Should I send this?
Dear Clive Barker,
You’re one of my gay icons/heroes. Pretty much based entirely on Abarat and your artwork, since I haven’t read any of your horror novels (although I did enjoy Hellraiser the Movie and some random comics I’ve flipped through-sorry for sounding so dismissive; I really love your work, my desktop background is nearly always one of your paintings sketches, and I rave about you to the Uninitiated.) I do actually rave. Foaming at the mouth and all. People worry about me. Um, just kidding.
Being one of my gay icons, and the only real life person I know of named Clive (oh, besides Clive Owen I suppose), I immediately thought of you when read Maurice and discovered that Durham’s first name was Clive. I was all, Hey! Two awesome gay men named Clive! Albeit one fictional. Then things went sour when Clive (Durham) broke things off with Maurice in the worst way possible (seriously, you do not tell someone “Sorry, apparently I’m not gay anymore” IN A LETTER and then say “Oh btw your sister’s hot.”) So I decided to associate the name primarily with you after that, as Durham was such a disappointment. You’re the most awesome Clive I know of, and I include Clive Owen in that category. (About Durham, though: what the hell is up with him? Is he bisexual? Is he just afraid of committing to the gay life? Did he really just turn straight through some Act of God or by being exposed to a disproportionate number of ugly men while in Greece?-nothing against Greeks: I mean, just, sometimes you happen to see the less attractive members of the human race in disproportionate amounts. Possibly it’s psychological, like how when my self-esteem is low I see lots of pretty girls around [all either straight or out of my league, usually both]. TMI, sorry. Anyway, Clive’s transformation is highly perplexing. Also what’s up with not wanting to “taint” the relationship with the physical? Clive exists too much in the brain. I mean, I’m pretty cerebral at times, but I would never read Plato and decide, “Oh, well, apparently I should never have sex with the person I love most, otherwise it’s not ideal.” You know?)
But anyway my main point in writing this letter is to say that if Candy Quackenbush has a love interest at all, it should be John Mischief, because he’s the coolest and because it would make my predictions from the first book come true (which is good for my ego-always a good thing). By this time I’ve flattered you as much as I am able while also being truthful, and talked about an excellent book, which A) if you’ve read it, we can bond over it, and B) if you haven’t, it’s a recommendation! If those oblique tactics aren’t convincing enough, I could try bribing you, but I don’t really have much money, being a student and unemployed.
One more appeal, this time to your aesthetic sense as I see it: a romance between Candy and Mischief would be strange. His brothers live on antlers on his head! They would be watching and commenting inappropriately as Candy and Mischief kiss! It would be like a polyamorous relationship, except I’m not sure all the brothers would be willing participants. Candy and John Mischief: their love is so misunderstood!
…I realize that this is probably not where you’re going with the books, and I think that Christopher Carrion would make for a very twisted and wrong and awesome love interest as well (not so much Finnegan, though)-also in that case there’s a possible redemption theme: not “Oh, Candy can change him!” (which isn’t a good message to send our impressionable young people) but more along the lines of “unrequited possessive love transmogrifies into selfless love, which makes Carrion a Better Person” and then Candy fights the Panacea guy alongside him and Finnegan and the three ladies, and the Abarat goes back to living in peace and harmony, and Carrion goes to live with Candy on the Yebba Dim Day with a bunch of Tarrie Cats. Or something.)
However, if you don’t go the Candy-Mischief route, could you please send me a leetle tiny postcard sized story about them? In return, I’ll read whatever book you want me to read and review it for you (including one of yours, in which case I’ll review it on my blog). As long as you don’t mind babbling and long parenthetical tangents.
With admiration,
Damascus Ayers
P.S. At a Christmas church service this past year, I sang
O woe is me
O woe is me
I used to have a hamster tree
while everyone else was singing “O Tannenbaum.”
You’re one of my gay icons/heroes. Pretty much based entirely on Abarat and your artwork, since I haven’t read any of your horror novels (although I did enjoy Hellraiser the Movie and some random comics I’ve flipped through-sorry for sounding so dismissive; I really love your work, my desktop background is nearly always one of your paintings sketches, and I rave about you to the Uninitiated.) I do actually rave. Foaming at the mouth and all. People worry about me. Um, just kidding.
Being one of my gay icons, and the only real life person I know of named Clive (oh, besides Clive Owen I suppose), I immediately thought of you when read Maurice and discovered that Durham’s first name was Clive. I was all, Hey! Two awesome gay men named Clive! Albeit one fictional. Then things went sour when Clive (Durham) broke things off with Maurice in the worst way possible (seriously, you do not tell someone “Sorry, apparently I’m not gay anymore” IN A LETTER and then say “Oh btw your sister’s hot.”) So I decided to associate the name primarily with you after that, as Durham was such a disappointment. You’re the most awesome Clive I know of, and I include Clive Owen in that category. (About Durham, though: what the hell is up with him? Is he bisexual? Is he just afraid of committing to the gay life? Did he really just turn straight through some Act of God or by being exposed to a disproportionate number of ugly men while in Greece?-nothing against Greeks: I mean, just, sometimes you happen to see the less attractive members of the human race in disproportionate amounts. Possibly it’s psychological, like how when my self-esteem is low I see lots of pretty girls around [all either straight or out of my league, usually both]. TMI, sorry. Anyway, Clive’s transformation is highly perplexing. Also what’s up with not wanting to “taint” the relationship with the physical? Clive exists too much in the brain. I mean, I’m pretty cerebral at times, but I would never read Plato and decide, “Oh, well, apparently I should never have sex with the person I love most, otherwise it’s not ideal.” You know?)
But anyway my main point in writing this letter is to say that if Candy Quackenbush has a love interest at all, it should be John Mischief, because he’s the coolest and because it would make my predictions from the first book come true (which is good for my ego-always a good thing). By this time I’ve flattered you as much as I am able while also being truthful, and talked about an excellent book, which A) if you’ve read it, we can bond over it, and B) if you haven’t, it’s a recommendation! If those oblique tactics aren’t convincing enough, I could try bribing you, but I don’t really have much money, being a student and unemployed.
One more appeal, this time to your aesthetic sense as I see it: a romance between Candy and Mischief would be strange. His brothers live on antlers on his head! They would be watching and commenting inappropriately as Candy and Mischief kiss! It would be like a polyamorous relationship, except I’m not sure all the brothers would be willing participants. Candy and John Mischief: their love is so misunderstood!
…I realize that this is probably not where you’re going with the books, and I think that Christopher Carrion would make for a very twisted and wrong and awesome love interest as well (not so much Finnegan, though)-also in that case there’s a possible redemption theme: not “Oh, Candy can change him!” (which isn’t a good message to send our impressionable young people) but more along the lines of “unrequited possessive love transmogrifies into selfless love, which makes Carrion a Better Person” and then Candy fights the Panacea guy alongside him and Finnegan and the three ladies, and the Abarat goes back to living in peace and harmony, and Carrion goes to live with Candy on the Yebba Dim Day with a bunch of Tarrie Cats. Or something.)
However, if you don’t go the Candy-Mischief route, could you please send me a leetle tiny postcard sized story about them? In return, I’ll read whatever book you want me to read and review it for you (including one of yours, in which case I’ll review it on my blog). As long as you don’t mind babbling and long parenthetical tangents.
With admiration,
Damascus Ayers
P.S. At a Christmas church service this past year, I sang
O woe is me
O woe is me
I used to have a hamster tree
while everyone else was singing “O Tannenbaum.”