Best news of the day: Someone obtained a paperback copy of my detective novel Smoke and stopped me to tell me that they were enjoying it. Links to my books, including Smoke, are at the left hand side of this blog. Check them out for yourself.

That leads me to this painting by Thomas Badger. I have no idea what it's supposed to depict, but I think it represents writers tracking down a reader to insist that he post a review.

Speaking of reviews. I did finish

I picked it up with my prime membership for less than a song, free, in fact--which is precisely what it was worth to me. I have seen this book, or at least a book of Ellison's short stories with this name on the cover ever since I first started reading science fiction as a kid. The title alone struck me with all the sweetness of a shot of kerosene in a dirty glass with a needle in it. I always avoided it, even as a free library book. So why would I chose to read it now? I recently saw a documentary, or at least part of one, about Harlan Ellison. His life story was interesting, to severely understate the matter. In one clip he called Dan Simmons the best writer in the room. The show also indicated that those two writers had an extreme disagreement when they met, but the documentary didn't explain the nature of that disagreement. So the documentary prompted my curiosity, and I was also familiar with the Star Trek episode "City on the Edge of Forever" which Ellison wrote. Although that is a great episode, it's not my favorite. It is, however, much better than any of the stories in this book. Ellison is was (he passed away in 2018) obviously talented. He put words together in a way that piques my interest...and then consistently makes me sorry that I became interested. In these stories, he frequently launched a series of word punches with the apparent intent to pummel the reader into submission to  his innate superiority, to compel the reader into accepting the unbelievable story because he demanded it. It's a forced hallucinogenic trip by proxy, an overdose of LSD nihilism. I thought some of the stories had great potential and would have provided the settings for great novels. Instead, they all raced to the same rat hole of despair. I did enjoy a few of the stories until the endings. The endings were always predictable, saturnine, lugubrious, and grim. Of course, my opinion is vastly overshadowed by the hordes of Ellison fans. The guy can write. I'll have to try some of his other works to see if these stories merely represent one side of a great writer.

***

I'm suddenly reminded that I was thinking about actors that I would cast in roles for the characters in Threading the Rude Eye, and Power to Hurt. I think Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson would make a great Atu. I'm torn between a young Anna Friel and Zoe Boyle for the role of Cat. Jeremy Irons or Pierce Brosnan would be interesting choices to play Jonathan. Actually, I might like Irons for the role of Old Will. Antonio needs a young John Rhys-Davies type. A late 30ish Jeff Bridges might work for Charles, but I'm not sure about that one, as Charles keeps a lower profile than I've seen in a Bridges character. I wonder about the Alex and Lucette characters. I would play with the idea of a young Tom Cruise for Alex and a young Heather Lind for Lucette. I'm sure there are other good choices of actors who are the right age now, but they're not coming to mind. I may consider more roles, and reconsider these roles another time. It's not as if the series will be made into a movie in the near future.

Smoke is finished! ...and Secret of The Incas - recap and review

Smoke is finished! I sat down this morning and wrapped it up. It's a bittersweet pill, completing this work. I put a lot into it, and enjoyed every bit of it.

Of course, I still have to do the cover (for which I need someone to give me a cigarette to use; part of the cover photo will feature diaphanous tendrils coiling upward from the cancer stick), and have it proofread, and complete the formatting...but the creation, the writing, the assembly of the monster is complete; the rest is just connecting the wires and calling down the lightning. I'll be treading on the wafting ether for a few days contemplating the completion of the endeavor.

The book is inspired by the likes of The Big Sleep, The Maltese Falcon, This Gun for Hire, and a slew of others, including My Favorite Brunette. Bogey would have been a great choice to play the protagonist; Alan Ladd might have been an even better choice. Some other time, I'll think about living actors who might play the roles of my characters.

***

Before I finished the Smoke wrap up, I treated myself to The Secret of The Incas. You can find the basic dope on it here.
Here's my recap and review.

It is the tale of the search for a fabulous golden disc encrusted with jewels. 

We meet Charlton Heston as Harry Steele, a sort of tour guide, returning tourists to the airport via a car that looks like a camp trailer running on the railroad tracks.

He tells the future Mrs. Cunningham, “Money sings, and I love music.” He asks a man at the airport about any private planes that have arrived. None. But he’ll keep asking.

Uncle Billy, now going by the name of Ed Morgan, is learning to shoot pool, perhaps in hopes of paying off the Savings and Loan debt. He tells Harry about a new exhibit, an Inca stone carving…with a missing corner. 

Morgan sends a man with a special present after Harry following their conversation. 

Harry drops, unscathed. He finds the shooter’s location, and races over while the shooter is trying to get packed and flee. He gives the guy a heaping helping of knuckle sandwich. Shooter promptly admits that Morgan sent him, but not to kill, only to scare him. Harry relieves Shooter of the money Morgan paid him, and breaks his rifle. Then Harry rushes to have a little tete-a-tete with Morgan. Morgan wants Harry to take him as a partner in finding the lost Inca treasure. Harry refuses. Still, Morgan has a client lined up for Harry. 

Harry takes his corner piece to the museum and matches it to the new exhibit. The exhibit is supposed to show the way to the tombs of the rulers of Machu Pichu. 

It’s at the museum that the new client makes her appearance…only to disappear quickly

The museum keeps an interesting item in a safe; it's a small sunburst which is like a much larger one--the fabulous jewel encrusted disc lost to the Incas four centuries earlier, and which is the object of Harry’s search. 

Mystery girl shows up again. She’s looking for Harry, 

but mistakes this Green Acres refugee for him. 

Her name is Elena Antonescu, and she’s an escapee from Romania. She wants to get to the USA. She’s wanted in La Paz, Bolivia. She only has $50; Harry tells her, “The wheels just don’t turn for fifty bucks.” When she goes all sad, Harry tells her it is a very good act. She says, “It usually works.” Harry seems interested when she talks about a guy with a plane named Marcu (the guy is Marcu, not the plane); Marcu is after her. Harry makes a call to Marcu. Harry tells Elena that Marco will be there tomorrow. He told Marcu about Elena, so that he would come with his plane. She is bait for Harry to get the plane. 

Harry is at the airport the next day. He orders fuel for the plane as it lands. Marcu, who has avoided the Russian front in the guise of General Burkhalter, is anxious to find Elena, and willing to pay. He tries to persuade Elena to go back with him. Harry knocks out Marcu, and instructs Elena to sneak into his room and get the keys to the plane.

Morgan again presses Harry for the corner stone. Harry refuses. Elena gets the key, and they depart for the airport. They sneak into the airport; Harry throws a stone through a window to draw the guards away. They get the plane and takeoff before the guards can catch them. So far, it all seems too easy. I think there’s going to be a plot complication. Nope—but that was too easy. 

They land, but not at an airport. Harry won’t say where, exactly, but it’s about 10 miles from where he’s going. At this point, I notice that Elena is still wearing the same clothes in which she arrived, even though she has a suitcase, and she had been down to wearing only a slip the night before. Maybe those are just good traveling clothes. While Harry gets a cached rubber raft, she changes clothes??. They float down the river.

That night at the fire. He tells her to wear heavier socks the next day. They’re going to Machu Pichu. But she wants to go to Mexico. She pretends to be cold, which, of course, leads to this:

Are they in love, or just using one another to achieve their own ends?  More importantly, did anyone bring any mouthwash, or deodorant?

 In the morning, they’re still Machu Pichu bound—a journey almost entirely in the vertical. When they arrive, Harry is surprised to find someone else already there. They are greeted by Pointy Hat (aka Michael Pate, known for playing bad guys, and ethnic types). 

Pointy Hat introduces them to Marcus Welby who certainly has the attitude that he knows best. He’s Stanley Moorhead, the leader of this archeological expedition, which also includes a general from the Peruvian government. It seems that they’re working in the very tomb where Harry expects to find the fabulous jewel encrusted gold disc.

When Pointy Hat’s sister, Kori-Tica, observes that Harry has a “very grave face,” meaning he is not to be trusted, a liar, or a thief, Harry tells Elena that he knows who he is, and that he can live with that. Harry has also sabotaged the radio so that the expedition won’t be apprised of their status as fugitives. 

The sister of Pointy Hat, who follows the old ways—i.e., she’s the Ruk of Machu Pichu (See, “What Are Little Girls Made Of?” S1 E7 for those of you playing along at home)--makes an offering to a princess mummy (the Mamakunu) already removed from the tomb. She sings a song that begins with what sounds like someone playing the handsaw and gradually reaches the weird-but-recognizably-human range, before going completely cackling hen on mushrooms and helium. If it really is Yma Sumac performing the music, she must be a trained opera diva with a range that goes from the moon to the bottom of the Marianas Trench. Harry takes advantage of the distraction to check out the tomb on his own. He swipes a mirror-like piece that seems to go with his corner stone. 

Finally, the much anticipated plot complication arrives in the form of Morgan. He lets Harry know that he’s now chairman of the board, and that Marcu didn’t make any report about the stolen plane.

Elena compares Harry to Morgan, and tells Harry, “For a tall man, you’re the smallest man I ever met.” The comment makes Harry re-evaluate himself.

Pointy Hat’s sister does another number, which sounds at first like she's doing a Louis Armstrong imitation; then it goes from saw and helium to barking dog. Of course there’s also some native dancing.

Dr. Morehead asks Elena to marry him. She doesn’t give him an answer…realizing she loves Harry (I suppose--because California isn't known for apples, and Abraham Lincoln didn't cut down the cherry tree).

.

The expedition opens the main tomb. It appears that the golden sunburst is merely a carving in stone; there is no fabulous gold disc--The Inca's Greatest Hits were just a myth. The natives take it hard. Harry thinks that perhaps Elena can take the sunburst’s place, at least in his heart. She turns him down, and Harry announces that he’ll leave in the morning. 

That night, Harry goes into the tomb. Morgan follows secretly. All Indiana Jones-like (before Indiana Jones), Harry finds the sunburst. Morgan has a rule against members of his party trying to abscond with all the treasure and XPs. He has Harry put the disc into a bag. Pointy Hat interrupts. A gunshot, a scuffle. Morgan knocks down both Pointy Hat and Harry. He runs from the tomb. Harry is out. Pointy Hat rouses the natives. Morgan plugs a native, but the rest keep after him. He’s finally out of bullets, and almost out of options. Somehow  he manages to elude the natives. Back at the expedition HQ, it seems that they can’t find Morgan or Harry.

Harry does find Morgan (they join up and go on to act in Dragnet and MASH—no). Morgan is played out; altitude and age have stolen his vitality; besides, disappointing Jimmy Steward on Christmas Eve really took a toll on him. Morgan delivers a nice little soliloquy about age and gravity as Harry wrests the disc from him. In the struggle, gravity, unmoved by the soliloquy, seizes Morgan and deals most unkindly with him, bouncing him against every crag sticking from the mountain's otherwise sheer face.

Harry takes the disc back to the expedition HQ; he hands the disc to Pointy Hat. This joyous event calls for more oxygen gargling from the diva.

A long engagement is in the works as Harry and Elena leave. He gives her a gold trinket that “must have fallen in my pocket” until he can get her a ring. He’s changed, but not entirely. 

It's not Heston's best work, but it is a treasure. It was nice to see the actors that I had known as a kid from other shows. Yma Sumac's singing was impressive, but seemed designed to show the range of her talent rather than to be enjoyed. I was disappointed that we didn't get more plot complications back in Cuzco where the film started; the plane theft seemed too easily accomplished...and yet, I still like it.

Casting Call

Having been cast recently in the role of a dashing young man of half my age for a local play, my thoughts turned, like milk past its expiration date, to wondering who I would cast to play the characters in my books -- assuming of course that I wasn't available to play the protagonist myself.

(Some) Imaginary Casting for Justice in Season:

Victor McBride - He's the young protagonist. He's well-read, but hardened by his experiences in the war. I see him as something of a Tyrone Powers. A young Michael Landon would fit. I suppose Chris Pine would be a good modern actor for the part. For an interesting twist, a young Michael J. Fox, or Matthew Broderick might give the part a interesting flavor that I had not anticipated when I wrote the character.

Ted Vaughn - He is McBride's poetic best friend. He is Sam to McBride's Frodo...sort of. The Goose to McBride's Maverick...somewhat. I could see Chris Pratt playing this character who is both humorous and intuitive, but doesn't take himself too seriously. It's a great side-kick part, so there are many great character actors from which to choose. Would Johnny Depp bring too much Capt. Jack Sparrow to the role?

Carl Parker - He is McBride's business partner and friend. He doesn't speak much. He is the Athos to McBride's D'Artagnan. Maybe Karl Urban would have the presence this role requires.

Shorty - Mostly because every western has to have a character named Shorty. It's right in the rules of the Western Writer's Guild (and if such an organization doesn't exist, it should). He is impetuous and not entirely predictable, except that he will always see things through to the end. He's the Montgomery Scott to McBride's Kirk. A young Bruce Willis, or a young Val Kilmer would bring an interesting flavor to this role. If Johnny Galecki could play an intense cowboy who is good with the lariat and pistols, that would be a role that I would like to see just for kicks.

Clarence Fortune - He is a storyteller, and an able and willing hand with a gun or a hammer. He is more of a Danny Glover than a Denzel Washington.

Bill Longhurst - The calm voice of reason. He is older and well respected, even though he is only a ranch hand. Robert Duvall would fit this part.

Sheriff Upton - He is one of the villains that McBride must face. He is tall, dark and devious. Peter Weller might be my first choice to play the role, but there are some other great actors like Christopher Lee, Corbin Bernsen, and Billy Drago who would (or could've) been great in this part. If I wanted to give a bit of a surreal flavor to the story, Christopher Walken would do the trick.

Jack Butterfield - He is one of the saloon owners who figures prominently in the story. If I couldn't play McBride, I would play Butterfield.

Luther Griffith - The other saloon owner in the story. He also owns an important horse. There is only one man who could have played this part like I imagined it in my head when I wrote it: Keenan Wynn. His unavailability since 1986 being a problem, I can imagine Kurt Russell bringing the intensity this part requires.

Harmony Rivers - This beautiful red-head might be the most difficult part to cast. She's a real stunner who can sing. She can soften (and steal) the hardest heart. I picture her rather like Jill St. John in her glory days, but with a presence that I don't recall in the characters that St. John usually played. Christina Hendricks doesn't seem to fit. Rita Hayworth being unavailable, someone else will have to dye their hair for the role.

Emily Bastion - This lovely girl is much more demure than Harmony Rivers. Who could play this seemingly fragile but quite strong woman? Natalie Wood is out. Heather Lind might be right for the part. A young Alyssa Milano, Kate Beckinsale, or Terri Hatcher? Ashley Greene? I don't know. I thought this role would be easier to fill...I was wrong.


Besides the fact that I've left out at least one important role, there is another problem with this casting: Almost everyone I've chosen usually plays the lead. What a mess it could turn out to be if everyone thought that they were the star. On the other hand, don't we all play the starring role in our own story? I'm going with that. Everyone's a star; at least I am, regardless of the role; sometimes I'm in a supporting role, but those can be the most fun parts to play.