Two Cents Worth by David J. Schow

[Eeegor]

GARAGE SALE, read the sign. I saw the chromium-yellow tagboard, with its big black cartoony arrow, on my way back from the bus stop, stapled to a much-stapled phone pole. The address on the sign was dead between my building and the phone pole. Ever since de-zoning, re-zoning, or whatever other catastrophe acceptable to the City Council's bribed lackeys had befallen this former "neighborhood," the residential blocks had been carved, sliced and diced to please the developers until some bloated fat cat with a cigar in his mush, incipient cancer and a string of embezzlement acquittals had pronounced it "good," like Frankenstein's Monster sucking watery soup.

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[Circle V]

I enjoyed this story.

The social commentary, other than the rather heavy-handed depiction of the corruption of the local government, struck me as similar to that in Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451. This was likely no mistake, as one of the books mentioned in the story is another of Bradbury's. While the basic premise was revealed much too easily for my tastes (in fact, repeated in no uncertain terms several times), it appealed to me in a similar fashion as Bradbury's main message from 451 did.

It makes me very glad that literature of the more subtle sort-- of small darkness and quiet tragedies-- can still survive among the throngs of hamfisted, pretentious pieces that have consumed much of Gothic literature. It is for this reason-- that so few modern dark writers are capable of subtlety and simplicity in their writing-- that I tend to avoid the Gothic genre. I am not saying that this is a truly Gothic piece-- if it was, I likely wouldn't have enjoyed it-- but it does have a darkness of character that is quite suitable for the black-clad masses.

Thou shalt read this story. Thou shalt also read the books that have inspired it.

[Kanedawg]

Around the core of this near future tale are accurate sociological observations. The mother's illiterate manner of speech; the general paranoia on the part of all three family members and the cops; the gaming obsession; the matter-of-fact assumption of the girl's sexual conduct by her brother; the T.V. actually collecting dust as the narrator triumphantly enjoys reading. There is also the penny price on the books, that the writer in the computer mpeg is taken for some perversion, and the fact that the girl had run off. (Maybe her brother was right?)

Read a book, go to jail... weirdo! Very nice. :^)