Re-release: The Midnight Club by Christopher Pike

[00:00:02] The Midnight Club was about life, sometimes extremely violent life, true, not about death.

[00:00:08] The idea had clicked instantly.

[00:00:10] They would meet in the study at the stroke of midnight.

[00:00:12] There would be a roaring fire.

[00:00:13] The stories would flow, they would fly with them, and the nights would be a little less

[00:00:17] dark.

[00:00:18] The four of them were already friends, Spence, Kevin, Anya and Alanka.

[00:00:23] Sandra they let come along for the ride.

[00:00:25] That was it, they all agreed.

[00:00:26] No one else would join the club.

[00:00:28] And the funny thing was, no one else asked to join the club.

[00:00:31] The late hour of their meetings may have had something to do with it.

[00:00:34] Midnight was prohibitive for the deathly ill.

[00:00:36] The study was centered on the fireplace, an ancient brick affair that they often joke

[00:00:39] was big enough to cremate them all.

[00:00:41] Alanka took a seat between Kevin and Spence and a cross from Anya and Sandra.

[00:00:46] Anya was in her wheelchair as usual, a blue shawl wrapped around her shoulders.

[00:00:49] Kevin was also wrapped in a blanket.

[00:00:51] He hadn't changed from that afternoon except to remove his coat and boots.

[00:00:54] He continued to be deathly pale.

[00:00:56] But there is no sense going to Dr. White and asking for a blood transfusion for

[00:00:59] him because treatment was against the rules.

[00:01:01] Only painkillers were administered.

[00:01:05] Hello and welcome to Say Podcast and Die.

[00:01:08] The podcast where two queers sit in their closet and talk to you about goosebumps.

[00:01:12] Usually.

[00:01:13] Today, not so much.

[00:01:15] We are going on a more somber and spiritual direction today.

[00:01:19] The much different tone.

[00:01:20] We are reading The Midnight Club by Christopher Pike.

[00:01:23] It is a banger of a book.

[00:01:25] Should I just go into the summary?

[00:01:26] We should probably introduce ourselves.

[00:01:28] Oh, I'm Andy.

[00:01:30] I'm Alyssa.

[00:01:31] And here we go.

[00:01:32] Yeah, I have to say I read Christopher Pike before this, but it wasn't this serious or somber.

[00:01:38] It was a lot more fear street.

[00:01:40] Yeah, I read some interesting background on how he came to write this book and the trajectory of his

[00:01:44] career, which started out with much more straightforward horror slash routine type

[00:01:48] things like his first book was called Slumber Party and it's what you'd expect.

[00:01:51] I saw from the bio one of his books is called Chain Letter and I really want to read it.

[00:01:55] Oh yeah.

[00:01:56] Remember Chain Letters?

[00:01:57] Yeah, I do.

[00:01:58] My mom didn't want me to respond to them and she had the right idea.

[00:02:01] Yeah, I got one and I read it and I was like, oh, and then I realized how much work it would be

[00:02:04] and I didn't respond.

[00:02:05] It's a pyramid scheme for kids.

[00:02:06] It is.

[00:02:08] It says in his author bio that he practices meditation.

[00:02:10] He seems like he's a white guy who's into Buddhism and that comes through in this book

[00:02:14] and also in the trajectory of his career is my understanding.

[00:02:17] So let's get into it.

[00:02:18] Bird's Eye View of the Plot.

[00:02:19] We are at the Rotterham Hospice for terminally ill teens.

[00:02:23] In what state?

[00:02:24] In Washington State.

[00:02:25] Hello.

[00:02:26] Where I'm from.

[00:02:27] Yeah, they said some starvation heights vibes.

[00:02:29] Oh, good point.

[00:02:30] If you don't know starvation heights, that's where a bunch of patients were essentially

[00:02:34] starved to death by a doctor who thought that was a cure for everything, including the

[00:02:39] mother of the guy who founded Ivor Seafood Restaurants, which I grew up going to.

[00:02:43] We're delicious.

[00:02:44] Anyway, so we follow Alanka who is 17 and she's Polish originally and has terminal cancer.

[00:02:52] Well, she's Polish still.

[00:02:54] She's still Polish.

[00:02:54] She moved to the US as a eight month old.

[00:02:56] Yes.

[00:02:57] Yeah.

[00:02:58] So she has cancer and she and three friends in a hangar on have this thing called the midnight

[00:03:04] club or Sandra.

[00:03:06] Yeah.

[00:03:06] So it's Alanka, Spence, Kevin, Anya and Sandra and Sandra is the hangar on.

[00:03:10] But you know what Christopher Pike's real name is?

[00:03:12] What Kevin?

[00:03:14] So this is a little bit of a Barry stew book.

[00:03:17] I think he made himself the sexy artist hero.

[00:03:21] Well, they meet at midnight in this, you know, drawing room.

[00:03:24] This house has been converted into a hospice and they tell each other

[00:03:27] some of them tell each other scary stories and that sort of seems to be where it's going.

[00:03:30] But some people drift into other genres of story in the first sort of meeting that we see

[00:03:36] they say, you know, the first one of us to die should send some kind of signal if there's

[00:03:40] some kind of afterlife.

[00:03:41] And as the book progresses, first Anya dies, Sandra finds that she's been misdiagnosed.

[00:03:46] Sandra gets to leave.

[00:03:47] Yeah.

[00:03:48] She's not going to die.

[00:03:49] Alanka thinks that her cancer has been getting better.

[00:03:51] It turns out not to have been the case.

[00:03:52] She and Kevin confess their love for each other.

[00:03:55] Kevin passes away.

[00:03:56] Alanka is in Spencer left and we find out that it's gay and is dying of complications

[00:04:01] resulting from AIDS.

[00:04:02] And then he dies and eventually Alanka dies and there's also this plot woven throughout

[00:04:06] the whole thing where Alanka believes in past lives and throughout all of human history,

[00:04:11] basically she and Kevin have been together in some way.

[00:04:15] We keep being reborn in different times and places and making versions of the same

[00:04:19] mistakes in their relationship.

[00:04:21] Yeah, exactly.

[00:04:22] Yeah, that's basically the story.

[00:04:23] I think we should just move into it.

[00:04:24] And there's this guy called the master who is maybe a bird in this.

[00:04:28] Yeah, it's weird.

[00:04:30] Yeah.

[00:04:30] He's her spiritual teacher and there's a lot happening here.

[00:04:32] It's I would say ambitious.

[00:04:34] It is.

[00:04:35] After reading Arlstein especially.

[00:04:36] After reading Arlstein.

[00:04:37] Oh my god, where it's sort of one plot line the whole way through.

[00:04:39] Oh man, yeah, this was complicated.

[00:04:41] It was much longer.

[00:04:43] It was more involved and a lot more introspective, I think,

[00:04:46] than a lot of the stuff we've been reading so far.

[00:04:48] Yeah.

[00:04:48] And one difference I would say is so Christopher Pike and Arlstein are just different writers.

[00:04:53] Yeah.

[00:04:53] They're totally on the same shelf in the bookstore and you know if you read one then you might

[00:04:57] like the other.

[00:04:58] But Arlstein is let's get into the action.

[00:05:01] Here is this cool story and touches on things that I think as complex as what Christopher

[00:05:06] Pike touches on.

[00:05:06] But Christopher Pike wants to talk you through it.

[00:05:09] He's like here are the philosophies.

[00:05:11] Here are the emotional nuances.

[00:05:13] And Arlstein more is like here's the iceberg point above the surface.

[00:05:16] Yeah, and it's interesting though because the cover of the book that we have is definitely

[00:05:20] trying to sell it to you as if it belongs exactly with other Christopher Pike novels

[00:05:24] and Arlstein novels.

[00:05:25] We've got a bunch of teens sitting around.

[00:05:27] There's somebody with their back to us in a looks like a black hooded robe.

[00:05:31] And also-

[00:05:31] Who is this person too?

[00:05:32] It's not a character in the story.

[00:05:33] No, I think it's supposed to the back cover copy.

[00:05:36] I think it's supposed to hint that oh there's this master and it's going to

[00:05:38] be some sort of mysterious horrible thing.

[00:05:40] But that's not where it goes.

[00:05:41] But I also just want to point out this kid with a mullet and the like sleeveless

[00:05:45] flannel shirt that's open all the way to his navel like that was a moment.

[00:05:49] That's Kevin.

[00:05:49] You think?

[00:05:50] Yeah, I was identifying them all based on hair color.

[00:05:53] And so Kevin has this shaggy blonde mullet and this sleeveless flannel shirt.

[00:05:58] Hello 90s.

[00:05:59] Extremely, extremely good looking guy.

[00:06:03] And so this cover read to me a satanic panic.

[00:06:06] So I thought we were getting into that kind of stuff.

[00:06:08] And like you said the back cover is a total mislead to get kids to pick it up

[00:06:11] and then they find something really different.

[00:06:13] Let me talk to you about terminal cancer.

[00:06:14] It's like oh god.

[00:06:15] Yeah and zen.

[00:06:16] Yeah.

[00:06:17] All right so we start by meeting Alonca Pollock.

[00:06:19] There are no punches pulled from the beginning.

[00:06:21] We learn she has cancer, she's wearing a wig, she has no how long she has left.

[00:06:26] She's been taking herbal remedies and supplements and she thinks that they're

[00:06:29] making her feel better.

[00:06:30] Everyone else is taking morphine and she's refusing.

[00:06:32] She's taking like a Tylenol mixed with codeine because she's convinced

[00:06:35] she's going to get better and she's going to be hooked on hard drugs.

[00:06:38] Yeah and this is a really interesting twist on the teen drug genre.

[00:06:41] Yeah.

[00:06:41] Because she's surrounded by a bunch of kids who are addicted to morphine for good reasons.

[00:06:45] Yeah.

[00:06:45] That's not a problem.

[00:06:47] Yeah.

[00:06:47] And something that was really powerful about this book I think is just the fact

[00:06:51] that you know everyone in it is going to die within a month and it's very blunt about that.

[00:06:55] Yes.

[00:06:55] Throughout you know she says today's the first day of the rest of my life but the

[00:06:58] rest of my life might be a very small portion of my life overall.

[00:07:01] Yeah.

[00:07:01] So Anya Zimmerman what do you think of her?

[00:07:04] I really liked Anya.

[00:07:05] I loved Anya.

[00:07:05] Yeah.

[00:07:06] Yeah.

[00:07:06] Anya and Spence are the ones I want to hang out with.

[00:07:08] Me too.

[00:07:09] Yeah so Anya is Alonca's roommate and she has bone cancer.

[00:07:13] She has had an amputation of her right leg so she's in a wheelchair

[00:07:17] and she is just cynical and I loved her.

[00:07:22] She's very blunt and she really is the kind of person who is like I'm gonna confront these

[00:07:26] dark things because that's the way the world is.

[00:07:29] At some point to the point of my own self-destruction on some level but yeah I loved Anya.

[00:07:32] Yeah I felt bad that she gets you know it's hard to say when the plot is punishing

[00:07:37] someone and not because everyone in this book just has horrible trauma.

[00:07:40] Of course yeah.

[00:07:41] Like over the top you know it read a bit like you're watching Days of Our Lives or

[00:07:44] something where you're like how much more misery can be piled on here but I really

[00:07:48] enjoyed the way Anya got to be an individual.

[00:07:51] Yeah and what's interesting too is there is fully developed sexuality throughout the book

[00:07:55] which is you know something that's really only implicit or at least the very most you know

[00:07:58] some making out in Arlstein.

[00:08:00] Arlstein has keggers and makeouts and this has needle drugs and like...

[00:08:05] Penetrate of sex yeah.

[00:08:06] Right with someone you just met in a park and that's the good Christian girl.

[00:08:09] Yeah.

[00:08:11] Speaking of which Anya has started flipping through the bible.

[00:08:14] She says she has no religion.

[00:08:15] She says dying people have no religion or actually no she says dead people have no religion

[00:08:19] which is something that comes up again too is actually Alanka who even is trying to be a bit

[00:08:23] more optimistic will say she feels like a dead person like the corpse waiting to stop moving.

[00:08:28] So we learn a little bit about the midnight club as Alyssa read at the opening

[00:08:32] and we learn Anya's stories in particular tend to be Christopher Pike's typical stuff.

[00:08:37] How Susie Q disemboweled Robbie Wright it says.

[00:08:40] We also learn here that Alanka is in love with Kevin and that Kevin's girlfriend from his high

[00:08:44] school is visiting.

[00:08:46] Kathy.

[00:08:47] And it's unclear that Kathy knows the extent to which Kevin is terminally ill or is denying it maybe.

[00:08:52] Yeah I think she's in real denial in a way that at least from Alanka's somewhat

[00:08:57] self-interested perspective is bad for Kevin.

[00:09:00] So she thinks that Kathy is trying to make plans for the future trying to get

[00:09:04] Kevin to go outside and walk with her and things like that.

[00:09:07] Even though he's very easily cold because of the type of cancer he has.

[00:09:10] Exactly and so Alanka feels that it's hindering Kevin from being able to

[00:09:15] grieve and move through sort of acceptance of his death even though she is kind of in the same position.

[00:09:19] Yeah.

[00:09:20] Mostly what she wants is Kevin to herself.

[00:09:23] So yeah there's a brief interaction with both Kathy and Kevin and they go out

[00:09:26] and as she's watching them we meet Dr. White who set up the hospice.

[00:09:30] How do you feel about Dr. White?

[00:09:32] You know I wanted to like him but there's some really uncomfortable interactions

[00:09:34] including this one that we're about to see.

[00:09:36] So basically no one at the hospice gets treatment because they're all

[00:09:39] terminal but Alanka has requested an MRI and he is really trying to dissuade her from that

[00:09:44] because of the discomfort it will give her but she's really hopeful.

[00:09:46] She believes very sincerely that the tumors in her abdomen have shrunk.

[00:09:49] He says well let me give you an exam right now and he's like there's no one else in the room.

[00:09:53] Like she unbuttons her pants.

[00:09:55] Yeah yeah she's taken off her pants or unbuttoning them or whatever

[00:09:58] and he's feeling her abdomen and she's reacting and he's like I'm barely touching you and

[00:10:02] she says well it hurts I must just be you know a little sore.

[00:10:04] She's really trying to deny the fact that she's still in pain.

[00:10:08] So there's this moment where it's like first of all this is just

[00:10:10] uncomfortable for this adult man and this teenager to be there and he's having her

[00:10:13] take down her pants and then also is he being rough with her?

[00:10:17] It's unclear or is he trying to do the thing that she says she'll eventually say

[00:10:21] she's trying to do with Kathy which is like let me very bluntly tell you

[00:10:24] this is the reality.

[00:10:26] Well and I think that's a big theme in this book is people acting like they

[00:10:29] know how someone should approach death.

[00:10:31] Yeah and the people who are on the brink of death really feeling not heard by that

[00:10:34] or suspicious of whether that advice is actually good.

[00:10:37] And to that point we'll learn that the midnight club comes out of so they have

[00:10:41] group therapy there but Alanka and it sounds like a few other people don't

[00:10:44] really want to put their grief and trauma on other people and so the

[00:10:47] midnight club becomes this alternative outlet for it and Dr. White's all for

[00:10:50] it and he's a little surprised that they won't let him sit in but he

[00:10:53] accepts it and is like sure go sit by the fire.

[00:10:55] It's like why would we want you there?

[00:10:57] Yeah they're really big on this idea that no one else can really understand

[00:11:00] what they're going through.

[00:11:00] Yeah and to his credit he does respect that.

[00:11:02] It's true there is an element in this of you know fulfillment of the teen

[00:11:06] fantasy of being left alone without adult supervision but under these really

[00:11:10] extreme circumstances and another thing I thought was interesting is at this

[00:11:13] point we learned that the Rotterham hospice was a former mansion of an

[00:11:18] oil baron named Tex Adams and I think that's gotta be a Nobel prize kind

[00:11:24] of situation where it's like oh what I created caused so much

[00:11:27] destruction because as an oil baron he's probably been responsible for a lot of

[00:11:31] cancer and other illnesses so here's my attempt to make up for it.

[00:11:36] So that went into very different action then where my brain went which is you know

[00:11:39] it's the beginning of the book I didn't know what to expect I was expecting

[00:11:41] something that was more straightforward horror and I was like oh is that a

[00:11:43] reference to Tex Watson and I don't think it is I think that was me being

[00:11:46] morbid.

[00:11:47] Wait which one's Tex Watson?

[00:11:48] From the Manson family.

[00:11:49] Oh yeah yeah yeah Tex.

[00:11:52] Yes that's right.

[00:11:53] But to go back to it what do you think of Dr. White?

[00:11:54] Oh I just think that he hasn't processed his grief over his dead daughter who he

[00:11:59] later learned reminds him a lot of Alanka which is why he gives her special

[00:12:02] attention.

[00:12:03] He maybe should have more supervisors working over him because he gets

[00:12:06] compared to Santa Claus and I think that's actually really apt because

[00:12:09] he both wants to be bounteous and caring and give everyone what they want

[00:12:12] and on the other hand wants to police them and kind of has this control

[00:12:16] over everything that happens there and maybe isn't the most unbiased person

[00:12:20] to be doing that.

[00:12:21] Although it seems like in some cases he's willing to look the other way.

[00:12:24] Yes.

[00:12:24] In ways that the children probably appreciate but also an oversight board would

[00:12:29] have problems with.

[00:12:30] Exactly I feel like just the structure of this hospice that's so secluded it seems

[00:12:35] like a recipe for emotional abuse at least in fact other kinds of abuse.

[00:12:40] Oh speaking of the location I looked around because I'm from Washington like

[00:12:44] I said it's uh seems like this is probably

[00:12:47] Wattcom hospice would be the nearest one.

[00:12:50] I mean I don't know if it was around then but that's that's the area so

[00:12:52] there are some hospices up in the tippy top northwest Washington because it

[00:12:56] says they're near Canada so I think they're near Bellingham, Washington probably.

[00:12:59] It's a really beautiful area which is very like woodsy big waves crashing up on

[00:13:04] cliffs very wild and pretty secluded Bellingham is a small college town and

[00:13:08] that's the biggest city there's a lot of just stretches of fields of

[00:13:11] tulips between there and the next town.

[00:13:14] All right so we learn about Spence.

[00:13:15] I really liked Spence and at this point we think Spence has brain cancer.

[00:13:20] He's the least unhealthy person after Alonka right now.

[00:13:24] I mean he's still able to get up and walk around makes a lot of jokes.

[00:13:27] Has a quote unquote girlfriend named quote unquote Caroline who he

[00:13:31] will spend half the day writing letters to and we'll always talk about how

[00:13:34] they're hot and heavy.

[00:13:36] Supposedly she's the horniest chick alive.

[00:13:38] Which that's like cute at this point and really sad later when we find out

[00:13:42] his real story.

[00:13:43] We learn about Kevin who had leukemia and I thought this was interesting so

[00:13:47] he had fallen out of remission three times which means they're just he

[00:13:50] doesn't get another chance.

[00:13:52] Which is awful.

[00:13:52] Yeah well I mean what did you think about that part of the story so it's like

[00:13:56] these kids are all in hospice because no one wants to try to treat them anymore

[00:14:00] and I feel like there must be some at least from Alonka's perspective

[00:14:03] frustration at why are people giving up on me.

[00:14:05] You know yeah for sure because she and she's also an orphan and she's in a

[00:14:08] state hospital so that is most certainly related to the decision not to

[00:14:11] treat her right it makes me wonder could something have been done had she

[00:14:14] had more resources and I guess the same could be asked of Kevin right although

[00:14:17] I don't know again if that's there's some sort of other protocol for

[00:14:20] leukemia that I'm just not aware of but it was very sad.

[00:14:23] Well and we learned that most of them were from state hospitals so Kevin is

[00:14:26] the only one whose family has some money and the rest come from very

[00:14:29] few resources and in Alonka's case something I was wondering about too is

[00:14:33] so we learned that her dad left when she was a baby her mother moved her

[00:14:36] to the US when she was eight months old and her mother was an alcoholic

[00:14:40] and drank herself to death shortly before Alonka found out she had

[00:14:43] cancer and I'm wondering she probably wasn't going for regular checkups

[00:14:47] and maybe it could have been caught earlier if she had any kind of support

[00:14:50] structure. Very sad story. It really is. We also learned that Kevin's an

[00:14:54] artist. He does all of these science fiction

[00:14:56] paintings that Alonka says could be on the covers of the best

[00:14:59] science fiction books there's one she really likes that's a star but he

[00:15:03] doesn't really have the strength to work anymore

[00:15:05] but she loves his art. Which I felt like was a bit of a self reference

[00:15:09] from Christopher Pike too who always wanted to be a sci-fi author for

[00:15:12] adults actually. Oh I didn't know that. Yeah that was his passion. Oh and he

[00:15:16] wrote some sci-fi. He's written a lot. We meet Kathy. Kathy's a little cheerleader.

[00:15:20] Yeah she's like oh oh I thought you had an accent and Alonka's like yeah well I

[00:15:25] left Poland when I was eight months old and Kathy's like oh that must be what it is.

[00:15:30] And so after that is when she runs into Spence. Oh and my note when Spence

[00:15:33] shows up is all of these kids are thirsty. Yeah poor Spence too there's

[00:15:37] no one who's his type but I also liked that they're allowed to have

[00:15:41] sexual desires and there's no punishment for it right.

[00:15:44] Alonka takes a nap before the midnight club and she dreams about someone called

[00:15:47] the master who we'll hear about through the rest of the story

[00:15:50] and then she gets awoken by Sandra who is believed at this point to have

[00:15:54] Hodgkins. Sandra is the one who's the good Christian girl and she also never

[00:15:57] tells stories at the midnight club she just like wants to observe.

[00:16:01] Alonka refers to her as pleasant but simple.

[00:16:05] She's kind of rude yeah but again like everyone in this is kind of bad in

[00:16:09] various ways. But also well that and it's like well first of all it's not like

[00:16:12] she's saying that to her face but also it's like when in your life do you get to

[00:16:15] just be honest about your opinions if not when you're like a teenager about to

[00:16:18] die you know? Yeah and that is one thing this book

[00:16:20] emphasizes a lot is the need to say what you're feeling.

[00:16:22] And then we get the midnight club. Yes and I love that line that you quote in

[00:16:26] the opening I had it bolded where it says that telling these horror stories

[00:16:30] is not about death it's about life even though life is extremely violent in

[00:16:34] the stories it's about kind of clinging to that which I hadn't thought

[00:16:37] about in terms of my love of horror. Yeah interesting and the other thing

[00:16:40] that's interesting so they all you know they tell their stories Sandra doesn't

[00:16:42] tell one tonight but when Spence tells his story

[00:16:44] Anya is always interrupting him and kind of heckling him

[00:16:47] and it's clearly they have a banter right it's not angry but like

[00:16:51] you know she'll make these comments and it's clear then he'll adjust his

[00:16:54] story to sort of address her criticisms. I was wondering what you

[00:16:57] thought of this as a workshop a writing workshop. Right yeah.

[00:17:00] If you had these folks in your writing workshop who

[00:17:04] would you want to cut and who would you want to listen to the most.

[00:17:08] I'd want to listen to Anya the most like I know we were gonna I knew you wanted to

[00:17:12] talk about this like who's your favorite story telling Anya was hands down my

[00:17:14] favorite and she'll tell one story in the midnight club and one sort of not in

[00:17:17] the midnight club but that's her story for the day.

[00:17:19] Spences are just like off-the-wall violence they're so funny.

[00:17:22] They're really funny yeah it's like they're almost like a proto-Steven

[00:17:25] king but funnier yeah yeah because it's kind of the point of every story is

[00:17:29] this person was horrible got away with it had a great life.

[00:17:32] It's sort of a wish fulfillment I think like because he we find out to somebody

[00:17:35] who has a lot of anger yeah this is gonna be horrible but I'd probably cut either

[00:17:39] Alonka or Kevin. Me too. Yeah because it just their stories are

[00:17:43] they're very sincere and kind of kind of sentimental and sappy which is

[00:17:48] it's just not my thing and like you don't cut people from workshops so

[00:17:50] it's not like a thing I would do but like you could make it a game show.

[00:17:54] A reality show you know if I was gonna sit around listening to stories every

[00:17:57] night Anya would be sort of my number one. We should get into their

[00:18:00] stories but I think I would have to have a talk with Alonka about what

[00:18:03] white girls should be imagining themselves into because all of her stories

[00:18:08] are orientalist fantasies. Yes it reminds me of like Rachel D'Alazal or whatever

[00:18:14] it's like oh and this one I was Egyptian and this one I'm Indian.

[00:18:17] It also you are a Polish girl yeah from America. She's very new age yeah which

[00:18:23] is what I was thinking about was like oh in the past life I was this princess

[00:18:26] you know or whatever right but uh anyway well but that's like the

[00:18:29] limitation on that right I mean I'm all for imagining your past lives or something

[00:18:33] but for her it seems to be I'm fetishizing this thing which is part of new

[00:18:37] age stuff too right yeah I'm gonna get Hanna or something yeah and again like

[00:18:42] she's a poor immigrant to the United States I don't really fault her for her fantasies.

[00:18:45] It's a Christopher Pike thing. She's not like woke you know I mean

[00:18:49] she's as schooled as when I was 14 or 17 even I also had

[00:18:54] shirts with Chinese symbols on them so I can't talk yeah and when I was

[00:18:58] 17 I believed in Christianity so I really can't talk.

[00:19:01] I retract my criticism again the critique here is on the author

[00:19:05] exactly the 34 year old man or whatever you should maybe have a little more

[00:19:08] knowledge so back at you so who's your favorite and versus Lee's favorite

[00:19:11] storyteller so Aya's is cool but Spencer's story is first when we

[00:19:15] get here and I love it which I like to get into right away

[00:19:18] but um my least favorite I felt like Kevin's was pretty self-indulgent

[00:19:23] in a way that annoyed me but at least it was thought out

[00:19:27] I felt like Ilanka's felt a little bit more like rehashings of what she

[00:19:31] kind of vaguely thinks happens in a thousand and one nights or Bacchio or

[00:19:34] whatever that like reminds me of one of that the frame-tail type thing yeah

[00:19:37] ooh which is actually a nice comparison to this book I thought of it we'll get

[00:19:40] to taxonomies but I thought of it as an anthology work obviously but I

[00:19:43] hadn't thought about it as very similar to De Cameron

[00:19:46] except they're actually dying instead of waiting out the plague

[00:19:49] yeah well cool Eddie takes a step out.

[00:19:52] Spencer's story is about an American Vietnam vet who has been

[00:19:55] disfigured by napalm who is in Paris his ex-girlfriend lives in Paris

[00:20:00] he hates all women because they don't want to sleep with him because

[00:20:03] of how he looks yeah and he goes up onto the Eiffel Tower

[00:20:08] taking his ex-girlfriend hostage Linda Linda and has a sniper rifle and is

[00:20:12] picking people off from a mile away Aya is constantly pointing out this is

[00:20:16] really bad on women rifles don't work this way you can't put a

[00:20:18] silencer on a sniper rifle and he's like shh I can

[00:20:22] she keeps being like is anyone else having trouble with the plausibility of

[00:20:24] this I love her yeah she's great because of Ania's

[00:20:29] criticism she's like ah but then Linda says that he has a daughter and Ania's

[00:20:32] like when is the shootout from the police coming I mean he's like what do you

[00:20:35] mean and she's like you always have a shootout with the police and he's like

[00:20:37] shut up. Linda was an interesting character too

[00:20:40] right so he kidnapped his girlfriend he's gonna use her as a human shield

[00:20:43] and she's just making fun of him and she's like you killed my boyfriend

[00:20:46] because when he went to kidnap her he shot her boyfriend who was in bed

[00:20:49] with her and she's like I've been trying to get rid of that loser for so

[00:20:51] long like you don't know how much you helped me and also you're a

[00:20:54] ugly. Linda is like not taking it seriously. Linda gets the gun they kind of

[00:20:58] have a standoff and then the police think just because of what's happened and he

[00:21:01] has some blood on him that she is holding him hostage and shoot her.

[00:21:04] They just kill her on the spot. And so he gets away and gets to know

[00:21:08] his daughter who Linda had just told him about. Janice. I was assuming was

[00:21:11] just going to be a ruse but apparently was real and then they go kind of

[00:21:14] live happily ever after and Spence is like so there he didn't get shot by

[00:21:17] the police. He comes across as a big hero to

[00:21:19] Janice who worships him and they return to the U.S.

[00:21:23] That's awesome. I mean it's not awesome. No it's a terrible

[00:21:27] like wish fulfillment rage like reminded me of God I don't remember any details

[00:21:31] with the shooter who went up on the bell tower in that college campus and shot

[00:21:34] people like it's those vibes that energy. That for sure. It also reminded me a

[00:21:38] little bit of Rambo with a twist right because also Washington state but the

[00:21:42] interesting thing with Eddie is he loved being a Vietnam soldier he says

[00:21:46] he's like I just really love killing people. Yeah. And then just one more

[00:21:49] on there is it reminds me of stories of serial killers who were in the military

[00:21:53] right and then they come back and live an ordinary life but also then like serial

[00:21:57] kill or maybe stop for a while. That's kind of who Eddie is. He's someone who

[00:22:00] gets away with a bunch of stuff and then you know goes all BTK killer and

[00:22:04] buttons up for a while. Yeah it's funny though when you kind of dive into

[00:22:07] those stories most of those serial killers didn't actually see any action

[00:22:11] and exaggerated at all. They wish that they had. I really like Spence and

[00:22:15] Anya's dynamic here her heckling and him being like no no no that's not

[00:22:18] a problem and then clearly adjusting things to win her approval. What did you

[00:22:22] think of the devil and Dana? I really liked it. This is Anya's first story.

[00:22:25] This is Anya's story they're ways in which is nonsensical but I liked it.

[00:22:29] It's set in Wasteville Washington where everybody wastes their time working

[00:22:33] and going to school. That is the waste of time. Yeah well especially when

[00:22:36] you're feeling like I'm in hospice like why would I value those things you know.

[00:22:40] Yeah this is a side note but I feel like I remember at one point in

[00:22:43] it was either high school or college or both thinking like man if I found out

[00:22:46] that I had a terminal illness I wouldn't finish school like why would I bother

[00:22:49] with this. And of course which is what Anya's saying and it kind of raises the

[00:22:53] question of well you're not going to live that much longer than 17 years right

[00:22:57] or I guess she's 19 but Anya really thinks in terms of the long time scale

[00:23:01] so she's always saying say whatever you want to Kevin it won't matter in

[00:23:03] a few months or a hundred years or whatever. Yeah and so yeah it's like

[00:23:08] well what's the difference between dying at 19 and dying at 80 like should

[00:23:11] you really be spending that much time in school and work? Yeah her view is

[00:23:13] in the long-run world Ed. Yeah. The devil and Dana is about this

[00:23:18] goody girl religious gets all the good grades who has this fantasy life of being

[00:23:23] super promiscuous and trying drugs and all that and so one night the devil

[00:23:26] appears to her and I like this detail he appears as James Dean but she didn't

[00:23:29] know who that was so she just thought he was like a I don't know handsome guy.

[00:23:33] Yeah she didn't know he was doing a bit. Yeah well and then also I liked

[00:23:37] this part it's really well written something I appreciated I at least

[00:23:40] I thought Anya says that Dana prayed to God to free her of her

[00:23:44] base desires and also to fulfill them. Yeah. And Anya goes so what does God have

[00:23:48] to do with that kind of prayer the devil came to her instead.

[00:23:51] Yeah. So that was really well put. Yeah. It's very

[00:23:54] playfully written. That earlier scene where she was flipping through the

[00:23:57] Bible it's like oh that's why you were reading it.

[00:24:00] Exactly. I didn't think of that. She's getting material from it but also in

[00:24:03] this way that's cynical in a way that's informed like it reminds me

[00:24:07] of this poem from Spoon River Anthology. Spoon River Anthology is by a poet called

[00:24:12] Edgar Lee Masters early 20th century collection of poems about all these

[00:24:16] people in a town it's all based on actual people who died in this one town

[00:24:20] and it's like their voice from beyond the graves are kind of last epigram.

[00:24:24] And they're all titled after the people they are. This one is called Wendell

[00:24:27] Peapoid you can find it online it's uh it's public domain so this is

[00:24:30] this from the poem. My offense was this I said God lied to Adam and

[00:24:36] destined him to lead the life of a fool ignorant that there is evil in the world

[00:24:40] as well as good and when Adam outwitted God by eating the

[00:24:43] apple and saw through the lie God drove him out of Eden to keep him from

[00:24:47] taking the fruit of mortal life. For Christ's sake you sensible people here's

[00:24:50] what God himself says about it in the book of Genesis and the Lord God said

[00:24:54] behold the man has become as one of us a little envy you see to no good

[00:24:58] and evil be all his good lie exposed and now lest he put forth his hand

[00:25:01] and take also of the tree of life and eat and live forever

[00:25:04] therefore the Lord God said to him forth from the garden of Eden

[00:25:07] the reason I believe God crucified his own son to get out of the wretched tangle

[00:25:11] is because it sounds just like him. It's one of my favorite poems in that

[00:25:17] anthology. Yeah and I think that that's Anya like

[00:25:21] that's her attitude she's like I read this and the only way to make sense

[00:25:24] of it is to look at it like this. I wonder if maybe her attitude is a

[00:25:27] lot of stuff in the bible does reflect reality but

[00:25:29] it's not like a good thing it's like that it's arbitrary and mean

[00:25:34] a lot of the time. Yeah. Her and Spence have a similar outlook so the story.

[00:25:38] Yeah. Yes, the story so anyway the devil comes to her and says I'll split you into

[00:25:40] two people one of you can do all the good stuff one of you can do all the bad

[00:25:43] stuff and you'll each feel what the other is doing

[00:25:46] all the time so it's like you're living in two places at once

[00:25:49] this made no sense to me but Dana says yes so Dana one Dana two Dana two goes

[00:25:53] off to LA and like Dana one wanted to go then Dana two is like no give

[00:25:57] me your money yeah and then you go to school

[00:26:00] yeah Dana two goes and loses her virginity and does drugs and is doing

[00:26:05] all these things and meanwhile Dana one is back like taking tests and at the

[00:26:09] same time that Dana two is losing her virginity she is on

[00:26:12] the couch watching a movie with her parents like a Disney movie a Disney

[00:26:15] movie and she's like dad can I can I go to my room and he's like no we this is

[00:26:19] family time we watch we watch movies together and she's like oh

[00:26:21] should it so like that was really intense yeah and she starts having an

[00:26:24] orgasm really noisily their parents are like are you okay

[00:26:28] and this goes on for a while she gets hooked on coke and this obviously

[00:26:32] hurts Dana one's grades yeah and a relationship with her parents

[00:26:36] and then the two of them essentially decided to become zero some game one has

[00:26:40] to kill the other but of course the other knows what the other is thinking

[00:26:42] all the time I thought Dana two made a good point where she was like how do

[00:26:45] you know your Dana one which one of us is the original and

[00:26:48] obviously neither of them are I also liked the bad devil says if you kill

[00:26:51] me all the fun will go out of your life and the good one says but if you

[00:26:54] kill me all the good will go out of your life and the bad ones like

[00:26:56] wait what was what's good about your life are you having a good time at home with

[00:27:00] your parents yeah who are like really tyrannical

[00:27:04] they decide they're gonna shoot on three and they both cheat and shoot on two

[00:27:08] and one of them dies and the other is in a wheelchair and the devil shows up

[00:27:12] again and says if you kill yourself you'll never go to hell

[00:27:15] and then the story ends which is going to be relevant to on his plot later

[00:27:19] I didn't pick up on this at the time because I didn't know what was gonna

[00:27:21] happen but I guess she was hinting at or trying to start talking about what

[00:27:24] she was planning to do yeah and Alonka notes that it's interesting that she put

[00:27:28] one of her characters in a wheelchair because she's in a wheelchair

[00:27:30] and then we have Alonka story I don't even really want to talk about Alonka story

[00:27:34] I can sum it up real quick she says that this took place 26,000 years ago in

[00:27:38] Egypt even though I understand that is 13,000 years earlier than humans

[00:27:41] would have been in Egypt she has no it's like it was in my dream it's fine

[00:27:45] there are these two women Delias and Shradda Shradda has a daughter

[00:27:48] named mage but mage is also really close to Delias which makes Shradda

[00:27:51] jealous mage goes out one day to see Delias

[00:27:53] there's famine so she gets killed and eaten on the way yeah what the fuck yeah

[00:27:57] and then at some point Delias comes along and finds her stuff and was like oh I

[00:28:00] better hold this for Delias or for mage not realizing that she's already dead

[00:28:03] and then Shradda finds out that she's dead but also her stuff is gone so she's

[00:28:08] convinced maybe she's not dead or maybe there's an afterlife or something like that

[00:28:11] yeah because that was the idea you know like oh leave stuff in the tomb people

[00:28:15] needed in the afterlife but Delias is devoted to this master who's going to

[00:28:20] keep recurring and one of his teachings is that that's not true that you don't

[00:28:23] take possessions to the afterlife yeah and then basically many years later

[00:28:27] Delias reveals that she had the stuff all along and then they never speak again

[00:28:31] and sort of go to their graves never having repaired their friendship as

[00:28:34] Alanka is telling the story she's looking at Kevin and referring to him as Shadra

[00:28:37] sometime yeah sometimes yeah one of the first queer moments in this story

[00:28:40] is that when you're reincarnated you can change genders

[00:28:43] but it gets queerer but wait it's queerer then we get Kevin's

[00:28:47] long ass story he's going to tell little by little most people will be dead by the

[00:28:51] time it's done yeah himself in well not himself but yeah

[00:28:55] some people will be dead before this is over it's called the magic mirror did you

[00:28:58] like it it wasn't my cup of tea personally I didn't hate it

[00:29:02] it's kind of it's a wonderful life it's a romance yeah it's a it's a

[00:29:06] romance one of the romances in which you mostly have a

[00:29:09] horrible life but get a few nice moments at the end

[00:29:11] it's about an angel who's amused and lives in the Louvre and then meets

[00:29:15] his name is Hermie yeah without the s like Hermes but Hermie

[00:29:18] yeah so I wasn't sure how to pronounce it it was like airm

[00:29:21] airm yeah

[00:29:25] anyway meets this girl Teresa yeah which is Alanka's middle name

[00:29:30] Kevin's not being settled no he makes a deal with God

[00:29:33] because he's not supposed to leave the Louvre he's like he becomes mortal

[00:29:35] they start setting up shop because he's a talented painter but he's

[00:29:39] unhappy with Teresa wants him to have this studio and make money so

[00:29:42] that they can live because she supports him initially and he does it for a while

[00:29:46] but then we're not even at that part of the story yet no we're not

[00:29:48] okay so that's where the story ends for the night I was just wondering if you

[00:29:51] wanted to summarize the whole story now so that we don't have to come back to

[00:29:53] why not yeah go for it but it's okay that's okay it's because it's a

[00:29:55] progression so that's fine we'll stop there well where it kind of ends here

[00:29:58] is he's leaving the museum first with Teresa and

[00:30:01] thinks he's gonna be happy with her forever but he'd never been mortal

[00:30:04] before Kevin explains so implication like this is gonna

[00:30:07] suck people ask Sandra if she wants to tell a story and she's like

[00:30:09] nope never and she does tell kind of a cool little bit of flash later on well

[00:30:14] yeah she tells one the next night when they have some wine yeah that's it you

[00:30:17] know Alonka and Kevin have this sort of sweet good night

[00:30:19] Anya asks if anyone really thinks that they survive after death and Spence says

[00:30:23] you know I have no opinion Sandra's like I believe in God heaven in hell to

[00:30:27] which Anya says which one do you think you'll go to in the next few days

[00:30:31] she's so intense yeah Kevin believes in the soul

[00:30:34] because of near-death experiences and this is where they decide

[00:30:38] you know whoever goes first send us some kind of sign yeah that's their big idea

[00:30:41] which is referenced on the back of the book and what you think that the story is

[00:30:44] going to be at this point is like a ghost story almost

[00:30:46] also Spence I thought had an interesting point here where he says he thinks that

[00:30:50] near-death experiences the bright light and everything are the brain's last

[00:30:53] attempt to stave off the horror of non-existence

[00:30:56] yeah so it's like sensation sensation no like this book goes to some really

[00:30:59] cool places that does yeah I would have loved this as a kid

[00:31:02] yeah same and way over identified with Alonka because

[00:31:05] being a Polish person from Washington state just wanting someone to love you

[00:31:10] and touch you yeah yeah also that that's that's what I would have identified with

[00:31:14] the next day is Alonka's MRI she's having a lot more pain than usual she's

[00:31:18] trying to deny it and that's where we learn about Jesse which is

[00:31:22] Dr. White's daughter who died two weeks before her 18th birthday and

[00:31:25] had a lot of similarities with Alonka and we also get a bit back story

[00:31:28] on Alonka as well she thinks back to the first time she got an MRI

[00:31:32] and the very next day she got an operation because it was so bad and she was

[00:31:36] really upset because she found out she no longer had a uterus or ovaries and that

[00:31:40] also they weren't sure they'd gotten all the cancer

[00:31:42] she had told everyone before that that her mom had died of cancer

[00:31:46] and she kind of feels like a lot of this is people feeling like what did I do

[00:31:49] wrong to cause this to happen to me yeah that's a really common theme

[00:31:52] yeah it's just sad upon sad and so she doesn't get to MRI

[00:31:55] they stop at McDonald's on the way home but Alonka's like I'm really

[00:31:58] trying to eat healthy I wish that we weren't going to McDonald's

[00:32:01] because she's trying to kind of experiment with like what would you call that

[00:32:03] like wellness approaches yeah it's exactly so Kathy

[00:32:07] Kathy Alonka comes in and against her better judgment says

[00:32:11] look Kevin's dying he's not getting better you coming here is making him feel

[00:32:14] worse stop it and leave him with us she is very possessive of him and

[00:32:18] even introduced this whole ritual for the midnight society where whenever

[00:32:21] they meet they say to each other or sorry the midnight club not the

[00:32:24] midnight society from are you afraid of the dark

[00:32:27] each time they meet they say I belong to you and they

[00:32:30] hug each other and she feels it the most with him yeah and she says to Kathy

[00:32:34] he belongs to us Kathy's very upset she leaves

[00:32:37] runs into Kevin he says have you seen Kathy and Alonka says nope

[00:32:40] but Kevin finds out pretty quickly what happened he's not mad no he's not so

[00:32:44] she goes upstairs and tells Anya she's immediately feeling guilty about this

[00:32:47] Anya says well let me tell you a story and give you some morphine

[00:32:50] here she has her first morphine Anya tells the story about how

[00:32:54] she she never really had feelings for anyone until she met this guy named Bill

[00:32:57] at a mall bookstore and she's looking at poetry and he's looking at true crime

[00:33:02] like what a great couple that's a really sweet meet cute and he has an earring

[00:33:05] yeah in orange hair yeah they have a great relationship she says I never

[00:33:10] felt this sort of complete or fulfilled with anyone before but basically

[00:33:14] she felt like she didn't deserve it and felt like she had to hurt him and

[00:33:17] push him away and blow it up and so she stands him up one night

[00:33:21] goes on a date with this other guy brings him back to her house because her

[00:33:24] parents are out and has sex with him you know not even wanting to just

[00:33:28] wanting to hurt Bill and he shows up you know having wondered where she was

[00:33:31] and was very upset she had been making the statue of the two of them for

[00:33:34] Valentine's Day and he like throws it on the floor and leaves and they never

[00:33:37] see each other again and it breaks off at the leg that she later loses

[00:33:41] yeah and so that's another thing where she thinks she gave herself cancer

[00:33:43] she brought this on herself because of her bad behavior

[00:33:46] it's her biggest regret really but she never apologized or told Bill and he

[00:33:50] doesn't even know that she's sick and you know Alanka is asking her like did you

[00:33:54] you should reach out to him and she says no I don't want him to see me like this

[00:33:58] it's really sad Anja has a lot of emotional issues and it's not a book

[00:34:02] that feels like you need to resolve your emotional issues or that you

[00:34:04] necessarily can yeah hence the like maybe in the next life

[00:34:08] he will yeah probably not and so then Alanka has a

[00:34:11] dream yeah she naps yeah she takes a nap

[00:34:14] and we get some light intro to buddhism the master's telling her

[00:34:17] everything you see with your senses is an illusion it's Maya she's saying you know

[00:34:21] I'm in love with Kevin I need him and the master's like if you were in love with

[00:34:25] him you could just love him you wouldn't need him to do anything so that's

[00:34:29] not what's happening here and it's a lot of you know free yourself from desire

[00:34:33] and pain is good for you because it brings you to your inner self

[00:34:36] I don't love this you know yeah I can see how it might be comforting and

[00:34:41] also maybe a corrective to the sort of possessiveness that she's been

[00:34:44] experiencing earlier it's true which is like if you just love him you can

[00:34:47] just love him you don't have to yeah take him from someone else that's true

[00:34:50] yeah I guess it just felt to me like sometimes it goes into

[00:34:53] just criticizing people yes like especially yourself like blaming yourself

[00:34:57] for things criticizing yourself for things but I guess you're right about the

[00:35:00] part about needing to accept that you can't control outcomes

[00:35:03] so that night at the midnight club yeah part two

[00:35:06] Spence has acquired wine he has two bottles of wine he ordered through the

[00:35:10] mail yeah he said I didn't even need to use my

[00:35:14] fake ad he says we're gonna drink all of these tonight

[00:35:17] she's pouring everyone glasses and Ilanka thanks to herself tonight is the

[00:35:20] start of the endless night which is I guess a premonition of the fact that

[00:35:24] they're about to all start dying except for Sandra who's not really part of

[00:35:27] this although she does have her first wine and she's immediately

[00:35:30] immediately drunk she has her first and immediately her second

[00:35:33] yeah so it surrounds me of uh me where I'm like I had two glasses of wine

[00:35:38] and I'm drunk yeah well I was also thinking of 19 year old Andy who had

[00:35:42] their first screwdriver and then immediately their second screwdriver

[00:35:46] and was like I like everyone yeah

[00:35:51] college slash now I still can't have more than two gals as a wine

[00:35:55] um and then there's this moment where Spence is about to pour

[00:35:59] Ilanka's and he says oh this one's dusty and he gets her new glass and it's

[00:36:02] immediately making Ilanka tired Anya says she's not going to tell the

[00:36:05] story and Ilanka kind of knows the story that she told today

[00:36:08] was her story. Sandra pounds two glasses and wants to talk about her first time

[00:36:12] having sex she's like I was in Portland looking at ducks

[00:36:16] this guy named Dan walked up he wasn't even very attractive we talked about

[00:36:19] sex and then we went to the woods and had sex

[00:36:21] that's my story yeah it everyone's like whoa

[00:36:26] did you come from yeah so I think we did we I would I would read

[00:36:31] Sandra's story you know her future story she just seems

[00:36:34] you know who she is is Karen from Mean Girls the one that what's her name

[00:36:39] plays oh Amanda Saferade yeah yeah yeah sometimes my

[00:36:43] breasts can tell when it's already raining right exactly

[00:36:45] we're just like sometimes you have little gems yeah but mostly not

[00:36:49] Spence's story is called Sydney burns down his school which did feel very

[00:36:52] Stephen King it's true yeah it's got some carry in there

[00:36:55] it's about a kid who's a magician and no one likes and then this girl who

[00:36:59] Mary Mary who was a cheerleader but then drove drunk and killed the

[00:37:03] football team with her father's semi because her father had been like here

[00:37:07] drive my semi and that way when you get drunk you won't get hurt

[00:37:10] and she did not but it turns out the school doesn't like it when you kill the

[00:37:13] football team I also don't think that if you get in a

[00:37:15] semi crash as the driver of the semi you're not in danger of getting hurt

[00:37:19] no I don't think so either Anya is the one who's pointing out that this

[00:37:21] doesn't make sense and Spence is like they get together and Mary says oh

[00:37:25] you're so good at magic why don't you perform for the school and I'll be

[00:37:28] your assistant and then she deliberately screws stuff up and everyone laughs at

[00:37:31] him and so he's like I must have my revenge and she's like

[00:37:34] interestingly enough I wanted revenge and a patsy to get it for me

[00:37:37] so he fills the gym with gasoline during a game

[00:37:41] and sets it on fire he changed the door shut yeah everybody then he starts to

[00:37:44] feel guilty partway through so he doesn't actually set it on fire as he

[00:37:47] hears everyone screaming inside trying to get out he

[00:37:50] starts to stop and then Mary shows up and conks him on the head and

[00:37:53] lights the fire and she goes I shouldn't laugh it's

[00:37:56] fucked up she goes a thousand die hard fans

[00:37:59] it is funny though and they get away with it for a while and then Mary is

[00:38:02] constantly holding over his head oh I could I could turn you in no one will

[00:38:05] believe it was me and so he does this saw her in half

[00:38:08] trick at a show one night but he saw us her in half and then he gets away with

[00:38:11] it because he's like whoa it's worked before it's just an accident

[00:38:14] and he's a headliner in Vegas to this day yeah it's just like weirdly

[00:38:19] joyful all of Spence's stories he's got a lot of anger that he enjoys

[00:38:23] getting out I mean to me they don't even feel so much angry they have

[00:38:26] angry characters but they feel to me more like can you believe this strange

[00:38:30] and unusual story you know what I mean can you believe that all the people

[00:38:33] around you might have done something terrible and you wouldn't even know it

[00:38:36] or they might do it and human life might count very

[00:38:39] little to them then we get another of Alonka's past lives

[00:38:42] yeah this one's in ancient India and her name is Padma

[00:38:46] I don't want to summarize the whole thing but the gist of it is Padma

[00:38:49] was from the Brahmin cast and whatever Kevin's name Vishnu was

[00:38:54] was in the worker cast they weren't supposed to get together but they did and

[00:38:58] they were trying to hide the fact that he was had been a laborer

[00:39:01] people found out but then the master showed up was like hey don't be like that

[00:39:05] be my way and they did the end it's a happily ever after story there's some

[00:39:09] more stuff in there but including a magic jewel but everyone

[00:39:12] loves her story if I was listening to this story I would be like you have an

[00:39:16] over-inflated sense of yourself you think you're magic

[00:39:20] you know whatever I don't know maybe I'm being harsh but everyone's like

[00:39:24] how do you know all this stuff about ancient India and I'm like she doesn't

[00:39:27] well also she's like well I did read some books yeah so like but also it came to

[00:39:32] me in a dream so what are you gonna do so anyway they all love her story and then

[00:39:35] we get some more of the magic mirror so like Alyssa was saying this is where

[00:39:39] Kevin opens Kevin well Kevin slash Hermie opens a studio

[00:39:44] Teresa's pressuring him to make more money he thinks it's boring so they

[00:39:47] moved to New York and people kind of stopped liking his work because it

[00:39:50] gets more and more uninspired they're spending more time together because

[00:39:53] they're in a new place she starts to think he's clingy he's like I want to do

[00:39:56] abstract earth inspired works and she's like cool no one's gonna buy those people

[00:40:02] like pictures of themselves and so um this is New York someone will buy it

[00:40:06] right she says that he owes her and he's like uh

[00:40:10] I'm going for a walk and when he comes back kind of like an on-your-story he

[00:40:14] finds her in bed with another man and so then he's like I'm gonna jump off

[00:40:17] the Brooklyn bridge what I find really interesting is so this is how he's

[00:40:20] telling his story this is kind of where it ends for this he decides not to jump

[00:40:23] off the bridge he's he wonders to himself could I recapture that feeling

[00:40:27] that I had at the Louvre when I was just in love with my paintings so he

[00:40:30] doesn't kill himself the story ends for now but later when we hear Teresa's

[00:40:34] version of what happened she seems so reasonable yeah from his

[00:40:38] perspective this is all about his feelings not being sufficiently

[00:40:40] attended to and what a drag it is to be asked in a relationship to provide

[00:40:45] some kind of help yeah they sort of head off to bed

[00:40:48] Spence and Anya want to talk so they go to their room

[00:40:52] Alanka walks Kevin to his room he's very weak they talk a little bit

[00:40:55] she tells him about what she said to Kathy he says he knows and it was kind of a

[00:40:59] relief and and he didn't have to have that

[00:41:01] conversation with her Alanka goes back to her room Anya tells

[00:41:05] her stop dwelling on the past try to live a little before you die

[00:41:08] kisses her and goes to sleep and and Alanka has this dream

[00:41:12] which is the master is kind of just being a Yoda and she says she wants a

[00:41:15] miracle and he says okay when you wake everything will be just as it should be

[00:41:19] then she wakes up and Anya is dead there's a really short chapter most of the

[00:41:22] chapters more like 20 30 pages this one's only seven so she died

[00:41:26] right after Alanka went to bed and Alanka wants there to be an autopsy and

[00:41:30] wonders if she OD'd but Dr White is like we don't do that here

[00:41:34] and yeah I'd have cancer yeah and also she couldn't have gotten that medicine

[00:41:37] out and I mean for him I'm sure it's also if it got out that she was

[00:41:40] able to get more medicine I'm sure the whole hospice would be

[00:41:43] endangered because of their lack of protocols right which all these kids

[00:41:46] are able to get it seems like a lot of excess medicine yeah whenever they want

[00:41:49] yeah Alanka has this moment of thinking oh wow the bed turnover happens really

[00:41:54] quickly here the people who run this place are eager to get the bed open

[00:41:57] for another person and all of our beds are

[00:42:00] beds someone else has died in like probably lots of someone's part of

[00:42:03] how she copes is by packing up Anya stuff when she gets to the bathroom

[00:42:06] she sees that all of her toiletries are gone so she thinks that's how Anya

[00:42:09] left a sign for her maybe she asks everyone else and everyone says they

[00:42:12] didn't touch them then Kevin and Alanka have a heart to heart they go walking

[00:42:16] around outside Kevin gets super cold and I was

[00:42:19] thinking you know isn't this what Alanka just was criticizing Kathy for doing yeah

[00:42:23] he um I think wants to see the ocean so they do that and she's promising him

[00:42:28] and when the future will sing to you and I'll spread your ashes where you

[00:42:31] want them he says he's leaving them to her because he's worried that his

[00:42:34] parents will bury them somewhere and what he wants is to be just put in the

[00:42:37] ocean and no one can find him and when they get back

[00:42:39] there's a rumor going around that someone has been misdiagnosed

[00:42:43] and will be leaving and Alanka has convinced her because of her MRI but then

[00:42:48] she finds Sandra packing yeah and it turns out that she talks to Dr. White

[00:42:51] and Alanka's cancer is much much worse and spread

[00:42:54] further and she has essentially a couple weeks left most likely so it was this

[00:42:58] double whammy like that hope that she had is gone

[00:43:00] and she knows she only has a very short time left to live

[00:43:05] so she takes a nap and when she wakes up Kevin is waiting in Anya's bed

[00:43:10] and he says oh I dreamed about the master too I'm not afraid to die

[00:43:14] let's take some morphine I'm gonna tell you the rest of the story so she gets the

[00:43:17] final bit I guess Spence is too sick now to really leave his room so the

[00:43:20] midnight society is not really meeting anymore yeah everything ends pretty

[00:43:23] quickly so what happened to Hermie he got a job as a taxi driver

[00:43:29] he then moves to Colorado and becomes a forest ranger he falls in love

[00:43:33] with a woman named Deborah a forest fire breaks out one night and he gets

[00:43:36] paralyzed trying to save a family and then he bullies Deborah into leaving him

[00:43:41] for her own good which is like okay you're an asshole but

[00:43:44] Hermie doesn't really have a sense of other people's needs it reminded me of

[00:43:47] this segment there's a limited podcast series called Dr. Death which came out

[00:43:51] of years ago they interview this guy who was paralyzed for this doctor and

[00:43:54] they also interview the woman he was seeing at the time and how like he

[00:43:57] this guy was so angry about being paralyzed he would basically he had a

[00:44:00] power chair and he would ram it into her and like keep doing that over and over

[00:44:04] again eventually she like had to leave because it's just like I can't like I

[00:44:08] loved him but I could not have this taken out on me and this part of the book

[00:44:11] reminded me of that and it's interesting I think all of these stories

[00:44:15] and in particular Kevin's is a way of processing the things that they're

[00:44:19] all going through so things that he actually didn't even know about from

[00:44:22] the members of the midnight society's life show up in his stories

[00:44:26] kind of hears the story of all of us made you know dramatic

[00:44:30] yeah exactly like here's the story of someone driving another person away

[00:44:33] for their own good and so he decides to become a doctor he

[00:44:36] starts working in a free clinic in LA but after a while he's not taking care

[00:44:40] of his health his kidneys start to fail he starts to get sick and he's

[00:44:44] gonna die at some point and then a woman gets brought in who has been

[00:44:48] living on the streets she has pneumonia she has AIDS and he takes

[00:44:51] care of her learns about her life it's Teresa he doesn't tell her he

[00:44:55] recognizes her which I think is kind of rude it is he's not good to her okay it's

[00:44:59] supposed to be romantic but she's like so what happened her is kind of

[00:45:02] she had some bad marriages her kid died unexpectedly like her child died

[00:45:07] and that led her to kind of become an alcoholic end up on the streets

[00:45:11] lose everything and she's like could I have a mirror and he's like

[00:45:15] sure and then he goes and paints a portrait of her as he remembered her

[00:45:18] and that's not a mirror no it's not she had one one ask partly he does this

[00:45:25] because he's she's worried about seeing herself yeah but she asked to see

[00:45:28] herself yeah I know like you're like no baby I know

[00:45:32] what's best for you and so into what's your so disgusting I won't show you

[00:45:36] you so what's her account of their relationship oh yeah so she says

[00:45:39] here is her account of their relationship I met him in Paris when I was

[00:45:45] young woman he worked at the Louvre he was an artist I fell in love with

[00:45:48] him he was shy I practically had to twist his arm to get him to leave the museum

[00:45:51] we were inseparable he got a job painting portraits

[00:45:54] soon he was able to open a studio we lived together then we moved to New York

[00:45:58] and everything went wrong he didn't want to paint portraits anymore and we

[00:46:00] were getting low on money I was getting nervous

[00:46:03] then I met another man and had an affair with him well my boyfriend came

[00:46:05] home and found us together he turned around and walked out and I never saw

[00:46:08] him again that seems like she was not that bad

[00:46:15] she had some serious anxiety had an affair and he would not communicate

[00:46:19] yeah he she never saw him again yeah also he was mad at her and resentful of

[00:46:23] her in all these ways well from her perspective she's like yeah he was good

[00:46:25] at painting portraits so he opened the studio

[00:46:27] yeah but from his perspective he's like I was super resentful and she was

[00:46:30] making me do this communicate that yeah so I was kind of pissed off at this

[00:46:36] but you know again we have a 19 year old telling us story

[00:46:39] but I was like Teresa's fine yeah and I also didn't deserve to be abused

[00:46:43] this much in the story because like you know you say Spencer's stories are

[00:46:46] angry I think this is angrier yeah because like

[00:46:48] she didn't deserve to be you know become like an addict alone on the streets

[00:46:52] you know with AIDS and he really wanted to punish her

[00:46:55] for not being able to read his mind but then basically he shows her the

[00:46:59] portrait she realizes it's him they have this sort of one happy moment

[00:47:02] before they both die and along cuz like I've noticed

[00:47:05] some parallels between your story and between our actual lives

[00:47:08] and he's like ah it just came to me unintentional and she's like let's

[00:47:12] have sex and he's like no she's talking about how

[00:47:15] like I'm gonna die a virgin which I understand no it wasn't can make yeah

[00:47:19] no no I just wanted to explain the sort of like emotional tenor that scene

[00:47:22] which again like I can get being worried like there's so much in life I'm

[00:47:25] never going to experience and she's like you know I wish we had talked about

[00:47:28] this sooner because now I feel like we can't and but at the same time he's

[00:47:31] like we can make love and it doesn't have to look like having sex in the

[00:47:34] movies which I did think was very sweet yeah yeah because they're kind

[00:47:36] of don't have enough energy to really go to all of it but they just get

[00:47:40] undressed and hold each other in bed and he dies in the night I mean

[00:47:44] there's some more trauma for extremely traumatized girl the hospice is very

[00:47:48] discreet and they don't really tell the parents about

[00:47:51] circumstances under which he died she scatters his ashes she writes an apology

[00:47:55] letter to Kathy she also locates Bill

[00:47:59] Anya's former boyfriend and writes to him about what happened to her

[00:48:03] and sort of the story behind their relationship then she goes and finds

[00:48:06] Spence who you know can't get out of bed and gets his real story

[00:48:10] and he also admits that he put fina barbador in her wine that night

[00:48:14] and because he wanted her out cold so that he could help Anya and her life

[00:48:17] yeah so he smothered Anya and Anya I guess he and Anya had been more open with

[00:48:21] each other than with most people so Anya already knew his story and she's like

[00:48:25] you've ended a life before maybe so maybe you can do that for me too

[00:48:29] so what happened he has AIDS Caroline is really Carl

[00:48:33] who was his first big love we get something unusual for I think a book

[00:48:36] of this moment what's it 94 1994 where she's like you could have told

[00:48:41] she were gay it's nothing to be ashamed of to be gay so hey there's that it's

[00:48:45] also a gay character in a story in 1994 has to have AIDS well and he's also like

[00:48:49] yeah you say that but like here's what my experience was in high school

[00:48:52] exactly horrible yeah yeah he says that really really well I love this part

[00:48:55] actually where he says you know these are things you had to say in the mid

[00:48:58] 90s he says yes I'm gay I have been since I was born

[00:49:01] don't try to probe for a reason my parents didn't molest me I wasn't

[00:49:04] exposed to radiation yeah and he also points out you know you can admit

[00:49:07] to being gay if you're famous or if you live in certain cities but

[00:49:10] otherwise you'll be bullied I wasn't a person in people's eyes but he still

[00:49:14] managed to meet Carl when he was 15 he was in love with Carl he had had a lover

[00:49:18] before that found out that he had AIDS and didn't tell Carl

[00:49:22] and wonders if he gave it to Carl he doesn't know Carl could have given it

[00:49:26] to him too and he he just believes that like he 100%

[00:49:31] believes he gave it to Carl and he is the reason that then Carl died of

[00:49:35] AIDS so like Anya he feels like this is a punishment

[00:49:38] yeah for the way he acted I wish the book would go a little further too

[00:49:42] let everyone know it's not yeah getting a disease is not a punishment but that

[00:49:45] actually relates really well to some taxonomy stuff I want to get into

[00:49:48] yeah and Alanka does try to sort of point out these flaws in the thinking

[00:49:51] and point out that this is this is a trauma talking as opposed to reality

[00:49:55] that's true he appreciates that she says that but it's not clear that he

[00:49:58] buys it but you know in the logic of this book you get other chances when

[00:50:01] you're reborn yeah the thesis I think you know Arlstein doesn't have a

[00:50:05] have morals in his book that says he says I see them there but you know he's like

[00:50:09] no that's not my thing Christopher Pike is like I have a moral here it is

[00:50:13] and in this one it's the point of being alive is to learn how to love

[00:50:16] and the more that you love while you're alive the more love accumulates in

[00:50:20] the universe and so that's kind of what they

[00:50:22] decide here is the value of their lives is that

[00:50:26] they have loved and contributed to that yeah we skipped over the stream

[00:50:29] Alanka had I think we can we can but the what she learns from it is

[00:50:34] essentially that in another another another life

[00:50:37] she acted badly to whoever Kevin was but he fell in love with her and decided

[00:50:41] okay in the next life rather than you being punished for it I'll share your

[00:50:44] punishment so she's interpreting their young lives being cut short as

[00:50:48] actually it's this act of love where we're sharing this together so that we

[00:50:51] get this moment together even if it's brief and because we learned this

[00:50:54] these lessons in the future we'll be able to be together so real sense of

[00:50:57] the universe wants to punish and reward but the idea is supposed to be like oh

[00:51:01] but you know doing bad things leads to this opportunity for divine love and

[00:51:06] therefore it's not all bad or it's the sort of I guess what

[00:51:09] Buddhist interpretation right that there are repercussions for your actions

[00:51:13] but also you can learn from them and move beyond them yeah I think a lot of

[00:51:16] this book is about trying to find a way to make a situation that feels

[00:51:20] helpless be one where you have some kind of control

[00:51:23] yeah which is really sad mm-hmm we learned that Anya knew Carl and that's how she

[00:51:27] knew their story and yes we learned that Spence

[00:51:30] smothered Anya it does sound like she kind of guilted him into doing it

[00:51:34] yeah he says that he felt he was giving her back what he took from Carl

[00:51:37] which was dignity which is really sad this this opens up a can of worms and

[00:51:42] does not get them back in that jar no but I guess that's fine you know

[00:51:46] leave teens with something to think about and he also tells

[00:51:49] Ilanka that he thinks Kevin took Anya's things to give her some hope

[00:51:53] just like her story of Delias which is interesting because

[00:51:56] at the end of this Ilanka's not sure if she was Delias or if she was Shrata

[00:52:00] and it's unclear who's who and which stories then Ilanka starts to die

[00:52:04] Bill comes to see her and she gives him the statue that Anya had kept

[00:52:09] its leg has been fixed she doesn't know how but he remembers it and

[00:52:13] he's grateful to have learned the truth about that and to have some

[00:52:16] closure about what happened with Anya

[00:52:17] and then Spence dies the next day time starts to lose meaning for Ilanka

[00:52:22] she looks out the window looks at the stars and then we assume dies

[00:52:25] there's a bird who shows up that may or may not be the master

[00:52:28] because because the master had said to her in a dream you won't be alone when

[00:52:31] you die I'll be with you and she'd seen a bird singing on a civil

[00:52:34] previously and said are you the master and then there's a very an

[00:52:37] epilogue that changes the tone I would say yeah so we are on the space

[00:52:40] Beagle 3 headed to Cyrus Isakna is leaving earth with

[00:52:46] Carlin her newlywed they're headed off to colonize Trata the sixth planet in the

[00:52:50] Cyrus star system yeah and she has this feeling of like I'm done with

[00:52:55] what I had to do on earth and I'm done with that genre yeah let's go do

[00:52:58] this thing now and they're going I think to the star that was painted in

[00:53:01] Spencer's painting or sorry Kevin's painting yes so that's cool I actually

[00:53:05] kind of like the ending but it was also yeah surprising you got to

[00:53:08] relieve that low note somehow yes did it by being a bit weird

[00:53:13] which you know story of my life yeah it felt a little flippant to me

[00:53:16] I don't know I think it was meant to be well so like at the end we have this

[00:53:20] sense that Elanca is experiencing all of these lives as if they're happening

[00:53:23] simultaneously so I feel like it's meant to be this moment of redemption that

[00:53:28] it's okay all of that suffering led to something yeah you're right and that

[00:53:31] they're gonna have more chances yeah and get to be colonizers yes

[00:53:36] sorry I'm getting a little weepy oh baby should pause it no it's okay

[00:53:42] we had to take a break there goosebumps to have a small cry yeah closet it's like

[00:53:48] it's very unusual for me I'm usually not a in the I'll take credit for it was my

[00:53:52] fault I'm usually not a crier at books

[00:53:55] yeah just when I read this I almost cried then as we were wrapping up our

[00:53:58] discussions like oh god it's I mean it's a really sad

[00:54:00] premise just like people who don't deserve any of this trying to end

[00:54:04] their lives with dignity and make sense of it you know well something I

[00:54:08] think as mentioned it's too little but I know I'll be very hungry for if I

[00:54:11] am aware of the fact that I'm like obviously I'm dying and we all are but

[00:54:15] like if if I have some situation where I'm like oh I'm gonna die soon

[00:54:18] I would love for there to be lots of stories about people going through that

[00:54:21] yeah you know because I feel like that's how I've navigated my life up to this

[00:54:24] point with any sense of stability security is looking for stories that can

[00:54:28] talk to me about here are ways you can feel like here's someone else

[00:54:31] feeling the way you're feeling and Christopher Pike actually said he

[00:54:35] still he's gotten after he published his book got just

[00:54:38] tons and tons and tons of letters to the state still gets emails from teens who

[00:54:42] are dying saying this makes me feel seen and understood

[00:54:45] yeah because it's interesting but we're gonna get to our taxonomies but

[00:54:49] like I started I'm sorry we're both doing it

[00:54:52] well I mean we're gonna get to our taxonomies but I was realizing it's

[00:54:55] really hard to find things about children that are dying

[00:54:58] that are also not like straightforward very syrupy nonsense

[00:55:01] yeah but one thing that we were both saying just now is that man I would

[00:55:04] have been so happy to have an openly gay character as a kid in the

[00:55:07] 90s even again like 94 would have been only young but later in the 90s

[00:55:12] yeah this I wouldn't have been able to read this in as a seven year old

[00:55:15] but also yes he dies and obviously we've come to recognize that as a trope

[00:55:19] but everyone dies and it doesn't matter if they were good or bad like

[00:55:22] and it's all different kinds of this happens to all different kinds of

[00:55:25] people and they all deal with it in very different ways

[00:55:28] I don't know that Alonka's interpretation of things

[00:55:32] is in any way right like it feels like this sort of wish fulfillment

[00:55:36] but like I feel like she has as much of a right to that as Anya does to

[00:55:39] the death that she wants well something that Spence says

[00:55:43] is you know he would agree about the afterlife he says I don't know and I

[00:55:46] think that's the most honest answer I can give yeah

[00:55:49] and I feel like Christopher Pike maybe has a similar approach because he

[00:55:52] doesn't actually decide between these different characters perspectives

[00:55:55] he just I mean he's not very supportive

[00:55:58] Sandra's but he lays them out on the table and

[00:56:01] doesn't decide ultimately yeah and I think some of it

[00:56:03] it's about the meaning of your death is something you get to determine so for

[00:56:06] Alonka it's this belief in the kind of continuation of her specific self

[00:56:10] and for Anya it's not it's more about getting to choose

[00:56:15] how she wants to go yeah and then what happens after that doesn't matter like

[00:56:18] it's yeah yeah exactly she's really let go yeah

[00:56:21] alright so that actually brings me to my first point on a horror tax

[00:56:25] on a means I wouldn't even call this a horror story really yeah it has

[00:56:28] like some horror elements in it but it's ultimately not a horror story

[00:56:32] no it was marketed as one but tax on a means so my first one is memento mori

[00:56:37] yeah latin for remember you will die the biggest one is connected to for me was

[00:56:42] six feet under yeah which if you have not watched that series it's

[00:56:45] so goddamn good speaking of something that will make you cry but every episode

[00:56:49] of that starts with a character dying so it's like two minute

[00:56:52] little intro sequence where all different kinds of people die some ways

[00:56:55] that are really upsetting some ways that are really funny some ways that

[00:56:58] are really you know just surprising and then red mixer right

[00:57:03] oh and then the characters in it work in a funeral home

[00:57:07] and so that's how they encounter all these different dead bodies and

[00:57:11] it's about trying to reconcile yourself to the fact of your death and try to

[00:57:16] locate meaning in life and similar to this book it dabbles in the kind of

[00:57:19] spiritual surreal and it doesn't come down on an absolute answer

[00:57:22] yeah it more values a lot of people's perspective that's also a genre that's

[00:57:26] been with us for a long period of time right it's on all kinds of medieval

[00:57:29] latin inscriptions and stuff yeah and at this moment in the 16 17th century

[00:57:33] maybe even a little later when there's this upwardly mobile middle class we

[00:57:36] have all these things now like i want to decorate my home with

[00:57:39] something's like here here's a painting of some flowers in a skull you're

[00:57:41] gonna die yeah joy exactly after we got married we got memento mori

[00:57:45] tattoos that's right yes i have a radius and

[00:57:48] ulna on my left forearm yeah and i have a skull with a brain cactus

[00:57:53] yeah i mean it came out kind of looking like like zombie brains like it looks

[00:57:56] awesome but i love it i don't know it just felt right we were starting a life

[00:57:59] together and very happy about it and then what would you say was the motive

[00:58:03] i don't know i guess also thinking about life being short wanting to get the

[00:58:05] most out of it yeah i like spending it with you too

[00:58:09] yeah i love you this is our pride episode

[00:58:12] yay so you have to listen to all this yeah all right tech zombie points

[00:58:16] semi-related are stories that think about storytelling in relation to

[00:58:19] death and specifically staving it off you mentioned the de cameron i also

[00:58:23] had a thousand and one nights right i didn't think about that yeah where

[00:58:26] she has that is telling stories so that she won't die

[00:58:29] yeah i think that maybe there's a nod to that genre within that

[00:58:33] i don't know if anyone maybe specifically has that level of wishful thinking

[00:58:36] except maybe along kuh but i feel like the

[00:58:39] active gathering together and telling stories as an act of life is is a

[00:58:42] big part of this one yeah which is interesting on

[00:58:45] twitter this past week on the goose first twitter we've been having this

[00:58:47] conversation about women enthusiasts in particular pointed out this

[00:58:51] that ghosts in the goose first are often connected to storytelling

[00:58:54] so you know they're telling stories right before they die

[00:58:57] or they're like you need to tell my story or they keep repetitively telling the

[00:59:00] same story again so i think that it's interesting that connection

[00:59:03] bleeds over here too yeah let's show so many ghost stories i think

[00:59:07] at least you know the ones that i'm familiar with yeah sort of repetition

[00:59:10] compulsion and yeah it's relation to narrative absolutely and also learning

[00:59:14] like kind of passing knowledge across generations and things

[00:59:17] i think a related one i had to that would be just anthology stories

[00:59:22] and i got into what each of the subgenres were is that something you touched on too

[00:59:25] i uh no so the subgenres i saw at work here were first of all

[00:59:29] on your stories are basically horror meets teen

[00:59:33] drug use stories so i saw her story as a mix of the dazzled the

[00:59:37] Brendan Frazier elicited her right so deal with a devil that's kind of

[00:59:41] comical and also dark meets goaskallus

[00:59:44] yeah so like let's look at the sordid world of treating teen drug use which was a

[00:59:48] super popular genre at this time the after-school special

[00:59:51] yeah and then with with spence's stories i just thought quentin

[00:59:54] terantino yeah that's what he's dealing in so funny quick violent

[00:59:58] surprising slash bready stanellis like a back in psycho yeah oh

[01:00:02] that's even better yeah that's exactly what this is and then finally

[01:00:05] this kind of new age slash buddhist awakening slash

[01:00:09] orientalist fantasy genre so dharma bombs was one i thought of

[01:00:14] white american person encountering eastern philosophy

[01:00:19] so you know quote unquote and thinking about how

[01:00:22] it relates them as a person in their era and time and place

[01:00:25] there's a lot of that happening here uh it also reminded me of the x-files

[01:00:28] episode that jillian anderson wrote and directed or i don't know if she wrote

[01:00:31] it but she definitely directed it called all things which is about scully

[01:00:34] getting into like learning about her chakras and stuff like that

[01:00:39] alternative medicine and then big one it reminded me of this kind of

[01:00:42] earlier version of this which is written by the christian scientist

[01:00:45] children's author frances hotkin burnett a little princess

[01:00:49] which is one of the earlier orientalist fantasy type stories i know of it's

[01:00:54] about i know the movie a white girl who grows up in india and so she has this

[01:00:58] like special connection to india and so that's kind of the vein that i saw

[01:01:03] ilanka operating in when she's imagining herself into these it's like this

[01:01:07] racial cross-dressing fantasy basically yeah but why i bring up the christian

[01:01:11] scientist part this actually gets into a different taxonomy but she also wrote the

[01:01:14] secret garden which is an early version of sicklet

[01:01:18] right oh yeah did you have sicklet on there no i didn't

[01:01:21] put it so when you said anthology stuff i thought you were going to talk about

[01:01:25] types of anthologies so i actually have some that are related to what you've been

[01:01:27] talking about let's get into that actually but you might have to just

[01:01:30] real quickly yeah okay so in terms of the sicklet thing

[01:01:34] the reason i bring up that she's christian scientist is because she

[01:01:36] believed that being sick was a matter of something internal and i don't

[01:01:40] mean bodily yeah like mental state or spiritual state

[01:01:44] and you could heal yourself she had a child who died of tuberculosis and that's

[01:01:48] thought to be part of what made her want to believe that people could just get

[01:01:51] better and so in her story a secret garden which

[01:01:54] is a kind of sicklet there's a character named colon who seems to have

[01:01:57] some kind of spinal problem but once he just starts getting outside more

[01:02:00] he is better that's very much a also like 19th century

[01:02:04] view of like that was sort of part of the idea too of creating green spaces

[01:02:08] in cities yeah like people need that for the you know a good constitution so for

[01:02:12] the betterment of the race like we better better put in parks and send them to

[01:02:16] summer camp yes exactly and for the betterment of the genders as well yeah

[01:02:19] and some other sicklet obviously fault in our stars walk to remember

[01:02:23] my god there's a whole spate of those that were turned into movies in the

[01:02:26] what two thousands my favorite one which i've mentioned before i think is

[01:02:29] never let me go which you know the characters in that they aren't actually

[01:02:32] unhealthy they're clones but they're fated to have to start

[01:02:36] donating their organs to people at a certain point because they're not considered

[01:02:40] human that reminded me a bit of this story in that it's

[01:02:43] young people who are you know there's an inevitable deadline on their life and

[01:02:46] they're kind of watching each other go and it's about how do you value the

[01:02:50] creative work or relationships that you have in your life if it's cut short

[01:02:55] or you know what the end is coming so over to you yeah so i also had deal

[01:02:59] with the devil oh cool so you know going back to the

[01:03:02] classic foust where you think you're trading

[01:03:05] your soul for something but the devil has his own like

[01:03:08] way of getting his cut and also of undermining what you wanted bedazzled as

[01:03:12] well bedazzled so good i've never seen the original we

[01:03:15] should watch it yeah but it doesn't have Elizabeth Hurley

[01:03:17] or brendan frazier yeah that's the problem and then weird fated super

[01:03:21] natural love stories so i was thinking about cat people

[01:03:24] oh which was such a weird bizarre psychosexual

[01:03:28] thing but yeah so there's all this stuff about i don't even remember

[01:03:32] hanging out as cats in ancient trees yeah stuff yeah and then later in wanting

[01:03:36] to fuck your brother or something who's melko mcdowell in this in this case

[01:03:41] and working at a zoo you know that kind of story yeah the mummy one and two

[01:03:44] which also have to do with mhotep wanting to get back with

[01:03:48] an oxenamoon yes and then actually the original 1932 more brendan frazier

[01:03:52] yeah yeah the 1932 mummy also has that sort of

[01:03:56] desire to reincarnate a lost love plot so it's actually that mummy franchise

[01:04:00] actually very much a reboot of the original yeah not to mention the mummy returns by

[01:04:05] Robert stein yes also and then also i was thinking about candy man we have

[01:04:11] obviously been in a new one but there's this like it's not out to logist right

[01:04:15] i think but it's definitely not out yet they just released some images from it

[01:04:18] and it looks so good yeah but yeah the candy man from the 90s very much has

[01:04:23] this strange love story and like trans historical kind of because candy man

[01:04:27] is this person person who i don't know how old he's supposed to be yeah but he

[01:04:30] keeps kind of reappearing and then grappling with illness particularly a

[01:04:34] terminal illness so the taking of deborah logan the visit you know it's funny

[01:04:38] most ones that are like that and that aren't disease in the sense of a

[01:04:41] pandemic that are you know more of a slow degenerative disease they really

[01:04:45] deal with elderly people as opposed to with kids and so and i was still in

[01:04:49] sort of a horror mindset so the only one i could really think of where a

[01:04:52] child is facing some terrible potentially wasting disease was the

[01:04:55] exorcist yeah right because that's the sort of main fear and it's at the end

[01:04:59] where they're like we have tried fucking everything else like let's do this

[01:05:02] exorcist thing that the that element of it really comes into play

[01:05:05] yeah i was actually looking into hospices a little bit related to this

[01:05:09] because i was seeing if there are any in washington that are specifically for

[01:05:12] teens didn't seem like there are but i was thinking that must be a strange

[01:05:15] element of a hospice if you're there as a kid and most of the other

[01:05:18] people there are really old i remember reading an article it wasn't it i

[01:05:21] don't think it was in washington but about one that was

[01:05:24] yeah aimed at younger people so like late teens early 20s and

[01:05:27] yeah it must be very weird i know it was something that made me want to like

[01:05:31] donate money to hospices yeah yeah actually yeah the only other one i had

[01:05:35] was stories about communication from beyond the grave

[01:05:39] do you remember the christian stewart movie personal shopper yeah which was

[01:05:42] kind of cool her brother dies and then it seems like he might be texting her

[01:05:46] from beyond the grave which sounds silly but it isn't it i would say it's

[01:05:50] not a silly movie i thought it was pretty cool yeah and then another one i

[01:05:53] thought about was the classic 1990 film ghost

[01:05:58] starring swazy and and whoopee and demi yeah that one is very different in tone

[01:06:04] than this one but also super natural love story from beyond the grave

[01:06:07] yeah with some light new agey stuff mm-hmm all right taxonomies

[01:06:11] there you have it there you have it the book is very misleading from its

[01:06:15] front and back cover yes versus what's inside yeah now shared universe

[01:06:20] we're not in the goose first so did you have anything under this i do have one

[01:06:23] thing actually which is if you flip to the very last printed page i didn't see

[01:06:27] there's an ad that says feel the fear fear street knights a brand new fear

[01:06:32] street trilogy from the master of horror rl stein see the stores now

[01:06:36] this is why you put previews before the movie because that really kills the

[01:06:39] tone

[01:06:42] like even more so than that sci-fi a few pages yeah there are a couple ads a

[01:06:46] couple other ads to the party room series killing britney oh wow

[01:06:50] i love the font and all of these yeah we should post extras of these

[01:06:53] yeah so for shared universe i decided to go into the world of paperback horror

[01:06:59] 15s of the 80s and 90s and so i went and re-looked through gabriel moss's

[01:07:04] excellent book paperback crush the totally radical history of 80s and 90s teen

[01:07:09] fiction the title makes it sound like it's a little more

[01:07:11] silly than it is it's i mean it's it's a fun read but it's really

[01:07:14] thoughtful and well researched it's like awesome definitely pick it up gabriel

[01:07:18] moss we should do a post about it this week yeah let's do that it has a few

[01:07:22] sections about well actually has a bunch of stuff that rl stein too if you're

[01:07:25] interested um including his non-horror work but

[01:07:28] it has some stuff about the midnight club and here's what gabriel moss says

[01:07:31] about it so first of all it's much more thoughtful than previous teen

[01:07:34] illness literature which had been pretty popular but most of it is

[01:07:37] just kind of reveling in the suffering

[01:07:41] for vicarious pleasure for the reader and aids literature in particular is like

[01:07:46] if the main character in story has it obviously they're straight and obviously

[01:07:50] you know some bad person gave it to them right they didn't it wasn't their

[01:07:54] fault yeah there was a story called it happened to nancy

[01:07:57] which is exactly what you expect and that was the norm so this book was

[01:08:00] extremely enlightened for its time again remember it's 1994 and a big

[01:08:05] departure also from the world of teen horror which at the time was

[01:08:09] basically it's either supernatural or you have a serial killer slash

[01:08:13] stalker and those that's that's as close as it gets to a real

[01:08:16] world horror what christopher pike does here that's really

[01:08:19] different is talk about actual real world

[01:08:22] horrors like the ones people actually are more likely to experience right

[01:08:25] which is like dying early or something yeah from a disease yeah

[01:08:29] it was not well received by adults but it was well received by teens as they

[01:08:32] mentioned earlier especially teens who were dying

[01:08:34] we're like thank you for writing this publisher's weekly called it a

[01:08:37] queasy blend of grizzliness and new age unctuousness

[01:08:41] which until i read that i had been a little irritated with

[01:08:44] that latter aspect of the book the new agey part and once i read that i'm like

[01:08:47] you know what fuck you yeah publishers weekly this is a good book

[01:08:50] yeah gabriel moss points out this was published at the heights of aid

[01:08:55] aid hysteria all the mainstream discourse around that was

[01:08:58] pretty unenlightened so that's what she had to say about this

[01:09:01] was christopher pike gay no he has a he has a wife

[01:09:04] he might be gay but he has a wife did you have any other theories and queries

[01:09:08] no i mean it's so different from the christopher pike that i remembered

[01:09:11] from my childhood yeah i was very surprised and caught off guard

[01:09:15] yeah i hadn't read any other christopher pike but sounds like more often it's

[01:09:18] like a pretty standard slasher yeah it was more like fear street what i

[01:09:22] would i remember again who knows what i remember beyond the actual just like

[01:09:25] this font and you know the royal blue and pink colors and whatever well i

[01:09:30] guess i had i had two other points to bring up

[01:09:32] one is just we get some information about what drove

[01:09:35] elonka here so she was born in 1976 dies in 1994 and presumably she comes here

[01:09:41] because of unrest in poland so poland in 76 basically throughout the 70s

[01:09:46] poland had been seeing protest after protest worker strike after worker

[01:09:50] strike and in june 1976 there was a major protest because

[01:09:54] the prime minister had suddenly increased prices of food by up to 100

[01:09:58] percent because the government set the prices of food and so and the

[01:10:01] economy was in shambles there were bad harvests people protested

[01:10:04] were put down by the polish people's army and citizens militia

[01:10:08] thousands of people were hurt and many were killed and the government was

[01:10:11] super paranoid that there was going to be a large-scale working class revolt

[01:10:15] which led up to a period of martial law in the early 80s so that's what

[01:10:18] elonka's mother was trying to escape who knows what her father did but he

[01:10:21] was probably not doing super well either when he ran off and then

[01:10:24] flash forward to 1994 because i was like why is christopher pike writing

[01:10:27] about poland right now i mean maybe he just is polish or knows polish

[01:10:31] friends or something but this is a major era of shift for poland moving

[01:10:35] towards a market economy moving towards having free elections it's like kind of

[01:10:40] i guess moving towards a more democratic but also more capitalist system yeah

[01:10:44] the and there would have been sort of all again increasing protests throughout

[01:10:47] the 80s particularly towards the late 80s i remember my mom who's polish

[01:10:50] having a pin that was like it said like solidarity on it and had the

[01:10:53] polish flag yeah solidarity was the name of the

[01:10:55] movement actually and uh solidary it said like

[01:10:59] solidara nosk or something yeah it's something like that i can't pronounce

[01:11:02] polish words but the the solidarity movement was a huge deal and like i think

[01:11:06] americans like to think that the cold war ended when reagan said mr grovachev

[01:11:09] tear down this wall but that had nothing the f*** to do with it but like

[01:11:12] yeah there was just widespread you know and it wasn't just poland there were

[01:11:16] lots of those eastern block countries that were having just escalating food

[01:11:19] prices wild shortages of goods and so yeah it makes sense that they

[01:11:23] they would have left well 1994 the year of this book

[01:11:27] and the year that along the dies was the first year that poland was in the euro

[01:11:31] vision contest so it tells you how they had made it

[01:11:35] they joined nato a few years later in the e u in 2004 but i was curious i know

[01:11:39] this might seem a little flippant too but do you have any thoughts on like

[01:11:42] why bringing this story of polans move to a different economy in form of

[01:11:47] government i feel like there probably would have been

[01:11:50] more people leaving especially during the late 80s early 90s right not just

[01:11:54] because of the collapse of soviet union but other events right like

[01:11:58] turnoble or like russia made these agreements with germany about like

[01:12:02] well let all these Jewish people go you know you take them think like they

[01:12:05] made these very like so i think that probably demographic shifts would have

[01:12:07] been a part of it and it probably would have been in the air right so it

[01:12:10] might be teens are like vaguely aware that things are happening and also

[01:12:14] i don't know it makes it not just be a bunch of americans right

[01:12:17] yeah and maybe it's a way of like it's a very tightly focused

[01:12:21] around a few people story and maybe it's a way of bringing in a larger

[01:12:25] social political picture and a larger sense of the ways forces

[01:12:29] totally unexpected and beyond your control can end up disrupting your

[01:12:32] lives in surprising ways yeah and maybe also pointing out like well if you

[01:12:37] came here with only your mother and then she died and you had cancer like

[01:12:40] this this like you'd end up in a state hospital what i was surprised is there

[01:12:43] was still a state hospital yeah um in 1994 yeah so that's that's part of it

[01:12:48] too thanks to things like capitalism right and especially

[01:12:53] reagan's version of that yes exactly and we all

[01:12:56] sorry i was just which is obviously intertwined with the kind of rhetoric

[01:12:59] that led former eastern block countries down the path that they took it

[01:13:03] you know yeah but also the other kids are also interested in the bigger world

[01:13:06] and i think it probably points to like there are two stories about paris and

[01:13:09] so kevin spence have this argument over can we have two stories about

[01:13:12] paris but like i mean i think they're also interested in the bigger

[01:13:15] world and there's probably this hint that i'll never see that right or i

[01:13:18] think one of them had maybe been to paris and did know i think it was kevin

[01:13:20] did know it but yeah so this um sense like i know the outside world through

[01:13:26] stories as opposed to through experience which is

[01:13:29] similar to how elonka experiences egypt and india she's like i read some books

[01:13:33] about the nile flooding well and she talks about also something like famine

[01:13:37] coming along and disrupting people's lives in egypt and that's similar to

[01:13:40] what brought her to the u.s. yeah exactly so it's i think these stories

[01:13:43] are all ways of integrating different pieces of their lives

[01:13:46] well the other thing is in the process of looking for hospices for young people

[01:13:50] i came across ladybug house at ladybughouse.org and this is an organization

[01:13:55] that is trying to establish a hospice for oh no i'm getting emotional too

[01:13:59] this is an organization run by a woman named susanne gwin who is an rn in

[01:14:03] seattle who has worked with children and young

[01:14:05] adults in hospice care for over 30 years and she's trying to establish

[01:14:10] a hospice specifically for children adolescents and young adults

[01:14:13] so i don't know if you're interested check that out because they're looking for

[01:14:16] a way of making that available wow man so on that note yeah

[01:14:22] what would you rate this book god it seems kind of harsh to rate it which is

[01:14:27] very sneaky christopher yeah right well publishers weekly didn't feel that

[01:14:31] way so yeah i really liked it i wish that i had

[01:14:35] like some of the stories within it more but i really liked certain of them

[01:14:39] so i think this is like um somewhere between a four and four and a half for me

[01:14:43] that's how i feel about it too yeah but it's really good yeah i really enjoyed

[01:14:46] it and it's yeah i really like the complexity of the characters the i mean

[01:14:50] it was certainly hit me in the feels yeah you know i prefer not to feel

[01:14:54] feels yeah similarly the characters were complex these stories were

[01:14:58] interesting the sort of overarching story was

[01:15:01] interesting as well even if some of the stories within stories were

[01:15:03] less my cup of tea there is i think maybe also something for everyone because

[01:15:06] i'm sure there's some people who are like i don't want to read the story about

[01:15:09] a deal with the devil and i'm gonna read about love

[01:15:11] so there's something for you too yeah whoever you are

[01:15:14] and there's for some reason listening to this podcast well what are we reading

[01:15:18] next next we're back to the goose first

[01:15:21] mercifully i haven't read this one yet how to kill a monster

[01:15:24] i look forward to that yes also happy pride everyone

[01:15:28] if you take nothing else away from this story um yeah take care of each

[01:15:33] other yeah

[01:15:37] listener but where that was worth the scarce good boo

[01:15:45] melanka went to the bathroom to collect ania's toothpaste and hairbrush and

[01:15:48] stuff like that only it wasn't there all of ania's

[01:15:50] toiletries were gone but that's not possible she just died

[01:15:53] who would have taken them who could have taken them with me here

[01:15:56] the answer to both questions was no one could it be the sign

[01:16:00] could ania be telling her there wasn't afterlife no way it's just a matter

[01:16:04] one of the nurses heard ania was dead while it was talking to dr white and

[01:16:07] immediately cleaned out the cupboards no maybe not only i knew she was dead and i

[01:16:11] only talked to dr white for 10 seconds before we returned to the room

[01:16:14] okay it's a trick ania knew she was gonna kill herself so she gathered

[01:16:17] everything up in the middle of the night and stowed it elsewhere to fool me

[01:16:20] that's it she heard my story about deal yes and mage and

[01:16:23] shrata what better sign to fake me out with the only problem with the

[01:16:26] second hypothesis was that ania had been a grievously ill girl

[01:16:29] it would have been next to impossible for her to gather all her things

[01:16:32] together and dispose of them in the middle of the night ania couldn't even

[01:16:35] wheel her chair from one place to another without assistance then what

[01:16:38] alonka didn't know it was time to talk to the others