John Pelan - The Autobiography (Reviewed)

"Wrestling With Obsession: The Acclaimed Diary Of John Pelan,
Critically Acclaimed Author"
Midnight House, Seattle, 2005. Limited to 100 copies, 5 of which come
with free plastic wrestling figures of 'Slamhead' and 'Drillface'
together with a leather-look leotard.

Reviewed by Ambrose Silk, Times Literary Supplement.

Having been cast in a traditionally poetic mould, I must confess to
blissful ignorance of that obscure branch of literature which is
apparently termed 'pulp horror', but after reading WRESTLING WITH
OBSESSION: THE DIARY OF JOHN PELAN, CRITICALLY ACCLAIMED AUTHOR I have
to extend bottomfelt thanks to John Pelan, the critically acclaimed
author, for rectifying this gap in my embarrassingly formal education.
Yet this beguilingly simple exercise seeming self-adulation is not
merely a thin veneer of autobiographical puff, for in WRESTLING WITH
OBSESSION the critically acclaimed author dispenses with the delicate
policy of ambiguous and disingenuous personal revelation, instead
opting to lay bare his soul in what is often an illuminatingly honest
series of bold confessions. In his own words, "In setting out to
write down this biography what you are now reading I didn't so much
want to trumpet on endlessly about my huge global success so much as
clamber up on to the ropes so that I could shake my hairy fist at the
world in retribution."

The book features a spoof introduction by a Jessica Amanda Salmonson.
One quickly intuits it be a parody of a badly written Victorian
romance, so deceptively nauseating is the prose. In this amusing
piece, Ms Samonson enthuses wildly about the author's indisputable
erudition and literary importance, placing her former lover on a
pedestal with Harold Robbins. In a sentence that defies conventional
analysis, she accords him the status of "a Le Fanu for the Hugh Hefner
generation". The joke is on us, one suspects, so sublimely does
Salmonson caricature bad writing.

Mr Pelan then opens proceedings proper in a rather unconventional
manner; the first chapter comprises a series of very praiseworthy
quotes from a succession of apparent "Genre Legends" all testifying to
the brilliance of the critically acclaimed author. Although unfamiliar
with the names mentioned, I feel sure that 'Rufus T. Firefly' and
'Baron Corvo' ring a distant literary bell. In yet another break with
tradition, the second chapter lists in painstaking detail every extant
- and indeed forthcoming - credit of the critically acclaimed author.
We learn that he has authored some very popular stories about a
Policeman's cockerel, presumably in a series of tales which emulate
his literary peers Robert Hichens, 'Saki' and Rudyard Kipling. I must
confess to having missed Mr Pelan's early fictional offerings, though
no doubt that would be attributable to my local W H Smiths having sold
out of these critically acclaimed pieces. Furthermore, although I have
an entire run of the Times Literary Supplement and similar journals, I
must have missed the glowing reviews of same. No matter, Mr Pelan
waxes effusively about his own work, saving us the bother, citing much
highly laudatory praise from close colleagues, which more than
compensates for the reader's inability to locate the original works
concerned.

All to often one hears of a brilliant writer having narrowly escaped a
life of worthless ignominy. Not so in the case of Mr Pelan, for in
chapter three Mr Pelan modestly informs us of his glittering career
path which eventually led to his stupendously successful literary
awakening. We are told that he left school at sixteen to attend what
he calls 'The University Of Life'. And in a remarkably candid and
moving paragraph, Mr Pelan bravely contradicts the school's contention
that he was expelled for sadistically harassing a succession of
younger boys, accusing the since retired headmaster of being "…a
failed and jealous mother-f****** who would never qualify for
membership of the Horror Writer's Association not while I'm in
charge". We then learn that Mr Pelan turned down a promising trainee
fryer position at his local branch of McDonalds, where he was employed
as a fat scraper, in order to take up an important position as
wheel-balancer at 'Tyres R Us'. There after six years he was urged to
apply for the role of assistant tyre-fitter after a discrepancy in the
till arose, but he instead took up a position at his local sewage
plant, having been head-hunted by an old school friend. It was here at
Seattle Municipal Sewerage that Pelan took to correcting the omissions
of his education, spending hour after hour locked up in a toilet
cubicle avidly devouring 'pulp horror' when he should have been
working. This, coupled with his fervid interest in all things male
wrestling, turned his burgeoning mind 'literarywoods', resulting in
his critically acclaimed decision to take up a pen and start writing
himself. However, he still managed to hold down part-time work as a
Gorilla-O-Gram (Urko from PLANET OF THE APES) and a nightclub bouncer,
despite his convictions for bovine molestation.

Chapter six is dedicated to celebrating Mr Pelan's lucrative income
from writing. In a highly innovative move, the book's publisher
(coincidentally bearing the same postal address as the author) appears
to have fitted a 'pop-up' flap on one page in which these breathtaking
figures are listed. Either that, or my review copy, which features a
flapping piece of card detailling far lower sums, and is marked 'IRS
File Copy' on the flap's rear, is a curious publishing anomaly. As a
reviewer, one can't quite see the point of this chapter; after all,
against what are we meant to compare these nebulous figures? However,
it does at least appear to suggest that Mr Pelan's income is up there
with the Stephen King's and John Grisham's of this world, which must
surely further bolster the author's critical acclaim. This reviewer
was also reassured to discover that despite working with a succession
of unknown and highly obscure publishing houses, the author has still
been able to carve out a very lucrative career for himself (through no
doubt I have failed to realise in my humble ignorance that Midnight
House and Ashtree Press are subsidaries of Random House or the
Bloomsbury Press).

In an additional nod to the notorious 'Baron Corvo', Mr Pelan then
dedicates seventeen chapters to minutely and - if truth be told -
profanely, criticising his critics. No doubt this is a fashionable
American pose; it certainly complements the author's obsession
low-brow horror fiction of a sadistic bent and is therefore, no doubt,
simply a clever similie. However, this modus operandi is a new one on
this 'out-moded' reviewer, and I found it all just a little odd. The
seventeen agonisingly slow chapters read like a convoluted and badly
scripted nightmare, in which the author claims that he is being
stalked by his critics, whilst the reader quickly begins to form the
inevitable conclusion that he has it the wrong way round. How else are
we to judge Mr Pelan's constant and repetitive references to the
children, attics and sexual habits of his critics, which he resorts to
by way of seeking to invalidate literary criticism levelled against
himself. The facts of the situation - if indeed any ever existed - are
alas drowned in a heaving cesspool of malicious conjecture. Indeed,
the reader is left wondering if even this was the clever intention of
the author, designed to purposely obfuscate and erase all criticism of
himself, or whether is simply an obsession running rampant. If the
latter, it must surely qualify as a subtle pun on Mr Pelan's fictional
reading interests, and as such should perhaps be read as an homage to
Uel Key, a writer with whom the author has justly been compared to in
terms of literary capability.

The next few chapters chart Mr Pelan's rapid progression to the very
pinnacle of the American literary establishment. Amusing anecdotes
involving his best friends Clive Barker and Stephen King are
interspersed with a rueful awareness that his burgeoning success was
"…driving a big fat fried potato wedge between me and my old crappy
life." Although opting to stay in the same house that he always lived
in, Mr Pelan become '****-scared' that constant media and "fanboy"
attention would compel him to relocate to Long Island or Manhatton. He
grew a ZZ Top beard in order to hoodwink the obsessive gangs of fans
who would hound him around Seattle for autographs, and purposely
increased his weight by fifty pounds for that same purpose.

It was Mr Pelan's bar-room trick with a Terry's chocolate orange that
apparently gave Clive Barker the inspiration for HELLRAISER, and even
now (the author informs us), the multi-millionaire Hollywood writer
and director still calls him up in the middle of the night to "..thank
me personally for all the success he has achieved." Stephen King is,
we are quietly informed, a constant house caller, roaring up on his
Easy-Rider motorbike with a leather jacket, the collar fashionably
upturned. Apparently whenever the author of CARRIE, SALEM'S LOT and
THE SHINING encounters a writing block, he charters a plane to Seattle
and then drives over to 'Dunboastin'', the informal name by which Mr
Pelan's domicile is known, for support, advice and "a damned
well-flipped burger".

One might speculate whether all this acclaim and success had gone
straight to Mr Pelan's head; on the contrary, Mr Pelan modestly
informs us that his extremely prestigious position at the Horror
Writer's Association enables him to keep a cool and controlled grip on
both awards processes and work preferment. He strenuously denies that
the Association is run nepotistically for the benefit of a few chosen
cronies, comparing it to the British Fantasy Society, which is
apparently above reproach because it has the word 'British' in the
title. He shrewdly dismisses claims of 'vote-rigging' and
'award-creaming' as "…sour grapes made up by jealous critics what
haven't got the balls to set their own Society up if they want awards
that badly which they appear to". His arguments are certainly
compelling and authoritative, citing as they do fellow Society award
recipients, worthies who are apparently perfectly positioned to
comment, coincidentally holding high office as they do.

When it comes to his private life, Mr Pelan is very reticent, which is
perhaps surprising in an autobiography. He lists his hobbies as
wrestling, drinking fine wine, collecting Shakespeare folios and
reading "high-brow, improving literary-ture". He is coyly evasive
about family members but effusive about his pets, telling us that he
keeps seven regrettably incontinent cats which help keep reptiles and
amphibians out of the house (creatures he appears to be in mortal
dread of). And despite the stratospheric success of his literary
career, he reveals in a tiny footnote that he still holds down a
position as a salesman with a local double-glazing company, where he
works daily on a commission-only basis. This reviewer warmly commends
this modest and disarming authorial affectation, demonstrating as it
does the author's unwillingess to 'loose touch with reality'. Could
one imagine J.K. Rowling working five days a week as a petrol pump
attendant to keep in touch with her working-class roots? Certainly
not, onethinks.

In casting aside this odd tome, I speculated how best to classify this
strange chameleon of a man. What was Pelan really? Was he a
working-class drunk aspiring to Charles Bukowski's mantle? Could he be
the keenest poet that pulp horror porn never had? Or might he be the
editor's editor, mopping-up on all the unwanted and highly challenging
projects that more discerning writers snobbishly disdained? Yet to
pigeon-hole this most resourceful of men is to 'break a walrus upon a
wheel'; far better to accord him the title of 'jack-of-all-trades', or
perhaps 'Nixon-in-waiting'. Just as there is no beginning to his
literary talent, there is no surely end to his ability to diversify,
and this awestruck reviewer should not be surprised to see this
versatile professional washing showroom cars or compering at
prestigious Hog Roasts, such are his multi-tasking talents.

Age appears to be his only enemy; age, and his inability to author
meaningful adult prose.


Ambrose Silk
March 2005

Hoppy, what of your vow to leave this NG on 12/12/04?
wrote in message
oups.com...
[Having decided to leave the venom-filled pit called rec.collecting.books,

Now you've posted an obsessive tirade that makes the sick, demented Yammy
look like Mary Poppins!
Try a high colonic.

Inappropriate post ignored.

Gina Harader

Haunted River wrote

"Wrestling With Obsession: The Acclaimed Diary Of John Pelan,
Critically Acclaimed Author"
Midnight House, Seattle, 2005. Limited to 100 copies, 5 of which come
with free plastic wrestling figures of 'Slamhead' and 'Drillface'
together with a leather-look leotard.

Reviewed by Ambrose Silk, Times Literary Supplement.

Having been cast in a traditionally poetic mould, I must confess to
blissful ignorance of that obscure branch of literature which is
apparently termed 'pulp horror', but after reading WRESTLING WITH
OBSESSION: THE DIARY OF JOHN PELAN, CRITICALLY ACCLAIMED AUTHOR I
have
to extend bottomfelt thanks to John Pelan, the critically acclaimed
author, for rectifying this gap in my embarrassingly formal
education.
Yet this beguilingly simple exercise seeming self-adulation is not
merely a thin veneer of autobiographical puff, for in WRESTLING WITH
OBSESSION the critically acclaimed author dispenses with the delicate
policy of ambiguous and disingenuous personal revelation, instead
opting to lay bare his soul in what is often an illuminatingly honest
series of bold confessions. In his own words, "In setting out to
write down this biography what you are now reading I didn't so much
want to trumpet on endlessly about my huge global success so much as
clamber up on to the ropes so that I could shake my hairy fist at the
world in retribution."

The book features a spoof introduction by a Jessica Amanda Salmonson.
One quickly intuits it be a parody of a badly written Victorian
romance, so deceptively nauseating is the prose. In this amusing
piece, Ms Samonson enthuses wildly about the author's indisputable
erudition and literary importance, placing her former lover on a
pedestal with Harold Robbins. In a sentence that defies conventional
analysis, she accords him the status of "a Le Fanu for the Hugh
Hefner
generation". The joke is on us, one suspects, so sublimely does
Salmonson caricature bad writing.

Mr Pelan then opens proceedings proper in a rather unconventional
manner; the first chapter comprises a series of very praiseworthy
quotes from a succession of apparent "Genre Legends" all testifying
to
the brilliance of the critically acclaimed author. Although
unfamiliar
with the names mentioned, I feel sure that 'Rufus T. Firefly' and
'Baron Corvo' ring a distant literary bell. In yet another break with
tradition, the second chapter lists in painstaking detail every
extant
- and indeed forthcoming - credit of the critically acclaimed author.
We learn that he has authored some very popular stories about a
Policeman's cockerel, presumably in a series of tales which emulate
his literary peers Robert Hichens, 'Saki' and Rudyard Kipling. I must
confess to having missed Mr Pelan's early fictional offerings, though
no doubt that would be attributable to my local W H Smiths having
sold
out of these critically acclaimed pieces. Furthermore, although I
have
an entire run of the Times Literary Supplement and similar journals,
I
must have missed the glowing reviews of same. No matter, Mr Pelan
waxes effusively about his own work, saving us the bother, citing
much
highly laudatory praise from close colleagues, which more than
compensates for the reader's inability to locate the original works
concerned.

All to often one hears of a brilliant writer having narrowly escaped
a
life of worthless ignominy. Not so in the case of Mr Pelan, for in
chapter three Mr Pelan modestly informs us of his glittering career
path which eventually led to his stupendously successful literary
awakening. We are told that he left school at sixteen to attend what
he calls 'The University Of Life'. And in a remarkably candid and
moving paragraph, Mr Pelan bravely contradicts the school's
contention
that he was expelled for sadistically harassing a succession of
younger boys, accusing the since retired headmaster of being "...a
failed and jealous mother-f****** who would never qualify for
membership of the Horror Writer's Association not while I'm in
charge". We then learn that Mr Pelan turned down a promising trainee
fryer position at his local branch of McDonalds, where he was
employed
as a fat scraper, in order to take up an important position as
wheel-balancer at 'Tyres R Us'. There after six years he was urged to
apply for the role of assistant tyre-fitter after a discrepancy in
the
till arose, but he instead took up a position at his local sewage
plant, having been head-hunted by an old school friend. It was here
at
Seattle Municipal Sewerage that Pelan took to correcting the
omissions
of his education, spending hour after hour locked up in a toilet
cubicle avidly devouring 'pulp horror' when he should have been
working. This, coupled with his fervid interest in all things male
wrestling, turned his burgeoning mind 'literarywoods', resulting in
his critically acclaimed decision to take up a pen and start writing
himself. However, he still managed to hold down part-time work as a
Gorilla-O-Gram (Urko from PLANET OF THE APES) and a nightclub
bouncer,
despite his convictions for bovine molestation.

Chapter six is dedicated to celebrating Mr Pelan's lucrative income
from writing. In a highly innovative move, the book's publisher
(coincidentally bearing the same postal address as the author)
appears
to have fitted a 'pop-up' flap on one page in which these
breathtaking
figures are listed. Either that, or my review copy, which features a
flapping piece of card detailling far lower sums, and is marked 'IRS
File Copy' on the flap's rear, is a curious publishing anomaly. As a
reviewer, one can't quite see the point of this chapter; after all,
against what are we meant to compare these nebulous figures? However,
it does at least appear to suggest that Mr Pelan's income is up there
with the Stephen King's and John Grisham's of this world, which must
surely further bolster the author's critical acclaim. This reviewer
was also reassured to discover that despite working with a succession
of unknown and highly obscure publishing houses, the author has still
been able to carve out a very lucrative career for himself (through
no
doubt I have failed to realise in my humble ignorance that Midnight
House and Ashtree Press are subsidaries of Random House or the
Bloomsbury Press).

In an additional nod to the notorious 'Baron Corvo', Mr Pelan then
dedicates seventeen chapters to minutely and - if truth be told -
profanely, criticising his critics. No doubt this is a fashionable
American pose; it certainly complements the author's obsession
low-brow horror fiction of a sadistic bent and is therefore, no
doubt,
simply a clever similie. However, this modus operandi is a new one on
this 'out-moded' reviewer, and I found it all just a little odd. The
seventeen agonisingly slow chapters read like a convoluted and badly
scripted nightmare, in which the author claims that he is being
stalked by his critics, whilst the reader quickly begins to form the
inevitable conclusion that he has it the wrong way round. How else
are
we to judge Mr Pelan's constant and repetitive references to the
children, attics and sexual habits of his critics, which he resorts
to
by way of seeking to invalidate literary criticism levelled against
himself. The facts of the situation - if indeed any ever existed -
are
alas drowned in a heaving cesspool of malicious conjecture. Indeed,
the reader is left wondering if even this was the clever intention of
the author, designed to purposely obfuscate and erase all criticism
of
himself, or whether is simply an obsession running rampant. If the
latter, it must surely qualify as a subtle pun on Mr Pelan's
fictional
reading interests, and as such should perhaps be read as an homage to
Uel Key, a writer with whom the author has justly been compared to in
terms of literary capability.

The next few chapters chart Mr Pelan's rapid progression to the very
pinnacle of the American literary establishment. Amusing anecdotes
involving his best friends Clive Barker and Stephen King are
interspersed with a rueful awareness that his burgeoning success was
"...driving a big fat fried potato wedge between me and my old crappy
life." Although opting to stay in the same house that he always lived
in, Mr Pelan become '****-scared' that constant media and "fanboy"
attention would compel him to relocate to Long Island or Manhatton.
He
grew a ZZ Top beard in order to hoodwink the obsessive gangs of fans
who would hound him around Seattle for autographs, and purposely
increased his weight by fifty pounds for that same purpose.

It was Mr Pelan's bar-room trick with a Terry's chocolate orange that
apparently gave Clive Barker the inspiration for HELLRAISER, and even
now (the author informs us), the multi-millionaire Hollywood writer
and director still calls him up in the middle of the night to
"..thank
me personally for all the success he has achieved." Stephen King is,
we are quietly informed, a constant house caller, roaring up on his
Easy-Rider motorbike with a leather jacket, the collar fashionably
upturned. Apparently whenever the author of CARRIE, SALEM'S LOT and
THE SHINING encounters a writing block, he charters a plane to
Seattle
and then drives over to 'Dunboastin'', the informal name by which Mr
Pelan's domicile is known, for support, advice and "a damned
well-flipped burger".

One might speculate whether all this acclaim and success had gone
straight to Mr Pelan's head; on the contrary, Mr Pelan modestly
informs us that his extremely prestigious position at the Horror
Writer's Association enables him to keep a cool and controlled grip
on
both awards processes and work preferment. He strenuously denies that
the Association is run nepotistically for the benefit of a few chosen
cronies, comparing it to the British Fantasy Society, which is
apparently above reproach because it has the word 'British' in the
title. He shrewdly dismisses claims of 'vote-rigging' and
'award-creaming' as "...sour grapes made up by jealous critics what
haven't got the balls to set their own Society up if they want awards
that badly which they appear to". His arguments are certainly
compelling and authoritative, citing as they do fellow Society award
recipients, worthies who are apparently perfectly positioned to
comment, coincidentally holding high office as they do.

When it comes to his private life, Mr Pelan is very reticent, which
is
perhaps surprising in an autobiography. He lists his hobbies as
wrestling, drinking fine wine, collecting Shakespeare folios and
reading "high-brow, improving literary-ture". He is coyly evasive
about family members but effusive about his pets, telling us that he
keeps seven regrettably incontinent cats which help keep reptiles and
amphibians out of the house (creatures he appears to be in mortal
dread of). And despite the stratospheric success of his literary
career, he reveals in a tiny footnote that he still holds down a
position as a salesman with a local double-glazing company, where he
works daily on a commission-only basis. This reviewer warmly commends
this modest and disarming authorial affectation, demonstrating as it
does the author's unwillingess to 'loose touch with reality'. Could
one imagine J.K. Rowling working five days a week as a petrol pump
attendant to keep in touch with her working-class roots? Certainly
not, onethinks.

In casting aside this odd tome, I speculated how best to classify
this
strange chameleon of a man. What was Pelan really? Was he a
working-class drunk aspiring to Charles Bukowski's mantle? Could he
be
the keenest poet that pulp horror porn never had? Or might he be the
editor's editor, mopping-up on all the unwanted and highly
challenging
projects that more discerning writers snobbishly disdained? Yet to
pigeon-hole this most resourceful of men is to 'break a walrus upon a
wheel'; far better to accord him the title of 'jack-of-all-trades',
or
perhaps 'Nixon-in-waiting'. Just as there is no beginning to his
literary talent, there is no surely end to his ability to diversify,
and this awestruck reviewer should not be surprised to see this
versatile professional washing showroom cars or compering at
prestigious Hog Roasts, such are his multi-tasking talents.

Age appears to be his only enemy; age, and his inability to author
meaningful adult prose.


Ambrose Silk
March 2005

Inappropriate post ignored.

wrote:

Inappropriate post ignored.

SNIP!

If you are going to ignore an inappropriate post, you shouldn't hit the
reply button. And if you do, at least SNIP! the post.

C.S.Strowbridge

Yet again you show yourself up as a hypocrite.
You're doing youself no favours Chris

I don't necessarily agree with Haunted River's posts but it's always
interesting to glimpse strange mental vistas. His posts usually entertain
me even if they are libelous to Mr. Pelan of who by most accounts is a very
erudite and pleasant gentleman.

"Haunted River" wrote in message
om...
"Wrestling With Obsession: The Acclaimed Diary Of John Pelan,
Critically Acclaimed Author"
Midnight House, Seattle, 2005. Limited to 100 copies, 5 of which come
with free plastic wrestling figures of 'Slamhead' and 'Drillface'
together with a leather-look leotard.

Reviewed by Ambrose Silk, Times Literary Supplement.

Having been cast in a traditionally poetic mould, I must confess to
blissful ignorance of that obscure branch of literature which is
apparently termed 'pulp horror', but after reading WRESTLING WITH
OBSESSION: THE DIARY OF JOHN PELAN, CRITICALLY ACCLAIMED AUTHOR I have
to extend bottomfelt thanks to John Pelan, the critically acclaimed
author, for rectifying this gap in my embarrassingly formal education.
Yet this beguilingly simple exercise seeming self-adulation is not
merely a thin veneer of autobiographical puff, for in WRESTLING WITH
OBSESSION the critically acclaimed author dispenses with the delicate
policy of ambiguous and disingenuous personal revelation, instead
opting to lay bare his soul in what is often an illuminatingly honest
series of bold confessions. In his own words, "In setting out to
write down this biography what you are now reading I didn't so much
want to trumpet on endlessly about my huge global success so much as
clamber up on to the ropes so that I could shake my hairy fist at the
world in retribution."

The book features a spoof introduction by a Jessica Amanda Salmonson.
One quickly intuits it be a parody of a badly written Victorian
romance, so deceptively nauseating is the prose. In this amusing
piece, Ms Samonson enthuses wildly about the author's indisputable
erudition and literary importance, placing her former lover on a
pedestal with Harold Robbins. In a sentence that defies conventional
analysis, she accords him the status of "a Le Fanu for the Hugh Hefner
generation". The joke is on us, one suspects, so sublimely does
Salmonson caricature bad writing.

Mr Pelan then opens proceedings proper in a rather unconventional
manner; the first chapter comprises a series of very praiseworthy
quotes from a succession of apparent "Genre Legends" all testifying to
the brilliance of the critically acclaimed author. Although unfamiliar
with the names mentioned, I feel sure that 'Rufus T. Firefly' and
'Baron Corvo' ring a distant literary bell. In yet another break with
tradition, the second chapter lists in painstaking detail every extant
- and indeed forthcoming - credit of the critically acclaimed author.
We learn that he has authored some very popular stories about a
Policeman's cockerel, presumably in a series of tales which emulate
his literary peers Robert Hichens, 'Saki' and Rudyard Kipling. I must
confess to having missed Mr Pelan's early fictional offerings, though
no doubt that would be attributable to my local W H Smiths having sold
out of these critically acclaimed pieces. Furthermore, although I have
an entire run of the Times Literary Supplement and similar journals, I
must have missed the glowing reviews of same. No matter, Mr Pelan
waxes effusively about his own work, saving us the bother, citing much
highly laudatory praise from close colleagues, which more than
compensates for the reader's inability to locate the original works
concerned.

All to often one hears of a brilliant writer having narrowly escaped a
life of worthless ignominy. Not so in the case of Mr Pelan, for in
chapter three Mr Pelan modestly informs us of his glittering career
path which eventually led to his stupendously successful literary
awakening. We are told that he left school at sixteen to attend what
he calls 'The University Of Life'. And in a remarkably candid and
moving paragraph, Mr Pelan bravely contradicts the school's contention
that he was expelled for sadistically harassing a succession of
younger boys, accusing the since retired headmaster of being ".a
failed and jealous mother-f****** who would never qualify for
membership of the Horror Writer's Association not while I'm in
charge". We then learn that Mr Pelan turned down a promising trainee
fryer position at his local branch of McDonalds, where he was employed
as a fat scraper, in order to take up an important position as
wheel-balancer at 'Tyres R Us'. There after six years he was urged to
apply for the role of assistant tyre-fitter after a discrepancy in the
till arose, but he instead took up a position at his local sewage
plant, having been head-hunted by an old school friend. It was here at
Seattle Municipal Sewerage that Pelan took to correcting the omissions
of his education, spending hour after hour locked up in a toilet
cubicle avidly devouring 'pulp horror' when he should have been
working. This, coupled with his fervid interest in all things male
wrestling, turned his burgeoning mind 'literarywoods', resulting in
his critically acclaimed decision to take up a pen and start writing
himself. However, he still managed to hold down part-time work as a
Gorilla-O-Gram (Urko from PLANET OF THE APES) and a nightclub bouncer,
despite his convictions for bovine molestation.

Chapter six is dedicated to celebrating Mr Pelan's lucrative income
from writing. In a highly innovative move, the book's publisher
(coincidentally bearing the same postal address as the author) appears
to have fitted a 'pop-up' flap on one page in which these breathtaking
figures are listed. Either that, or my review copy, which features a
flapping piece of card detailling far lower sums, and is marked 'IRS
File Copy' on the flap's rear, is a curious publishing anomaly. As a
reviewer, one can't quite see the point of this chapter; after all,
against what are we meant to compare these nebulous figures? However,
it does at least appear to suggest that Mr Pelan's income is up there
with the Stephen King's and John Grisham's of this world, which must
surely further bolster the author's critical acclaim. This reviewer
was also reassured to discover that despite working with a succession
of unknown and highly obscure publishing houses, the author has still
been able to carve out a very lucrative career for himself (through no
doubt I have failed to realise in my humble ignorance that Midnight
House and Ashtree Press are subsidaries of Random House or the
Bloomsbury Press).

In an additional nod to the notorious 'Baron Corvo', Mr Pelan then
dedicates seventeen chapters to minutely and - if truth be told -
profanely, criticising his critics. No doubt this is a fashionable
American pose; it certainly complements the author's obsession
low-brow horror fiction of a sadistic bent and is therefore, no doubt,
simply a clever similie. However, this modus operandi is a new one on
this 'out-moded' reviewer, and I found it all just a little odd. The
seventeen agonisingly slow chapters read like a convoluted and badly
scripted nightmare, in which the author claims that he is being
stalked by his critics, whilst the reader quickly begins to form the
inevitable conclusion that he has it the wrong way round. How else are
we to judge Mr Pelan's constant and repetitive references to the
children, attics and sexual habits of his critics, which he resorts to
by way of seeking to invalidate literary criticism levelled against
himself. The facts of the situation - if indeed any ever existed - are
alas drowned in a heaving cesspool of malicious conjecture. Indeed,
the reader is left wondering if even this was the clever intention of
the author, designed to purposely obfuscate and erase all criticism of
himself, or whether is simply an obsession running rampant. If the
latter, it must surely qualify as a subtle pun on Mr Pelan's fictional
reading interests, and as such should perhaps be read as an homage to
Uel Key, a writer with whom the author has justly been compared to in
terms of literary capability.

The next few chapters chart Mr Pelan's rapid progression to the very
pinnacle of the American literary establishment. Amusing anecdotes
involving his best friends Clive Barker and Stephen King are
interspersed with a rueful awareness that his burgeoning success was
".driving a big fat fried potato wedge between me and my old crappy
life." Although opting to stay in the same house that he always lived
in, Mr Pelan become '****-scared' that constant media and "fanboy"
attention would compel him to relocate to Long Island or Manhatton. He
grew a ZZ Top beard in order to hoodwink the obsessive gangs of fans
who would hound him around Seattle for autographs, and purposely
increased his weight by fifty pounds for that same purpose.

It was Mr Pelan's bar-room trick with a Terry's chocolate orange that
apparently gave Clive Barker the inspiration for HELLRAISER, and even
now (the author informs us), the multi-millionaire Hollywood writer
and director still calls him up in the middle of the night to "..thank
me personally for all the success he has achieved." Stephen King is,
we are quietly informed, a constant house caller, roaring up on his
Easy-Rider motorbike with a leather jacket, the collar fashionably
upturned. Apparently whenever the author of CARRIE, SALEM'S LOT and
THE SHINING encounters a writing block, he charters a plane to Seattle
and then drives over to 'Dunboastin'', the informal name by which Mr
Pelan's domicile is known, for support, advice and "a damned
well-flipped burger".

One might speculate whether all this acclaim and success had gone
straight to Mr Pelan's head; on the contrary, Mr Pelan modestly
informs us that his extremely prestigious position at the Horror
Writer's Association enables him to keep a cool and controlled grip on
both awards processes and work preferment. He strenuously denies that
the Association is run nepotistically for the benefit of a few chosen
cronies, comparing it to the British Fantasy Society, which is
apparently above reproach because it has the word 'British' in the
title. He shrewdly dismisses claims of 'vote-rigging' and
'award-creaming' as ".sour grapes made up by jealous critics what
haven't got the balls to set their own Society up if they want awards
that badly which they appear to". His arguments are certainly
compelling and authoritative, citing as they do fellow Society award
recipients, worthies who are apparently perfectly positioned to
comment, coincidentally holding high office as they do.

When it comes to his private life, Mr Pelan is very reticent, which is
perhaps surprising in an autobiography. He lists his hobbies as
wrestling, drinking fine wine, collecting Shakespeare folios and
reading "high-brow, improving literary-ture". He is coyly evasive
about family members but effusive about his pets, telling us that he
keeps seven regrettably incontinent cats which help keep reptiles and
amphibians out of the house (creatures he appears to be in mortal
dread of). And despite the stratospheric success of his literary
career, he reveals in a tiny footnote that he still holds down a
position as a salesman with a local double-glazing company, where he
works daily on a commission-only basis. This reviewer warmly commends
this modest and disarming authorial affectation, demonstrating as it
does the author's unwillingess to 'loose touch with reality'. Could
one imagine J.K. Rowling working five days a week as a petrol pump
attendant to keep in touch with her working-class roots? Certainly
not, onethinks.

In casting aside this odd tome, I speculated how best to classify this
strange chameleon of a man. What was Pelan really? Was he a
working-class drunk aspiring to Charles Bukowski's mantle? Could he be
the keenest poet that pulp horror porn never had? Or might he be the
editor's editor, mopping-up on all the unwanted and highly challenging
projects that more discerning writers snobbishly disdained? Yet to
pigeon-hole this most resourceful of men is to 'break a walrus upon a
wheel'; far better to accord him the title of 'jack-of-all-trades', or
perhaps 'Nixon-in-waiting'. Just as there is no beginning to his
literary talent, there is no surely end to his ability to diversify,
and this awestruck reviewer should not be surprised to see this
versatile professional washing showroom cars or compering at
prestigious Hog Roasts, such are his multi-tasking talents.

Age appears to be his only enemy; age, and his inability to author
meaningful adult prose.


Ambrose Silk
March 2005

Inappropriate post ignored.

Gina Harader

C.S.Strowbridge wrote:
wrote:

Inappropriate post ignored.

SNIP!

If you are going to ignore an inappropriate post, you shouldn't hit
the
reply button. And if you do, at least SNIP! the post.

C.S.Strowbridge

wrote:

Inappropriate post ignored.

Ok, last attempt at injecting some logic into your life.

You can't both ignore a post and reply to it. They are mutually exclusive.

C.S.Strowbridge

C.S.Strowbridge wrote:
wrote:

Inappropriate post ignored.

G. Harader