(no subject)

[mallorys_camera]

Carmen Hermosillo died.

I'm stunned.

Chronic ill health and an abusive relationship had turned her into something of a recluse in – ha, ha, ha! – real life but she had the most distinctive online persona you could possibly imagine, she was the Lady With the Fan in that famous Velazquez painting. The word pictures she painted were among the most vivid I've ever read as though she were a character out of a Gabriel Garcia Marquez novel. She chronicled passionate relationships with music teachers and memories of her father in a garden.

Carmen's mother died about six months before. I suspect her mother was something of a caretaker since Carmen's haughtiness cloaked a very real fragility. After the funeral Carmen fled back to Central California where some years before the tragic love affair had taken place. She lived about twenty-five miles away from me and always in the back of my mind there was this thought, I should call Carmen up, I should see Carmen…

But these days I'm pretty much a recluse too.

There's time for that later, I thought.

I was wrong.

I can't believe her voice has fallen silent.

###

In other news, I continue on my Denis Lehane reading binge.

A Drink Before the War is a serviceable first novel with a very catchy title. You could tell Lehane was feeling his way around unfamiliar territory, that he was afraid to let go. The book didn’t grab me. It did make me decide to clean out my car. This was around page 194. Anton Meriweather had just had his left eye plucked out by the evil Socia: There was a soft, unpleasant sound, the sound a shoe makes when it steps into slush.

Oh, I don’t think so, I snorted to myself. Eyes are mostly vitreous humor. They’d make no more sound hitting the ground than a teaspoon of jello. Try this one at home!

I slammed the book shut and stuffed it into my Big Black Junk Bag. Later that day the Big Black Junk Bag got shoved on to the back seat of my unspeakably filthy car, whereupon it promptly spilled dislodging its contents – composition notebooks, unopened bills, bank deposit slips, yellow pads, plastic bags for scooping dog poop – on to the floor.

I wasn't enamored of A Drink Before the War, but I did want to finish it.

Only I couldn't find it.

Was my car a conduit to another dimension of sight and sound?

Apparently because later that night the book rematerialized on my kitchen table.

Page 231: He was the kid in the photographs.

This time I threw the book across the room.

Obvious from page 210 that Roland was the kid in the photograph, but c'mon -- you don't cram The Critical Plot Point into one short throwaway sentence. You tease it out.

I no longer wanted to read the book but I'm not quite over my literary crush so I started Sacred, Lehane's Raymond Chandler homage, instead.

So far -- page 51 -- so good.

###

Also Robin returns home today. I love the boy, but yes I'm apprehensive.

Comments

[sfo2lhr.livejournal.com]

Oh my, that is a huge shock and very, very sad. I have been away from the Well for a couple of days (unusual for me) and went to go catch up but checked LJ first. This is very heavy news.

[mallorys-camera.livejournal.com]

I know. Carmen was carrying a heavy load, and she did it with class and style. A true original.