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 By Weston Ochse For those who don't know me, I am a postmodernist (1). Although I appreciate the classics, I see them more as informing present thought than establishing baselines of excellence. I enjoy modern tales, but too many anchor us to the present without promising any potential of escape. Literature is forever transforming and reforming, and I believe that postmodern thought is the engine of this change. So I often search for novels outside of the mainstream and outside the horror genre to read, hoping to, not only be entertained, but to be informed so that I may transform. THE COYOTE KINGS OF THE SPACE-AGE BACHELOR PAD I'd set my wife, Yvonne, up for a book signing at a local bookstore one Saturday in January to sign copies of her new book, the novelization of the movie Elektra. She had a radio interview the following Tuesday, and since she had yet to receive her contributors copies from the publisher, we went to a different bookstore to buy two of the books so she could give them away on the air. See, she didn't want to buy them from the store she was signing in, because she was afraid that she'd take books away from people who'd planned to buy some. (She was right, by the way. The bookstore sold out the 30 copies they'd ordered). To make a long story short, while I was at this other bookstore, I happened to spy a trade paperback in the science fiction section with the most outrageous title--The Coyote Kings of the Space-Age Bachelor Pad. The title alone grabbed me. That is was science fiction made me pick up the book. A flip-through sold me and made me by the book, and boy am I happy I bought it. A little about the author: Minister Faust, a pseudonym for Malcom Azania, is a high school English teacher, community activist, poet, sketch comic and radio broadcaster in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. He has won every Poetry Slam he's entered and is the producer and host of the radio show The Terrordome: The Afrika All-World News Service (http://www.cjsr.com), a weekly program of Afrocentric and progressive news, politics, culture, history, religion and the arts. The Minister, as I want to call him, has harnessed his multi-faceted credentials to create a brashly written novel of two under-achieving uber-geeks - our heroes Hamza Achmed Qebhsennuf Senesert and Yehat Bartholomew Gerbles. Known as Yehat and Hamza, these black Canadian Muslims are multi-dimensional, likable, vexing at times, and the kind of people you'd like to call friends, if only to sit down and drink with them once a month because they are so damned interesting. An original method that The Minister used to introduce his characters was a Character Data Sheet, akin to a gamer tool used to keep track of character strengths, weaknesses and characteristics like the ones some of us used for games like Dungeons and Dragons, Shadowrun, Gamma World and those that came after. Check this one out for Hamza (shortened for space)-- CHARACTER DATA: Hamza Achmed Qebhsennuf Senesert Wait. You noticed that I used the word brash, huh? It's true. This book is brashly written. The author clearly disdains certain rules of English and composition. He's at times redundant, too long-winded, has characters that are unnecessary to develop the plot, and too concerned with mundane details that promise to drive even Brett Easton Ellis to American Psychodom. Yes, I mean brash. The Minister is far from timid. With sometimes gleeful abandon, The Minister hurls his words to the page until they stick, sometimes packing them one on top of the other. But let me tell you, The Minister has been saved. His volumetric camaraderie with words clears him of his literary misdemeanors, and allows him his greatest success. Remember that The Minister likes to Slam? I feel the samba rumbles of Beat poetry breaking the surface tension every now and then. William Carlos Williams, Ginsberg and Ishmael Reed seem to, at turns, take possession of The Minister's pen, prodding him to slam bam thank you mam words and their existential cousins into conjugate shape. Annoying Segue-I've seen many books with similar problems self-published or published by micro- or small-presses. These books, as this one, could have benefited from professional editing. Too many times, authors do not want to cut their scenes, eliminate their characters, or limit their dialogue, usually to their own chagrin, because it is through their unwillingness that their novels never achieve great success. Except for The Minister. The sheer quality of this novel overwhelmed the problems, supplanted the need for self publishing and caused a Del Reyian editor to take notice and champion this book. Now, before some of you authors who fall into the preceding category get a case of Fatal Hubris, please understand that what The Minister has done is the exception, rather than the rule. I'm serious. Do not try this at home. And as I understand it, this book is now a finalist for the Nebula Award. So...Hamza is the philosopher dishwasher and Yehat is the mechanical genius video store clerk. Their life, which has been a series of Canadian inter-racial sitcoms until now, drastically changes when a mysterious woman named Sherem crashes into Hamza's life. Yehat takes a dislike to her, not quite understanding how someone so beautiful could be interested in his best friend Hamza. But Yehat's fears fall short when they meet an ex-pro football player drug-dealing night club owner named Dulles who runs a group of baddies known as the FanBoys. They are searching for a magical artifact of ancient Egyptian ancestry, and they know that there's a strange connection between the item and Sherem. Dulles, Heinz and Lars, the latter pair once old gamer friends of our heroes, seek to stop Sherem from recovering the item at all costs. I'd thought this was going to be a science fiction novel, not only because I bought it in the science fiction section of a chain bookstore, but also because Locus had named it, as I discovered mid-way through my read, one of the top ten novels of 2004. Even while reading, I was reminded several times of Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash with its original characterizations, especially the main character Hiro Protagonist, and the world-bending, near-future cyber-punk plot. But this book isn't science fiction. I know after much thought that the reason I kept comparing it to Snow Crash was because the delight I had reading it, and the wonder that awaited each turn of the page matched the feeling I had when I first read Mr. Stephenson. But you know, one could think of it as science fiction, if they squinted slightly. How much are you familiar with Edmontonian (that's Canada) geography and culture? Might as well be a far flung planet to this guy from the southern half of the United States. And what do I know about black Canadian uber-geeks? They're alien to me. But seriously. This book was a delight. In the end, it is The Minister's athletic, muscular writing that propels the novel past those noted faults through a pleasingly linear plot and into a post-modern wonderland where Tarantino is eye-gouging jealous and the Bee Gees wish they could sing Afrikans. At times I found myself Spocking a Vulcan Mind Meld on the book as if it was the volcanic Horta and the fate of The Kirk depended on my concentration. I look forward to reading The Minister's next book. If it holds even a slice of the magic of Coyote Kings, then the book is sure to be wondrous. 1. Essay on Postmodernism by Dr. Mary Klages, Associate Professor, English Department, University of Colorado, Boulder. ~~~~~ Weston is the author of the novel Scarecrow Gods currently in hardback from Delirium Books. He is the co-author of the award winning collection Scary Rednecks and Other Inbred Horrors soon to be republished by Delirium Books. He lives in Arizona with his wife and two Great Danes. Visit him online at http://www.westonochse.com/.
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