by Ernest Hogan
In this era of the vanishing bookstore, I find a lot of books in antique stores. That’s where the title Rex Lee On the Border Patrol snagged my eyeballs. I yanked it off the shelf, eager to check out the cover, and was surprised. Instead of the six-guns and somberos pulp art there was a twisted view of a smoking World War One biplane and a guy falling to certain death.
Confused, I turned to the front flap of dust jacket:
“Framed” by Dave Fitzpatrick, the powerful and notorious Texas border criminal, Rex Lee faces disgrace. A quantity of opium, “planted” by Fitzpatrick, has been found in the ship of the intrepid young flyer, and he is accused of being a smuggler. But, Rex’s father is a power in Texas politics and soon strong influence are at work to bear Fitzpatrick and prove the air hero’s innocence.
The book's hooks dug into my curiosity. Copyright date was 1928. And the frontispiece was more like I was expecting: a scene of stiff figures and awkward perspective in which a sombrero was sent flying by the impact of an all-Americano fist.
On the back cover, the publisher, Grosset & Dunlap, touted the author, Thomson Burtis as a real life version of the rootin’-tootin’, rip-roarin’ hero:
All the air lore and thrilling exploits of the author’s own experiences as an army flyer have gone into this red-blooded series of a daredevil young American who became one of the country’s greatest heroes of the sky.
Like a lot of writers, Burtis has a variety of other jobs: postal clerk, hobo, actor, writer, mutton-chop salesman, preacher, roughneck in the oil fields, newspaperman, flyer, scenario writer in Hollywood and synthetic clown with the Sells Floto circus!
Rex Lee is literally a cowboy with a plane instead of horse, back from the GreatWar, ready to take on the world. The western genre updated for the new century. He was like a lot of other pulp heroes of the time, a brother to the two-fisted heroes in Amazing Stories, that included Buck (called Anthony in the magazine stories) Rogers.
Though essential to the plot, drugs aren’t a big part of the story. The opium planted in Rex’s plane isn’t described. The effects of drugs on people or society aren’t mentioned. It’s like the film La Banda De Carro Rojo, based on Paulino Vargas’ pioneering narcorrido, with Los Tigres del Norte acting as a musical Greek chorus, where the drugs don’t make it on screen. Also like Mickey Spillane’s Kiss Me Deadly, where Robert Aldrich had no trouble changing Mike Hammer’s adversaries into dealers of radioactive materials rather than heroin.
Drugs are just an excuse for daring-do.
And even though the book has the expected 1928 racism, Mexicans turn out not to be the brains behind the drug smuggling. There’s a stereotypical bandido from whom the hero rescues a pretty white girl -- she's also from a "good" family -- but the illegal operation is run by an Anglo American corrupt business/gangster (is there a difference between the two?) who takes over a border town, and brings in Mexicans to do the heavy lifting and thug-work
As it’s explained to Rex: “It’s a teeny little place, as you can see, but there’s something funny about it. Awful lot o’ spigs here, and hardly a single negro. Pretty rough sort of gang o’ whites and about half of ‘em don’t seem to be doing a thing to justify living.”
Like some folks here in Arizona have explained to me: “We won’t have crime if we just keep the Mexicans out.”
We still have Mexican bad guys, and all these years later, they aren’t evil geniuses. Maybe what 21st century pop culture needs is a Mexican supervillain, like Fu Manchu, who can take on the likes of James Bond and Sherlock Holmes. It would be nice if we could be feared for our diabolical brains for a change.
Ernest Hogan is back from a vacation in New Mexico. He’ll now be blogging about it, and working on the new editions of his novels, and his first short fiction collection.
Border Patrol Nation
Most U.S. citizens tend to think stopping undocumented workers at the border is a good thing that won't affect them. They should check out Todd Miller's new book about what militarization has done to the Land of the Free. It's entitled Border Patrol Nation: Dispatches from the Front Lines of Homeland Security and here's some facts from it.
"The U.S. borders have long been Constitution-free zones where more or less anything goes, including warrantless searches of various sorts. In the twenty-first century, however, the border itself, north as well as south, has not only been increasingly up-armored, but redefined as a 100-mile-wide strip around the country.
"Our “borders” now cover an expanse in which nearly 200 million Americans, or two-thirds of the U.S. population, live. Included are nine of the 10 largest metropolitan areas. If you live in Florida, Maine, or Michigan, for example, no matter how far inland you may be, you are “on the border.” You can be stopped, interrogated, and searched “on an everyday basis with absolutely no suspicion of wrongdoing.”
Omnidawn Fabulist Fiction Chapbook Contest
I own a copy of a previous winner, In A Town Called Mundomuerto, and love the magical realist writing of author Randall Silvis. Anyway, the submission period for this contest doesn't begin until August, but this posting will give you speculative fiction writers time to get manuscripts prepared. There is a reading fee.
From the Omnidawnwebsite:
The winner of the annual Omnidawn Fabulist Fiction Chapbook Competition receives a $1,000 prize, publication of their chapbook with full-color cover, 100 copies, and display advertising and publicity.Fabulist Fiction includes magic realism and literary forms of fantasy, science fiction, horror, fable, and myth. Stories can be primarily realistic, with elements of non-realism, or primarily, or entirely non-realistic.
Open to all writers. All stories must be original, in English, and unpublished. 5,000 to 12,000 words, consisting of either one story or multiple stories. Online entries must be received between Aug. 1 and Oct. 22, 2014. Reading fee $18. We expect to publish the winning chapbook in August of 2015.
About Omnidawn: "Since 2001, we publish writing that opens us anew to the myriad ways that language may bring new light, new awareness to us.
We began Omnidawn because of our belief that lively, culturally pertinent, emotionally and intellectually engaging literature can be of great value, and we wanted to participate in the dissemination of such work. We believe our society needs small presses so that widely diverse ideas and points-of-view are easily accessible to everyone.”
Issues Science Fiction Contest
If you're more into writing "hard" sci-fi, here's a contest with a $1500 honorarium and only requires one-page about what you would write! No reading fee.
"Authors should submit a précis or brief treatment (no more than 250 words) of a science fiction story idea that explores themes in science, technology, and society. Submissions must be received by June 1, 2014.
"Stories should fall into one of the following five theme areas: Big data / artificial intelligence / brain science; Education / jobs / future of the economy; Defense / security / privacy / freedom; Biomedicine / genetics / health / future of the human; Future of scientific research / automation of research & discovery. IST will select up to five semi-finalists for each category. Authors will have 3 months to submit their story, between 2,500 and 5,000 words. Winning stories will be published in IST, and authors awarded a $1,500 honorarium. Read all the details."
Issues in Science and Technology (IST), a quarterly journal that explores the intersections of science, technology, society, and policy. The editors of IST believe science fiction (SF) can help to bring key challenges and dilemmas in science and technology to an influential readership in new and compelling ways. Scientists, engineers, researchers, and policymakers often only see small pieces of an issue. SF writers can imagine entire worlds. By fully thinking through how today’s critical issues will play out, science fiction inspires, cautions, and guides those shaping our future. Throughout 2015, IST will publish one SF story per issue, on topics of broad societal interest.
Denver Museo's children's summer camp
Latino Science Fiction Explored
And if you haven't heard yet, I'll be in L.A. next week and hope to meet and talk with everyone who can attend. This is a precedent-setting gathering of 6 Latino sci-fi authors! What could happen? Quién sabe, pero vamos a ver.
The Science Fiction and Technoculture Studies Program at University of California, Riverside will host “A Day of Latino Science Fiction” next Wednesday, April 30, to be held in the Interdisciplinary Symposium Room (INTS 1113). Free and open to the public.
The morning author panel will feature 1. Mario Acevedo, author of the bestselling Felix Gomez detective-vampire series (The Nymphos of Rocky Flats, chosen by Barnes & Noble as one of the best Paranormal Fantasy Novels of the Decade, and finalist in the Colorado Book Awards and the International Latino Book Awards.
2. Science-fiction and cyberpunk novelist Ernesto Hogan (Cortez on Jupiter); the co-authors of Lunar Braceros 2125-2148, 3. Rosaura Sánchez and 4. Beatrice Pita. The afternoon panel features writer and director 5. Jesús Treviño (Star Trek: Voyager, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, and Babylon 5 and the book The Fabulous Sinkhole); and Michael Sedano, La Bloga Latino lit blogger; as well as Ph.D. candidates Danny Valencia, Rubén Mendoza and Paris Brown.
6. I'll be there talking about my alternate-world fantasy novel The Closet of Discarded Dreams (and about sci-fi stories) that took honorable mention in the International Latino Book Awards’ Fantasy/Sci-Fi, last year.
Come and find out about getting your spec lit published, the market for Latino sci-fi, the state of Latino spec lit and what the future might hold for our obras. It should be a chingón time, and we hope you come to add your voice and opinions. Check the details, especially about parking.
Es todo, hoy,
RudyG
Though essential to the plot, drugs aren’t a big part of the story. The opium planted in Rex’s plane isn’t described. The effects of drugs on people or society aren’t mentioned. It’s like the film La Banda De Carro Rojo, based on Paulino Vargas’ pioneering narcorrido, with Los Tigres del Norte acting as a musical Greek chorus, where the drugs don’t make it on screen. Also like Mickey Spillane’s Kiss Me Deadly, where Robert Aldrich had no trouble changing Mike Hammer’s adversaries into dealers of radioactive materials rather than heroin.
