Matt Stevens (![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} kent_allard_jr) wrote,@ 2008-04-18 05:45:00 |
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The Shark Infested Custard
One of my favorite authors is Charles Willeford (1919-1988). When I first read him it was soon after Pulp Fiction and the similarities were striking, with the same combination of humor, shocking violence and long, digressive dialogue. Willeford was best known for the Hoke Moseley novels, starting with Miami Blues (1984), but the most Tarantino-esque of his novels was the Shark-Infested Custard, oddly enough, since it was published posthumously in the 90s and there's no way Tarantino could have read it.
Anyway, The Shark-Infested Custard (the title's a metaphor for Miami) was about four swingers in the 1970s. I thought about it after my last entry, since at point, one of the guys sings up for a computerized dating service, and he has to fill out a questionnaire. Told by his friends, naturally, to lie his ass off, he gets to religion:
Larry eventually gets a date ... with a Jewish girl, who asked him to drop his draws in an elevator so she could see an uncircumcised penis. He was creeped out, but he kept dating the girl because he liked playing snooker with her dad. It was that kind of book.
One of my favorite authors is Charles Willeford (1919-1988). When I first read him it was soon after Pulp Fiction and the similarities were striking, with the same combination of humor, shocking violence and long, digressive dialogue. Willeford was best known for the Hoke Moseley novels, starting with Miami Blues (1984), but the most Tarantino-esque of his novels was the Shark-Infested Custard, oddly enough, since it was published posthumously in the 90s and there's no way Tarantino could have read it.
Anyway, The Shark-Infested Custard (the title's a metaphor for Miami) was about four swingers in the 1970s. I thought about it after my last entry, since at point, one of the guys sings up for a computerized dating service, and he has to fill out a questionnaire. Told by his friends, naturally, to lie his ass off, he gets to religion:
"What's your religion, Larry?"
"None, really, but I used to go to the Unitarian Church once in awhile in Gainesville."
"You can't put that down. That's the last thing you want, a date with a Unitarian. They're weird, man."
"I know. They were weird in Gainesville, but they weren't inhibited, either."
"Put down Church of England."
"Episcopalian?"
"No, Church of England. That way they can match you with Episcopalians and lapsed Roman Catholics. If you happen, by chance, to get a real Church of Englander, they aren't concerned with morality, anyway. Episcopalians are all time-servers, and lapsed Catholics have a sense of guilt they're always trying to deny. A girl who thinks sex is dirty, and feels guilty about it, can be a damned good piece of ass."
Larry eventually gets a date ... with a Jewish girl, who asked him to drop his draws in an elevator so she could see an uncircumcised penis. He was creeped out, but he kept dating the girl because he liked playing snooker with her dad. It was that kind of book.
