Tuesday, February 25, 2014

Arbitrary Lover

Today I read Artificial Lover by Erica Conroy. TELL me you're not intrigued!

(Link)

Description:
"AL is an artificial lover. His sole purpose is to bring pleasure to women. Like other sex-bots, he is designed with the end user in mind. Precise and accurate sensors make him sensitive to a woman's state of arousal, which allows his processors to program and adapt the perfect routine to ensure complete customer satisfaction. Unlike other sex-bots, AL has fallen in love. "

Woman's fantasy here. That's alright, I'll get in the mindset and everything. Hold on....


Okay, I stuffed my shirt, that should do it, right? So as you might have guessed by the description telling you, this is a story about a sex robot. Just as an aside, if you replaced him with a female real doll and had the same story, people would think it's creepy. How do I know? There is a documentary about guys falling in love with real dolls, and all you closed-minded fucks think it's creepy. ...Okay it's a little creepy.

But anyway, AL is a sexbot, and also apparently a prostitute available to the public and has an appointment every half hour (Yeah right, YOU try to make a woman orgasm in just a half hour!). But he is checking his watch waiting for his technician, Sally, to come and "do maintenance" on him.

Seriously though she just does maintenance on him. But this time he decides to grab her boob. AND IT WORKS. Try to grab a woman's boob next time she is going about her job. Totally doesn't go the way you want it to.

Anyway, they have sex, and it actually reveals a lot about this author's idea of fantasy. First, AL is physically everything she wants in a man--tall, huge pecs, stubble, and giant dick. Big surprise there. He also has a reputation for being somewhat of a sex bot. Seriously she found it necessary to mention this. The interesting thing is there are a ton of subtle hints about AL fucking tons of women, which is obviously meant to make you, dear reader, really wet.

BUT AL likes Sally because she has never taken advantage of him. Words like "hesitant" and "innocent" describe the way he seduces her. The poor guy is just a victim of having a huge cock and getting paid for sex. Conclusion: Let him fuck the shit out of you.


Seriously I'm not judging, I just thought it was interesting. I would fuck him too.

Ratings:

But Also Seriously, These Fantasies Really Contradict Each Other: 5 out of 5. He needs to be promiscuous but innocent. Strong as fuck but totally submissive. Seductive but not rapey. Haha okay that last one sounds like a horrible thing for me to say. SO I WILL LEAVE IT AS IS. The fantasy here is really having a stud fall in love with you and by consumed by utter devotion. In other words, taming the giant phallus. Again, so far there is nothing wrong with it. But the directions in which she takes it, her motivations for being turned on by this, are pretty awful.

AL is a Victim of Being Too Sexy: 5 out of 5. What do I mean by this? Well, AL had another technician previously. A man, who took advantage of him. AL only has two states, according to the narration, the feeling of being in the presence of Sally and the feeling of lacking her presence. But also there is the feeling of being totally freaked out by gays. You should be noticing a trend by now. A trend of AL being a fuck master but being excused of all this. The key to one night stands is apparently to find a guy with tons of sexual experience, but none of which he actually enjoyed (until you, of course), otherwise it would be utterly un-Christian. Anything that is not hetero, monogamous, devoted love to Sally is not his fault. The fantasy, the author seems to be saying, doesn't work if we have to feel guilty about all the poop holes AL has had to poke. And this homophobia did nothing for the story other than that. It seemed wedged in there, completely unnecessarily. I wonder why...

It Was a One Time Mistake: 5 out of 5. The last line of this story is fucking mind-blowing. 

"She comforted herself that it was her last day on the job and she would never, ever be tempted again."

EVER. Seriously, did she have to add the extra "ever" in there? I thought only guys got post-orgasm existential guilt, but apparently this author came so hard to her own story that she had to shove that last line in there. This is the plight of the cliche ladies' man. Yeah, you thought they didn't have a plight. But seriously you gotta feel for AL. All he wants is a long-term relationship but he just has to go on being a prostitute because the lady he loves feels guilty about all the pleasure he gave her. But as long as it was only giving into temptation as a one-time deal, everything is fine (from the "close your eyes and it didn't really happen" school of sex education).

Overall: 2 out of 5. Well, it was a story, but I didn't agree with the morality of it much. Sorry this post has been mostly psychology and few jokes, I couldn't help myself. Also, she totally cheated by having the narration switch randomly between their thoughts to construct her fantasy, and yes, further transfer away blame by not making it too personally connected to the female character. At least I can comfort myself with the fact that I will never, ever have to read this again.






If you would like to experience some post-orgasm melancholy, go to amazon.com/author/a.c.blackhall



Tuesday, February 18, 2014

Defilation

This week I read Dehydration by Grayson Queen.

(Link)

Description:
"The planet's water supply is contaminated. What is left is being guarded by the military. But what does it matter when that will be eventually consumed too?
This is a story of the last few days in a city without water and the accepted fate of one man who wasn't interesting or important enough to be on any ration lists."

Basic water trope story.

But first! Check out this guy's profile.


That picture is pretty amusing. That is the face of a man who just sharted. I actually almost thought I could like this guy, until I saw his other picture:


Uhhh what the hell? Is the dead eyes thing a theme of his or does he just naturally have dead eyes? And did that guy seriously photoshop a mask on himself, smirking with anticipation the whole time he took the picture? Or is it one of those Japanese photobooths where you paste random crap all over your pictures? Do they have those in the U.S.? Seriously check it out:


Best. date. EVER.

Also, it's worth reading this guy's author bio just for laughs:
"Grayson Queen is a full-time novelist and painter located out of Orange County, California. His artistic passions range from deeply philosophical to unusual science fiction and fantasy.

In his free time, Grayson dabbles with music, sculpture, and various explorations of geek culture. He is happily married to a dinosaur, and is happily owned by two amazing cats."
Wait, full-time novelist? Then why is this story filled with typos? And painter? Please tell me he did the brilliant cover for this story. And this story wasn't really unusual science fiction or fantasy, so it must have been deeply philosophical? So what was the deep philosophical question--what should you do if you run out of water? And the answer is kill yourself? Wait, he does that other stuff in his free time, but he just jacks around when he's on the clock too? Finally, "happily owned by two amazing cats." Either he is saying he lives with his parents (probable) or he is one of "those" people. Look...I know some people REALLY like cats, but cats seriously aren't people. And fine, it's a common joke to say your cats own you... for a middle-aged lady, not some dead eyed dude in an Atticus Finch suit.
Oh yeah, this guy wrote a story. So, all of the water gets contaminated and the military declares martial law and confiscates all the bottled water to ration, so the dude goes thirsty. He mentions that the animals have it in their blood from the ground water so you can't drink their blood (countering the very first thought I had) and that alcohol dehydrates you (tell that to ALL of our European ancestors who made it across the ocean) so there is basically no choice left. Except suicide. Which is the option he goes with.


The end?

Yes.

Ratings:

Choose a Tense Bro: 5 out of 5. I'll just let you read the first two sentences of the story:

"I watched a homeless man spray window cleaner into his mouth.

I check my lips with my tongue, and they're still dry and cracked."
See how jarring that is? Turns out it is just an experimental style; he has past events of desperation alternated with the present. I get that, but when you do it, it has to have a purpose. There has to be a why to the experiment. This isn't like that time you decided for no reason to upload (for all the world to see) the picture where you photoshopped a superhero mask to try to hide your creepy soulless eyes. By the middle of the story, he is just telling the past in both the present and past-tense, and by the end he just says he is going to kill himself, which could have been done in any tense since he doesn't even do it in the actual story. There is nothing really visceral about it, no reason. I'm saying I want to see him kill himself in the present tense.

Point to This Story: 0 out of 5. Look I get that apocalypse stories are all the rage now, but that's because they have hope that humanity can overcome and all that bullshit. I appreciate that this is a unique one too--a virus in the water that for some reason cannot be boiled out--and I like that it is humorous--water forces itself drooling out of your mouth, tear ducts, and sweat glands--but it is basically that one good idea immediately followed by "Fuck it, no hope. Gonna kill m'self." So much wasted potential here. If you don't believe me read Jam by Yahtzee Croshaw (better yet, get the audiobook).

Vest: 5 out of 5. The dude really does have a nice vest in that picture. I think I'ma buy me one.

Overall: 1 out of 5. Even with how pissed I am that this story idea was completely fucking wasted, I'm not giving it such a low score just out of anger. It really doesn't even qualify as a story. It ends so abruptly before any character development or conflict or any of that "tellin' a story" stuff. It's all exposition and no climax. It's like if I did a review and wasted most of it talking about the author before suddenly ending it.








If you want the climax (you know what I'm talkin' about) shoot me your a/s/l at amazon.com/author/a.c.blackhall

Friday, February 7, 2014

The Sham

This week I read The Plan by Nikos Kalpakis.

(Link)

Description:
"Leo is being groomed for a life of crime and violence by his vicious stepfather. He can see his whole life flash before his eyes and he doesn't like what he sees. He comes up with a Plan. A very dangerous Plan that will bring everyone around him, on the brink of destruction."

Why is Plan capitalized? Is it like The Final Solution? And shouldn't it be to the brink of destruction?

That really sums up the whole story there, but I'll tell you the plot anyway. So this Greek kid is handed a gun by a junkie at the beginning of the story who wants to get rid of the evidence by stupidly having the kid's fingerprints on it or something.

But nothing ever comes of that. The kid, Leo, goes home and his fat dad, Mario, is eating pasta. Yeah, that's not cliche or anything. But at least it allowed me to imagine a world where Mario--you know, the Mario--goes on to become a wife-beating human trafficker and Princess Peach is his battered heroine junkie wife. Because seriously, how else are you gonna make money if your idea of plumbing is beating the shit out of turtles all day?

Anyway, Mario tells Leo to be at the brothel that night to help with the deal with "the" Russians. So far, so lazy. BUT Mario says that he has a big surprise for Leo, and Leo suspects he might know about "the Plan." Oooooh tension.

But Leo figures he is just going to force him to help gang rape the new sex slaves. I'm not joking, I wouldn't make such a crass rape joke. I'm so pissed off I had to clarify that to you, what kind of classless maniac do you think I am?

Seriously though Mario raping someone? That's just silly.

Between the conversation with Mario and the meeting, Leo goes to practice THE Plan, which involves throwing beer bottles and knives at a building. (Just, like, spoilers--he doesn't use any knives in the actual PLAN).

So the deal goes down, and basically Leo knocks a gangster out, steals the drugs (wait, I thought they were sex traffickers?), jumps out the window, locks everyone in the building, then sets everything on fire and steals the money from the Russians he kills outside.

His junkie mother is also tied up in his trunk and he takes her to rehab, then he asks himself what a young man does when he has just robbed the Russian mob.


He goes to college, of course!

Seriously that is his answer. What the fuck? I would totally not go to college. Like, why? You're going to spend all your money on college? But you already have money?? Obviously you invest it in a safe mutual fund.

Ratings:

Edit This Shit, How Many Times Do I Have to Say It!?: 5 out of 5. This wasn't a completely fucking awful story for a beginner, but seriously, there is a grammar mistake IN YOUR FUCKING DESCRIPTION. Nobody is going to read this, or anything else you write now. They probably won't even read anything I write because I reviewed this shit. I know I gripe about grammar, like a fucking lot. I am like the Rush Limbaugh of complaining about grammar, but there's a reason, and that reason is I'm trying to fucking help everyone get past literally THE EASIEST THING TO FIX TO MAKE US ALL LOOK MORE PROFESSIONAL. Jesus.

Opportunities Wasted: 5 out of 5. Remember when Leo suspected that Mario knew about the pLAn and the me reading was all like, "Oh shit I just filled my pants with ice cubes. Which would have been totally nice but then I shit on them out of fear of creepy Mario"? And then remember when nothing ever came of that? Well, SOMETHING SHOULD COME OF IT! Instead this kid just pulled off his plan perfectly without any hitches or conflict. Not only that, he took his mom to rehab AND went to college! What is this whitebread shit?

No. I'm not letting you off the hook. Remember where that deal went down? That's right, it was at a brothel filled with innocent sex slaves. And Leo burned that shit to the ground after he trapped them all inside. Go to college with that on your conscience. I hope you major in philosophy, bastard.

Unnecessary Descriptions: 5 out of 5. The description of his mom cooking and looking older than her years from being battered, followed by the creepy description of Mario were good. I thought I had finally landed a good story here. But then this guy started describing literally everything. Sometimes more description drags out the tension, so he's got the right idea, but if you describe something, it should have a purpose--ESPECIALLY in a story emphasizing the critical small details in a "THE PLAN." But his descriptions were seriously like, "Leo stepped into the office, the short but smooth fabric of the carpet brushing against his black shoes, each double knotted. There was a filing cabinet, a desk, a door, a window, and a trash can. On the desk there was an unopened letter, an accounting book, an advertisement for a pizza place, a clock, a telephone, and a dildo. The dildo was about nine inches, blue at the hilt with transparent blue rubber on the head through which could be seen a ring of ball bearings that presumably spun around when the little remote was turned on. It was cordless, which was impressive, but the blue remote matched the dildo so Leo knew they were a set. It had a faint trail of smoke still hovering over it like someone had just overused it. Almost like a smoking gun. Then he walked out of the office. And never went back. And nobody ever used or mentioned the dildo around Leo, nor did he mention it to them or think about it."

Overall: 2.5 out of 5. I feel like this author wouldn't be so bad if he went over his story more than once and let some other people read it so they could say, "Hey, you have a great potential conflict you just completely pass up here. I mean, like, how the fuck did you miss that? Good thing you had anyone with eyes read it, meaning me." Unfortunately, he didn't do that. Damn kids.





If you want to find out what happens with the smoking dildo, go to amazon.com/author/a.c.blackhall