elusive lynn

Sample from You Know Me, Etc.

2011-05-29T12:42:00.000-07:00

From Chapter One, "A Drug Dealer's Funeral," of my novel-in-progress, You Know Me, Etc.

His memorial service was at noon, but Reena had to wait for her delivery. The Abbot would understand. “Business,” he once told her, “is like getting into bed with a woman. You go out of your way to land the deal, but once it’s over, you can fuck it over.” Misogyny aside, the Abbot was a good man, and Reena didn’t think he’d hold a grudge now. Then she remembered that he once claimed, “If I get killed, I’m haunting that place and those motherfuckers.” But the Abbot hadn’t been murdered. In the end, undercooked barbeque, which led to sal monella poisoning, killed the Abbot Keith. Reena had always told him that pork would be the death of him.

She took inventory of her supplies while waiting for UPS to show. She had enough rubbing alcohol and hydrogen peroxide to last another cook, but would need more before the next. Damn. She was just at the drugstore this morning.

The doorbell interrupted her, and she was glad. The service started in ten minutes; she would be lucky to make it before it started.

“Package for Reena Sanghavi?” She had a buzz cut, and each knee appeared to have swallowed a grapefruit. The driver – the delivery dyke – looked Reena over as she hastily signed her initials. Reena felt her skin crawl in discomfort and embarrassment, tiny ants burrowing into pores all over her body.

“Thank you,” Reena mumbled, and shut the door in a hurry. The Abbot awaited.

Reena missed getting on the train by a few moments, and she stood looking at the gaping and triumphant faces flash by until the only thing left in the station was herself and a hobo sleeping under a pile of tattered newspapers.

Great. Fucking great. Now you’re going to be lucky to slip in halfway through the service. How’s that for paying your respects to the man who taught you everything. He made you your first kit, remember? And he held your hand through your cooks for two months before you got the rhythm down.

The bum shifted under his gray paper bedspread and sat up suddenly. Reena absent-mindedly took half a dozen steps in the other direction. She began to mutter “slope” under her breath to relieve the anxiety bubbling over. It had been her favorite word since high school, and it was usually the only thing that could keep Reena from having panic attacks. Pot could probably help, but she was already too paranoid. Finally, the train blew into the station, bringing hot air and sweaty commuters with it.

After the darkness of the subway tunnel, the sun nearly blinded her as she ran up the steps to the street. But it was the heat of the city that made Reena stop when it blasted her at the entrance to the street. She tried to walk as fast as she could without giving herself a heat stroke. She passed a group of small children, cheeks flushed, one nearly purple with exertion, another who had a wrench clutched in his fingers. He couldn’t be much older than Reena’s brother. But today was supposed to be about the Abbott, so Reena pushed everyone else out of her mind.

By the time she got to the home, the service was over. She had missed her chance. The only mourners left were a couple of cigarettes lying on the steps to the entrance. But she still had to pick up the Abbot. He had prepared her for this a long time ago. “Nothing personal. You just keep your shit cleaner than anyone I know. I wanna be well dusted in my next life.”

The Abbot learned about Buddhism in the Haight, where his white hippie girlfriend had convinced him to drive to one night, stoned, two thousand miles. He didn’t really want to go to San Francisco, but she was cute and had the tiniest ass he’d ever seen in his life, so he stole a green Buick and they headed west, smoking joints the whole way. By Omaha he couldn’t stand the way she said “Jefferson Airplane.” When they stopped for breakfast in Boulder, she confessed that his lack of commitment to free love freaked her out. So when they finally, finally hit the fog-soaked city, they split and never crossed paths again. Which was fine with him.

And while the Haight-Ashbury was drenched in plenty of drugs, it was speed that seemed easiest to get hooked on, and even easier to get a hold of, because people were making it in their kitchens and sending it to his neighborhood. And it didn’t matter if one customer died or went back home, there were always three more to take his place, because overnight seventy-five thousand kids arrived, and a lot of them depressed runaways. Living there taught him one of the basic fundamentals of the business – not in a recession, not during a war, not during any catastrophe would business dry up, because these events breed depression, and when people are depressed, they turn to substances to escape. Fuck things like peace, love, and the Beatles – the Abbot Keith was, deep down, eternally, a hustler, and hustlers operate on the outside of what most people think of when they contemplate life.

His ashes had been vacuum-sealed and nestled into a small cardboard box. How they got a three hundred and fifty pound man into a box that Reena could hold in one hand was a mystery, but cremation is a powerful process. She tucked the Abbot into her messenger bag. She thanked the manager of the funeral home. His droopy Basset hound eyes gave her the sexual heebie jeebies.

Reena paused as she left the building and again faced the hot trek back to the west side. She blew out a breath in frustration. Even in death, the Abbot made her do pointless shit; surely his ashes could’ve been FedExed?

“Come on, you pain in the ass,” Reena mumbled. Hopefully she wouldn’t miss the train back. Slope . . . slope . . . slope . . . slope . . .

Sample from You Know Me, Etc.

2011-05-22T08:20:00.000-07:00

Please enjoy the beginning of my novel-in-progress, You Know Me, Etc.

A Drug Dealer’s Funeral

. . . and it had been months since she had spoken to the Abbot, who was not really an abbot, but rather an ex-con who got the nickname while serving a possession charge in another state. After the Abbot Keith returned to society, rehabilitated and repentant, he started selling blow and later pot and shrooms to college students. But all of this was then, and now the Abbot had died.

Her mother had taught her how to act at a bar mitzvah and a wedding (say mazel tov and don’t you dare ask the bride if she’s a virgin), but never had funeral etiquette come up. Neither did birth control, but Mimsey had been very insistent on always wearing seatbelts, even if you are just driving down the street to your friend’s house and back. Then Patricia remembered her New Year’s Resolution to stop blaming things on her mother, and tried instead to concentrate on getting off the train at the right stop. She looked around the others sitting in the car with her. There were two young Arab women sitting several seats away from each other. One’s face was shaded by Gucci sunglasses, the other’s by a burka.

The funeral home’s address downtown was scribbled onto a scrap of paper that she clutched in her right hand. It was an inappropriate day for a funeral; the ninety-degree temperature and neon August sun melted Chicago’s sidewalks. But the Abbot had never been one for doing things that were appropriate. His home, which he dealt out of, was within two hundred and fifty feet of an elementary school.

She had been asked to speak at the service, not so formal to call it a eulogy, but to share her memories about the Abbot. They had been close some time ago. It abruptly ended when he married his second wife, who distrusted anyone else with a vagina, mother and sister included. Patricia didn’t hear they divorced until after she learned he died. It was very bitter (the divorce, not the death), and no one expected the ex to show at the funeral. Watching the drama unfold between the two of them was a bit like watching a car crash in slow motion, and not only did everyone else stop to stare, they also congregated to comment on the gore. So because she was a writer and because she was lived in the city, she sat on the train on a beautiful summer Saturday thinking what she should say about her dead ex-dealer at his memorial service.

Patricia still didn’t know what to say forty-five minutes later, standing in front of a room less than half-full, a line of sweat bisecting her back as it made its way down. When she agreed to speak, she assumed it would be air-conditioned. And possibly catered. Come to find out, she was wrong on both counts.

“He was a good man,” she started. “A kind man. An understanding man. A man who wouldn’t rat out his client list to the cops.” A few heads nodded around the room. She was glad she came stoned. Patricia continued. “And if you needed a hookup at three in the morning, he’d get his ass out of bed and hook you up.”

“As long as you threw in a couple extra bucks,” someone called out.

Patricia continued. “He loved line dancing, Norman Rockwell, and Coca Cola. A great American patriot, he had a bald eagle and Old Glory tattoo on his chest. He was an accomplished alto sax player who frequented local jazz clubs.” Patricia wondered if this was still true. People change, especially after they get married. “What I’m trying to say is that the Abbot will be missed.” Heads nodded around the room, either in agreement or drowsing in the summer heat. He was the only person I let call me Patty-Cake, or Peppermint Patty, she said to herself. She got lost thinking about all the things about the Abbot Keith that she couldn’t tell these people.

When the audience started to shift in their seats and glance at their watches, Patricia decided to wrap up her rambling send-off. “So, uh, here’s to you, Abbott. Cheers.” She hurried back to her seat behind a guy who used to spit rhymes about how he “split rickety Wichita” in the Abbott’s living room. She didn’t pay attention to the rest of the service, and instead stared blankly at the chair back in front of her.

She didn’t notice the couple sitting towards the back of the room, but that was exactly the point of sitting in the back. They sat together, he looking up towards the coffin, she studying the stitching on her shoes. There was a cell phone in his pocket that he had switched to vibrate but still went off every few minutes. He answered every fifth call or so, to whisper, “Yo man, I’m busy.” Each time he said this, she would sigh a little, loud enough for him to hear but not loud enough to piss him off. Finally, several minutes before the service ended, a fat white boy came up behind them and tapped the black man in Armani on his shoulder. The black man in Armani stood, and she followed him outside to the streaming sunlight. Her skin was so fair and pale that a vein stood out prominently on the back of her calf and created a blue upside-down question mark.

“Baby, I gotta go. Work,” he told her.

“I know.”

“Homeboy will drive you home. Can I spend the night with you?”

“Mmhmm.”

One hand dove into his jacket pocket. When they kissed goodbye, he slipped a baggie into her purse. She wouldn’t find it until later, but she would smile when she did. It would keep her busy until he came home.

The fat white boy tried to make conversation with her as they sat in the downtown rush-hour traffic on the way home. Behind the tinted windows, she was already snorting her way through the gram of blow in the limo while they idled near the Metro Correctional Center on west Van Buren. She lived in perpetual fear of this building. He had been in there before, and would probably be there again. Twenty-seven stories of reinforced concrete molded into a triangular tower dropped in the midst of the business district. She thought it looked more like a building for computer nerds instead of those waiting for their federal trials to start. He had told her that when the weather was good, the inmates used the exercise yard on the roof.

The First Ten Chapters of You Know Me, Etc.

2011-01-18T18:33:00.001-08:00

I must admit, one of my favorite things about the first ten chapters of my novel-in-progress, You Know Me, Etc. are the names:
1. A Drug Dealer's Funeral
2. But No One Answered
3. Old School
4. Bad Manners
5. Fuck Happy Holidays
6. In a Place That Offered None
7. True Villains
8. Unless It's Your Own
9. Freeing Yourself from Other's Face
10. How the World Is

Crossroads

2010-11-23T19:23:00.001-08:00

Made an executive decision today to leave behind some of my smaller scribblings in favor of focusing on You Know Me, Etc. and expanding Cliterature.

Paper Cut

2010-10-25T17:43:00.001-07:00

Today I gave myself a paper cut on my eye. It happened while I was juggling a pet carrier, the mail, and my keys at the front door. One of the weirdest feeling clumsy injuries in a while.

Chapter Nine and MYTHS Done

2010-09-27T09:17:00.000-07:00

I'm exhausted but also relieved that within the last two weeks I've managed to finish Chapter Nine of You Know Me, Etc and also produce the MYTHS issue of Cliterature (and on time, to boot). MYTHS is a significant issue for me because it marks the four-year point for publishing Cliterature. Things have changed dramatically in my life and the rest of America's lives in that time. For one thing, social media has gone from a self-indulgence to a necessity for many of us.

I really don't think Cliterature would have taken off on the international scale that it has if it wasn't for two things: Cliterature is an exclusively online journal, meaning the distribution isn't limited by print runs or geography, and I've been able to promote it across several social media channels that reach a far wider audience than I could have done with more traditional forms of marketing. It makes me happy to see so many people from such different places and walks of life enjoying and submitting to Cliterature, many of whom struggle to see their work published in more mainstream publications. Over the course of the past four years, whenever I am able to publish someone for their first time, I feel a special pride that I am able, in my own small way, to get their voice into the public realm.

Bruised Foot, Twisted Ankle, Skinned Knee

2010-06-22T17:42:00.001-07:00

I've decided to take a new direction with this blog. There will most likely still be discussion of writing and Cliterature, but I need an outlet for something else that I've lived with most of my life.

People who know me know I'm a prodigious klutz. I've tripped going up stairs, over my own pant leg, in the middle of the street, and honestly run into doors/drawers more times than I care to share. I've had at least five concussions in the past 15 years -- falling down a grassy hill in 1993, falling down an icy hill in 2005, falling into a brick wall in 2006, falling down in the bathroom in 2007, and standing up and hitting the freezer door handle in 2010. (There may be others. I've forgotten.) I've had an air conditioning unit fall on me, slipped on a wet mat at a water park, and astonished friends and family members with a creative knack for klutziness. Despite everything, I have yet to break a bone.

I'd like to begin some sort of record of this. Sometimes I think if I had lived 1000 years ago, they would have written epic poetry about me and my stories of accidental self-injury.

So. The day before yesterday, I dropped a large glass jar of strawberry jam on my right foot. (Ironically, where it landed and where the bruise is overlaps a childhood scar from when I tripped over a badminton net and split the top of my foot open.) Then last night, while lifting my leg to cross it over the other, I hit the same foot on the coffee table. I woke up this morning and noticed it was sore, and I was leaving my apartment I thought to myself, "Oh, that foot doesn't feel right at all. You should keep an eye on it."

Not thirty seconds later as I'm crossing the road, I miss a pothole just by the curb and capsize, twisting my left ankle and landing in gravel in the process. When I get to work, I have a moment to actually assess the damage. In addition to two already fairly old bruises on my left leg, my kneecap is now red, shredded by the gravel, and bruised. You can actually see individual bruises from individual pieces of gravel.

(I'd also like to mention that this is the same knee I twisted when I was nine and went to a water park. It's never been the same since.)

Random and Probably Not Necessary

2010-03-07T08:19:00.000-08:00

If you submitted to Cliterature's CLASS issue, you should check your inbox. I emailed all the notifications out this morning.

And on a completely unrelated note, here's some fun stuff I found last week:

Obama and Pot Paperbacks

2010-02-22T18:24:00.001-08:00

Being an anarchist, I don't like to play favorites when it comes to politics. But it seems even to me that some people are being pretty hard on Obama. At least the man has taken on some problems that other presidents (both Democratic and Republican) have ignored. Doesn't matter who you are, that takes balls. And he's only had the job a little over a year. Get off his nuts.

Anyway, I was stumbling around earlier and found a website with paperback covers of warning literature about weed. These were my favorites:

Sunday Morning

2010-01-31T09:18:00.000-08:00

First off, I must say that my favorite part of Obama's State of the Union was where he launched into the lobbyists staying the fuck away from politics -- and the whole room went quiet.

Do you use music when you write? I don't mean listening to music while you write. I mean specifically crafting soundtracks to use when writing certain projects? I do. Started when I utilized the soundtrack to Requiem for a Dream for She Bears a King. And for my current project, You Know Me, Etc., I've spent the last few years building a playlist tailored to characters and also Chicago itself.

Need to get going on my piece for CLASS, the upcoming issue of Cliterature. Can't decide between two completely different ideas, but must commit and race with one in time for the deadline.

Blogging Rehab

2010-01-24T18:02:00.000-08:00

I find myself in a self-induced paradox whereby I intend and really want to blog about my writing and my work with Cliterature, but I'm too busy writing and working on Cliterature to get around to the blogging. From now on, I'm taking blogging like alcoholics take rehab -- one day at at time.

Update on You Know Me, Etc: finished with chapter six, trying to dive into number seven. Up to 150 pages now, but not even halfway through the story. In too deep to jump out now, but the end is far from in sight. If I was Harry Potter, I would have just been selected to participate in the Wizard's Cup.

Speaking of which, I want t re-read the Harry Potter series. Some of them I haven't read in years. Same with Lord of the Rings. Instead, I'm currently stuck on an 800 page biography of Alexander Hamilton. Most of it is boring and dry, but there are certain similarities between us that keeep me from putting it down.

Nerd Alert!

2009-07-04T11:04:00.000-07:00

First of all, technology is amazing. When I started Cliterature three years ago, I had no idea how long it would last, or if there would even be enough interest for a second or third issue. As the word spread, I've tried to add things to it to make it more fun and interesting for readers. After Cliterature went solely online in 2008, it took me a while to figure out how much more I could do with an online journal that a print version can't. Archives are available starting with the very first issue, so that anyone can read not only the current issue, but any contributor from any previous issue. With RULES, there's a new option for people to e-mail feedback about the individual works and have it posted up alongside the work itself. Facebook has been incredibly helpful in connecting with people who like Cliterature, whether they are submitting, contributing or just fans of the journal.

What I'm getting to is something I only learned about recently but am already very exited about. Have you heard about Google Analytics? It gives you an HTML code which you paste into each page of a website, and then in 24-48 hours you can start looking at reports about visitors, content, traffic, etc. Two of my favorite reports are which pages are looked at most frequently, and a map that shows you where people are visiting Cliterature from. I knew it was being read all over the United States and maybe in Canada. Imagine my surprise when I saw visitors from Ireland, South Korea, Italy, Algeria, Germany, and South Africa! Not to mention the most visits from a single city came from London! I can't wait to see what other information this service produces. It's just amazing.

It Begins

2009-06-26T16:58:00.001-07:00

Begun research on my next big (book-sized) project, to be written after I finish You Know Me, Etc. Here's what I know about it so far:

It's a memoir
Focused on my brother's story, but must also tell my family's story to do so
How my brother changed my outlook on life, authority, and family and shaped me as a person
Statistics, odds, and risk play at least a minor role, possibly major

For now, I think of it by its dedication, "For him, of course."

New Cliterature Issue ~ RULES

2009-06-20T19:26:00.000-07:00

The summer volume of Cliterature went live last night. RULES is huge! Sixteen contributors, and the manuscript is almost 50 pages. Makes me glad I made the decision to make it just online, because printing it could have bankrupted me. But I can do it as big as I want on the Internet, just have to put in a bit of extra work.

I contributed a piece of my own, "How to Survive a Zombie Holocaust, and Other Things I Learned in My Twenties."

Chapter Four and a Font

2009-06-11T18:11:00.000-07:00

Finished writing Chapter Four of You Know Me, Etc. last week. This summer marks the third year I've put into this novel. Much longer than anything I've ever attempted before. I had a working draft of my first novel in under a year. And there's still so much further to go, a total of fifteen chapters. It took me so long to prepare and research and lay out the plot. Now I'm aiming to be done with a first draft by spring of 2011, and that seems so long away.

Today I chose a font for the new Cliterature logo: Berlin Sans FB Demi. I put in two hours deciding on it. I hope it's worth it.

Tee Hee!

2009-06-02T15:43:00.000-07:00

Cliterature received 69 poetry, prose, criticism, and artwork submissions for the summer issue, RULES. Can't help but take that as a promising sign!

First 100

2009-05-23T12:39:00.000-07:00

Reached a milestone! First 100 pages of You Know Me, Etc!

Poetic Nonstalgia

2009-05-20T09:46:00.000-07:00

This morning before work I dug out my copy of The Cauldron, the lit mag from my undergrad institution, so I could re-read the poem that had won the Divine Crow Award in 2005. I miss being able to write poetry, and seeing my poem and knowing that is lost to me was akin I imagine a parent feels if they lose a child.

Referencing Myself

2009-04-20T18:32:00.000-07:00

Some words of mine appeared on Three Dames With a Clue.

http://threedameswithaclue.wordpress.com/2009/04/18/lynn-brewer-authentic-expression/

After the Fire

2009-03-31T21:07:00.001-07:00

For some time now, I've been trying to decide what to do with She Bears a King, my first novel. Wrote it in 2006, it's about a contemporary woman who becomes pregnant by Jesus Christ, who has become a mega-celebrity living in Hollywood. Needless to say, it's a hard sell for a first book from an unestablished writer. After getting mildly discouraged after the first fifty rejection letters (no joke -- I counted), I decided that a re-write was in order. More ideas had developed in my mind, and I had a better sense of the book's themes and how they should really be presented. So I metaphorically set fire to my book, burning through the clutter and letting the story's structure reveal itself. Now, I find myself with a charred draft that needs attention before it's reader-ready again, but unable to stop pushing forward relentlessly with my current project, You Know Me, Etc. I keep going back and forth -- divide my time and focus between the two, or let the remains settle for a while. I can still visit the burnt out frame if I want to.

THE HOUSEWIFE

2009-03-19T20:20:00.000-07:00

Tonight I published the 11th issue of Cliterature, THE HOUSEWIFE. It was a special pleasure because one it marks the first time one of the contributors, Michelle Valentonis, has published. One of my favorite parts of editing and publishing an on-line journal is introducing new writers to the community by publishing first-timers.

Can't blame a girl for liking to pop someone else's publishing cherry.

Anyway, check out the new issue to see some pretty kickass new writing and artwork by myself and others who have thoughts and considerations about THE HOUSEWIFE.

(Check out this adorable magazine cover I found from 1912!)

A pretty heavy entry

2008-05-29T19:43:00.000-07:00

For some time now, I've been an atheist and anarchist, mostly because I've lost faith in any sort of authority figure -- father, god, president, doctor. How, then, can I have faith that my book will be published? This is what I'm thinking as I bring it to the revision process again. I already know this revision will be the breakthrough one for this book, the one that will transform the snarky little voice and become the haunting yet strong narrative it will be. The themes are stronger in my mind now, the characters fuller. It will be a better story.

destroyed books = $$$ for New Orleans Public Libraries

2008-05-27T14:59:00.000-07:00

Part of my stint in Chicago included being a part of the Rebuilt Books project, where authors & publishers destroyed and rebuilt a copy of their own book, then donated them to an auction benefiting the New Orleans Public Libraries. Most of the libraries were destroyed by the hurricane, but the rebuilding campaign aims to not only replace them but use the opportunity to improve them to one of the leading library districts nationwide. I drowned a copy of my poetry chapbook, SAFARI, in the bathtub.
The event raised $4,000.

Blogging Virgin

2008-05-25T08:10:00.000-07:00

It's official; I'm jumping onto the blogging wagon. I've kept an online journal before, but this is different. This blog is more about my work and journey as a writer, editor, web publisher, journal founder, and all-around wordsmith.

I'm currently in Chicago, attending the very first Pilcrow Literary Festival. Props to Amy Guth and Leah Jones for all their hard work putting this together. I spoke on two panels yesterday, and attended two more. (One was specifically about blogging, which inspired me to start this.) Tomorrow I head back to a quiet little hippie mountain town that is currently home for me. After being on the Chicago streets for 10 minutes when I first arrived, I realized I've been living in Colorado too long. :) I want to strike out on this last day and explore some places to write about in the novel I'm researching (You Know Me, Etc) but a lot of the neighborhoods I want to see I've been warned not to visit -- not even in daylight with a police escort. Hopefully when I write those scenes something will ring true.

ta ta for now