Book reviews!

I read a lot of books. I also buy an awful lot of books, more books than I have time to read. Still, this week I treated myself to even more books from Amazon (first time I ever used them, actually, not bad at all) and since most of these recent purchases are suited to the blog, I thought I might as well review them.

So, starting with the gothiest, then: Gothic Charm School by Julian Venters. Yes, we've all read the blog and a fair bit of the content is lifted (in some cases word for word) from there, and yes, a lot of her content is really for people new to the scene, but do you know what? This is a book that everyone of a gothy persuasion (and their friends, families, and coworkers) should read. Why? Well, it dispells the myths, lays out a potted history of the subculutre, and hands out some thoroughly worth-while advice, all in a fun, accessible tone with some simply darling little illustrations. Ms Venters style, parodying ettiquette guides of yore, might be a bit wearing for those without much of a sense of humour, but then I guess it's not really going to help them much. She covers a range of day-to-day topics, from explaining goth to people who don't get it and dodging cliches, to raising gothy children, to coping with relationships, gossip and quarrels within the scene. It's a useful thing to hand over to people who keep asking silly questions.



I have to say I really like her attitude and I found myself agreeing with much of what she says (although I'm slightly perturbed by the notion that people at clubs might be rolling their eyes at my eyeliner...) Well worth reading, whether you're a jaded Eldergoth, a know-it-all but slightly clueless Babybat or just some bloke in jeans and a t-shirt scratching his head as all the black clad weirdoes walk by.







Next: Goth:Vamps and Dandies by Gavin Baddley. When I first heard Mr Baddley was writing this I was thrilled; it's predecessor Goth Chic was the book that first showed me that Goth was not some sort of weird satanic heavy-metal cult but a clique for people with interests very similar to my own. Goth Chic, for those who haven't read it (and I do heartily recommend it if you haven't), focused mostly on the origins of the subculture, through literature, film, television, and music (right from early rock'n'roll and jazz up to fully fledged nineties goth rock) with a couple of short chapters on sexuality and fashion. I've often wondered if the brevity of the fashion chapter was deliberate, an attempt to get away from the image certain people have of goth as a fashion/trend-based movement, but it looks like it wasn't since Goth:Vamps and Dandies is a study of the gothic aesthetic in fashion, tracing its roots and influences from the nineteen twenties to today. It's a fairly serious and scholarly book, but accessibly written and sumptuously illustrated with gorgeous full colour photos. This is a book to thumb through while getting ready to hit the town, or maybe to lend to people who say "goths all dress the same". It's bang up to date, too, discussing recent trends towards steampunk and cybergoth (something skimmed over in Goth Chic to be fair), the difference between goth and emo, and the goth scene's relationship with mainstream "spooky" brands like Emily the Strange. It's very interesting, fairly in-depth, well written, and, as I said, absolutely beautiful. If you don't have Goth Chic I'd still recommend reading that first, but this is a worthy appendix to it, covering plenty of new ground and looking at some of the things he covered before in a different light.

Highly recommended for leaving around on a coffee table.


Next: Paint it Black by everyone's favourite New York perkygoth Voltaire. I'm sad to say I never got the chance to read his What is Goth (it's dead expensive these days) but because I love his music and his comics (and his website, and his animation and... dammit why is this man so multitalented?) I snapped this one up too. It's pretty and it has some fun ideas but it's featherlight stuff, with whole pages given up to silly rambles and pictures of Mr V putting up curtains, or his gothy lady assistants lounging on the bonnet of a pimped out car. A lot of the projects are a bit... well Babybat; they scream out "my parents won't let me paint my room black!" And one or two are just plain dumb (there's a bottle "chandelier" that just involves collecting bottles and sticking candles in them). But still, it's fun (hell, it's Voltaire after all, what did you expect?) and some of the projects, though simple, are quite fun (I like the collection of punked-up dollies, the graveyard cake and the Hellraiser-esque picture frame particularly) so if you like your decor with a does of high camp, you might want to follow his ideas.

Next is a bit of a strange one; Go Ask Ogre by Jolene Siana, a collection of letters (and the odd journal) written by the author in her teenage years in the eighties to Nivek Ogre of Skinny Puppy. But these are no ordinary fan letters; Jolene is (or rather was) a troubled, lonely child, struggling with self-harm and verging on suicidal, bullied at school and at conflict with her mother. What start as rambling, stream of conciousness pieces (some of which can be pretty tough to read, I have to say) become increasingly frank, wise and painful as she strikes up a friendship with the singer. He encourages her to keep writing since it's clearly helping her, writing replies and meeting her at shows, and eventually, many years later in the late nineties, he sends her a parcel containing all of the letters she ever sent him, having kept every single one. Ogre's letters aren't published, apparently on his request, but she does publish her elated journal response to his first (hand written and pretty lengthy) letter, and the gist of some of their conversations in person are recorded in the same way. Now Ogre's request not to publish his replies is interesting, because let's face it most people finding the book are going to be drawn to his name, and to me it has two implications; that his letters were pretty personal and that he wanted her to remain the focus of the book, both of which I think are rather sweet.

Anyway, this is a lovely book; beautifully illustrated with Jolene's beautiful spiky doodles (even her envelopes are carefully constructed collages and elaborate drawings) along with photos of her and her friends and various flyers, ticket stubs and even pressed flowers kept as souvenirs. As her letter-writing continues her style develops into something at once very readable but also incredibly, painfully honest. She comes across as a very intelligent, very likeable and very brave person, but one very confused and more than a little lost. It's hard work, just because it's so raw, but worthwhile reading. I was drawn to this book mainly because I'd been looking for some sort of goth subculture memoir and they're pretty few and far between (which is funny considering quite how many books there are on the subject, but compare it quite how many punk memoirs there are and that's pretty strange) and this really fits the bill: Jolene's journey into the heart of the post-punk/industrial scene of the time is, to me, fascinating, and the solace it clearly gives her is wonderful. This is a book to give people who make complaints along the lines of "no wonder your depressed if you listen to music like that", because it illustrates the happiness and support that darker music can bring, that discovery that you're not the only person that thinks that way.

It's an unusual book, and, as I said, it can be pretty hard going, Jolene's descriptions of her depressions and self-harm are, though not always explicit, quite harrowing, but there's something about her and her survival spirit that is oddly uplifting. I have a feeling that this will be one of those cathartic, reassuring books that I'll drag out when I've got the Black Dog myself.

That's the main bunch of books I wanted to talk about, the others I've bought recently I haven't had time to read yet but I'll mention them anyway. I've finally managed to find a copy of Poppy Z Brite's Drawing Blood, the only one of her early novels I couldn't find. It's recently been reprinted (for the first time since it's publication) along with Lost Souls in a rather blatant attempt for Penguin to jump on the Paranormal Romance bandwagon (which amuses me endlessly, since Poppy is hardly a fluffy romance writer: her works are visceral, bloody, achingly erotic. The new cover for Lost Souls even has a chick with red lipstick on the cover. In a book almost entirely about gay and bisexual men. How thoroughly inappropriate!). I've not gotten far with it, but it's typical horror-period Poppy; not quite as extreme as Exquisite Corpse but getting there.


I also picked up, on a total whim, Japanese Ghost Stories by Catrien Ross which I'm quite excited by. Since discovering Japanese horror movies in the last few years I've become quite obsessed with Japanese folklore and this slim but rather pricey volume is full of traditional stories and pretty picutres. I love "true", folkloric ghost stories anyway, but my previous studies have mostly focused on European tales so I'm keen to explore this one.







Oh and one last thing, if you haven't read Let the Right One In yet, why not? It took me a long while to finally finish it (it's long and it's bleak), but it's a perfect novel. I don't care if you don't like horror, or you don't like vampire novels or whatever, read this book.







That's it for today, folks. Next time: mysterious charity shop garments, more Alchemy jewellery reviews, and things involving unemployment.