Down South Perspective

Hi Folks,

I write from September 4th, a holiday here in the States, Labor Day (which used to mean something, I think). Supposedly the “end of summer,” for the locals here at Montauk Labor Day really means the beginning of a more relaxed time (especially in the surf lineup), as the summer people go back west, up the “I” (island); they go home.

I have nothing against these folks, individually. There’s just so many of them.

I once owned a house here at Montauk. I sold it in 1988 for $186,000, and was lucky to have gotten that much; the real estate market crashed within a few months.

Last year that house sold for 1.2 million.

Many years ago when I first came to Montauk just about everyone I knew was a commercial fisherman or banged nails or some such. They fed people, built things. Plus rode waves.

Try owning a house, a home, here now, if all you do is feed people or build things. (Or write books.)

If you come from a beach town or ski town or farm town or other type of small community you probably know what I’m talking about.

Not completely changing the subject, here are some quotes from Edward R. Murrow, a decent journalist and probably a decent human being from back before truth-telling was likewise overwhelmed:

“Most truths are so naked that people feel sorry for them and cover them up.”

“Just because your voice reaches halfway around the world doesn’t mean you are wiser than when it reached only to the end of the bar.”

“No one can terrorize a whole nation, unless we are all his accomplices.”

“Good night and good luck.”

Now we have Bob Woodward. Good luck indeed.

A half-assed segue, with some sarcasm:

This stuff – the loss of culture and the loss of truth – isn’t what’s important. What’s important is that my new book is in print and on the way. I’ll have a copy in my hands tomorrow, Fedexed from the UK. Those of you who ordered early will have yours in about week, depending on where you live. (If you order now, it’ll likewise take about a week.)

The book contest/giveaway results are in.

1st Book Purchaser: Patricia Hopkins, Wales, UK
100th Book Purchaser: Bruce Reith, South Bend, Indiana
1000th Book Purchaser: Ben Sippy, San Diego, California

All the above get limited or “Uber” editions of my book.

Using a random process having to do with subatomic particle decay (Schrodinger’s Bandito was involved, I think), the guys at Humdrumming came up with the following other winners:

Grand prize (Surfboard Winner): Steve James, Cardiff, UK
2nd place (Poster Winner): Adam Bennett (via email so we’re not sure of his location)
3rd place (Manuscript Winner): Nicole Davila, Moerfelden-Walldorf, Germany
4th Place (Uber Edition Winner): Jacob Folkman, Hawaii
5th Place (Uber Edition Winner): Benton Danner, Alpharetta, Georgia
6th Place (Uber Edition Winner): Justin Driscoll, Brooklyn, New York

Congrats to all, and big time thanks to all of you who bought the pre-release edition.

Will the above people please email me with their ground mail addresses – no P.O. boxes please. And give us a couple or so weeks to ship. I’m horrendously overloaded with work, scrambling to finish the appendix/adjunct website to the new book, which will prove that everything I describe in the book is true and accurate (no James Frey shit), plus there will be an extensive selection of photographs. A big job; in fact, so big that I will not be finished by the time you all get your pre-release books. My apologies. I estimate the site-completion date to be around the third week in September. I’ll notify you via a DSP when the site is up, although some preliminary material will be viewable before then.

Although the appendix/adjunct site will be part of aweisbecker.com, the pages will not be reachable via the “regular” site. (Right: “You can’t get there from here.”) The site URL is in the book itself. This is so people who have not yet read the book are not tempted to go there, which would screw up Gradual Disclosure – they’d find out What Happens before reading the book, which is bad. And anyway, why read an appendix before the book? Dig this: the appendix will be almost as long as the book!

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A while back I said my website proper was under reconstruction. Those of you who have recently visited aweisbecker.com know that the work is done; I’ve gotten a bunch of complimentary emails about it.

John, my site guru (with the help of his aide de camp, Jon, plus CJ Design) did a spectacular job; I couldn’t be happier with it.

Although everything about it is improved, the new site’s home page is especially cool, I think. Geared to arouse curiosity about my new book, it’s a sort of tour of the story, both in the visual imagery and the passages you can discover through cursor exploration. (A blog and, more importantly, a Reader’s Forum are coming soon. More about them in future DSPs.)

The real purpose of this message is to get you to take a look at the new site. When you go to the home page, move your cursor around sloooowly, noticing when the arrow becomes the little hand. As you’ll see, there are a lot of hidden passages, which I carefully selected to give you a feel for the book, its tone, thrust, and various through-lines.

Again, go sloooowly, so as not to miss some good stuff. For example, there are 3 passages on the bikini-clad body, and which say different things about male/female relationships (plus a bit about writing). There are two on the male figure brandishing a knife in the lower left corner. This is the guy referred to in the passages, a dangerous psychopath and colluder in murder down at the end of the road. Another passage is hidden under the pistol in the lower right corner, and which refers to another lunatic subplot that was the stuff of my recent life.

Click here, enjoy, and please do email feedback if you’re in so moved.

I’ll be in touch,

Allan

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