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#46 - "Cracked" by Eliza Crewe

Vices and Shit

(1/10)

by HotBot

(book accidentally stumbled upon by HotBot)

Editor's Note: The main characters in this book are called "Meda," "Chi," and "Jo," which together are an anagram for "I, Chode-Jam." I, Chode-Jam indeed.

Sometimes, books make me angry.  Not books in general of course—I’m talking about specific ones.  I pick them up, all excited and ready to be bedazzled—and then I’m hit with a pile of shit instead. It’s not what I want.  Nobody Almost nobody wants that.  Such was the case with Eliza Crewe’s “Cracked”, and it irritated me sufficiently that I asked the gentlemen of the Piece of Shit Book ClubTM whether I could volunteer as tribute. Just this one time.

Cracked isn’t a shit book because it’s racist.  There is no fucking dinosaurs or dolphins, no heroin-based autobiographies, no subtle pro-US propaganda.  There’s not even any thinking you’re a horse.  But it does check all the boxes for an unlikable and unrelatable protagonist, a confusing target age, soooo much Bible-iness, and some casual harassment.  For a little background, our ‘heroine’ is Andromeda Melange, half-demon soul-eater and teen with attitude.  There’s also a bunch of people called Crusaders—virtually all of whom we meet are likewise moody teens or invalids—and they’re at war with the Demons, while protecting people they called ‘Beacons’.  Now, I don’t want to spoil anything, but Meda’s last name means “mixture”.  Any thoughts as to what makes her so special?  Spoilers, she’s a Crusader-Demon-Beacon.  A crudemacon.  Will she choose good?  Will she choose bad?  Who the fuck cares, but you can guess it from the outset if you’re so inclined.

Now, in chronological order:

The first few chapters

Meda goes psychotic and rips apart a man with her bare hands, releases insane people into the streets, and dances in trail of blood.  Despite the grizzliness, the word choice and ‘voice’ reflects perhaps a pre-teen audience, maybe the 12-14 bracket.  Meda’s character is 17.

P53—Lust

Meda next encounters her first Crusaders, one of whom is Chi (Malachi—get it?  Religious!  Because all the good guys are).  And because this is apparently what pre-teens like to read in books, we get this comment after Chi takes off his jacket: “The looks of an angel and yet all it makes me want to do is sin.”  This made me want to look up the Bible Malachi, and we have this dude:

'Sinning' is not at the forehead of my mind.

P71—What’s a plot hole, anyway?!

Chi, his friend Jo, and a kid called Uri(el), are explaining what ‘Crusaders’ are.  They are like advanced ‘Templars’ (yes, Knights Templar), and are descended from the original Knights.  But it’s not only descendants of the ‘originals’ that have special powers: “Oh, and anyone who marries a Templar”.  That’s right.  But why?  What could the reasoning be?  What is the world logic here?  Meda wonders the same thing, and asks.  “They all blink at me.  Finally Uri answers, ‘Because God says so.’”.  OH.  Because God says so.  Of course.  What the fuck happens in case of divorce?  What if it’s a marriage of convenience, because I hear there have been one or two of those since the recognition of the Knights Templar in the twelfth freaking century?!  What if someone stumbles onto your secret and starts force-marrying and divorcing you to a whole bunch of people in order to raise some kind of super army?!  And moreover, why the fuck is this important to the story?!  There’s this whole marriage theme that runs throughout—adult Templars, for example, always fight in pairs.  And those pairs are always couples.  And 17-year-old Chi, by the end of the book, is ‘joking’ about how he’s going to ‘make’ Jo marry him—but more on that later on.  Enough.  We get it.  Jesus, God, marriage, blah.  But please oh please cover up at least the more glaring of your plot holes with something a little more substantial.

P79—just a couple more names

Oh hey there, Ezekiel, Abraham, Methuselah and Judas.  Sigh.  And this book isn’t half as endearing as the way Christian mythology is used in Supernatural, for example.  Where’s Castiel?  We all want Castiel dammit!

There are an unbelievable number of memes of this guy on the internet.

P130—Sloth (on behalf of the editor)

Three times in the book, words were randomly in a different font size.  I don’t know why.  At first I thought it was some kind of inner dialogue mechanism.  Then I read the sentence “no one could be that surprised” and my internal monologue was confused.  I felt lied to.  Betrayed.

P186—Gluttony (in a very loose reference)

Meda constantly talks about her Hunger.  Her hunger for food, but also her Hunger for Souls.  Or, rather, the life attached to souls, whatever the fuck that’s supposed to mean.  I assume it’s some kind of Siamese-soul situation, and you swallow one then spit out the rest.  The more I think about it, the more annoyed I am.  Meda kills a person and then sucks out their soul, swallowing all of it.  But it’s okay, because really she only digests the ‘life’ associated with it.  So where does the rest of the soul go?!  And how are there ghosts wandering around (one of whom has a subplot which is never resolved) with all aspects of life, when Meda later explains that they’re only souls, no life?!  Meda is called a ‘Soul-eater’ (it says so right on the back cover!), but other Demons, ‘Real’ Demons, suck ‘life’ directly from … some kind of afterlife?  But not souls, oh no, not souls.

Either way, on the topic of eating, I was irritated to find an overbearing explanation of the word ‘hangry’ on page 186.  It’s like the author had just learned the word from a friend—a word which is in fairly common use, at least where I’m from—and was excited to teach it to the world.  Give me a break.

P216—the one thing I liked

This sentence.  This solitary sentence.  “Those of us who live with twisted bits like to think we can overcome them.”  It’s with reference to somewhat-crippled Jo, who doesn’t allow her gimpy leg (and I only say ‘gimpy’ because that’s how the author/Meda keeps referring to her) to hold her back.

P229—what??

A reference is suddenly made to the lack of a particular burger chain the UK.  As far as we know, the protagonist has never been to the UK, so this is just a bout of random.  Is the author trying to check whether we're awake?!

P274—again with the life/soul distinction

All right, so firstly, again with the ‘which age group is this for’?  A 13-year-old boy is tortured to death.  Lovely, right?  And then we (through Meda) see his “soul, stripped of life”, before ascending to presumably Heaven.  What?  So his soul didn’t have life but was still moving on to whatever afterlife?  So it sounds like Demons aren’t doing any harm by taking the ‘life’ from people’s souls, as they get to where they’re going anyway.  And in that case, how the hell (yes, a pun, but an angry one) do the Demons suck life from souls in the afterlife?!  BOOK YOU MAKE NO SENSE.

P278—oh no.

Meda meets her demon father, and she has the thought “I am such a naughty girl, aren’t I, Daddy?”.  Now I don’t know if it’s just me, but I read this and cracked up.  Thank you for backing up every ‘daddy issues’ cliché ever, Crewe.  Thank you.  I’m just surprised that it didn’t devolve into some kind of spanking/incest scene—especially given the father in question is apparently an incubus, and that’s what they do.  Or is it only when people are asleep?

I shit you not, the caption for this was "an incubus about to fornicate with a sleeping beauty".  I like how he looks lost in thought.  I'm less charmed by the idea of waking up to find a naked red dude sitting on my bed staring at me, especially if to all intents and purposes I've been drugged as this woman appears to have been.  Who the fuck sleeps like that?  You'd choke on your tongue!  Is this some kind of necro crossover?!

I don’t know, it’s not my bag, but the only context in which I ever encounter someone older than around 10 using the word ‘daddy’ is in a sexual sense, so this was just…  Oh dear.

P301–327 (ie end of book)

Chi and Jo declare their love for one another during a fight to the death with a demon horde (man, I just do not get to type ‘demon horde’ often enough).  I mean come on, if Buffy taught us anything it’s that people say stupid things when they’re about to die.

Buffy announces she loves him, given the apocalypse going on.  Spike is like "duh, no you don't, don't be retarded".

Then, once it’s been said, an incredible amount of the rest of the book is taken up with the following.  But imagine Spike is Chi.  Now watch the gif for ten minutes.  Now see if you feel like punching anyone.

I was never in the Spike camp anyway, punch away.

But does Jo go along with this?  Oh no.  P310, she explains that “’I only said that because we were about to die.’”  Straight-forward, right?  But Chi refuses to believe it, and keeps telling her how she loves him and she’ll be 'his'.  While saying how one day her name will be ‘wife’.  Meanwhile Jo keeps reiterating that “’I meant it at the time.  I thought we were going to die.’”  But Chi just doesn’t take his would-be wife that seriously—she probably doesn’t know what she wants, that silly duffer.

Except that she does.  And she's told you it's not you.

Chi is so persistent in fact, that Jo is forced from the room, and then in a later scene she has to run into the woods to escape him.  Chi is even good enough to describe the whole shebang as a “romantic assault”.  Oh yeah buddy, keep using words like ‘assault’ when you’re chasing some girl into the woods.  Good work.  Here’s some more of Jo protesting:

“’I don’t want to talk to you anymore,’ she says in desperation.  ‘I don’t want to see you ever again.  Just leave me alone!’  Her voice is high-pitched and frantic. 

‘Not gonna happen,’ he says easily.  ‘Ever.’”

Well that’s not scary as fuck.  Even Meda—half-Demon Meda—asks him what the hell he’s doing, pointing out that Jo’s getting more and more upset.  On the other hand, she then lets him go run into the forest after the girl who has been forced to flee him, so maybe she’s true to her demonic nature after all.

Finally, Meda finds herself wandering through the woods, and she comes across Chi and Jo.  No, they’re not banging.  But they haven’t seen her, so she hides in the bushes to watch them.  And watches Chi kiss Jo—while she’s crying and protesting—and pretends to eat invisible popcorn.  Oh and then suddenly the murdered kid’s ghost appears, even though ghosts once they’re in the afterlife are meant to stay there, because fuck plotlines.

1/10.  Fuck this shit.

#40 - "Rush Revere and the First Patriots" by Rush Limbaugh

Rushin around.

(3/10)

By HotBot

(book selected by Peartree)

Editor's note: Little known fact, it only took Limbaugh 30 minutes of make-up each morning for his portrayal of 'Pearl' in the movie Blade. 

When the guys assigned me this book, they asked whether Rush Limbaugh’s reputation had made it across the Atlantic and/or Pacific to me (there was some confusion as to which was the most appropriate ocean).  I said that I’d heard of him, mainly in connection with sexism and bigotry, and definitely as a conservative.  To give some context, here are some of radio host Limbaugh’s heavy-hitters:

• Cold air “proves the ice isn’t melting.”
• People “can’t go fishing anymore because of Obama.”
• President Obama… wants to mandate circumcision.
• Feminism was established so as to allow unattractive women easier access to the mainstream of society
• I have talent on loan from… God
• A feminazi is a woman to whom the most important thing in life is seeing to it that as many abortions as possible are performed.
• It’s sort of like hazing, a fraternity prank.  Sort of like that kind of fun.  (Re abuse of Iraqi prisoners are Abu Ghraib).
• They’re going out of their way now to establish evolution as a mechanism for creation, which, of course, you can’t do.
• There’s going to be a retard summit at the White House
•  You know how to stop abortion?  Require that each one occur with a gun.
• How many of you guys, in your own experience with women, have learned that 'no' means 'yes' - if you know how to spot it?

Rush mid-rush.

And then there’s this, which made it across all kinds of oceans:

“college co-ed Sandra Fluke, who goes before a congressional committee and essentially says that she must be paid to have sex, what does that make her? It makes her a slut, right? It makes her a prostitute. She wants to be paid to have sex. She's having so much sex she can't afford the contraception. She wants you and me and the taxpayers to pay her to have sex. ” and then “So, Ms. Fluke and the rest of you feminazis, here's the deal: If we are going to pay for you to have sex, we want something for it, and I'll tell you what it is — we want you to post the videos online so we can all watch.”

Oh but it doesn’t stop!

“The study's leaders claim to have bona fide research — I say "bonified" probably here — bonified research that says the average size of a penis is roughly 10% smaller than it was 50 years ago...  I think it's feminism. If it's tied to the last 50 years... it has to be the feminazis, the chickification and everything else. Give 'em time and they'll blame Bush.”

I’ve gotta say, this guy’s Wikiquotes page is gold.

With all of the above in mind, I started reading Rush Revere with something akin to fear.  Was it going to be an exercise in carefully (or not-so-carefully) disguised anti-whomever statements?  Were there going to be rants about the role of women, or the characteristics of different races, or what-have-you?  I’m happy to tell you that no, this book was not an exercise in the conservative indoctrination of children.  On the contrary, it was written at an appropriate level and in a style which will definitely appeal to kids.  There are awkward jokes (and fart jokes—sigh), the characters are—barring Rush—relatable children, and the various sections of society are covered.  Moreover, it’s really informative about the history around the American Revolution.  I’m definitely taking it all with a grain of salt, as there’s definitely a strong anti-monarchist pro-republican agenda, but all the same, I feel like I’ve learned something.  There’s even a quiz at the end of the book where you can test your knowledge!  Also, Star Wars references:

“Well, I’m not familiar with a star war,” said Benjamin [Franklin], “but if the thirteen colonies continue to rebel and resist, it is just a matter of time before the empire strikes back!”

That isn’t to say that there aren’t parts of the book which made me pause.  Firstly, there are illustrations throughout, starring a sullen Rush Limbaugh in the role of time-traveller and all-round nice guy, Rush Revere:

Rush Revere and his horse, Liberty.  (It's cos it's about Freedom.  The only way the message could be less subtle if the horse was called Murica.)

The story-line itself is fine.  Though I must say, I particularly enjoyed how characters came to understand the whole 'our weird history teacher has a time-travelling horse' situation:

"It’s a time portal, isn’t it?” I must’ve looked surprised because she said, “I knew it! And don’t look so surprised. It’s obvious with all the colonial costumes and the movie you showed us about the Pilgrims in Holland and the talking horse who knows about American history.”

Oh, and did I mention that the horse sings?  To the tune of 'Call Me Maybe', no less.

As to Rush’s big hitters:

Republicanism, conservatism

•  You've gotta love how Limbaugh portrayed the King of England:  "I will have my way!” He pouted. “I will. I will! The colonists are rabble-rousers and common criminals. They are dumb, silly dressed fools who are still subject to my laws and my word. I shall not have them forget that I rule the New World. I am the King! The land and the people of the thirteen colonies are still mine. Mine, I tell you! The colonists will do anything I say and buy anything we sell them! Except for fine fashion, it appears!”
• I'm just gonna leave this here: "William knew that the best way for each of the Pilgrim families to prosper in their new way of life was for each family to have a plot of land where they could build a home and work for themselves. Instead of putting all of their goods into a communal chest, William Bradford encouraged the Pilgrims to be on the same team, yet work hard to take care of their own families. He knew they would try their hardest if they knew they could keep the rewards of their hard work and labor. It’s a lesson I’ve always tried to teach my own students. What if they all studied really hard for a test but no matter how hard they worked they would all get the same B grade as everyone else? Why would they ever try for an A?"

Sex and gender

•  All of the important characters who we see in each scene are guys--usually Rush, Cam, or Tommy (who Rush is... very... fond of).  There are also two girls, one called Freedom (no, I'm not kidding), and another, Elizabeth, who is a spoilt brat and the butt of many jokes.  The guys on the other hand are all very reasonable and sensible human beings.  Bratty girl goes from besotted with one character to another, and Freedom is used only as a communication device.  There are no female characters in this book which any young girl reading the book would be able to relate to or emulate--not the case for guys.  The heroes are definitely all men.

Race

•  Limbaugh doesn't believe in using politically correct terms like 'Native Americans'.  No no, instead you've got sentences like "In a few minutes we were all dressed like Indians.".  I feel like 'traditional Indian dress' would have stuck out in colonial USA.  Then again, maybe not:
  

It's important to be beautiful, like Liberty.

• One of the kids under Rush's care is African-American, and at one point he's nearly punished as a runaway slave.  However, Rush steps in, and in the end several of the Patriots recognise the kid's contributions as equal to their own.  Ie political correctness aside, this issue was handled fairly reasonably.

Religion

• Sorry, atheists:
  “Only when we are free can we be all that God wants us to be. Only when we are free can we do all that God wants us to do. Remember this, my friend, freedom is from God. And when we fight for freedom we always fight on the side of God.”
• "I believe the only way America can prosper is to remember the religious freedoms that our forefathers fought for. Only then can the smiles of heaven bless this sacred land.”

Rush sheds light on the matter.  The light of Liberty.

I find this whole situation very confusing.  On the one hand, Limbaugh in real life comes of as a misogynist, climate-denying, racist jerk--but that's not how he portrays himself in the book.  Other than the 'subtle' references to the difficulties of managing a small business (though noting that they form the backbone of America's economy) and expected references to the amazeballsness of Republicanism (which in and of itself, isn't offensive), there's really not an offensive amount of agenda, and issues are handled in a fairly balanced way.

Overall, I don't know how to feel about this book.  As I said, children would enjoy it, and it approaches history in a fun way.  On the other hand, Rush Limbaugh is full of shit, and so without a comprehensive fact-check of the stories in the book, I just don't know what to believe.  So I guess at the end of the day, it's maybe not the book that's the Piece of Shit™.

Ah, the sweet taste of Liberty.

I'll leave you with a quote:

There’s nothing worse than overcooked potatoes or carrots or especially asparagus! Seriously, limp and soggy asparagus is almost as bad as a limp and soggy handshake.” Confused, I questioned, “a soggy handshake?” Liberty clarified: “You don’t want one, trust me. It begins by soaking in the bathtub or playing in a pool for too long and then your hand looks old and wrinkly! Shaking a soggy hand feels like you’re holding a slimy, shriveled piece of seaweed. And you’re not going to impress anyone with seaweed. Why are we even talking about this?”

Good question, Liberty.  Good question.

#37 - "Red Rain", R.L. Stine

Red Rain.  The rain was red.  Red was the colour of the rain.  I read it (not readily).

(0/10)

By HotBot

(book submitted by a Fan)

Editor's note: As requested by DiscordiasFavoredSon, we are reviewing this wonderful Piece of Shit™. 

My favourite film growing up was The Labyrinth, starring David Bowie, Jennifer Connelly, and a bunch of puppets.  I really loved that movie (and can still quote every line)—I loved the concept, the magic of the ball scene, the themes of friendship, and I wanted to be Jennifer Connelly so badly (I still do).  However, I re-watched it last year, and rather than magic, all I could see was David Bowie’s crotch.  Seriously, there are numerous web articles about his crotch in that movie (here's a convenient YouTube video with inappropriate zooming; here's the FB fan page for his crotch in the movie; here's a critical analysis of the part played by his crotch).  And why does he thrust all the time?!  People don’t walk like that (/stand like that/sit like that/dance like that).  I’m actually a little concerned for his posture.  The (highly visible) point is that some things should stay in your childhood, and never, ever be revisited as an adult.  Such is R.L. Stine’s writing.

Growing up, Stine’s Goosebumps series was my gateway into two years of reading exclusively horror books.  The second book I started writing as a kid was even in the genre.  Stine’s books had it all—they were easy to read, had novel story-lines which weren’t too scary for kids, and always a twist at the end.  And do you know what Stine’s Goosebumps and Fear Street books have in common with his adult novel, ‘Red Rain’?  EVERYTHING.  AND IT IS A BIG, STEAMING HEAP OF SHIT.

Phew—okay, I didn’t mean to let that out.  I’m just so ANGRY that somebody would publish this TRIPE.  What the fuck.  I mean seriously, the opening sequence features such an intense amount of word repetition that I felt I was going insane.  I now understand how it must be to live with a trained talking parrot—except the parrot would be less repetitive.  ‘Polly wanna cracker?’ on repeat isn’t anywhere near so irritating as ‘Polly wanna cracker?  Cracker wanna Polly.  You know what Polly wants?  A cracker Polly wants.  Cracker.  Polly.  Cracker cracker Polly.’  FOR FUCKS SAKE.  In the prologue, our idiotic protagonist encounters some ‘red rain’: 

“the raindrops were red.  A shimmering deep scarlet.  … “It’s raining blood!”… [she] watched the red raindrops… Stared at her hands as the red drops trickled… raindrops falling all around her.  Red, as if… blood.  Bloodred raindrops… A blood rain…  She had read about a blood rain… red rain poured… the red rain was the onset of the world’s end.  Now sheets of rain fell… Like red curtains… Red curtains of rain…  blood curtains”.  

WE FUCKING GET IT.  I mean, I guess if you’re an adult with a severe short-term memory problem, or are happy to be treated like a complete idiot, then this is the book for you.  Incidentally, I wonder how many pages the book would be if the repetition were removed—the 534-page electronic behemoth could probably be whittled down to 200, at the absolute outside.  And if the completely irrelevant parts of the book were removed, that could probably be further reduced to 50.  That’s right, removing the parts of the novel which are actively insulting to one’s intelligence would reduce it to ten percent of its size. 

God, there’s so much more to this book.  And I mean more in terms of shit-ness.  The characters are completely ridiculous and make no sense, not to mention stupid; the plotline is inconsistent and incoherent; the way in which the twins speak is ludicrous (“We’ll convince the bruvver and sister.” Samuel stared at him. “Convince them? Okay. But no smoked meat, Daniel. Okay? No smoked meat?” Daniel nodded. “Total domination, Sammy. You’ll see. Total domination.”); the language is basic (one might say ‘graded for children’); and oh.  The sex scenes.  Of course, I should cover that—because what the hell business does R.L. Stine have writing sex scenes?  About as much business as the characters do having sex.  I mean seriously, there’s this sub-plot written in where one of the protagonists has sex with his secretary for no reason.  At all.  It’s never addressed other than ‘oh I feel guilty, oops’, and it never forms part of the story-line—I mean it would have made just as much sense to go into a protracted scene about the dude cleaning his teeth.  It contributed nothing whatsoever—it’s like Stine was just dying for one of his characters to get laid.  The scene had the exact awkwardness of a children’s writer chucking in a scene with genitals because he thinks that’s the only difference between children and adults—our overwhelming interest in fucking.  And apparently, fucking written like this:

She uttered low gasps in his ear. “Oh, yes. Yes. Oh, yes.” Like a porno video. He felt his erection grow. “I don’t want this.” But suddenly he did. 

Oh, God. Over the desk. From behind. His khakis were down. And he was inside her. Sprawled over the desk, she moaned, rhythmic soft cries. He buried his face in her soft hair. He lost himself in her. He lost himself. Lost. And came inside her. It didn’t matter. All the doctors said he could never have more children. He stayed on top of her for a long moment, breathing hard, gripping the shoulders of her T-shirt, the creamy ass still moving beneath him. Then, heart pounding, he pushed himself to his feet. She climbed up slowly. Turned to him. Grabbed his shirt, brought her face close, and licked the side of his face. “Am I your best assistant?” A whisper that tingled his skin. “I want to be the best. Am I the best?”

I’m not sure it’s possible to be less aroused than I am right now (without involving scales).  I’m more confused as to why Stine thought that our key priority would be the possibility of pregnancy rather than, say, diseases.  Or the fact the dude had just cheated on his wife.  I’m also preoccupied with how creepy the assistant is—stalker, much?

Lastly, because honestly this book just makes me angry, the ‘twist’ ending.  Every single one of Stine’s fucking books has a fucking twist, so it was hardly a surprise.  In fact, it was downright predictable.  AND IT MADE NO FUCKING SENSE.  The non-twist was in complete contradiction to the mythology Stine had built up throughout the book.  It’s like he realised he’d written a complete Piece of Shit™ and just stopped even pretending to try. 

This book is an embarrassment.  0/10.

#35 - All in a Day's Twerk

All in a Day's Twerk

(2/10)

By HotBot

(book chosen by Peartree)

Editor's Note: I love twerkin'. It's like my green eggs and ham. Twerk that shit in a boat, with a goat, in the rain, in the dark, and on a train.

“[W]e must have the confidence to twerk by ourselves, even if we’re alone in a crowd; EVEN IF you’re the only twerker in the entire club, council chamber or place of worship.”

There are certain circles in which my ass is renowned—infamous, even.  I’m pretty aware of this fact—a girl’s gotta know her assets[1]—and sometimes walk around at home quietly singing “Baby Got Back” to myself (not that I’ll ever admit it, of course).  When I’m having a bad day, I can always reassure myself that ‘well, at least I have a great ass’—it’s the base on which my self-esteem sits.  In fact, someone recently described my ass as ‘phat’, meaning it’s not only magnificent, but capable of causing time-travel back to the 90s.

However, I have one fatal flaw which detracts from my otherwise solid ass-game: I am completely unable to twerk.  And it’s not through lack of trying, of course (oh the things my room has seen!)–rather, thanks to a series of accidents which may or may not have involved a shark attack[2], the lower part of my spine is titanium.  As it turns out, titanium isn’t that flexible, and I just don’t have the range of motion required to ‘twerk it’.

Luckily, my assigned reading didn’t constitute a guide on how to twerk—rather, “Twerk it to the Top” is a guide to the spiritual basis of twerking, and how your inner twerker can be unleashed to gain success in all aspects of your life—career, pastimes, romance.  (Strangely, it didn’t go into many details on the romantic applications of twerking, so I can’t imagine what they’d be.)  It opens with the author’s discovery of the awesome power of the twerk: when his hut was accidentally set on fire one day, he and thirty of his closest family members twerked around the bonfire, putting it out with only the magic of their butts.  After this miracle, the author realises that “twerking is the true godhead”, and the source of all creativity, intelligence, history, culture, and freaking pineapples for all I know.  Twerking is All, and don’t you forget it!  Key to this is your attitude—after all, Columbus[3] wouldn't have twerked his pantaloon-beclad posterior across the Atlantic if he’d listened to the haters.

This historical photo shows Columbus dropping into prime twerk position.  He’s ready to twerk it all day!  I hope the natives are ready to be twerked over.  (Note the guy behind him, who is clearly just waiting for the twerk to be unleashed.)

Butt what if you’re twerkless like me?  Is there any hope for you?  The author says yes—for “If you are reading this book, you have an inner twerker, and if you have an inner twerker you are bound for greatness”.  I’d never previously realised that having someone twerking inside of me was the path to greatness, but I was much relieved to find out that this was the case.

I must say, I was occasionally confused while reading the book.  It gives a list of seven tips for relaxing your body after “a hard day’s night twerking like a dog”.  Like a dog?  Are we meant to be on all fours while twerking it?  Or is that only for advanced twerkers?  Tell me, oh Twerkmeister!

After the author recounts the story of an angel visiting him in his childhood, telling him he was destined for greathood (plus an instance or two of twerk-based fiction), he presses on to more soothing matters.  One of the book’s best inclusions is a meditation routine for realising your inner twerker.  This is essentially basic meditation, combined with visualising your ass “irradiating a bright strobe light”, culminating in an orgasmic declaration of “TWERK” as you let the pent-up energies resound throughout your body.

I’d also like to include a brief excerpt of a particularly inspirational poem from the book.  I’m not going to recount all of it, because I wouldn’t want to be accused of spoilers.  Instead I’ll include just this one following, beautiful stanza:

“Slamming and jamming to that cold hard funk,
I writhe and thrive with the twerk inside,
As butts and crotch and souls collide.”

Isn’t that just one of the most beautiful things you’ve ever heard? Such imagery!  Such power!!  At this point I started to really be touched by my inner twerker.  It was a truly moving experience.

Of course, any treatise on twerking would be incomplete without statements on the nature of the space-time continuum (duh), and our guru Zarathustra is kind enough to explain that “quantum mechanics is merely the study of the cosmic twerking of discrete quantities of subatomic particles.”  Mind, blown.  And when times are tough, never forget that “time is merely change, and all change is the twerking of existence.”  Chills man.  Chills.

I’m giving this book 2/10 stars.  It would obviously score higher for its sheer ability to move people, however I’ve detracted points for the first half of the book, which seems to be copied from a normal self-help book, butt with every instance of the word ‘work’ replaced by ‘twerk’.  That’s just lazy.  On the other hand, at least I wasn’t reading about bestiality this time, so I had a lot to be grateful for.

“Twerk Your Way to the Top” concludes in the most fitting of ways—the Twerk of Independence.  It proves definitively that America’s Founding Fathers were filthy plagiarists, who took what is a holy Text of Twerk and modified it to suit their own nefarious uses.  The Twerk of Independence is clearly the original text, and is much more moving.  I’m going to go and write an angry letter now, demanding immediate corrections to the historical record.  In the interim, I’ll leave this here for evidence, pending the inevitable law suit:

“We hold these twerks to be self-evident, that all twerkers are created equal, that they are endowed by their Inner-Twerker with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of twerking perfection.”

TO TWERK!

---

[1] Apologies for the inevitable word-play.

[2] It didn’t.

[3] Googling ‘Columbus twerking’ led me to this NSFW facebook page.  This is what happens when you try to play Googlewhack.

#24 - "The Princess and the Penis" by RJ Silver

On not meaning to be a dick

(4.99999999/10)

By Hot Bot

(book chosen by Beau Dashington)

Editor's Note: Apparently the way to a woman's heart is through dick jokes. Go figure. 

I once went through a phase of downloading and reading pretty much any free book which came my way.  Occasionally this was a good thing; usually it was a bad thing. No, scratch that—usually, it was a downright horrible thing.  One example of particular horribleness was ‘Beauty Awakened: The Queen and the Honey’, and my Amazon review began “I read this book because it was free, and without reading a summary or any reviews. I was therefore pretty confused when it turned out to be a mix of a fairytale and BDSM erotica. I'm not entirely sure they're genres that should be mixed”.

Imagine therefore my delight when the erudite gentlemen of the Piece of Shit Book Club assigned me my next reading: a fairy-tale!  A fairy-tale called “The Princess and the Penis”!  Perhaps I should have seen it coming (ayy)—after all, they libellously claimed that I am ‘no perfect princess’, and suggested that I need to get ‘in touch’ with myself.  I think they were hoping I would relate to the princess in The Princess and the Penis (henceforth ‘P.A.T. Penis’) and therefore learn to explore my sexuality: following which I would naturally share my erotic adventures in the guise of a book review.

Clearly, the boys have been at sea too long if they think the mere mention of a p-word is going to scare me off.  And so I launched into this book with gusto!

By the end of the first page, I was pretty sure I knew what my review was going to be about.  I was already face-palming, at sentences such as: “To keep [the princess] safe from the greatest danger of all—men —[the king] surrounded her with three chaste companions and a special troop of guards sworn to defend her virtue” and “he wanted to keep her as pure as fresh snow… [until] her purity attracted a crown prince from one of the big kingdoms.  He hoped such a union… would help his small impoverished kingdom of Westwich survive”.  The whole idea of preventing someone from sexual knowledge or experience, let alone commodifying it, just hurts.

Happily, things improved.  The premise of the book is that our retardedly-named protagonist, ‘Amalia’, is awoken one day by a giant phallic shape in her bed. Or a ‘lump in her rump’ to be more precise.  A ‘pain in her butt’.  And the thing is, these aren’t even my puns!  (At this point, I realised that I may actually be slightly in love with the author.)  Amalia’s father the king is very upset to hear about the mysterious lump—what if it affects his daughter’s purity?  She is, after all, now betrothed to a certain ass-wipe by the name of Prince Rupert.  Without giving too much away, no matter how many inspections of the princess’ room are conducted and no matter how many times her mattress is changed, night after night the princess finds herself sleeping with a massive dick-shaped lump.  (And balls too, it should be mentioned.  Anatomy is important at a time like this!)  The princess eventually befriends it, cuddling up to at night time—and of course, this just wouldn’t be a fairy-tale unless someone (something?) was getting kissed at the end.

The puns and innuendo in this book are just magical.  After the king suspects an interloper of sneaking into Amalia’s room at night, he throws a tanty.  “Then he must be coming in elsewhere,” growled the king.  “Empty the room and check every crack, crevice, and hole you see!”  Now, before accusations that I just have a filthy mind start rolling in, almost every sentence is written with a double meaning: it’s clearly, clearly intentional.  Though I was quietly disappointed at how the author spelled ‘coming’ in the above example.  I’m going to blame spell check.

I should probably also give mention to the outlandish size of the mysterious member at hand (or in bed, as the case may be).  Talking to her husband, the queen says that “they’ve never heard of one so enormous.  Frankly, neither have I.  It seems almost mythical.”  (This is probably the best use of dramatic foreshadowing I’ve ever seen.)  At the king’s presumably disgruntled expression, the queen hurries to add that “I only meant it was…unusual…by ordinary standards.  Not that you’re in any way ordinary, my lord.  Things can be mythical in many different ways.”  Smooth.  Real smooth.

I’m reading through my notes from this book as I write this, and it just gets better and better.  One of Amalia’s salacious aunts asks her whether she might not be dreaming, “the same way you might dream of a snow cone on a hot summer day?”  Amalia replies with an innocent “Why?  Does this have to do with food?”  to which the aunt responds “Not if you’re quick”.  Not if you’re quick.  I seriously can’t stop laughing.

I could keep banging on and on about the hilarious dick jokes in P.A.T. Penis, but there’s so much more to enjoy!  The alliterative chapter titles, for example: the Phantom Phallus and the Wacky Wizard.  The fact that the prose is both hysterical and well-written.  The tongue-in-cheek (tongue?) morals.

As you may be gathering, while this book is not to everyone’s taste (and certainly, if you don’t enjoy sex-based jokes then you won’t like The Princess and the Penis… or this book review site for that matter, so what the hell are you still reading for?!), I actually loved it.  I’m going to buy the rest of the series ASAP: I not only read the whole book with a grin on my face, but started holding story-time and reading it aloud to my friends.

To the sadistic gents of the PoS Book Club, this evens it out: I officially forgive you for the dino-porn.  Maybe one day, in the distant future, I’ll even be able to watch Jurassic Park again.

Verdict: NOT a Piece of Shit.

_______________________

The Princess and the Penis is available on Kindle here.

#14 - "Mating With the Raptor" by Christie Sims

Erotica Scaled Up
 (1/10)

by HotBot

(book chosen by group consensus)

Editors' note: After author Laura May requested us to write a review of her book, Pickles and Ponies, the Piece of Shit Book Club™ agreed to do so on condition that she write a review of a book of our choice. Last week, we wrote a review of her book, and now its her turn. And here is that book, the too-hot-for-John-Hammond dino-rotica classic Mating With the Raptor. So light some candles, put on that Barry White album, spread some rose petals on the bed, and get ready to uncover some dino bones. .

Warning 1: Don’t read this review if you plan on ever getting aroused again. Or if you plan on reading the book, because, you know, spoilers.

Warning 2, for the persistent few: The review has quotations.

Caveat to Warning 2: But none of the ones that made me dry heave. Consider yourselves lucky that I’m sheltering you from that.

Bestiality seems to be in at the moment, and I can’t understand why. There’s werewolf (and every other type of shape shifter) porn, where people are apparently down with getting naked with men. Who are wolves. Who sometimes turn into wolves mid-coitus. And proceed to enjoy some kind of body fluid bukkake party (I’m looking at you, Anita Blake).

This book is not shape-shifter erotica. ‘Raptor’ is not a pseudonym. This is the tale of a woman having sex with an actual live dinosaur. After the trauma of reading it, which involved both the aforementioned dry heaving and a significant amount of crying in horror, I’m here to review it for you with a stiff drink in hand. (Oh god. Oh god no. Too soon on the word ‘stiff’.)

I just looked up ‘velociraptor’ on Wikipedia and am crying again. That’s how horrifying this book is. I think I have PTSD. Anyway, apparently the authors didn’t do any research, as they would have realised that raptors were around thigh-height (or genital-height, if you’re talking about dinosaurs going down on you, which we are). As such I’m assuming they’re talking about raptors á la Jurassic Park, so kindly imagine the lead raptor from the film making sweet love to you. No wait—don’t do that.
In the name of journalistic (bloggeristic?) integrity, I’ve had a quick look at velociraptors’ bone structure, and I’m not altogether convinced that they’re capable of (a) picking someone up and carrying them away with them or (b) thrusting. And that is a plot point, people.

I’ve also conducted research into velociraptors’ sex lives, because again, integrity. Unfortunately, modern science does not seem to know the precise size nor shape of velociraptors’ ‘vagina miners’, and there’s nothing about how long they might have lasted in bed (though this article has some ideas). Luckily, Sims and Branwen are here to fill in the blanks.

The story starts out with Marga, some kind of priestess-cum-queen (sorry) of a village set in an indeterminate time period, when advanced humans and dinosaurs coexisted. She lives in a hut “draped with elk skins and gold medallion curtains”, and has recently attained her privileged role thanks to her mother’s retirement. Her main duties are supervising the protection of the village against ever-advancing dinosaur hordes, and producing an heir. Unfortunately, Marga isn’t attracted to any of her warriors. She had a hasty affair with one, but Marga “left with little sense of satisfaction”. There’s one man she’s almost resigned herself to settling down with, but despite the redeeming qualities of his “tan arms”, there’s just something missing. As it turns out, that ‘something’ is literal dinosaur dick.

We hear a lot about Marga as a person, and despite myself, I started enjoying the book. I do love dinosaurs, after all, and the writing isn’t appalling. I’m even starting to emote with the character. Surely, surely there’s not actually going to be any raptor-on-woman action coming up? (Coming. Up.) We hear about her bow—“When she was given her mother’s protection bow, it all began to make sense. The way her hand fit into the grip made her feel as though she was holding the hands of all of her female ancestors at once, and her shots became increasingly steady.” She cares for her mother, asking a friend to make sure that “you get more gumroot from town and plenty of mineral water [to give to mommy dear, who is presumably not into cretaceous cock].” This woman is written like an actual person, which serves to make what transpires all the more horrifying.

Marga goes to inspect an outpost, thinking about a raptor, “its big claws erect”. Then—what do you know—raptors attack! Our heroine takes a moment, “hopeful that the raptors weren’t hunting for food, but rather sensing a mate… Unfortunately, there was no way of knowing where the desired female might be.” I think we have some idea about that last part (insert dramatic foreshadowing here).

Things go awry shortly after this: there’s a detailed battle scene, warriors are killed, and Marga is carried off by a raptor, cradled in its scaly arms. Definitely not ‘cuddled’ though. There’s none of that soft stuff in this book.

Marga wakes up in a nest, the raptor grunting at her. It comes to investigate, whereupon Marga “looked down, and noticed the heavy green pouch hanging between the raptor’s legs… Her mouth gaped when she saw a pink mass emerge from it.” (At this point in reading I was somewhere between denial and fear.) Suddenly, the raptor “began to move his hips towards her, punching the air with his swollen member that glistened in the light of the cave. In that instant, Marga understood, though the reality was hard to grasp… The thought disgusted and terrified her” (Sounds like Marga was going through pretty much the same things I was.)

I am not going to make you live through what follows, though I don’t think I’ll ever be able to erase the images from my mind—or watch Jurassic Park again. But I do need to share this sentence with you. This horrible, horrible sentence: “[it was] filling the space between her legs with a fullness she’d never experienced before.”

After disengaging then a solid licking out by the raptor, Marga starts to enjoy herself. She felt “instant bliss as the firmness worked across her”. Then “Wetness fanned out from her womanhood” (this is a sentence that should never be used under any circumstances, let alone with regard to dino-rotica). A couple of sessions of dry heaving later, I moved past ‘horror’ to full-blown hysteria, and was amazed to find that the raptor’s prehistoric penis was perfectly shaped to stimulate this woman’s g-spot. So what men of her own species weren't able to do, this raptor was delivering on. Tempted, anybody?

At this point I should probably mention that at no point can you forget that this woman is having sex with a dinosaur. Every sentence not describing the effects of the sauropod’s sausage was detailing its scales, its arms, its claws as they grasped her leather bodice. There’s no forgetting. There’s no escape!

Marga has a couple of orgasms, then as the raptor gets closer, he “becomes animalistic.” Because being an actual animal was apparently not animalistic enough.

I’m giving this book a 1/10: the part before the scaly sex wasn’t awful. The horror of what followed, though. The horror. *Shudder*

Before I start running head-first at walls to try and give myself retrograde amnesia, I’ll leave you with one last quote: “[Marga] wondered what this might mean about her. Would any normal woman enjoy a raptor filling her like that?”

Well, Marga, wonder no more—the answer is a resounding fucking “NO."

I will never describe myself as ‘loving dinosaurs’ ever, ever again.

- HotBot

25/11/2014