Friday, October 24, 2008

Recipe For A Best Seller

Gothic novel: A novel written in a style which emphasizes the grotesque, mysterious, and desolate.

Interviews With The Dead: Unravel The Secrets You Thought Were Lost Forever

What do you do when you have half a day to whip up a novel?

First choose a small second hand French text book with pictures. Second sew 10-15 pages together, making sure that each page has a person's portrait on it. You should end up with 8-10 pages to decorate. Paint the cover and inside pages black. Don't cover the faces with paint, but do dry brush the outer edges of them. Adhere creepy pictures. Paint more black over the raw edges of the glued on images. Dry brush vermilion and chalky white over everything. Affix hardware, keys, and ephemera to the cover and some inside pages. Add the text.

Inside cover: Map of Paris with all the cemetaries circled

Paul investigated the paranormal events that happened in his family mansion.
He died of fright.


Poor Paul. You will be missed.

Marie was always strange. She kept to herself and wrote cryptic poetry that her publisher
didn't understand. She had a cult following of young girls and older men.


Mysterious Marie

Colette's mother was a famous gypsy from whom she learned the art of reading tea leaves
and palms. She often saw love in her client's futures.


Famous fey Colette

Marcel spent most days pondering the meaning of his life.

Consequently, Marcel was plagued by depression

Andre was just plain weird.

Circles fascinated him

Thomas' life was spent looking for the love he lost when
his mother ran away with the cable man.


Thomas, heartbroken and desolate

Robert kept the keys to his cellar on a key chain that never left his belt.
His secrets died with him. But, we still have the keys.


He left us the key to his secret life.


Seriously folks, I don't know why this wasn't a run away best seller. Do you?

13 comments:

  1. Stevie, that is great! As usual the artwork is beautiful and your comments so witty. Now you've got me really thinking about hosting a murder mystery dinner.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Perhaps not 'runaway best seller', but I'll bet everyone there read it and enjoyed it. And so did we...

    ReplyDelete
  3. I see a trip to France in my future, at least that is what my tea leaves said. That would be great because, it would be so easy to buy the French text book there!
    Quite a collection of quirky, well down right strange people in your little novel. They do make for an interesting read though. I love your altered art.
    denise

    ReplyDelete
  4. That was very interesting. I think it should be published. You are very creative and innovative. I would be curious as to where you got the pictures of those quirky people.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Trish, the people in the pictures are Marcel Proust, a novelist and Sidonie Gabrielle Colette who wrote Gigi (which was made into the movie of the same name). She used Colette as her pen name. Unfortunately I don't remember who the rest of them were.

    ReplyDelete
  6. I love this! What a fun altered book, and just right for the season ...
    :-)

    ReplyDelete
  7. To me this is a most unusual art form. It is interesting the way you have done it. - Dave

    ReplyDelete
  8. Your artwork is so amazing and I love the comments you pick for them!

    ReplyDelete
  9. Stevie! This is so magnificently weird! I was nicely creeped out by your artwork - especially the "circles" guy. Gave me a hair raising chill. Wonderful!

    ReplyDelete
  10. I had to come back to look at what I missed on your blog while I was away and I'm glad I did! I like the black background and the new banner for Halloween, and this altered book is fantastic! Very clever and artistic! I love it!

    ReplyDelete
  11. Stevie this should be a best seller now that you have given it a new face. Love it!

    ReplyDelete

I'm glad you stopped by and I look forward to your comments. As Dr. Fraser Crane would say, "Hello, I'm listening."