Craveman
Hey, dude. I wanted to tell you how much I really used to dig on your music. I too grew up in Detroit and fancied myself the proverbial Motor City Madkid. Your ’70s solo records, crammed with all those droning, teenage wasteland turn-’em-up-and-go-for-it rips, simply sent me. I mean c’mon, Motor City Madhouse, Free For…
Decoration Day
If Springsteen had been born in Denton, Texas, instead of Asbury Park and weaned on Lynyrd Skynyrd and the Texas twang of the Flatlanders, he’d write songs a lot like those of the Drive By Truckers. Like the Boss, the Austin quintet excels at portraits of those clinging to society’s underside. Their outlaw fictions such…
Lowlights
You’ve heard all the comparisons before, from old-timers (Gram Parsons, Lee Hazelwood) to contemporary icons (Giant Sand, Wilco), applied ad nauseam to many so-called young bucks. This upstart, however, deserves the praise. Lowlights is California’s Dameon Lee, a gifted multi-instrumentalist swapping his hardcore punk past for a woozecore pop present. Among Lowlights’ peers one might…
City haiku I
Greg Nannini, Redford Sign of the times Prime industrial acreage Liquor lotto and more Return to the Summer Fiction index. Send comments to [email protected]
Somebody help me
The remarkable achievement of Steve James’ film is the way it draws us into Stevie’s world to the point where we actually begin to care about his fate and the whole benighted, violent, helpless and hopeless milieu he’s stuck in. Slowly, we begin to see both the larger picture and the perplexing details.
Chapter 1: School Supplies
by Jennifer Fine, Rochester Hills “You know, at any given time approximately 104 mass murderers are running around the U.S.” My best friend Suzanne paused dramatically, then continued. “Most will kill between twenty to eighty people before they get apprehended.” I tried to be subtle as I gently pulled the large machete from Suzanne’s callused…
Hot pink
by DeLeon DeMicoli, Wixom When she sat down next to me one of the first things outta her mouth was, “‘Just think of them as dead.” Before that it was, “You must be new.” Before that, “I’ve never seen you here before.” She walked in like a hot number that headlined the show. The top…
Cuckoo for cockatoos
Lori K., Redford If she tells me to turn left one more time, I’m gonna pull over and knock her teeth in. I see the goddamn sign! Willow Run Airport, turn left. How many times I gotta tell her I can read. What the hell’s she doing now? Muttering ’bout what, my driving? She’s muttering…
Untitled
Tammie Giziki, Detroit I planned to meet up with her, even though everything told me not to. I knew exactly how it would all go. It was routine, whether she knew that or not, it was. We always met up at this coffee shop that was equally as far away from her flat as mine…
My mother’s funeral, my father’s regrets
by Khan Davison, Detroit I took a hard sip of the Hennessey; hard enough to make my chest hairs stand up straight. Alice sat to the right of me as my foot tapped vigorously to a rendition of "The Thrill is Gone" by B.B. King. I was itching for my turn to get up and…
Obviating squirrels
by Kevin Dole 2, Ypsilanti The next morning he woke from the dream to find the squirrels flinging themselves at his basement window, the cold reports of their bodies against the glass. They rebounded onto the wooden walls of the window well and launched themselves again. — What do you want? — "We want in."…
Her needle name
Roadside stranded, he keeps the need for her in his teeth. Smokes out an hour of shakes as the rearview clouds. Then comes the darkness the animals know. They open mouths to his cause. And every tongue like a spurring drum brings snips, hics, and snivers to knee him down a thistle bank. On and…
Dr. Stoogelove
stooge n. One who allows oneself to be used for another’s profit or advantage. TORONTO — I’m looking at a yellowing 4 inch-by-5 inch newspaper ad that I clipped from the entertainment section of a Detroit daily 30 years ago, one which proclaims in no uncertain terms that “the bizarre” Iggy and the Stooges will…
Cinemania
Geezer: 2 stars Weezer: 2 stars If you think you’ve got problems, meet Jack, Eric, Bill, Roberta and Harvey, five New Yorkers who must see two to five films a day at the expense of almost everything else, like, say, regular bowel movements. Cinemania (a documentary by Angela Christlieb and Stephen Kijak) hits the screen…
Freaky Friday
In this umpteenth update of the switcheroo story, Jamie Lee Curtis and Lindsay Lohan have plenty of fun trying to be each other. This Freaky Friday is actually very entertaining, most of which is due to the engaging, sharp script by Heather Hach and Leslie Dixon.
Lounge lizards
Just what exactly is the good life? David Johnson and Dan Stollman think they’ve found it in their new downtown spot, Good Life Lounge. Already three weeks old, the multi-purpose space has been under construction for more than 18 months, with a VIP room almost complete, and plans to expand next door in 2004. With…
Arcturus
by Amy Elliott, Farmington Hills Arcturus only has half a million years left in our sky before it fades. You Bay and howl at the puffy light the star Cast off in 1969. Deep,you say. You’ve read the first stanza. Orange light Empties onto your face and you are carved in orange oil. Helium Fusion…
‘It’s All Good’
High Times magazine, back in 1998, magnanimously invited me to serve as High Priest of the Cannabis Cup in Amsterdam. My duties would include presiding over the induction of two great Americans, Louis Armstrong and Milton “Mezz” Mezzrow, into the Cannabis Hall of Fame; performing with my Blues Scholars band and dancers from New Orleans…
Baby beatsmiths
In a small Southfield recording studio, two 19-year-olds are hard at work producing or co-producing four new albums for Barak Entertainment. Their projects include the much-anticipated fourth album from Slum Village, the debut full-length from Phat Kat (aka Ronnie Cash), a sequel to the successful Dirty District mixtape, and a new album from MC Breed…
Busting a whistleblower
Earlier this year, Hamtramck police officer Dennis Whittie became convinced that the city’s director of the Department of Public Works was using city staff to renovate a rental home he owned. Then, during his off-hours, he investigated further, and found the same department head had recently been found guilty of committing felony fraud. Whittie then…
S.W.A.T.
This stylishly clichéd action popcorn-muncher is less inspired than derived from the mid-’70s, run-of-the-mill TV police series. S.W.A.T. may have its rare thrills, but few of its big-screen tactics are actually special — with Samuel L. Jackson, Colin Farrell and Michelle Rodriguez.
atlas all over
by Kristin M. Hatch, Ann Arbor the sky in your palm, it is milking: i could a thousand count photographs between freckles i could some graces find new just outside your lung, mainland these scapulas patent navigation better than ecco-ever better than, or at least with brows a kinder furrow amiable for /amiable smooth neck…
Figure Forty
by David Hardin, Royal Oak One second, the time it takes to inhale and exhale a breath, held for a beat then released. Not the breath of a lover or worried mother breathing in fractions of a second, held for one long moment at the touch of fingers tips or a ringing phone, released with…
Free Will Astrology
ARIES (March 21-April 19): If you’re single, this is the most favorable time in many moons to try creating a harem for yourself. But if you’re in an interesting monogamous relationship, don’t mess it up with fantasies of polyamory. Instead, brainstorm with your partner about how you could provide more variety for each other. Dress…
Summer Fiction 2003
Floating in reverie’s cool darkness, our minds drift with the tide. On the imaginary shore, just beyond our reach, strangely familiar things start happening to people we recognize (let’s call them “characters”) as we tread water and feel the words and phrases flow together. What the hell’s going on here? Ah, dear readers, it’s just…
In This Ordinary Myth
by Melinda LaPere, Detroit Hephaestus, the one who can figure things out, drives a wood paneled station wagon. He carries a low musk of perpetual coal from the boiler room. Forget Aphrodite, he rides with Hestia, keeper of the hearth. She concentrates on the road hits panic brakes on the dash wills a destination. Hephaestus’…
Kitty’s Christmas Tree Farm
by Molly Brodak, Ferndale People have always wanted particular shapes. No one sees the difficulty in this. In the morning, sometimes it is like an orchard with the strange grey belly of the sky heavy like fruit on the boughs and I must be quick, sometimes I am pruning magnificent gowns. And to hem their…
Old Men in Hats
Esperanza Cintron, Detroit I like old men in hats pork pie or broad brimmed stogies and gnarled hands gripping dapper canes of ebony or bamboo hair, close cut w/waves that remember processes and basement dos I like old men in hats who used to court their girls w/barbecue dinners and rhinestone chokers whose Hogs and…
Attacking Roe vs. Wade — Part 2
With reproductive rights hanging in balance, a new set of regulations undermine access to abortion providers This is the second installment of a two-part story on abortion rights in San Antonio. To read part 1, go to “Aborting the Right to Choose.” “She has a 2 o’clock appointment,” said the quite-pregnant girl in the red…
Pembroke Park
by Luann Rouff, Ferndale Last year, before he Decided to die, Because he didn’t know How else to live, My father brought her here. I wonder what she remembers, But say nothing. Are words dead things? Or are they living things. As binding as breath? If, at three, She has no words for it Can…
send in the clowns
by Audrey R. Shangle, Harper Woods i wanna quit school i wanna drop out i wanna lock myself in the fucking basement with a mag lite and a black roller ball pen so I can write poetry in the semi-dark all over the god-damn walls. i wanna write all day or is it night it’s…
that was now this is
by Kristin M. Hatch, Ann Arbor our love, purchased half-off rack at the second hand store, always a gamble then you played another me to sleep: there were churches milkglass windows enough to make clear faith from stale pastries to clutch the rearview by the arm and tug we drove a timemachine into earthshatter travel,…
THE SUNSET BUS
by Michael Boettcher, Detroit Downtown Detroit breathes a hollow sigh at the end of another summer weekday as the last used businessmen quiver off to their cars. I’ve waited here a few eternities as nighttime climbs up chilly skyscrapers and pigeons peck at closed-up street-corner fruit stands. You can feel the november restlessness in these…
Chocolate City Latina (Part 1)
by Esperanza Cintron, Detroit Daddy taught me to merengue when I was three The rhythms blurred with the Motown do wop a salsa and Fingertips cacophony Instead of Marin there was Coleman’s slant-eyed, cocky grin and the low-down rumble of his African laced with black bottom cadence covering the rolling r’s and labia-loaded lengua de…
At 69, Still the Birthing Dream
by Mary Ann Wehler, Troy I live in Detroit or Warren, I’m in a car, an apartment, a flat, I’m alone or with someone — but — always struggling to figure out what I need to get the job done. Sometimes the details vary. The sheets are dirty or old or lost. I can’t find…
Alter
by Vince Samarco, Auburn Clay went to see the flat at Jefferson and Alter because the line between Detroit and Grosse Pointe ran through its living room. The landlord barely described this oddity, but Clay’s family had been affected by the line for the better part of a century — his grandfather longing to shed…
Love lying on a smooth plane
During that time in his life we were all just brides, prostitutes, majas, witches or gypsies — I was a maja. Goya had been deaf for 10 years and found the work commissioned by the Spanish royalty limiting. I would lie there naked, listening to him mumble about “caprice” and “invention” as his paintbrush absorbed…
At a Denny’s on Gratiot — Volume Two
Melissa Sharpe, St. Clair Shores Some douche bag named Nick Lange likes to eat condiments. He will squirt a whole bottle of ketchup into his mouth while people look away and that girl goes to vomit. None of this explains why I’ll hug him longer than the other people when we say goodbye, but it’s…
Big Jim’s new world
by M.J. Andrews, Harper Woods Big Jim pulls himself up for the march to the lounge. This was not his march of the past to the lounge with the full bar and Friday night check cashing crowd. Now Jim skates in soft-soled slippers, takes my arm when the linoleum snakes come close. “Markie, you made…
Cuba
by Joanna Goddard, Bloomfield Hills The stewardesses didn’t seem to mind my father’s requests for peanuts. I rolled my eyes. At the hotel, he whistled Gershwin. “Shhh!” I snapped. He cracked his knuckles. He snored. He made strangers take pictures of us with his camera. I counted the days until we’d fly home. On the…
Cycle
by Beth Trombley, Royal Oak Alarm. Sigh. Haul. Daze. Shower. Commute. Caffeine. Correspond. Interact. Eat. Snack. Sigh. Compromise. Sigh. Snack. “Camaraderie.” Headache. Disgust. Frustration. Numbness. Commute. Eat. Restlessness. Desperation. Non-productivity. Depression. Apathy. Cleanse. Bed. Desperation. Dread. Toss. Fear. Turn. Anxiety. Toss. Frustration. Turn. Sadness. Loneliness. Stare. Alarm. Repeat. Return to the Summer Fiction index.
Devotional
by Lisa Middleton, Detroit Cordelia, photographer. Christina, hydrogeoligist. Two years of acquiescence, work, gaining familiarity. Then one cross-country road trip, three major arguments, and two weeks of silence later there’s a long fervent night of love-making. A real Venus-soaked session of romping. The following week two platinum bands. House. China. Years. Dinner parties. One case…
El dia de crisis
by Joanna Goddard, Bloomfield Hills We were having sex in Barcelona when the condom broke. “I was wondering why it suddenly felt so amazing,” I told him, crying. We walked onto the sun-drenched street, found a payphone, and called a friend. “Go to the hospital for emergency pills,” she advised. He bought me an apple…
First date
by T.B. Myers, Clarkston Shawn Colvin concert, summer of ’95. I sit next to her on the blanket, drinking bad white wine. Later, we eat burned Tater Tots, then go skinny dipping at 2 a.m. We’re too loud, and the neighbor threatens to call the cops (something about people having to work tomorrow). Back at…
Friends
by Erik V. Wicks, Royal Oak He hadn’t seen her in years. She e-mailed, and called him “my friend,” but whenever he wanted to see her, she demurred. She recycled old excuses; she gave every answer except “I don’t want to.” One day, he got good news. “Something came up, something good, and you helped…
Homeland security with a side of fatoosh
by A. Zayne Tawil, Grand Blanc Mike thought that working for the CIA would be exciting, but monitoring phone calls made by persons of suspicious ethnicities turned out to be painfully boring. There was one plus: Mike overheard hundreds of recipes exchanged by old ladies of every nationality imaginable. As his wife was an enthusiastic…
Mermaid
by Peter Macfarlane, Dearborn Heights I sat with a mermaid by the edge of the sea. We talked about the tides and why she turned tricks for a living. She chain smoked Pall Malls and didn’t want to talk about her mother. She asked me if I wanted her and I said, “I do, but…
The Mongoloid brother popped in
by M.J. Andrews, Harper Woods At 12 years old Phil had the waterfall conk, and he had a way of spitting, rolling his tongue and blowing it out beyond 3 sidewalk squares. We hung at Phil’s house. Part of it was his older sister at the ironing board: ratted hair, white lipstick, pink shell sweater,…
My dream about Jorge Luis Borges
by Jon Muzzall, Detroit And now I will cease this dissembling. I remember what happened when I was here. I am, in fact, Borges. Thirty years have passed and I am not blind or old or an Argentine, but I am he. The woman I wrote of then is here again too; I still have…
Resolve
by Robbin Tenglin, Dearborn Keep watching me. You think you’re smarter, somehow better, but I’ll win. I meet your cold-eyed stare across the table and I realize I’ve been sitting here for two days now. I’ll sit here a hundred more if I have to. My resolve is that much stronger. I watch. And listen.…
Return trip
by Michael Murphy, Farmington Hills He ambles through the airport, slowly. His shoes are caked with dust from the Roman Forum, his shirt is new and French, his face brown from the hot sun all over Western Europe. He’s starving and stiff and tired, but he dallies on his way to baggage claim. He wants…
The juggler
by Peter Macfarlane, Dearborn Heights When I was a boy of eight or nine my father took me to the waterfront. There were performers there with trained cats, and others who danced or mimed, but it was the juggler who garnered all of the attention my youth could afford. He wasn’t a very good juggler…
Trying to fit in
Michael O’Reilly, Royal Oak At the Christmas tree farm we saw an eight-point buck walking down one of the rows. Later he was in the parking lot with a doe and a fawn. They didn’t seem confident with their selection — maybe unfamiliar with the tradition. But there was the mangy tree on top of…
Untitled 4
by Rowan James, Dearborn The Boy leaned his head on the window and tried to glimpse the moon, which hung low and pale yellow against the night sky. He closed his eyes and saw its lunar body floating through his mind. The sound of the car radio woke him from this dream. The Driver was…
Wedding gift
by Emily K. Morris, Dearborn It is clear he has never seen a fondue pot before, but she pretends not to notice his bewilderment. His smile is stretched to the point of caricature, and he is starting to sweat. She has never wanted him more. As he skewers the bread morsels and lowers them into…
Letters to the Editor
The cop on the beat Regarding your report on the crime increase in Southwest Detroit (“Arrests trigger crime wave?,” Metro Times, Aug. 6-12), the people directly responsible are the ones who indicted the 17 officers. I’m talking about the feds, because they took the officers off the street who proactively patrolled the high crime areas…
Trying pay-per-pew
Must we pay whites to worship next to blacks? Do we need integration that badly? Bishop Fred Caldwell, pastor of the Greenwood Acres Full Gospel Church in Shreveport, La., thinks so. On Sunday, Aug. 3, he became probably the first to ever pay white people $5 an hour to attend Sunday worship services at a…
The white people’s party
Here’s a safe political prediction. Even if Democrats’ wildest dreams come true, even if they win next year’s presidential election, President George W. Bush will win a solid majority of white people’s votes. How do I know that? Because Republicans always win the white vote for president. The last time Democrats carried a majority of…
Medium and message
Thanks to a handful of intransigent artists and punks, you can now trace Detroit’s rock ’n’ roll history from its punk years through its flier art. The Punk Rock Flier Art Show at the Detroit Art Space will feature everything post-Stooges/MC5: decades of local club shows past-to-present from Sonic’s Rendezvous Band to Negative Approach, Shock…
Man’s biker boobs; Von Bondies exit the garage
One nation army We couldn’t think of a juxtaposition more droll than seeing cuddly working-class bard Man gigging in the middle of the Sturgis biker rally, an event rife with topless mechanical bull riding, Harley-straddling schtupps, and hirsute beer guzzlers numbering in the tens of thousands. E-mail reports from the one-digit punk militia were a…
August 13-19, 2003
13 WED • ART “Human Wreck: A Solo Exhibition by Bask” — What’s so exciting about contemporary art is the sense it gives us of that approaching cloud just beyond the horizon, its massive, color-saturated darkness that, before we know it, will be overhead and thrilling us with strange breezes. The show currently at Primary…
Bush bash
The president took some well-earned time off last week. Driving the world’s largest economy into the ground and getting its armed forces bogged down in a foreign quagmire — complete with fresh body bags almost daily — is enough to tire even the hardiest brush-clearin’ good ol’ boy. So it’s only natural that the prez…
It is what is was
A few years back, I had coffee with an old friend who had just moved back to town. Next to her was a man whom I had never met. This guy, a blast from the “old days,” was silent at first. He had shorn blond hair. He didn’t smile or even really acknowledge my presence…
A cruise alternative
Growing up in the blue-collar bliss of 1980s Royal Oak, the dog days of summer helped establish the pecking order: He who had the swimming pool had the say. We spent our summers playing baseball and hanging around the downtown diners until the waitresses and bus boys grew sick of our faces. Those of us…
Tigers tagged
OK, enough doom and gloom. It’s time to talk about something fun: the Detroit Tigers and how gawdawful they are. That’s not exactly a news flash to sports fans here in Motown. The Tigers have sucked giantly for a long time. But sometimes it’s nice to hear an outside perspective, which is exactly what we…
Chainsaws and sawbucks
Bad news for Michigan’s trees and the people who enjoy them: A couple of state Republicans announced they want to extend President George W. Bush’s “Healthy Forests” initiative to the Wolverine State. As with most Bush plans, envision the opposite of what the name promises and you’ll be pretty close to the actual effect. House…
Up for grabs
Abandoned Shelter of the Week This week’s designated ASS (that’s Abandoned Structure Squad for all you who are behind the times) adventurer found herself scaling the cinder blocks supporting a house more than 100 years old just to get a glimpse inside. Luckily, the tiny lady wasn’t on her own — nice guy Dennis Wojnarowski,…
