Review of 'You Private Person' by Richard Chiem

       This is Chiem's first published book, he has two e-book's out and approximately one hundred million short stories published online. He obviously went hard for You Private Person: it's heart is beating and it is drenched in sweat.

Bits and Pieces about Keep this Bag away from children vol. 2

            When Keep this Bag away from children Vol. 1 came out I dropped a mini shout-out at the end of a longer review of some other books. I've decided to go whole hog on Vol. 2 because this mag is worth it.

Bag me up

I got mine...brief review to follow

Piece in Sadcore dadwave

The online lit journal Sadcore Dadwave was kind enough to publish a short story of mine titled Whop Stick.

Story

It had been a run i had gone on.

It was the air that had been cold

My feet, but only for a little bit, were the things that had hurt.

It was the cruisy park that i had seen something

In the bushes I had seen

What had been eerie was the silence, really

Something that was there, and knowing that, but not having seen it in the...

To me anyways

Two legs maybe...

Yes two legs they had looked like

But no upper part

er...

a torso

No torso

It had been a second, no more, that I had seen it

It didn't move

The branches are what had obscured it

For a second it had turned me inside out

uh...

my stomach was tightened

This couple on the bus

     It had taken them years to find each other, but when they did they finally began to know happiness. Each had experienced a life full of the harshest trials which had etched themselves indelibly onto their faces. It was a strange ugliness however. This was not the caustic smoothing or wrinkling of years of alcohol nor the progeria of poverty (which will render a 40 year old with the face of an elder). Not the eternal exhaustion of chronic disease or the hunch and flinch of abuse. No this was a mark separate from all of these: a tiring of the very cells, a concentration of blood to strange areas of the face which gave them a wholly unique and beautiful ugliness.
     It was this, then, that had kept them alone for so long, these marks creating some unknown atavistic fear in those that they met. This indescribable and subliminal wear producing a revulsion in the very genes of the gazer. When they met each other however the mark, this untouchable ugliness, was recognized in the other immediately. And so they sit there, just down the bus from me, silent and smiling in their reward: eachother.

City on a hill (Keith at the party)

Look at this fucking done up piece of shit with his glued ass hair and white clothes I'd smash him into the ground grind glass into his faggot ass face needs some scars glistening in the moonlight probably
      -Fuck s every girl he wants with that pretty boy smile brushing twice a day with whitening toothpaste, fucking sitting in that dentist chair once every six months and I'd slip if I were drilling "Oops sorry sir! Seem to have missed there, seems to be a large hole in your face now. Well nothing I can do about it . Goodbye! So nice to see you again! Wonderful mouth really!" Even the playing field a little bit. God this shit tastes amazing
       -God this shit tastes amazing, it's...
       -I know right?!
       -It's like if 30 angels walked up and came in my mouth during some angel bukkake sesh God that was funny -Or like two angels one cup, and this is the cup. I guess two angels one can. What's with the camo on the outside?
      -I don't know, don't you love it it's so Iraqi! Like you could drink these during a war and be like "Okay!  I can drink while I fight. This is gonna be O-Kay."
      -Gonna be okay, Keith repeats this thoughtfully, looking off into the distance and stroking his chin, sprouting a meager Irish-red beard -Can I have another smokie-smoke?
      -Sure! Can your friend hook me up with a little more... A second's worth of pause as the words connect, spindles turn.
      -Yeah, yeah of course. Don't remember my fingers feeling like this, all not there and shit -So what's the deal with this little extra paper bit on the filter here, this little uh, tunnel here?
      -I heard it was so, during Vietnam, the snipers could smoke while they were looking in their little gun telescope things.
      -Wow really?
      -mmm hmmm God this chick loves it I am killing it she's getting kind of boring though and the fuck did Lana go? probably fucking some dude in the bathroom and is no one at that drink is that an unattended drink I will not allow neglected drink in my presence will not allow such alcohol abuse yoink
     -Yoink
     -Oh my gosh! I love your dance it's so funny chelsea look at his dance!
I'm on fire tonight
    -I'm on fire tonight.
Wait what's the deal? is she just ignoring me now? What the fuck happened? Where are they going? The fuck is Lana at? We came here and she ditched me and this shit tastes awful...Okay I need a goal this will be good I'm going to set a goal for tonight and fulfill that goal and fulfilling that goal is going to make me happier. Okay the goal is to drinnnnnk to drink until I can't feel anymore which, yes, this is a noble endeavor for me to undertake. what is this can number 3? and it's a yellow one which is good because I like the yellow ones sort of lemony in a floor cleaner pine-soley sort of way which covers up the piss flavor well and  I guess I'm already sort of...
    -Now this guy knows what's up! What's up guy? Double-fisting over here? Gettin' double loco I like it!
The
fuck
is this
glued ass
motherfucker?