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Everyone else thinks this is a stupid idea, but they can just suck rope, can't they. So here it is. I want to see more international bestselling fiction about serial killer's parents. It's an effing brilliant concept and I'm inspired to elaborate. And so I shall...here's the thing. Mass quantities of people get obsessed with reading the paper backed lives of the big names in serial killing, and have for decades. Call it morbid interest, call it nothing else to read on the plane, the fact remains...they have always been a popular genre. I think it's people's innate need to understand one another. They try and get into the murderer's head to see what makes them tick. The evidence for this lies in the popularity of crap shows like Law and Order and CSI, as well as the various spin/knockoffs.
But you can't get inside these people's heads. They're off their nut. That's why they kill and eat people or stuff their pieces in jars...they're crazy. You can't understand that, no matter how much you read about their obsession with JD Salinger novels and bad grades in elementary school. What IS interesting to me are their parents. What the hell is their deal? Is the fault with them? What must if feel like to be the mother of Ted Bundy? And what's her story anyway? Did she like JD Salinger?
The interesting thing to me is that the parents are considered relatively normal in comparison to their twisted offspring. So how did the twisted offspring get so twisted? Could the parents have stopped them? I don't know, I think it's an enigmatic topic.
I got the idea from listening to a This American Life episode where Lee Harvey Oswald's mother is being interviewed. She keeps going on and on about what a good boy Lee was. Nevermind this assisination business, her kid was a good boy. I find that fascinating. And anyone who doesn't is stupid.
So now someone needs to start writing this stuff. It won't be me. I can't be bothered with the research aspect of it. I can't even muster the gusto to do this blog once a week.
My new year's resolution is to read all my own books. There should be a rule somewhere that makes it so you can't purchase or receive any new books until you've read all the ones that you already have. But then Barnes and Noble would go out of business. It's pretty silly, though, some of the books on my shelves that I have read and which ones I haven't. I have Thus Spoke Zarathustra by Neitzsche next to Snow Falling on Cedars. Guess which one I've read? Hint...not the one more recently turned into a major motion picture. It's ridiculous. The Complete Kama Sutra is next to The Buying of the President 2004. Again, which one would you guess I've read? Wrong...I've had that stupid Kama Sutra book for years and I've never so much as read the introduction.
Reading has most certainly taken a backseat to other forms of entertainment. It's a shame, but at the same time...all things will go extinct eventually. Don't get me wrong, I'm not putting the written word in the same category as the 8-track or anything, it's just that, I can't invite friends over to read with them, by the time I get in bed I can't stay awake for more than a page or two, the bus ride isn't quite long enough for me to get involved with a story before I have to get off, I get car sick on long trips if I look down too much. So what's there to do? Do I become a hermit to make sure I get the recommended daily allowance of intellectual stimulation? Or is that being fulfilled by The Daily Show?
And honestly, much of what comes hot off the press now is as much drivel as you're average thirty minute sit-com. I mean, Paris Hilton has been published for Christsake. What does that say about the world of books in the modern century? That they're nothing more than merchandizing for bad reality television. It's all pulp fiction. Of course, there are exceptions. But those are always a thousand pages or more and who has time to read that without becoming a hermit? It's a viscious cycle.Ok, let's go see how many pages of Harry Potter I can get through before falling asleep. My guess is not even a chapter.
