Down South Perspective

Hi folks,

I'm working on a DSP you'll like, I figure, as it combines two interests many of you have voiced, surfing and writing. But give me a few days to get it together.

Meanwhile, just a little biz plus a challenge for those of you who have taste similar to mine in movies. A trivia question that could win you something.

Which reminds me. The guy from Wales who won the surfboard in the Can't You Get Along With Anyone? lottery-type drawing finally got the board, my 9'2" Will Allison noserider, upon which I rode my last Pavones wave, and about 1,000 waves preceding it. Lotta history there. (Plus a lotta hassle, plus about $400, in getting it to F-ing Wales.)

Which further reminds me. I'm now up to just under 250 email-reactions to CYGAWA. Here's a bit from the latest, which I read a few minutes ago:

Hi Allan.

Finished your latest crazy tome Sunday night. I must say, it left me out of sorts and I had to get up and slug a rum to help me get to sleep…

Here's how he finishes up, a couple hundred words later:

Thanks for giving us aging brethren of the coast a feeling of belonging to a club without a roster, but we know who we are. Larry

It's amazing how many emails like this one I've gotten: saying that I'm not alone in what I went through in the book. (Larry puts it very well, though, doesn't he? A club without a roster. Indeed.)

As I've said before, the reactions to the book have exceeded my wildest expectations. I even rather enjoyed the email I got from a Pavones resident a couple days ago, a wild-eyed rant about how fucked up I am. MENTALLY ILL. Reminds me of a chapter epigraph I use somewhere in the book, a quote from Kingsley Amis:

“If you can't annoy somebody, there's little point in writing."

As you may know, I've posted on my website excerpts from the first 100 CYGAWA emails I received. Here they are, if you're interested:

http://aweisbecker.com/books/cygawa/reviews.php

If you've read the book and feel at all the way these people do, I have a favor to ask: Tell your friends. Maybe suggest they buy the book. Or lend them your copy. Whatever. Help me get the sucker read!

Hey. Christmas is coming, right? I don't know about you but my favorite sort of Christmas present, either given or received, is a book. If you've read it (and liked it), consider ordering CYGAWA as a Christmas present for someone you love. Or, for that matter, someone you hate – they'll get the drift. 

We have a limited number of Advance Reading Copies left – with the Thank You list of pre-release buyers in the back. So if you're one of those listed, you can get another one to give as a gift. Do it soon, though; when we run out you'll have to wait until April to get the hardback edition.

Click here to go to the Humdrumming store.

That's the biz I spoke of.

Now, answer a question and maybe get a free copy. Here we go:

A couple days ago I was watching (for about the hundredth time) the Coen brothers classic Raising Arizona and noticed something I noticed the first time I saw it: A cryptic reference to my favorite movie of all time, Kubrick's Doctor Strangelove.

Email me describing the reference and I'll send you a book. The first one in my Inbox wins. Include your mailing address in your email.

If you haven't seen Raising Arizona, definitely go out and rent it. If you have seen it, I hope you agree it deserves multiple viewings. One of the best examples of comedic pacing you'll ever come across. Those boys sure as hell know how to make a movie. (Their first, Blood Simple, is maybe the best noir ever.)

Raising Arizona is also a good example of what I claim in CYGAWA is the basis of comedy/humor/whatever: Obsession and pain.

I'll be in touch.

Allan

A reminder: The ARCs have more typos and other screw ups (questionable punctuation and tense changes, for example) than I would have wished. Hang in there with them.

Also: I've done some fact checking and there's a serious error in Part Three that I want to correct here – as I will in the text of the store-bought edition. Max Dalton did not have white supremacy leanings. That should never have made it into the book.

My apologies, especially to the Dalton family.

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