David Thayer

Dateline: Uncle Bob’s Ribshack: The New York Yankees have named the Earl as their opening day starter. “He passed the other guys in the rotation,” Manager Joe Torre said. “The guy can flat bring it.”

The Earl was a non-roster invitee when spring training began. His six inning stint against Houston locked up a spot at the top of the Yankee staff. “He reminds me a lot of Vladimir Nabokov,” said one Astros scout. “With all those different arm angles it’s tough for lefties to pick up his release point.”

The Earl fanned the side in the B game against Atlanta by pitching the entire inning from second base. “He doesn’t even have an agent,” noted GM Brian Cashman. “We got him cheap.” Some expressed concern that the earl has never pitched above A level; he won twenty games for the Wellington Leg Gastropods in the Steinbeck League last summer. “That’s a coed league,” noted Cashman. “A Mrs. Frothingmunster went yard off the earl when we scouted him.”

Some of his teammates are reading Voltaire’s Miasma. Derek Jeter was quick to point that infield signs are now in French. “He’s a ground ball pitcher, so I have to be on my toes.” “I can’t touch the guy,” said Jason Giambi. “He was bringing gas.”

The earl was struck by a line drive in the bullpen where he was reading Denise Mina’s Garnethill trilogy. Fortunately he was wearing the full regalia of a Roman centurion and the ball glanced off his helmet. “Quad erat demonstratum,” noted bullpen coach Norm Mailer. “These guys have got to wear their headgear at all times.”

Welcome to the Wellington Leg podcasting contest. Your host and master of ceremonies is the Earl of Watership Down captain of the green team, author, if you consider a disreputable Isle of Mann vanity house a publisher, and friend of hogs. The Earl is approaching the stage, a floating stage, surrounded by papier mache nymphs and a frieze of gastropods in mid bite, the crowd is engaged in pre-ceremonial hubbub as the cameras pan the once red now orange carpet, a carpet whose neglect reflects the zeitgeist, malaise, scadenfreude, and weltschmerzen so redolent this evening.

Oh the first pod has been cast, ladies and gentlemen, a vicious throw that seems to have left an elderly gentleman stunned…no, he’s okay, and he fires his pod from beneath that plaid blanket of uncertain yet blinding hue…pods are flying from the Huffington balcony. It’s all the Earl can do to hold his position…he’s re-enacting his encounter with the killer gastropod…this is incredible, for the first time anywhere The Earl is gastropod casting…A Sea Snail, an Abalone, these creatures with bipectinated gills, so dangerous when roused! This reporter is fleeing the scene, well, pausing on the orange carpet, a rumor of Maureen Dowd my only hesitation, a great pink abalone is casting pods of its own. Somebody, call the cops.

I took a friend of mine for a spin through the Seattle Mystery Bookstore yesterday. He’s a reader who needed a book and I had to keep him away from the hole in the street in front of the store now in its seventh month of continuous operation. Pretty soon GM Ford or Earl Emerson will have to feature this dig in one of their novels. I thought the trip through the aisles revealed much about the state of our crime fiction union, so I’ll give you my impressions. Also Tod Goldberg needs something to read.
They had plenty of copies of Sara Gran’s novel, Dope. An impressive display near the front window, right on the pub date. Lee Goldberg, Dana Stabenow, Andrew Vacchs, Michael Connelly and Barbara Serenella had books on the front table; that’s an eclectic mix driven by an assortment of award nominations, personal appearances fore and aft, and the store’s own quirks. Robert Ferrigno’s latest Prayers for the Assassin caught my eye. He’s a home boy.

I rescued Tim from the cat mystery section and we plied through a John Connelly, Ken Bruen, Jason Starr section; as a civilian, Tim was unable to recover from the cat stuff. Yes, as far as I know these cats solve mysteries. I don’t know how they do it. Then we discovered that William Brodrick’s The Sixth Lamentation was out of print. Our last stop was the SoHo crime display. He’d read Rebeccca Pawel’s Death of a Nationalist but we couldn’t locate her newest book. On the way out I looked for releases from Hard Case Crime. Then the jackhammers began once more.

At lunch he’d been telling me how crazy his business has become. Book publishing has its travails, but so does banking, insurance and the restaurant biz. Crime fiction isn’t suffering from a dearth of talent. Even a specialty shop grapples to define what a mystery is, what might appeal to whom, and why. The breadth of choice is daunting, the categories vague to the unitiated. I didn’t solve the mystery of what sells and what languishes, but I worry that gimmicks will backfire if the writing becomes secondary to high concept titles that do not deliver the goods. That’s a tough hole to climb out of.

As some of you know leaving a comment here at One More Bite of the Apple is a chancy thing. Some of you can, some of us cannot. The shotgun guy has no problem. In order to address the problem Booksquare, my web hostess, tells me we’re being upgraded to WordPress 2.0. An even number! That bodes well.

This coincides with a shakeup at the Druidical & Literary. Reporter Geraldo Riviera, who spent time with the Roman invaders, is being tranferred to the Sports desk. His memoir, Tuesdays with Severus Antoninus, is being hailed as a remarkable achievement by the Wellington Leg Intelligencer.

Underwater Service reporter Roger Ramjet will remain near Santa Cruz. Roger will cover the movements of Her Most Catholic Majesty as she and Proconsul Arnold restore order in the Californias.

Finance specialist Donald Thump is on the trail of literary fraud wherever he can find it, although he missed the James Frey story and still believes in JT Leroy. Don will report to Olivia Earthwindandfire currently on leave at Belvedere Castle. We look forward to sporadic weather updates from Olivia and some sort of epiphany from the Donald.

Crime fiction will be reviewed by Earnest and Julio Fallow if they ever show up for work. Of course the entire staff remains devoted to literature however it may be defined, although being forced to read the Earl’s epic Voltaire’s Miasma has created pockets of resentment. Intern Heather DeMedici will continue to run the office and organize the Letters to the Earl, one of our most popular features. Dogsbody Urquhart Depew will deliver the D&L to your doorstep through the Earl’s Own Dialup and Telephony Service.

Being at the mercy of others this week, impaled, becalmed, stranded, weakened by crows, coexisting with nature I take consolation from the fact that I’m on the cover of Glamour…again! Rumours abound as to the next Wellington Leg Person of the Year award… tipping dangerously toward that pompous interloper Borchardt; one prefers to think that Coverboy confers as much authorial gravitas as the coveted statuette depicting Mercury Slowing designed by the Dowager Princess and her bookie.

These awards are terribly political. This year’s Snooker Award was a case in point. As a previous winner I was not eligible this time around, a rule rushed into fabrication by a faction of malcontents led by Mrs. Chalfont-Smythe. Knowing full well that the grand manor house was being fumigated, she insisted that the awards committee be invited over for drinks and eats. Needless to say, several of these VIPs were overcome by fumes, an incident that sank my candidacy in a malicious wave of overreaction.

Ah well. My work is my reward. The cover of Glamour will probably result in a deluge of calls from ueberagents but unless I locate an extension ladder in the very near future the opportunity will be lost; my one consolation is the small black and white TV the Duchess delivered….I can utliize the remote to ring in the New Year observing the happy crowds thronging the dual carriageway as the ball drops outside The Gutted Ponce…adieu, and Happy New Year. YHS, The Earl

Mrs. Leona Glasnost of Trenton New Jersey asks, “Is your blog a blantant attempt at promoting your stupid book?”

Dear Leona, Thank you so much for writing. As you know I’m trapped in my chimney so forgive me in advance if I seem curt. All correspondence must be dictated to Haskell who then must relay my words to Depew; the liberties taken by my dogsbody would shock you. Anyway, yes my blog is a blatant attempt to promote not only my book, Voltaire’s Miasma, but my Internet service the Earl’s Own Dial-up and Telephony Service which features ESS ( Earl’s Simple Syndication) which is manually installed in your basement or attic by a team of crack technicians. I’m not certain quite where Trenton is, although I believe Lord Cornwallis may have slept there. If that’s true, and Haskell is nodding in affirmation, or he’s falling asleep, it’s difficult to know…we can offer the Lord Cornwallis Simple Syndication or LCSS. Thus equipped, Leona, you are the analog equivalent of a bolt of lightning, always one step ahead of business rivals when attempting to go ‘online’ as we call it. YHS, The Earl.

I think Haskell is asleep. Perhaps my words are echoing beneath me so that Depew can eliminate the middle man. Are we blogging? Haskell? Depew? Being me requires endless patience.

Ursa Major? Ursa Minor? I don’t know. As dawn breaks…Day Three of my chimney ordeal begins. I’m dictating this post to Haskell, aka the sensible one. The Dowager Princess is covering my Tuesday agony column for the L&D whose circulation has dropped since my captivity began. DCI Borchardt removed the police personnel to investigate the Costco Incident. Haskell tells me that a copy of Joanna Scott’s Liberation is missing along with all those Pattersons. I gave a seminar on being James Patterson early last summer to a group of cenobitic monks who were bound by the Great Silence from offering feedback. I think they enjoyed themselves, especially the two hour video montage of the Hilton girls.

My extension ladder, the means of rescue, is thousands of miles away in Los Angeles. The Duchess stopped by with her cousin’s stoelen but Depew ate it all. I’m fasting in the hopes that my bulk will diminish enabling me to plummet earthward into the hearth. Like many long term plans this one overlooks the immediate issues one confronts when stuck inside a chimney…good taste prevents me from detailing them further. Needless to say the local media is in a frenzy; I’ve whiled away a few hours reading Noah Lukeman’s treatise on the semi-colon. Depew is sending him a query letter; fourteen hundred semi-colons used in three pages. That may be a world record. Oh no, here come the crows! YHS, The Earl.

Mr. Gareth Andrews of Mount Lake Terrace asks: Did Jane Austen ever date the Earl? Was he the inspiration for much of her fiction?

Dear Gareth, Good to hear from you. I’m just catching up on my mail after resetting the parking brake on my Viggen ( the key to commuting is air superiority.) Many things have gone to seed in my absence…and I have strange cravings for onion rings, but no matter! ‘Tis the Season! I think my romantic entanglements are hardly suitable fare for this web log although one can certainly read between the lines in re the enigmatic Chalfont-Smythe. Widowed at a young age, heiress to the Crumbly Cakes fortune, one can imagine the parade of unsuitable scoundrels, rakes and Lotharios presenting their burnished credentials. I think Prudentia, if I may use the familiar, is drawn to my capacious knowledge of all things literary, a knowledge, Gareth, hard earned indeed. No less a figure than Natasha Last Name Deleted has written several passionate essays on the topic of my fabulous collection of author photographs taken against the day my literary ship comes in.

As to Jane Austen I recall escorting a young woman of that name to the Fusilier’s Ball. The evening ended abruptly after I was shot out of a cannon ( a dreadful misunderstanding). I penned a note of apology but I fear the transgression has yet to be forgiven. YHS, The Earl.

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.

Hello, this is the earl. Not the earl as you know him, but a chastened, weary earl. Some malady or other has struck, rendering the REM phase disfunctional. Like many of you, I face obstacles on the path to publication, aside from encounters with gastropods, blown head gaskets, and the like. I came across a survey of some seventy odd literary agents collected by Dee Power. Dee published the results of the survey which focuses reasons agents offer for rejection. I’ve taken the liberty of sharing some of those reasons while adding a few of my own.

Bad queries. Very high on the list. This pitfall is easily avoided. For instance, my own bad query letters are routinely quarantined after being read aloud in malls. Mrs. Joan Darcy and her eight year old son, Ethan, were instrumental in intercepting this Query: Voltaire’s Miasma will appeal to readers who routinely fly long distances, feeling trapped, resentful, poorly served, put upon, indeed, people for whom travel has become a postmodernist farce. “Sounds dumb,” Ethan said.

Bombast and Hyperbole: no strangers to the earl, bombast and hyperbole are the Pillars of Hercules through which my prose must pass! Forgive my poor attempt at humour; if you stare at the ceiling long enough, patterns emerge, maps of Greenland, that sort of thing.

What’s the book about? This must be revealed. For example, on page fifteen of my Standard Agent Query the plot of Voltaire’s Miasma begins to emerge. Agents resent this: they feel their life force ebbing by page three.

Explain your platform: very important these days. Some tips in this regard: try to become an assistant at Vogue or a contestant on a reality television show. Failing this, you may have to learn to write, a tedious process that offers no guarantee of success. Those of you who choose this option will receive letters that contain baffling or contradictory passages that may be harmful to your state of mind.

Hone your skills: yes, I know, this honing advice is both hortatory and useless. I think Cicero stood on street corners and practiced oratory, something that could be misconstrued these days. On the other hand, sometimes people will throw money. Reciting the words to Mr. Tambourine Man in a veleveteen greatcoat can be a profitable way to refine your subliminally implanted elevator pitch. Details of these activites need not appear in your initial query: put this information in your Bio.