“Fatgirl Goes to the Fugly Pride Parade” by C. S. Johnson is part of Appalling Stories 4 (an anthology to which I contributed). It’s the sole superhero story in the book. And Fatgirl is one unique superheroine.
Fatgirl has a superhuman menace to face down and stop in the tale, but is that her primary antagonist? Maybe, or maybe not. You see, Fatgirl’s alterego, Kallie Grande-White, is a high school student and so superhuman menaces are far from the only villains and challenges that she has on her mind. Indeed, they’re probably not even her primary ones. Like many a high school student, Kallie’s focus centers on her personal world and the drama that’s going on in it.
So how does a Fugly Pride Parade factor into all this. Well, you’ll have to read the story to find out. Suffice it to say that when the fat hits the fan and Fatgirl springs into action, the reader gets to experience a big fight with a big foe.
Pick up Appalling Stories 4 today and enjoy “Fatgirl Goes to the Fugly Pride Parade” and the rest of the tales.
I’m not sure how intentional Paul Hair was about paying tribute to Indiana Jones with this story, but I couldn’t help making comparisons while reading it (specifically to Kingdom of the Crystal Skull and Raiders of the Lost Ark). However, it’s more than just a pastiche or fan fiction.
The author uses pulp adventure to thematically concentrate on the old axiom: “Power corrupts; and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” Which, I guess, would have made it a candidate for a spot in some of the classic adventure magazines in the heyday of pulp fiction. Except that Hair weaves in some more modern elements–like a couple typical Current Year college students assisting on the quest.
Plot-wise, The Chosen One is almost formulaic…until you get to a big twist that I honestly wasn’t expecting. Having communicated with Paul a little bit (he does blog here, occasionally) I wouldn’t figure him as an author who likes moral ambiguity. But I just don’t know for sure which character’s perspective he endorses.
There is some ideology that pops up in the story, but it’s on the subtle side, compared to his flash fiction. When I get political in my prose, I tend to use a sledgehammer. So do some of the other authors who contributed to this anthology. That’s not how Paul tackles it, unless I’m just dense. You might find yourself pondering and questioning long after you finish reading the story…which could be the author’s core purpose in writing it.
Some of the tales in Appalling Stories 4 are super-quick reads. But this one’s got some meat on it. I thought it was a fun read.
I’m not calling it “the Martial Law Book Sale” because I’m trying desperately to be optimistic about the shutdown and what will happen afterwards.
While we’re waiting (and hoping) for this to blow over, don’t succumb to boredom. Kick back with a good book and enjoy the down time.
Mike has reduced the prices of all his e-novels, now. Also, I’ve slashed the prices of my shorter books and will add those links, too. Remember, you can click on the images or the text links to buy. And all these books are available not only on Amazon for the Kindle, but at Barnes & Noble for the Nook, Kobo, the Apple Store, and just about every other store where you can buy e-books, for whatever device.
-Hank
Fast Cars and Rock & Roll…that title tells you exactly what you’re in for in this 459 page high-testosterone tale of Deke Jones’ adventures with racing, rock music, and ravishing women.
Deke Jones is back for 612 pages of private detective work mixed with irreverent mayhem in Shadow Hand Blues, trying to solve a cold-case mystery after stumbling on a dead blues man’s electric guitar.
There are no elves, unicorns, or pixie ninjas in Gods & Proxies, but it’s about as epic a fantasy as you could possibly get in 316 pages. Or is it a fantasy at all?
The entire Retreads series is available for a song at Amazon. Well, I don’t think they actually make you sing. But the three E-Books will cost less than a cheeseburger from the drive-through.
And, of course, the books are for sale individually, too. Hell and Gone was the series premier, my first bestseller, and still the most popular of all my books.
Below are some shorter books that were priced lower than the full-length novels. Now they’re even cheaper! (Sale prices will be visible after clicking on the links.)
Long before mixed martial arts, men of the west displayed their violent prowess with fists only. Tomato Can Comeback is the tale of a young fighter’s quest for redemption…on the canvas.
Also available as an audiobook from Audible. Comment on this post to get a coupon code for a discount!
Radical Times is set during the aftermath of the Civil War, when a soldier returns to the girl he loved, but is caught in the middle between two factions that still want to fight.
Thus Spake the Bard tells the story of a troubador and his creative friend, who get on the wrong side of a sheriff from Nottingham.
The Greater Good is a satire, dropping snark bombs on the superhero genre and leftist groupthink.
We are back in Europe for this issue. The Global Justice Initiative is trying to track down the French nationalist superhumans.
The nationalists use the catacombs under Paris to escape, initially, and their invisible benefactor (invisible in this issue, anyway) has some tricks up the sleeve to help them along. Writer Vox Day has inserted some in-jokes for his blog followers, but not in a way that harms the flow of the story.
Arkhaven’s production quality continues to improve from issue to issue. Aside from an acquired personal affinity for the legacy superheroes that the Hive Mind drones at Marvel and DC are hell-bent on perverting, there’s absolutely no reason to read any of the cultural Marxist comic books anymore.
Captain Europa does provide an excuse for losing the fight in Issue 4: he was taken by surprise. Not sure how you can consider it a surprise when you’ve already been fighting with the guy for a while, but this could just be an insight into the character’s self-rationalization mechanism.
All the Arkhaven comics have been worth the time and money so far, but I’ll write about my favorite one next.
We are back stateside, and the nationalist superteam has decided they need to win hearts and minds by fighting crime. Hammer and Rebel are teamed up on patrol to keep the streets safe.
But a couple of super-powered folks arrive from Europe to track them down and either kill or capture them. Their job is made easier when Hammer and Rebel, looking for criminals, are accosted by a cop instead. The vampire chick is surprised at how easy it is to take them out. Frankly, I am too…as well as disappointed.
But the tension continues to build, and the artwork has improved again. There’s an interesting story arc taking shape–and building (I hope) towards an epic showdown between the European and American superteams.
Captain Europa meets with his E.U. overlords to observe a Paris riot-in-the-making between French nationalists and Antifa. The Captain’s team is scattered around, but the U.N. has their own superteam held in reserve just in case the police can’t handle it.
There’s no confusion about which side Captain Europa wants to prevail; but unlike real-life situations in places like Berkeley, the police actually try to restrain both sides. It turns out, though, the cops can’t handle it.
To make matters a whole lot more interesting, there are some super-powered folks on the nationalist side.
I’ve still got some nits to pick about the art. Sometimes it’s hard to tell exactly what I’m seeing–especially in the details of the big splash panels. It’s too bad, because from what I could make out, it looks like those details would have been quite interesting if discernible.
I’m still really fuzzy on who has what powers, which works to the writers’ favor, I guess. Two super-strong dudes duked it out at one point, and one seemed to have the other outclassed by an order of magnitude. …Or maybe not? The outclassed guy, after playing punching bag for most of the fight, ended it (?) with a comic book haymaker–and I’m not sure how. Because he got really, really, reallymad, I suppose. This is far from the first time that a comic book hero surpassed the limits of their own defined abilities, so it’s not that big a deal. I’d just like to know more about those abilities, that’s all.
This is turning out to be a humdinger of a series. I haven’t been this engaged by a comic storyline for a couple decades. When all these are combined into a print graphic novel, I will probably buy a copy for my son.
Arkhaven is turning up the heat, and steering us toward a big showdown. They’re also still improving on all fronts in Alt Hero 3. The Rebel character is growing on me, too, though the sperg in me wants to inform her that foreigners are not Yankees. In fact, foreigners refer to all Americans, North and South, as Yankees.
Anyway…the SPC is aware there’s a rogue team of superheroes out there–nothing less could have liberated Rebel from their holding tank. So they do what the Federal government has done before: go after the family when their target proves too elusive. They set a trap for the rogues.
But the true heroes are a little too streetwise to fall for it. I won’t give any more away. Suffice it to say, I’m looking forward to the next issue (and 26 ad-free pages just don’t seem like nearly enough for each comic. Sigh.)
Arkhaven Comics is already making a name for itself. Granted: it couldn’t have come along at a time when the competition was less formidable. Still, they’re doing a lot of things right, and may just revive an interest in the medium from someone other than obese gamma basement-dwellers looking for something to do in between LGBT parades.
I don’t want to evoke the old post-Watchmen/Dark Knight Returns “grim and gritty” ideal…but to describe my impression in one sentence, I would say this: Avalon reminds me of the early Astro City comics, only darker.
The art strikes me as somewhere between classic Kirby and some of the ’60s Charlton work. As for the story…it seems Dixon is laying the groundwork for a character-driven saga that might border on deconstructive.
Forgive me for all the analogies (and I’m not going to assume Dixon’s goal is moral ambiguity), but Issue #1 strikes me as how the Cohen Brothers might attempt to tell a superhero story. A certain character pontificates on ethics, appointing himself to define the moral code all masked vigilantes should abide by. Meanwhile, some glaring chinks come into focus on his own shining moral armor.
With understated irony Dixon has no doubt honed to a fine point over his prolific career, this same character warns his crimefighting partner not to breathe in the cocaine dust kicked up by a fight with some bad guys. “Don’t want to get a taste for it,” he says. This comes just after a series of panels documenting his own (presumably first) moral failing–for which he will probably develop a taste.
Then again, will it be considered a moral failing in this narrative? I can’t predict for certain.
Another vigilante guns down some unarmed individuals–a couple in bathrobes–who have a child locked in a cage, waiting to be used in some sort of child pornography. As much as I cherish the Bill of Rights, the last thing I want to hear (read) is some speech about due process and how it’s wrong to become judge, jury and executioner, blah blah blah.
I suppose I’m jaded by the criminal “justice” system that occupies reality. Maybe Dixon is, too. It will be interesting to find out as this story weaves out.
In the reality we inhabit, it’s difficult to imagine a world where Darwinism hasn’t been pushed by academia until it undergirds nearly every creative work, dominates every alleged discussion of science, and permeates the thinking of so many people (even those considered religious). But in the ancient world, it’s unlikely anyone promoted an idea that life originated, then evolved, by random accident–either according to the Big Bang process as conceptualized by atheists (“first there was nothing, then it exploded”); or via pan-spermia (“life originated in some far-away solar system according to Darwin’s model–therefore you can’t examine any evidence–then Earth was seeded by the resulting advanced life forms as an experiment”).
Whether or not humanity was entirely composed of superstitious simpletons, what evidence has survived suggests that supernatural creation was a mainstream concept and supernatural intervention was often expected.
Supernatural intervention is commonplace in the many surviving variations of the Greek, Roman, and Norse myths. Other mythologies are more difficult to research, but share most of the same themes. And, though it was rare for the Israelites to witness a physical manifestation of their God, they frequently begged His intervention, and often got it.
Initially (when Gods & Proxies was the first draft of a screenplay), I had characters with a 20th/21st Century attitude (agnostic, leaning toward atheist). It was an easy mistake to make, because you can’t go anywhere in the present day without encountering Darwinist worldviews, and assumptions based on the work of his zealous disciples. It’s only natural for a writer wanting to include life-like characters to craft them so that they wouldn’t seem out-of-place in the real world.
Which takes me back to my point: the real world now is perceived much differently than the real world was thousands of years ago.
It’s a major blunder to transpose modern values and attitudes into a period piece with no consideration for credibility. We see it in movies, TV shows, and books all the time. It’s a lazy and rather arrogant blunder. That’s why, when adapting the story into prose form, that anachronistic worldview had to go.
That said, human nature hasn’t changed, at all. Certainly the sophistication of deception has advanced considerably from ancient times, but not what deception is perpetrated to accomplish (abandonment of the Creator God, a hate for the truth and what is right, debauchery, and a love affair with lies).
There is no political correlation between what happens in our time and what happens in Gods & Proxies. Any flavor of social conflict you may find in the book is not inspired by current controversy, but by the clues from the ancient historical records, influenced by what the author understands about human nature.
Razorfist gives us the skinny on this early pulp hero, as few others could.
I admit, aside from a few boxing pulps, Conan is pretty much the only Robert E. Howard property I’ve read much of. I credit this to early exposure to the Marvel Comics adaptations, more than the aborted film franchise from the 1980s. I wish I had time to correct that.
Red-Blooded American Men Examine Pop-Culture and the World
But a couple of super-powered folks arrive from Europe to track them down and either kill or capture them. Their job is made easier when Hammer and Rebel, looking for criminals, are accosted by a cop instead. The vampire chick is surprised at how easy it is to take them out. Frankly, I am too…as well as disappointed.
I’ve still got some nits to pick about the art. Sometimes it’s hard to tell exactly what I’m seeing–especially in the details of the big splash panels. It’s too bad, because from what I could make out, it looks like those details would have been quite interesting if discernible.
Anyway…the SPC is aware there’s a rogue team of superheroes out there–nothing less could have liberated Rebel from their holding tank. So they do what the Federal government has done before: go after the family when their target proves too elusive. They set a trap for the rogues.
