Mykle Hansen

Help! A bear is eating Marv Pushkin!

And, uh, that's pretty much it. That was the easiest review I've ever written.

Well, okay, maybe that's not all of it.

What happens when you have a complete narcissist stuck in the middle of the Alaskan wilderness (insert Sarah Palin joke here) underneath his SUV getting eaten by a bear? You have Help! A Bear is Eating Me! by Mykle Hansen.

It's been said that there are three basic plots: Man vs. man, man vs. nature, and man vs. himself. While this book at show more first seems like it would be man vs. nature just by the title alone, it quickly becomes apparent that this plot is actually man vs. himself. This book is a character study in its purest form. It's told in a complete stream-of-consciousness style where you read Marv's entire thought process during the days he is trapped under his SUV being slowly eaten by a bear and waiting for rescue. He flashes back to his version of events throughout his life and how it led up to him being in this predicament. There's nothing left out of this stream, so you'll read everything he's thinking, hallucinations and all.

Marv Pushkin is probably on the most unlikable characters you will ever read about, which tests the literary hypothesis that the protagonist, while flawed, always needs to be likable, or at least redeemable, to the reader. Marv has no redeeming values. He's an ad executive, a bully, a philanderer, and completely self-centered. He thinks of himself as a gift to the universe and that through the power of positive thinking, the universe is there to serve him. As the book progresses, though, you discover that everything is not peachy-keen with Marv. He's got some serious demons and has a history of mental illness. At times, you're not entirely sure if what he's describing is what's actually happening or if it's just happening in his head. So, while he doesn't have a redeeming value, he does have a certain sympathetic value, and the reader come to feel sorry for him. Whether the reader roots for him to get out of the situation is up to each individual reader and how sympathetic they actually are.

The stream-of-consciousness style of writing is often something that puts off a lot of people. I'm actually drawn to it. It's fascinating to actually get into another person head and read every thought that goes through their mind, rather than the selected thoughts that many authors choose to show for the sake of plot. Marv, however, is the plot. In a sense, he's correct in that he is the universe, at least as it pertains to this book.

The stream-of-consciousness does get a bit choppy at times, but for the most part it flows well with a few bumps here and there. I'm not entirely sold on the ending either (which is probably not what you're expecting), but in its own way it worked, especially given what we learn about Marv during the course of the novel.

While this book is technically classified as bizarro fiction, the most bizarre thing about it is that it's published by Eraserhead Press. There's really nothing that bizarre about it. So if you're expecting a genuine bizarro book, or what you may think of when you think about bizarre fiction, you'll probably be disappointed. If you're looking for a genuine character study of a severely broken man who doesn't know he's broken, then you'll definitely want to read this.

Help! A Bear is Eating Me! by Mykle Hansen earns a solid 4 bear cubs out of 5. show less

I purchased this book, "Rampaging Fuckers of Everything on the Crazy Shitting Planet of the Vomit Atmosphere", based solely on its title alone. But, my god, it's brilliant, and I've never really read anything quite like it before. It's rude, crude, and breathtakingly funny. Apparently there's this entire genre of fiction out there that I've never heard of called bizarro fiction. I WILL be tracking down more bizarro in the near future.

This book contains three satirical novella-length stories show more about three very nasty apocalypses:

"Monster Cocks" A tale of penis enlargement gone horribly awry. Giant detachable killer schlongs... enough said.

"Journey to the Center of Agnes Cuddlebottom" A large group of doctors, journalists, entrepreneurs, marines, rockstars, concert-goers, cocaine addicts, and one chimpanzee are shrunk and deposited inside the anus of a dying woman. Hilarity ensues.

"Crazy Shitting Planet" I just can't explain this one. But check this out: "Tonight I hate the stars. Tonight the stars are ugly stupid specks, flaws in the darkness. They can't help me and they never could. Tonight I'm hanging upside-down in my bed of ropes, watching Mrs. Teeth suck the marrow from another man's bones while the giant floating fat woman wails and the mad pirates laugh and the never-ending world of filthy shit reeks in all directions. Tonight I stare out over the shit-dark sea watching the nun-ship burn. I eat my piece of nun, and wait for Gertie the Whale to take me down." show less

Forse, quando in questo Stato si decideranno a sbattere fuori a calci quei quattro straccioni di eschimesi e cominceranno a cercare un po’ di petrolio, avranno le risorse per importare qualche poliziotto bello tosto, come quelli delle nostre periferie degradate, e mettere in riga gli orsi. (17)

Ma io non appartengo al regno animale. Io sono cittadino degli Stati Uniti, cazzo! (26)

E’ una specie di hippy invecchiato. Ha sempre magliette anni Settanta, calzoncini da jogging, baffi grigi show more impomatati e capelli dello stesso colore raccolti in un codino: uno schifo, in sostanza. (36)

Negli anni Cinquanta l’America aveva attaccato e quasi messo al suo posto la natura, ma poi torme di capelloni abbracciabalene erano riusciti ad infiltrarsi nelle infrastrutture della societa’ e avevano indebolito la nostra resistenza. (113)

Okay, il terrorismo e’... be’, non e’ facile da spiegare, …
No, no, no. Non io, non gli umani, sono gente diversa, completamente diversa. Hanno turbanti e barbe lunghe e sfrangiate. Se vedi qualcuno col turbante e la barba lunga che si intrufola da queste parti, non fartelo scappare, mangialo subito, okay? (139) show less

Mykle Hansen lives in Portland Oregon and I am pretty sure he has live feeds of the max trains which he monitors avidly for footage of people reading his books on mass transit. This is where I read the majority of this book and it was the most uncomfortable experience I have had in years. If he doesn’t have such a feed, he should chat with TriMet and work something out…

I would welcome a chance to interview him and dig into the crackpot lounge of his brain for cigarette butts.

I loved this show more book, and as my introduction to the splatterpunk genre, I do not think that I could have lucked out better. If you read the below summaries and find even vacant humor, you should check this book out. Not even vacant humor?… leave this one alone. The exclusion to this logic would be every IT admin in the world, as they should read this regardless of their opinion. Monster Cocks will make them chortle between sessions of slack jaw amazement.

‘Rampaging Fuckers of Everything on the Crazy Shitting Planet of the Vomit Atmosphere’ is broken out into three novelettes (the cover says novels), ordered as follows:

MONSTER COCKS: This is the tale of a man who finally succumbs to the spam advertising in his email box. In an effort to increase his penis size, and by proxy impress the woman he obsesses over, a man buys every penis enlargement gimmick on the market and then takes it all at once. Things fail to go as planned when his penis begins to take control of daily life.. and grows it’s own eyes..

Every chapter has a big penis drawing as the header. I found this to be both awesome and embarrassing. It all depended on if someone on the train was looking over my shoulder. In some cases it made people give me more room, allowing for more comfortable transit on the max. This chapter is a space maker as people give you room, unsure what kind of person would be reading it.

JOURNEY TO THE CENTER OF AGNES CUDDLEBOTTOM: Scientists learn how to fold space allowing for matter to be shrunk to the nth degree. The only problem is that organic matter tends to explode once it reaches a certain point unless it is encased in like material. Tested on an 80 year old drug addicted prostitute, scientists learn that by shrinking the material and having it reside in the anus of a comatose whore, the explosions can be avoided. This is a journalistic interview piece with all the people who explored the uncharted territory of Agnes Cuddlebottom’s anus prior to the terrible catastrophe that the world never saw coming.

Every chapter has a big pair of ass cheeks. This was less troublesome on the train as when squinting, it would appear like a drawing of a peach.

CRAZY SHITTING PLANET: In a world drowning in the trash and fecal matter of a floating sky paradise, what is a boy to do with his days? Living every day ingesting trash and plastic, allowing the organisms in his body to assist in turning garbage to nutrients. When a boy and his best friend are caught in a tidal wave of liquid shit, they must struggle to survive and find a way to coexist with the ins and outs of day to day, floating in an ocean of poo on a very strange life raft… Oh yeah, there are pirates there too.

Every Chapter was headed with a steaming drawing of curly-que poo. This one was hard on the train. One particular day, a woman was standing over me while the train broke down. After forty minutes of her watching me turn pages, when we were finally moving again she would only make huffing noises at me and feign interest in the ceiling. Later someone else stopped me before departing the train. From 30 feet away, they saw the title and cover and had to.. HAD TO know what in the good goddamn I was reading and laughing over. The people sitting near this person were not as interested in the description I shared.

That’s it, go buy it if you want it. Then come back here and tell me what you thought of Lassie’s adventures.. I am interested in your opinions :) show less