The Bottoms, by Joe R. Lansdale

"The main concern of the fiction writer is with mystery as it is incarnated in real life."~Flannery O'Connor

"I had an interest in death from an early age. It fascinated me. When I heard 'Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall,' I thought, 'Did he fall or was he pushed?'~P.D. James

"I abhor a mystery. I would fain, were it possible, have my tale run through from its little prologue to the customary marriage in its last chapter, with all the smoothness incidental to ordinary life. I have no ambition to surprise my reader."~Anthony Trollope

"I've always enjoyed crime fiction. I think that much of the best writing being done today is in crime novels. The plot and discipline essential to a crime novel save it from the terrible traps of being sensitive and stream-of-consciousness and all of that stuff."~John Mortimer

As we prepare to close out the reading year, Gem Meacham has done her part to make our penultimate formal book discussion one to be remembered for some time to come. That's because for first time in club history (hopefully not the last), we will have a seasoned author present to help us understand his book, and perhaps a bit of the process by which he arrives at his creations. That's right, gracing our lively conversation this month, will be local East Texas author, Joe R. Lansdale.

The meeting has a couple of new wrinkles. We thought dinner with the author would be nice, so the plan is to meet at 6:00 p.m. at Don Giovanni's, an Italian restaurant on White Oak Road, just around the corner from our house. Those wishing to join us can, but it's not required. We also thought it might be nice to cover the author's meal as well as pitch in to help defray the costs of gasoline, and his time for graciously agreeing to spend an evening with us. Purely on a voluntary basis, of course.

As mentioned, the year is hurtling to an end, which means now is the time for considering the entertaining, challenging, and thought provoking books that you might like to share next year. Indeed, if we all begin the arduous, exquisitely agonizing process of choosing our titles now, we stand a better chance of completing the list and the schedule by the November meeting or soon thereafter. So, get to it!

Gem, with the help of Joe Lansdale, presides on Tuesday the 15th. She also provided the questions in the attachment below. I believe this opens an exciting new chapter for our club, and have high hopes of having a poet in our midst in April. Congrats and thanks again to Gem, and we look forward to seeing everyone on Tuesday.

The Bottoms, won the Edgar Allen Poe award for best mystery novel in 2001--alternately called mystery fiction, suspense fiction and speculative fiction. 

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

1. Choose one word to describe your impression of this novel.

2.  Evil – where and what is it in this story? Is there redemption?

3.  What about the depiction of East Texas?

4.  In an interview about his general body of work, Joe said, “the style, the characters and the attitude are as important as the plot.” How did that play out in this novel?

5.  Did you discover anything about yourself by reading this novel?

Joe’s questions:

1.  Do you think it is fair to say that “The Bottoms” is softer and less mojo” than a lot of your work? 

2.  Have you always been glib and loquacious? Colorful metaphors and raunchy descriptions?

Bonus:

Early in his writing career Joe Lansdale won the 1988 Bram Stoker award for a short story, 

“Night They Missed the Horror Show.” It has been described as a “vicious pearl of a story”. . . . 

“unique and awesome.” It is definitely unique and not for the faint hearted. Here is a link if you 

want to read it. Joe subtitled it “For Lew Shiner. A story that doesn’t flinch.” 

http://www.revolutionsf.com/fiction/horrorshow/01.html 

Joe says he likes to answer questions. Don't be confined to those two that I thought up.  If you haven't listened to the interview, it is very insightful.

Here's the link to the interview
http://readingandwritingpodcast.com/joe-lansdale-interview-episode-131-reading-writing-podcast/

Joe has other books:

"Christmas with the Dead" a movie based on a story written by Joe with screenplay by his son, Keith;

"Impossible Monsters" an anthology with a story by Joe that his daughter edited;

"Restless" his daughter Kasey's music CD

"Reading is essential to writing. No excuses. Read. If you feel you've burned out on the genre you're writing, at least as a reader, read outside the genre. But frankly, if you no longer read, it's pretty hard to write. I try and read three or four books a week. Sometimes I don't, but most of the time I do. This can be short stories, comics, novels, plays, you name it. But read."  Jo Lansdale