then Neverland, that I’ve gotten close to Glenn and his wife, Sheila.
I’ve seen Glenn’s studio — and the phenomenal pen-and-ink illustrations he creates there. No high tech gizmos to fix his art — he just takes the pen to paper and goes from there. It’s remarkable to see.
I rank him somewhere between Tenniel (who did the early Alice in Wonderland illustrations) and Edward Gorey. But he’s completely distinctive in style — a true artist.
He also has a wonder-pug named Rocket who is the resident guardian spirit of the house.
Glenn has illustrated the fiction of Stephen King and many others. I was very fortunate to work with him in the production of Isis and Neverland, with thanks to the team at Vanguard Press who loved his art, as well.
Glenn recently launched a website, and that’s the real reason for this post. I want to point you to it. You can see more of his fantastic art and find out more about him:
Honestly, don’t you think novels should have more art within them? I do.With all the artists out there who can bring the writer’s vision to life through illustration, I want more.
If you haven’t done so, be sure and play the Neverland game and the Isis game when you get a chance. And pick up the books, of course.
Welcome to Necropolitan Life — these are weird little stories or places or curios my team and I find on the web. I launched this in late 2009 as a “hidden” part of this site just to see if I might be able to blog consistently about it.
But I’ve decided to make it an intermittent feature into my regular website blog.
Whenever you see the logo up top (”Douglas Clegg’s Necropolitan Life” with the cool Glenn Chadbourne illustration), you’ll know it’s a day of weird stuff on my blog.
I’ll bring you stories of odd museums, the haunted or not, the scientific creepies, the stories of weirdness and the craziness of life and history.
Come back often – it’ll also make great linkage content for your Facebook, Twitter, Myspace and other social media pages. Just click on the “Share” icon at the bottom of this note to instantly pass any Necropolitan Life news on to your friends, tweeps and followers.
If you’d like to submit a link for Necropolitan Life, just leave the link in your comment here and I’ll check it out and see if it’s right for a future Necropolitan Life moment here at DouglasClegg.com. Thank you.
Woke up late, did an hour and a half of the treadmill, and have been writing today.
Taking a break now to address a reader who wrote in asking a which books on writing that I’d recommend to an aspiring writer.
Here are the three books I believe writers should read — often:
1. Aristotle’s Poetics.
2. The Art of Dramatic Writing by Lajos Egri
3. The War of Art by Steven Pressfield
Most bookstores can order these for you, or you can find them at your favorite online bookseller’s site.
Sure, there are dozens of other great books on writing. But these three have proven their weights in gold to me over the years. I added the Pressfield book recently — he is writing about the resistance that we all feel at times as writers. It is well-worth seeking out that book.
Read them slowly. I suppose if you’re an absolute genius, you’ll absorb it all quickly. I, myself, believe there are no shortcuts. Both the Egri book and the Aristotle are meant to be read slowly — to think about, to apply, and figure out with regards to your work and the books and plays you’ve read.
There are good books out on writing a commercial novel, but that’s a whole other blog entry. I hope those of you who write will pick up and enjoy these three books.
Mist drifting in off the sea today out the windows; living room, on laptops, amaretto-flavored coffee, cat curled in a fleece-lined throw. That’s my Saturday so far.
Recent reviews of Neverland came in — you might enjoy these:
“It is rare that I find a story that unsettles me, as I have been reading horror for nearly fifteen years now, but Clegg is a breath of fresh air…” — click here to read the review.
In Bookgasm, a great review site:
“Following the success of ISIS, Douglas Clegg has not disappointed with NEVERLAND. This haunting novel — no pun intended — tells the story of a group of children on a family summer vacation on Gull Island. They form a kind of club, centering on an abandoned shack in the yard of their family’s retreat, no grown-ups allowed. This simple concept forms the foundation of a waking nightmare, in which…” Read more here.
I’ll link to some other reviews in future posts.
Hope you’re doing well — let me know (in comments, below) what you’re reading, what you’re up to, and how you’ve been. I look forward to hearing from you.
I’m thrilled to announce that the winner of the 1st Neverland Contest is Kelly Holcombe of North Carolina — drawn at random from among the eligible subscribers to my newsletter.
Contratulations, Kelly!
Kelly chose the Barnes & Noble Nook, and it’s on its way to him.
A minute after that contest ended, another one launched. This means: you’ve got another shot at winning this Grand Prize. Details here.
You love the disturbing, vaguely nightmarish roadside attractions out there in the middle-of-nowhere hellholes of America, right?
“Thus it is that I have now undertaken, in my eighty-third year, to tell my personal myth. I can only make direct statements, only ‘tell stories.’ Whether or not the stories are ‘true’ is not the problem. The only question is whether what I tell is my fable, my truth.”
I’m thrilled to announce that the winner of the 1st Neverland Contest is Kelly Holcombe of North Carolina — drawn at random from among the eligible subscribers to my newsletter.