Neo-Decadence

[Zaharoff]

Quote Originally Posted by gveranon

I notice there's a link for Amazon but not for Snuggly Books. Do they prefer orders through Amazon now (maybe because of Covid or some other reason)?

I placed an order from Snuggly a few weeks ago, and everything went OK.
I prefer to buy direct. Amazon gets enough money as it is.

[Justin Isis]

Quote Originally Posted by gveranon

Quote Originally Posted by Justin Isis NEO-DECADENCE: 12 MANIFESTOS, is now available for order from Snuggly Books. Neo-Decadence: 12 Manifestos: Murphy, Damian, Crisp, Quentin S, Isis, Justin: 9781645250630: Amazon.com: Books I notice there's a link for Amazon but not for Snuggly Books. Do they prefer orders through Amazon now (maybe because of Covid or some other reason)?

NEO-DECADENCE: 12 MANIFESTOS can now be ordered directly from Snuggly here, as well as from Amazon here:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1645250636/

 

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1645250636/

[Michael]

I just buy Snuggly's Bundle the second they release it. Best to play it safe.

[Justin Isis]

NEO-DECADENCE: 12 MANIFESTOS has just been featured on Dennis Cooper's blog, with photos of all contributors and generous excerpts from all 15 (yes, it is actually more than 12) manifestos. So check it out here. This should give some idea of what it is about, for people who are still wondering.

And all-purpose fashion-forward arts site THE AITHER has given it an insightful review as well. Check here.

This may have already been pointed out, but 12 MANIFESTOS also features a manifesto penned by longtime TLO contributor ramonoski, which should be of interest to people here...

The next Neo-Decadent volume (a fiction anthology) is in the works, and could see print some time around the end of this year at the earliest...so stay tuned for more.

	TLO THOMAS LIGOTTI ONLINE

[bendk]

Is that real fur? Yes or no.

[Justin Isis]

Quote Originally Posted by bendk

Is that real fur? Yes or no.

It is not...everything in this is pure artifice.

[Michael]

My copy JUST came in!!

[Frater_Tsalal]

THE NEO-DECADENT MANIFESTO OF REVIEWING BOOKS ONLINE

1. There are no rules for writing Neo-Decadent book reviews. Here are some rules for writing Neo-Decadent book reviews.

2. When reviewing a book, the Neo-Decadent does not merely regurgitate plot details, analyze themes, or cherry-pick favorite sentences: in fact, mentioning the book at all is the height of Neo-Passéist mediocrity and should best be avoided as a sign of bad taste. The role of the Neo-Decadent book reviewer is NOT to review the book as a physical artifact but instead to represent its very soul and Inmost Light. Likewise, we seek not to colonize the conscious mind of our reader but to instead infect their very dreams with the piss of angels and the dandruff of demons.

3. Ideally, a book should be reviewed long after it has been published, when it has passed into the collective unconscious and thus forgotten by humanity in general. The aesthetic meta-ruins of a book are always more enticingly beautiful than a book newly released. The same goes for obscurity. Books that have been read by more than five people should NEVER be reviewed as they have been irretrievably corrupted by the eyes of the Profane. To the Neo-Decadent book reviewer the ideal book is one that has never been read, or published, or written, or for that matter even conceptualized.

4. You should never seek to sway the minds of others with your book reviews: the last thing you would want to do is convince them to read the book in question. Better to demolish all opposing viewpoints utterly and banish them to the dustbins of history with a mocking sneer, as anything that existed before the nativity of Neo-Decadence is hopelessly obsolete. Slaughter your childhoods and murder the past!

5. When reviewing books, be sure to avoid the usage of conventional words, phrases, ideas, even modes of common shopworn expression. As Novelty is the Godhead, it’s far more important that one makes up one’s own personal/private language to express their deepest and darkest thoughts and desires. With that in mind, the conventional sentence “I really enjoyed reading this book” could just as easily be translated as {K ylirt jumbdulla yuriobastic fgqbzfdas sixl pxop\\+>. While it may SEEM like clarity of expression can be a useful tool (for example, in the mass dissemination of nascent literary socio/political/cultural movements), it’s actually for suckas and is a repressive meme-prison designed by the Archons of our Aeon of the Anthropocene, representative of various monolithic monogamous monotheistic materialistic imperialistic fascist American thanatopic Westernized binary patriarchal Anglospheric pseudo-Victorian capitalistic corporate control industries. Smash the control machine! Well, except maybe when it comes to controlling your bladder or your bowels. There you might want SOME control.

6. The review as vaporware: an appraisal of a book that vanishes from the world 5 minutes after it’s posted. Rule Impermanence!

7. It is well-known that denim is the root of all evil, to the extent that it can even be said that it has hopelessly infected the 5 letters that constitute its name. Ergo, the Neo-Decadent reviewer of books should strive to avoid using any words with those 5 letters entirely in their reviews. Admittedly, this may prove a difficult task but perseverance is key.

8. It is the bane of the strongly opinionated to have their reviews attacked by the Neo-Passéist hoi polli. While it is best to avoid engaging with such trolls entirely, should you feel the need to do so, playground taunts make an effective weapon. Some suggestions in this regard would include “kiss my grits,” “up your nose with a rubber hose,” or the blunt but effective Skank comeback: “Shut your stinking trap!”

9. The Neo-Decadent book reviewer should always strive to avoid comfort, safety, privacy and leisure when penning their book reviews. They should typically compose their reviews blindfolded, while lying on a bed of nails and wearing a hairshirt, on a malfunctioning and virus-infected computer, surrounded by famished wolves, while squatting in a derelict building that could collapse at any moment, on a Friday the 13th of a Chinese zodiac bad luck year. If one’s budget allows it, hire some local kids to throw wasp nests at you during the process, along with a sex dwarf to whip your arse, to make the whole exercise as annoying and painful as possible. Remember, the resulting review should be as awkward and difficult to read as it was to write. Bonus points if you cut your fingers off first and type out your review with bloody stumps.

10. skyscraper.c:373: sparkly error before 'mouth' - soggy tablecloth in toy phone. I'd rather mop up kitchen spills with Hansel and Gretel than vomit over Fred Flintstone. Play football with Bugs Bunny, RavenBlack! Play football with Bugs Bunny like a rubber muppet! Don't you just love it when you sing “Mint Car” to Canadian Mounties and your teapot gets black and white? I'm a level 5 Flying carpet, in shirt-world! I've got a magic strange object and everything! Don’t come in crying to mummy when you find yourself transformed into some A.I. mushroom gestalt-being.

* * * *

All joking aside, this is a very interesting collection of diverse (and sometimes contradictory) ideas. Very well and good, and in any case the Bible has shown us that our holy books need not be consistent. At first I thought it would be rough-going for me, as I’m a genre-loving pro-nostalgic manifesto-hating traditionalist (well, a traditionalist of queer angles), but I breezed through it in 3 days while sipping non-alcoholic Mai Tais and listening to obscure Coil albums. Naturally, I probably disagreed with 50% of the ideas expressed herein (okay, more like 75% . . . well, probably closer to 90% if I'm being totally honest), but what matters is that, because none of the contributors phoned it in and gave it their all, it made even the ideas and modes of thought I disagreed with to be a delight. The book made me smile, made me angry, made me laugh, made me cry, made me paint my toenails different colors and sing praises to my blue Madison Park Kelsey Ottoman Pouf, etc. And if you can get past the paradox that a book seemingly tailor-made for the younger generation yet where the majority of its contributors are well-past the age of 30, you will find that some of its theories aren’t entirely wrong-headed. After all, Minimalism IS like “...a hideous tax accountant with a protruding jaw who has not even the good sense to wear clashing colors.” Musicians SHOULD compose their own requiems. Alan Turing IS the “poster boy of superficiality.” Chaos Magick WAS a “...spectacular flop” (on the other hand, it DID give us Grant Morrison’s THE INVISIBLES, so, uh, maybe not). Khublai Khan WAS a modern. Bizarro DOES suck. In any event, a book that likens eating at horizontal tables with the assumption of Austin Osman Spare’s Death Posture, or that presents us with sentences such as "...sunflowers with bright brown faces and crowns of insolent gold, their spirits those of drunken jesters mocking the ugly solemn sky," is all but guaranteed to light a Promethean conflagration in the cockles of my Gothic aortal chambers. Now get off my lawn!

[Justin Isis]

The NEO-DECADENCE EVANGELION anthology is now available for order from Zagava, here. The book is available in both a numbered and a high-quality lettered edition with lavish production values.

"The Neo-Decadents, those Post-Naturalist culture sluts of the 21st Century Empire of Ruins, present eleven new international tales of Altermodern dissipation: the rot, rutting, riots and resignation linking India, Japan, Iran, Romania, Italy, England and other glittering jewels of our tedious global capitalist hegemony, all detailed in prose with more convolutions than the shell of a venomous marine snail. Lull yourself into a synthetic opioid stupor of the literary consciousness with these stories of fashion, self-absorption, drugs, murder, Internet anomie and excessive retro gaming, penned by some of today’s most attractive, well-dressed and impolite young authors.

The perfect book for your nervous unmarried uncle who can't stop collecting tweed waistcoats, or your aggressive lesbian sister who is really too into unpopular and historically-inaccurate pagan rituals.

THIS ANTHOLOGY INCLUDES: at least 60% more sex and violence than earlier editions, making it especially appropriate for younger readers."

Contributors include Brendan Connell, Golnoosh Nour, Justin Isis, Arturo Calderon, Gaurav Monga, Audrey Szasz, Colby Smith, LC von Hessen, James Champagne, Kristine Ong Muslim and Damian Murphy.

[Zaharoff]

Quote Originally Posted by Justin Isis

The NEO-DECADENCE EVANGELION anthology is now available for order from Zagava.

Thank you, Justin. Any idea when you expect this to be out?