David Thayer

The Hummingbird’s Daughter is my favorite novel of 2005. I reviewed the book on Collected Miscellany last summer, and I believe Daniel Olvias blogged about it on La Bloga. In turns majestic, funny, tragic, dense and exciting The Hummingbird’s Daughter pays homage to the great traditions of literature; at the same time, the suspicion lingers that Urrea is having a great deal of fun with this story. Fun is strictly forbidden among today’s writers. This may be a byproduct of the Industrial Revolution or the unintended consequence of post secondary education. Jasper Fforde notwithstanding, literature is a grim business.

Urrea pokes fun at his Sinoloan rancher Don Tomas. Tomas is alarmed by Teresita’s emerging power, secretly pleased as well. Tomas blunders and rages, denies and decries, alienating his wife when he brings her replacement into the house. Events occur on the scale of Exodus and what emerges in the end for Tomas and Teresita is a triumph of human nature at its finest.

Belly by Lisa Selin Davis is one of this blog’s notable books for 2005. Set in Saratoga Springs, New York it tells the story of BellyO’Leary as he returns from prison to his beloved home town. I posted a review of the novel on Amazon under the username ‘davidthayer.’ Don’t get me started about Amazon.

Rather than rehash my review I’ll speculate a bit. I enjoyed the novel because the protagonist is one of those people everyone wishes were dead. By everyone I mean his family. Davis doesn’t fall into the yawning trap of turning her secondary characters into saints; they have issues, they have personalities. Choosing a 58 year old man as a protagonist was gutsy. First of all, men that age are not on the demographic radar screen. Men that age have two primary options: wealth or death. If not wealthy or dead, they enter the service industry as Davis so skillfuly points out. Belly O’Reilly doesn’t wear Prada. God be praised.

As a deluge of fiction drawing on religious societies and centuries old secrets looms ever closer, Publishers Marketplace quotes Doubleday’s Mark Tavani as saying the DaVinci moment has passed. I know, you’re groaning. But, remember, in pre-Renaaissance Europe, monks were a serious nuisance. Here’s why: monks had nowhere to live. They roamed from town to town. As religious folk monks could demand food and shelter from stressed out peasants. Sometimes they killed nuns who tried to boss them around. Monks carried daggers under their robes. You see a monk coming, man, you better run.

This was straightened out by St. Benedict. He wrote a book. The Rule of St. Benedict is over two thousand pages long and was completed around AD 650. His book governed the lives of cenobitic monks, monks who gave up life on the road to live in monasteries. Among other things St. Benedict ordered men not to kill women, abbesses, who gave them instructions. He detailed monastic life. Monks were permitted a pillow and a blanket, ending six hundred years of controversy about that. Everyone breathed easier.

The Rule spelled out work, meals, methods of sleeping, the Grand Silence, imposing a heirachy of authority previously lacking. The Rule of St. Benedict was never a bestseller. But, for fourteen hundred years it served as a blueprint for communal living in religious order. That beats two hundred weeks on the NYT’s list, doesn’t it?

I’m going to need an exclusive. Three weeks. No, three weeks from now. That’s right. No, don’t call, don’t write. I’ll get back to you. Hold your questions until I call. Speak to no one. Don’t leave your house. Okay, you can go out for food. This project has possibilities; I love the undertone of postmodern angst. It captures the zeitgeist. Ciao.

And, so the Duchess waits. The Earl’s secret mission is a success. For his part, the Earl takes an early breakfast at a Denny’s on Doheny. Lars is having pancakes; Natasha is smoking a cigarette in the parking lot. After a job the adrenalin reverb is tough. The morning sun stains greasy windows; the Earl is gripped by an unexpected melancholy. Sure, it was great to help the Duchess, but what about me? What about my fading aspirations? A paperback stand taunts him. The Nanny Diaries…what cursed luck that his former nanny couldn’t write. Since the earl has no children, all she had to do was write…

“Bittersweet, isn’t it?” Lars asks. “Like the time I sold a 76 Volvo to Danielle Steele’s neighbor’s nephew. I was this close to greatness.”

Natasha’s back. She has tradecraft issues. “We left the extension ladder behind. That ladder is clearly labeled as property of the Earl…it has your contact information and the promise of a reward.”

“Make my Grand Slam to go,” The Earl cries. “We must recover that ladder.”

This melodrama is sponsored by The Earl’s Own Telephony and Dial-Up Service, whose slogan is ‘you don’t have to be home to make that phone call.’ Click here for a brief infomercial in which The Earl demonstrates the use of a cellular telephone.

The Set-up: An urgent message from the Duchess sends the Earl into action. Ueberagent Lydia Careerbreaker has requested A Royal Deflowering the Duchess’ steamy memoir about her fling with George the Third. In her excitement the Duchess failed to enclose adequate SASE for reply. The Earl, a former commando with the VSOP, is breaking into a Hollywood bungalow to place a SASE inside the Duchess’ otherwise acceptable buff colored envelope.

EXT. Dusk. Hollywood Bungalow of Ueberagent Lydia Careerbreaker. Disguised as housepainters The Earl and his team approach the bungalow. Lars and Natasha have unhooked the extension ladder while the earl boldly rings the doorbell. No answer. They didn’t expect one. The annual ueberagent dinner has already begun at Lutece of Century City. Urquhart Depew, dogsbody and smoldering figure of resentment, is inside the restaurant. Depew has a cellular telephone….

Natasha, former chief of MI5, author, gourmet chef, master of unarmed combat, haunted by a former lover’s unexpected flight to Bulgaria, is looking for payback. Everywhere she turns there is always something there to remind her…on the roof of the bungalow a pop up ad reads, “Visit Bulgaria!” Natasha cannot go on.

Lars, with his fear of heights, both wuthering and otherwise, is experiencing an acid flashback. Only four years old when he was drafted, Lars cannot enjoy films by Francis Ford Coppola. Now trapped near the decorative palms at the foot of the driveway, Lars is pinned down. “You guys…go on without me,” he says through gritted teeth.

The Earl is startled when a distinguished fellow answers the door. The earl falls back on his VSOP experience; trained to infiltrate, navigate, mix with indigenous populations, he is truly a man who rises to the occassion: “Is this 455 Flight of the Bumblebee Drive?” he asks. The homeowner frowns. “That’s my neighbor…Ueberagent Lydia Careerbreaker…you’re not trying to break into her house and put a SASE inside a submission, are you?”

Depew is calling! “She’s rolling,” he says.

The Earl, never one to be caught off guard, not a man easily shaken, springs into action. He vaults over the porch railing, carefully avoiding the prize azaleas, and rushes next door. He scales a Valley Oak, swings from a branch onto the roof. He dives through an open skylight, landing on the balls of his feet. Kicking aside a throw rug, no, the rug has him, the earl corkscrews his body upward, the rug clutches, but he performs an inverted flip! Free of the rug, the earl slides down the bannister to the ground floor.

Lydia Careerbreaker has just pulled into her driveway! She’s approaching the house. Depew is on the sidewalk dialing his cellular telephone…the ringing echoes with the overpowering noise of a jet engine…Lydia is alerted! She eyeballs Natasha, then Lars, spots Depew! All is lost.

She is unlocking her front door. Lydia Careerbreaker sweeps into her office where the Earl has opened the Duchess’ envelope and placed the SASE inside. He licks the envelope and dives through a window just seconds before Lydia hits the office lights….A Royal Deflowering is on the top of the pile…Lydia checks the envelope…SASE! Secure in the knowledge that the author is a professional, Lydia begins to read…

Fortunately Mall Security didn’t look up. They aren’t trained that way. “We never look up,” said Mall spokesperson Armand Assanti. “You can bet we’re going to rectify that.” True to his word Director Assanti has his people in the parking lot this morning; he has a copy of The Kite Runner in his pocket. “okay, everyone…look up.”

San Jose California: a city ordnance that seeks to control poor quality fiction and bad writing in general stirred controversy today at the Really Big Mall near Campbell. A publicity stunt involving vanity publisher Wellington Leg Premier distracted shoppers when a hot air balloon landed in the parking lot. A banner advertisement for Your Memoir may have caused Mrs. Doris Day of Santa Cruz to rear end Professor Ulrich Whattodoincaseoffire. “My 1989 Volvo was stationary,” reported the professor. “Her late model c-70 coupe came out of nowhere.”

“My memoir is almost complete,” Mrs. Day commented. “Then a city inspector told me that my prose was ’substandard.’ When I saw the Wellington Leg balloon…I think I snapped.”

Professor Whattodo was sympathetic: “My own roman a clef was recently savaged by a flying squad of critics employed by Santa Clara County. I saw the Earl on his two am infomercial. He spoke directly to me.”

Local officials agree that the Earl is a menace to literary standards. “His shameless self-promotion is causing a seismic shift in the number of local residents writing lurid potboilers and crime stories. Productivity is dropping. Silicon Valley could see its position erode as the nation’s leading technology center.”

Mrs. Day took her car to Ballard Auto Body and Publicity where her mansuscript will be analyzed and then pounded into shape. “I’ve seen worse,” said manager Lars Kierkegaard. “She’ll be back on the road to publication by the end of the week.”

The damaged vehicles were towed by Google’s new roadside service Tow-Bot. “This is beta test,” said Amanda Tollman. “Our bots love working on Volvos. They also enjoyed the balloon ride.”

Mountain View, California. Special to the Druidical & Literary, Hi-tech Correspondent Anthony Palmesano reporting: “California suits me. I mean I drove out here from Hoboken, right? I thought I’d go to Pittsburgh. That’s a nice town. But this hitchhiker named Neal started telling me about how we oughta keep going. Ohio was tough. I liked the way Sandusky smells…are we live?”

“No, go ahead.”

“We got to Tahoe. The natural beauty? Forget about it. People that I grew up with? Natural beauty to them is having the Jets cover the spread for a change. Once in my life I’d like to see a couple of trees stuck together in a row. Hey, telephone poles are not trees!”

Olivia Earthwindandfire here: “I’m standing near Google’s World Headquarters where conditions are less than optimal. A test of its Google Glove for data downloads revealed that certain anomalies occured with the current Glove. Standing next to me is Professor Foghorn Lillehammer, an expert on the Glove Retrieval System. Professor, what went wrong?”

“It’s all about hand eye coordination, Olivia. Our scientists and technicians don’t have it. For example, when our Google Sats fired the text of Voltaire’s Miasma into the Google Outfield our guy dropped it.”

“Was he charged with an error?”

“Then the Google Bots tried rewriting the novel. None of the bots remembered to say anything nice before they started criticizing. That’s not the Google Way.”

“What will Mr. Canseco do?”

“Well, we have training now for the techs in the Outfield. When data arrives they’re being shown how to squeeze the Glove, how to hit the cutoff man, never to throw behind the streaming data or toss souvenir data into the stands.”

“Will Google go ahead with its acquisition of Arizona?”

“I’m not at liberty to say. We’ll locate a training facility though. Someone mentioned Sandusky, Ohio. We all agree that the Outfield should be grass. Too many skinned knees here in Mountainview, Olivia. “

I catch myself using ‘book’ and ‘novel’ interchangeably. This inner bias intends no disrespect toward works of non-fiction. Cook books and travelogues, ambitious biographies, blustery political tomes, memoirs, self-help, how to, all deserve the same nomenclature as novels. We live a non-fiction moment as the NYT is fond of reminding us at least twice monthly, in case we forget and allow our imaginations to run riot. The non-fiction moment in the United States implies there is nothing to learn from fiction, that novels are failing to explain exigency and circumstance as distinguished from pomp and circumstance. Non-fiction delivers facts, verified and homogenized, to blend with existing facts, statistics, metrics, conclusions accompanied by source material. The Times posits the idea that since 9-11 we’re collectively incapable of entering the alternate realities fiction presents because the current state of affairs demands our full attention.

I’m game to suspend disbelief and enter the non-fiction moment. Like Disneyland this moment is color coded for convenience; there is Important Non-fiction, usually found on the right as we enter the park. These authors have television shows. Their opinions shape and mold us by emphasis. Be careful as you pass the Anne Coulter exhibit; she bites. Let’s follow Mickey toward the Celebrity Corner. This is serious as well; reading celebrity biographies inspire the rest of us to imitate our heroes in the hopes of fulfillment. Gurus are located in the booths next to the celebs: Goofy is waving a banner that reads ‘Learn the Secrets of Bond Investing.’ Not to give away years of research but one of the secrets of bond investing is diversification. Even post 9-11 I think I can grasp that much.

I’ve stopped for a nine dollar soda, fully cognizant that energy costs, litigation costs and post manufacturing non-recurring charges have influenced the price of my drink. This is good to know. I feel better in the non-fiction moment. Yes, I want to lose forty pounds, learn the secrets of bond investing, understand the deleterious effects of independent thought, surrender to the guru of moment, allow them to work their magic with empirical soufflees whipped to perfection. Now that I understand how the Consumer Pice Index is calculated, I doubt I’ll read any more fiction. The nagging doubt that remains is this: why are these non-fiction moments available only in Fantasy Land?

Dear Earl, People in my critique group roll their eyes and make faces when it’s my turn to read. One man coughs repreatedly. Is he doing that on purpose? Theo ‘Bull’ Mason Fort Worth, Texas.

Dear Bull, Not everyone is adept at these complex interactions. In my group, Prudentia Chalfont-Smythe will yawn at a strategic moment…perhaps during the famous car chase scene in Voltaire’s Miasma, a passage so thrilling that the uninitiated will cry …Voltaire, watch out! You see, Bull, Voltaire doesn’t know how to operate a motor vehicle, whereas his nemesis, Viscount Arnold, trained at Nurburgring. That’s the tension and for many it’s unbearable. Hang out there Bull!

Dear Earl, Is it true that Brad Pitt wants to be Voltaire? Will you write the screenplay? Sincerely, Graf von Hohenzollern, Reseda, California.

Zehr Geehrte Graf! There have been meetings. Only yesterday Lars replaced a fuel pump on the Volvo to the Stars. His consultant, Murray, suggested a rebuilt pump as opposed to a new one. Murray’s cousin Artie wrote coverage which was hand delivered to Sandra Bullock’s college roommate who loved the heft of the story. I’ve written a treatment including a few drawings and camera angle suggestions as well as notations such as INT and EXT. Those are essential. Our current school of thought is to let Brad approach us; this enhances our enforced hiatus here in the High Desert as we await delivery of the timing belt. My kingdom for a fuel injector…

Dear Earl, I bought your book at Eddie’s Book Nook in Red Bluff. Where can I get my money back? Roberta Nixon, Ashland, Oregon.

Dear Roberta, Sadly, my publisher, Wellington Leg Vanity Press, is reluctant to accept returns. This may seem harsh or unfair, but there are no exceptions due to regulations issued in the Isle of Mann. You may write a letter to Urquhart Depew, care of Fenway Park, Boston, Mass. I fear, however, that Depew may feel his hands are tied in this matter, figuratively of course, and that all sales are final. With the holidays approaching, you might consider presenting Voltaire’s Miasma to a loved one. YHS, The Earl.

Near a Copse of Chestnut Trees Outside Wellington Leg: Geraldo Riviera reporting: I have to whisper this report. At risk to my own life, my career, perhaps even my mustache, I’m imbedded with a unit of police from Wellington Leg, led by DCI Borchardt. The team is investigating reports that two Roman legions are menacing the town and its environs. After careful preparation, Borchardt and his men, and this reporter, are perched on a hillock or small hill where darkness on the edge of town is yielding to a glorious sunrise, oh, it’s beautiful!

Oops. DCI Borchardt explains: “Those horsemen are scouts from the Legio Valeria Victrix. I’m afraid your lamentable outcry has attracted their attention. Oh My God, one of them is waving!”

“Geraldo, don’t wave back!”

Roberta, if you’re still receiving, I’m crawling forward to meet the scouts. I can see the daylight flashing from their swords…hello, I’m Geraldo Riviera…Roberta one of the scouts is pressing the tip of his sword to the microphone…they seem curious…I’m drawing a map in the dirt. Send help, Roberta. A centurion is approaching. I think he understands me…fair and balanced…I’m being dragged away, lashed to a horse. Does Dan Rather speak Latin? Call Dan…this is Geraldo Riviera reporting.