In case you didn't know, there's something in publishing called a "book trailer." It's like a movie trailer, except for a book. Genius, right? Readers don't need them and booksellers actively hate them. Still, when moving 5,000 copies constitutes a hit, it never hurts to try to reach outside your core demographic for new readers.
But Hollywood has been making trailers for ninety-nine years; publishing has only made the effort since 2005. The result is that very, very few trailers make one say, "Wow, I really need to buy that book." I've enjoyed three book trailers in my life: Carolyn Parkhurst's The Nobodies Album (see the trailer in which authors are funny; now buy the book), Gary Shteyngart's Super Sad True Love Story (trailer here, rife with cameos; now buy the book), and Kristen Schaal & Rich Blomquist's The Sexy Book of Sexy Sex (trailer with actual comic actors who are also the authors; now buy the book). Caroyln Parkhurst made me laugh out loud but the book came out two years ago and I haven't read it, Gary Shteyngart amused me but I already owned Super Sad True Love Story before I saw it, and I'll never read The Sexy Book of Sexy Sex - way to go, trailer-makers!
And remember, those links represent the cream of the crop. If book trailers are movies, you just watched The Godfather, Casablanca, and Citizen Kane. Except, you know, funny. Most book trailers look like something your local high school AV club made for their final exam sophomore year.
All that having been said, I love this trailer:
It perfectly captures the mood of Tom Lichtenheld's whimsical, witty Cloudette.
My first Lichtenheld experience was Shark vs. Train. All the the little asides in the Cloudette video ("tee-hee!" "hi!")? Lichtenheld peppers his illustrations with those. Half the fun of reading his books is seeing Dylan giggle over those asides - particularly the trash talk in Shark vs. Train. Finding them, reading them, and getting the joke; it's like watching a pinball machine light up.
Becky met Tom Lichtenheld at his hotel when he came to Miami. I dropped her off and waited outside in the car so we wouldn't have to pay the $20 parking fee. Becky emerged about half an hour later. We're fairly sure the valets thought she was a call girl. Or a drug dealer.
To capture Cloudette's rough look, Lichtenheld used pencil before tracing over it with Sharpie.
We don't worry about lead poisoning when art is at stake.
Especially cute art.
Somehow, Becky convinced tattoo artist Dicky Magoo to open Tattoos by Lou not only on his day off, but early so she could get back to work. I don't think Becky has ever heard the word "no."
Dicky used an extra-fine needle to create the outline and shading. What looks deceptively simple holds a lot of detail. Tom Lichtenheld looked very happy with the result.
For a minute, Becky wanted Cloudette tattooed inside her wrist so she could see it better. But as we all know, The Very Hungry Caterpillar is the tattoo that started it all. So imagine them chummily side-by-side on her arm.
Caterpillar fart?
Of course, one could argue that as she lays, Cloudette could be seen as en extra large chuff from Otis that got blown astray. Nevertheless, we've had fun with Cloudette. Like the time Dylan decided that Becky and I should have matching tattoos. He whipped out a pen and went to town on my forearm.
Becky and I were not supposed to get new cats. We were just visiting the Humane Society, seeing what was out there. Great plan, no? Like visiting a pizza parlor when you're starving. We went to the Miami Shores Humane Society, where the second floor is all cats, all the time. Rooms and rooms of purring fuzziness. If not for the fact that some of the rooms were under quarantine due to skin diseases, it might have been heaven.
Becky and I walked around the corner and saw this:
Her name was Mojo - not what Austin Powers has but what you marinate chicken in. She has beautiful markings, mostly tiger-striped but with leopard spots, and gorgeous, gold-colored eyes. We fell in love instantly. Like, we couldn't leave without her.
We felt that way about one other cat, a blue-eyed white cat with fingerprint smudges of gray named Jingle. Jingle never took her eyes off us. She had a sister named Jangle. Jangle never woke up. Slept in the litterbox, in fact. We didn't want the other sister, we wanted the good one, but the Humane Society gave us a guilt trip for attempting to break them up.
Three cats is one cat too many but we had to get two (they charge $50 for the first cat but only $10 for the second), so we "settled" for this:
Frankie wore that same look the entire time, a look that said, "My family might leave without me? They wouldn't, would they?"
Newly dubbed Dr Seuss (stripey) and Hugo (black and white), they have become playful siblings, night time cuddlers, and best of all, friends with Dylan. It's fun watching him get over his fear of cats. He's slowly realizing that he can play with, pet and kiss, and pick up a cat without it turning into a hissing bundle of claws and teeth. In fact, I don't know that I've ever heard Seuss or Hugo hiss.
Dylan named Hugo after Hugo Cabret. Me? I just liked the name "Frankie" on a female cat but I didn't want to go with the Humane Society's tag, so we arrived at Hugo after gentle nudges away from suggestions like Cutey Pie and Fuzzy Face.
Hugo has a little quirk; she likes to suckle. It started with collars (moist) and progressed to necks (ticklish) and has settled mostly on ears (very loud, especially at two in the morning). In an updated version of the water bowl picture above, Hugo would be the bigger cat. But she still hasn't outgrown this urge.
I don't mean the best uses of music, because if I did then the top three would be the Siren scene from Oh Brother Where Art Thou?, the tour bus rendition of Tiny Dancer from Almost Famous, and John Cusack holding his boom box aloft to Ione Skye in Say Anything. I'd probably throw in a good shower sing-along, too, maybe Ferris Buelleror Family Man...
But not any old song use will do. I mean those moments when traditional scoring could be used to increase the emotional impact of the action, but the creators decided to go with actual songs instead.
And before we begin, HERE THAR BE SPOILERS. If you haven't seen these movies, then proceed at your own risk. Most of them don't affect plot that much, so I'll start with the one to really skip.
4 - Gary Jule's version of Tears for Fears' Mad World, as used in Donnie Darko
I loved this movie so much that I made the mistake of buying the director's cut. I enjoyed the director's cut, but it was so detailed I couldn't help but wonder - if I was seeing the movie for the first time, would I enjoy this particular version? Further viewings will be required to see if the director's cut self-indulgent or just added layers of awesome.
I'm not going to put my head up my ass and interpret Donnie Darko's ending. Alternate universes and times, what happens in Donnie's head and what happens with the rest of the world, none of that matters. At this moment, Donnie is dead. Gary Jules's plaintive, haunting voice, the lyrics, people we've met over the past two hours reacting to their brush with... something. The result is one of the most moving music cues in the history of film.
But what always kills me is Donnie's father, played by Holmes Osborne. The paramedics wheel Donnie's body past his family and we see them react (starting with Jake Gyllenhaal's real-life sister, Maggie). Donnie's father is blubbering, devastated, but he still rocks his youngest to comfort her.
There's little point in watching this if you haven't seen the movie, but here t'is.
Speaking of Maggie Gyllenhaal...
3 - Wreckless Eric's Whole Wide World, as used in Stranger Than Fiction
This is one of my favorite movies. In real life, who knows why Maggie Gyllenhaal would want anything more than the time of day from Will Ferrell. In movie life, these two characters need each-other.
After a nice dinner, the taxman and the righteous baker he's auditing are both wondering what the evening might hold. He spots her guitar. She asks him to play. He's shy, reserved, and just beginning to learn guitar, so he begs off.
While she's in the kitchen washing the dishes, he begins to play in the living room. His tremulous voice fills the quiet apartment. You might wonder if Maggie Gyllenhaal's Ana Pascal is unfamiliar with Whole Wide World (as I was when I first saw this movie), if she's touched by his ability to be vulnerable and nothing more. But Gyllenhaal is a professional; she mouths a few of the lyrics while she's watching him play and even manages to make it look natural.
I can't believe he picked this song, her face says, the one song he knows on guitar and it's this. In her sad eyes, there's the realization that if she opens herself to his desire, then he might have something to offer, too. Her silent appreciation mirrors the audience's support of Howard Crick's blossoming during the course of the movie.
Then there's the great moment when she moves to the couch, watching Will Ferrell's Howard Crick play. You're about to get kissed, her grin says, and you don't even know it.
When Ana climbs over her guitar to kiss Howard and Wreckless Eric takes the song over, it's perfect. Watch the whole scene for the build.
2 - Van Halen's rendition of Ice Cream Man, as used in episode #4 of Freaks and Geeks (Kim Kelly is My Friend)
Whatever feelings you struggle with now when Van Halen comes up, in 1978 they could do no wrong. Van Halen was running with the devil while Jamie cried, and they got us so we didn't even know what we were doing.
It starts off quietly, David Lee Roth murmuring over Eddie Van Halen's acoustic guitar as Busy Philipps's Kim Kelly stops her Gremlin at the park in hopes of meeting up with her boyfriend, James Franco's Daniel Desario.
She spots him obviously flirting with her sometime best friend, Karen Scarfolli (a pre-US Office Rashida Jones).
"Thefuckisthis?" Kim's face says, "My boyfriend-? My best friend?" At this point it's still flirting. Not innocent flirting - this is Daniel Desario, after all - but she's waiting to see what develops.
Pictured: what develops.
As David Lee Roth says, "All right boys," Kim's best friend breaks out the move which says, "let's go somewhere private so I can suck something else." Acoustic gives way to electric with a crash of drums and a trademark Roth howl just as Kim Killy goes ballistic.
Pictured: Hell Hath No Fury
Skip the first 8 seconds and enjoy.
1 - Faith Hill's This Kiss, as used in Practical Magic
Mark Feuerstein, who is notRick Grimes in The Walking Dead, was once in a movie with Helen Hunt. Hunt wanted to play a game where they named their guilty pleasure movies, movies which are "so bad that they're good." To illustrate, she started off with her favorite bad-good movie, Practical Magic.
"Really..." Feuerstein said. "I was in Practical Magic."
I'm going to focus on the good part of the bad/good equation and forge on like those groans of protest are all in my head.
One day, Sandra Bullock's Sally Owens is tending her garden. She stops, looks up, and realizes she's supposed to be somewhere.
"Did I leave the oven on?"
Meanwhile, Feuerstein's Michael pauses at his fruit stand, realizing he's expecting someone.
"Is that guy from Smucker's ever going to come? I'm sick of this nickel-and-dime shit."
But no, it's not imminent fire and the hope of a corporate buyout that has these two distracted, it's love, motherfucker. L-O-V-E. Sure, it took a little push from the Owens' aunts (in the form of a spell) to get Sally to run to her destiny, but when two genetically gifted individuals smile at each-other, do we really care why?
Watching as their secretive grins widen into blissful smiles, while Faith Hill's optimism bubbles in the background, it's impossible not to smile with them.
Okay, that's not true. It's possible, but why make the effort? Do you want to be miserable your whole life? C'mon, let the director manipulate you a little. You'll be glad you did.
Sally and Michael reach each-other and she closes the distance by leaping into his arms. Where, guess what? They kiss. Hard.
At this point in the movie, they haven't exchanged one word. But they know- it's magic.
It's also the point where you either give up and go with the movie, or decide you hate fun.
This week Mitchell introduced me to two authors. Both men, both well-respected, prolific writers whose work I have at home, but neither are authors I've read.
The first conversation went like this:
ME (on the way to clock out): How's it going, Mitchell?
MY BOSS: Good, good. You want to meet Fred Savage?
ME: Not really, no.
MY BOSS: Hey, Fred, I'd like you to meet someone. Fred, this is Aaron. Aaron, this is Fred. Aaron is one of our buyers. He's a big, big fan of your work.
ME (grinning hugely): Good to meet you! Wow, great stuff this time!
FRED SAVAGE* (not buying it for a minute, not even a little): . . .
ME: So. . .
FRED: I like your tattoo, Aaron.
The second encounter went like this:
ME (on the way out): S'up, MK?
MY BOSS: Hey, how's it going? Do you want to meet Idi Amin?
ME: No, I'm good.
MY BOSS: Idi, this is Aaron. Aaron, this is Idi.
ME (holding my hand out): Hi, it's good to meet you.
[IDI AMIN** stares past the proffered hand, saying nothing.]
ME (still holding hand out): Uh.... I'm one of Mitchell's buyers.
[IDI AMIN continues to ignore ME's hand, saying nothing. ME's hand falls, his smile wilts. A fissure opens up in the ground, and ME steps inside.]
This is why I'll be avoiding my boss in the future.
As further proof of the world of awkward twos, two authors offered to memorialize themselves on my ass. This is a first for me which managed to happen twice in just a few months.
The first was the mighty Brock Clarke, who I've written about once or twice. He was in town for the early release of his third novel, Exley.
We drank the night away before I realized he hadn't signed my poster for An Arsonist's Guide to Writers Homes in New England, a brilliant piece of marketing with quotes from the book set up as rules to follow when torching historic homes. I was thinking it would look lovely with my signed posters for Choke and Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet. Plus, I was going for an even fifty for things I need to get framed.
Two am was a distant memory. Brock was understandably reluctant for me to run across the street, open the locked store, grab the poster, and run back.
"I'll be back for Miami Book Fair. I'll sign anything you want, I promise."
Seeing my lack of enthusiasm for this idea, Brock offered his Ace in the Hole.
"I'll sign your ass," he said.
I worked Miami Book Fair, but my ass and Brock's pen somehow missed each-other.
A few months later, this happened:
PHASE 1: This will be awesome - wheeeee!!! Thanks so much, Lane!
PHASE 2: She realizes she is the most ticklish person who currently exists.
PHASE 3: Lane discovers how hard it is to erase wavy Sharpie Lines from skin.
After mortalizing the bibliophile monkey inside Becky's biceps, Lane Smith was on a high. When he found out Becky and I were a couple, he turned to me and said, "How about one for you? I could put it right on your ass."
While listening to the “80’s Hits” station on Slacker radio at work the other day, I found myself singing along to Don Henley’s Boys of Summer. You know the one, I can see you / your brown skin shining in the sun. You got your hair combed back and your / sunglasses on, baby.
Oh God, how I hated that fucking song. It came out in 1984. I was 12, and radio stations played it to death. Then MTV gave in an extended funeral, awarding Boys of Summer Video of the Year in 1985. Three years later, some genius decided to resuscitate the song so they could play it to death all over. The resurrection just missed the Top Ten. From age 12 to age 16, I couldn't turn a radio dial without being served this sit sandwich at least once.
Growing up, I watched my parents sing along with certain songs. I always wondered if they really liked those songs or were just reminiscing. No really, they explained in my imagination, I’m not so lame that I think this song is cool. I just liked being eighteen and having the whole world in front of me, and they played this song a lot at the time.
Now I have my answer. Here I am, singing along to a song I couldn’t turn off quickly enough when I was a teenager. Maybe it’s because the song is about passing from youth into middle age and it finally speaks to me, or maybe I just liked certain things about my teenage years, something besides pimples, peer ridicule, and feeling perpetually outside of a joke everyone else seemed to get. Whatever it is, I see a long-haired mullet boy with braces, odd clothes, boney limbs, and love-handles shaking his head at me in disdain.
"Boys of Summer?," he mutters. "Really?"
Flipping through some CDs to play while I cleaned house, I came across a pink one mixed in with the A’s. I thought it was Tori Amos’ Under the Pink. When it came into rotation and started to play, I felt like a drunk gremlin was trying to spit in my ear. I gave the whole disc a listen, reasoning that I’d liked it enough to buy it at some point. When I popped the disc out, I saw it was Aphex Twin’s Windowlicker.
Now, I didn’t much go for Windowlicker when it came out. Until I decided to write this post, I never saw the video. If you’re billing yourself as an artist and video is your medium, bring it, but don’t fool around in the studio and tell me it’s music. That came out pretty fucking cool; let’s put it on CD! I threw it in the trash, because life’s too short. The video? Definitely worth a peep or two.
I’ve listened to a disc and trashed it once before [POTENTIAL EAR-VIRUS WARNING], Chumbawumba’s Tubthumper. You might know it for the single “Tumbthumping,” the one that goes, I get knocked down / but I get up again. You’re never going to keep me down, on and on until your head implodes, a song on more worst-of and most-hated lists than I care to name here.
It should be noted that I loved the shit out of Tubthumper when it came out in 1997, and played it to death for a few months (usually skipping the annoying single). Then I heard it last year. That’s what pop in the nineties was like? Oh, dear lord, no.
I think my favorite you can’t go back (or “don’t look back, you should never look back” as Don Henley would say) moment came on my birthday, in 2009. In the middle of a divorce, celebrating my first adult birthday as a single guy, I scheduled an array of events. I didn’t expect everyone to come to every event, but I figured with four to choose from, my friends would find time for at least one. It worked like a charm, and I had the best time.
After opening night of Where the Wild Things Are, we found ourselves trapped in a line of cars. Inching our way around the parking garage, we decided it would be fun to play a CD I’d been given at the bowling alley a few hours before- Spin Doctors’ Pocket Full of Kryptonite. I still think it was a gag gift, but G insists she went to a thrift store and spent her hard-earned dollar on a genuine piece of nineties nostalgia just for me.
We popped the CD in and were transported back in time nineteen years. Trapped in the car, there was no escape. Between signing along with the dated music, our running commentary, and the heavy emotions I’d been dealing with for the better part of a year, I couldn’t stop laughing. I laughed until it turned into a fit.
“Man down! Man down!” Amanda yelled from the backseat, while tears of laughter rolled down my face.
I left that CD in Hilldawg's car, but it’s still one of the best birthday gifts I’ve ever gotten.
If you don’t remember the move from separation to singledom, let me remind you that the three-week cleanup of the Treehouse was complicated by a leaking roof. Perhaps it’s appropriate that on the way from singledom to cohabiting, the leak has returned.
Before going to Orlando to celebrate Dylan’s birthday, I called the landlord’s son to let him know the closet was leaking again. At that point, it was a small drip, avoidable by scrunching my clothes to the side and putting a bucket down. After ten days of back and forth, the roof became about as effective as swiss cheese.
My clothes, shoes, and spare linens have been removed from the closet, where mold grows luxuriantly in the back corner and water trickles from several spots. The closet fixtures I purchased and installed are now rife with mold.
The kitchen ceiling also leaks from several spots. The sound of dripping water is so loud, it wakes me at night. Of course it keeps me up, but that’s not what I mean. I’m saying I finally manage to drop off despite the wet stench of the place and the frustration of having everything I own piled into half of a tiny studio, and the sound of rain inside the house is loud enough to wake me.
If you’ll remember, the water damage in the kitchen is not new. Clearly, the prior tenant experienced similar problems, as the new wall panels and rusted drip pans on the oven can attest. And their realtor has the nerve to call me and ask what the landlord can do to keep me from moving out.
The house was built in 1925; it needs a new roof, not more handyman patch jobs. That’s the minimum which needs to happen to make the place livable, and my landlord could pay for it with by selling the Escalade he drives in Miami (he lives in San Bernardino, CA) or the chunk of gold around his wrist. Meanwhile, I no longer feel safe in my own home. I’m sleeping with a bat near my bed. I know that makes no sense – what am I going to do, beat the water to death? – but it helps me get a few fitful hours of rest.
1200 Wallace Street in Coral Gables, FL, 33134, reeks of mold and festering water damage. It’s August in Miami, but I’ve opened the windows to let the stench escape. Since it’s rainy season, the ceiling never stops dripping. The water went from brown to white, laced with glue from the tar paper the well-meaning, ineffective handyman keeps layering up there.
There’s no Becky. I can barely stand the conditions here myself, and I’m not about to subject her to them. We’re getting through this because we know we’ll share a home soon, and we’ll be able to discover each-other all over.
I can’t masturbate, even though I’ve got all the makings of a first-rate prison fantasy. You know the one, where I’m a guard at a women’s prison? That’s caged heat, baby. The dripping water, the smell, it’s like special effects. When it rains, I can imagine Becky and I getting hot and heavy on the front porch of some tropical hut during a rainstorm. But there’s no way to reconcile disgust and self-lust, so even that momentary peace is lost to me.
Now I’m run down and feverish just when I need to be packing up. Ever cleaned your dishes in the bathroom sink, rinsed them in the shower, and dried them in your living room, while running a fever, as roofing glue drips down your neck? It’s exactly as fun as it sounds.
Mr. Rojas, the keys to your Escalade wouldn’t get me to stay in this dank hole another day. If you have an ounce of humanity, you will replace the roof before you give the key to the Treehouse to some other poor sap.
Oh, and stop charging the poor woman who just moved in below me rent. All that water flows downward, you know.
