Upsetting Day: Orson Scott Card's Lost Boys (Patreon)

Hello here we have another one birthed into this Hot Dog world from the Friends of the Library Book Sale this one is about a author who made a pretty creatof story world and wrote lots of books about it and pretty much everyone who read em was like: this is great, good job, we love you, here is a lot of awards and money. The books were important for lots of folks for teachin us at a young age about bravery and moralities and stuff and then over the years we heard more and more about the authors ‘pinions on pretty much everything and some of em were pretty gross, sayin that certain margarinized people are bad and wrong, so we did more thinking and talkin about: what do we do with tale-teller folks who are good at making storys and characters we love, but outside of that well…

Of course im natcherly talking about: Orson Scott Card.

Who if you dont know or member he wrote The Enders Game which was real popular and beloved so he made it a into a trilogy with 19 books in it and also if you didnt know he is a Mormon Fella so he wrote a fantasy series about a magickin’ Joseph Smith.

And also a series about what if the Book of Mormon had spaceships:

And then he went on to have a lot of ‘pinions about gay people and make some predications about what would happen if all adults could get married like: if that happened pretty soon you couldnt even talk about head or o’ sexuality in schools or man and woman marriage. Orson is still around and talkin a lot but lately it seems more like doin slander with teenage sci-fi boys about how Moonlighting was bad.

But today we’re talkin bout one specific book of his what I found at the book sale which answers a very important ant throw apology question: What if a Mormon person wrote a horror novel what the heck would that even look like?

Oh my goodness what do you thinks gonna happen? Here first lets talk a little about the con texts of this one: Orson said he wrote it because he didnt like the way Pet Cemetery ended.

Well at first in interviews thats what he said, but later on he remembered that what REALLY happened was he started readin Pet Cemetery and he knew write a way what was gonna happen: the little boy would die and come back evil and so he skipped ahead and yep He Was Right and he was so mad he threw the book at the wall! So he did like i guess maybe like a lot of us after we read for example Ready Player One and said: what a piece a shit, i’ll hate-write my own now, so he wrote one about a boy who died but stayed good! Spoiler!

(To me thats not really the same as M. Night Shyamalan’s Sick Sense but Orson also said Shyamalan totally ripped him off on purpose it was so obvious he could totally sue him but hes not going to)

First it was a short story about a man named Orson Scott Card who wrote Ender’s game and his good dead son, but Orson said some people were mad because they were dumb and dont know what fiction means (fake) and they criticalized he was doing a dead son stolen valor so he changed it to third person and wrote a whole novel and guess what its his own favorite book of his own now so and also later his son did die so: Checkmate.

Okay thats probly enough history background for Lost Boys: lets find out how our lds bud Orson gives us some good clean family-friendly spook-ums, first page here we go:

Oh. Ok so I guess this maybe isnt very latter-day-saintly just more like Thomas Harris, kinda depraved and bleak, monsters with humans faces type-thing, but alright i sin searly like that kinda thing too, hit me with that dark stuff Orson!

Except, huh. There’s just that first real short chapter and then we move right into a whole differnt story about a Mormon dad and mom named Step (B- mormon name) and DeAnne (A+++ mormon name) and there three kids who just moved to North Carolina because the dad is a genius video game programmer and made a lot of money on a game everybody loved called Hacker Snack but they spent all the money and now he has to get a office job writing software manuals and he is very bitter about that.

Right here is a good place to stop and note that Brother Card has said Lost Boys is his most autobiological book:

Now some of you might be realizin we’re headin into some Teasin our Mormon friends and neighbors territory and wonderin: is Sissyneck gonna get mean-spirited here and say mormons are dumb or bad as a way of feelin superior and good about hisself? The answer to that is no because Orson does that for us. For example: DeAnne grew up in LA with no racial pre judge us what so ever:

But then she met UTAH MORMONS and she saw the racisms for the first time and she and Step decided Never Again:

Yes its kinda all through the book that Step and DeAnne a-sure us that their not like the other saints, look at how they met for example:

Yes its that old sweet roman tick story about a man usin his pop-culture taste to test women and its good that DeAnne could handle the dark-edgedness of Bruce Springsteen. She was so cool in fact that she and Step gave each other the very cute E-street nicknames of “Junk Man’’ and ‘’Fish Lady”. Which if your thinkin: those sound like not-very-flatterin bedroom names your right and their kids know that too:

Yes they are a very loving couple but dont go thinkin their perfect they also let each other down and have to make it right, look:

Yes when you sin like leaving the door open and feel real terrible and have a strong cumpullshun to confess thats called bein righteous and a Good Wife and not any other thing.

Here’s another time they hurt the one they love

Okay so i guess this is good flavor background and makin our characters sympathetic and very like able and relate able but I was told this was a horror novel, wheres the spooky stuff!?

Well here I will tell you the super nature all horror parts of this 528 page book: Theres that first chapter about Boy which is 3 pages long and then:

A buncha crickets get in the house and they clean them up.

A buncha june bugs get in the house and they clean them up.

A buncha gnats get in the house and they clean them up.

A buncha daddy-long-legs get in the house and they clean them up.

(i dont know if its otherworldly as much as just kinda what happens when your gettin used to livin somewhere thats not high-desert country) but THEN in the last like 10 pages the parents find out theyre son got murdered a few days ago and he and some other ghost boys spend christmas eve with them and they find out who was the murderer and he goes to jail the end. Which if your doin the math is a lot of other pages uncounted for and its in them ones that we find that the TRUE tale of terror, lookit:

Step goes to his new job and right away he suspects that their sonuvabitches trying to screw him over with a bad contract and he shows hes brave and willing to walk away from this wageslave situation and guess what:

Orso-I mean Step Was Right, the person he thought was bad? Was bad, and then he outsmarted and outbraved them.

Then we have Step’s direct supervisor, Dicky (heh) who Step thinks is probably also bad:

So: Step Was Right again and used the perfect witherin words to dispatch his foe and felt so good and brave about it. Here I will use imagery from another Hot Dog hero to help us understand:

Does the good feeling last? No: there is, if youll pardon me a pun, a final boss. See, the CEO’s little daughter makes the terrible mistake of invitin Step’s son to float on a raft at the company picnic:

Yes he says that to the little girl about her dad. But: Step perceives that Allison is perhaps wounded but not yet fully van squished and he is too smart to risk her risin’ up again so he delivers a terrible finishin blow:

So, It occurs to me that some of you might not agree that it is good and correct to perceive any slite or correction as a deadly mortal danger and a front to your god-given agentsy and you might be thinking: this sounds more petty than heroic, maybe the Author Orson Scott Card is creating the Character Step Fletcher: A Very Small Man, as a cushionary tale? Well, you are wrong it is a mistake to think that, I refer back to the Writers Own Words:

So we will stop pretendin that its not Orson whose doin the talking here. This is how he quits the job.

Yes they all clap. This feels sorta familiar, you know what it ‘minds me of? Of how in Enders Game the military children would be so schemey and smart and out-maneuver and manipulate each other for power to protect the earth from aliens. But in Lost Boys its the high steaks world of politics and power-struggles of a office job and also: a mormon church-ward. Orson spends a lot of his time talking about his system for quickly and surely getting the best and most powerful Sunday School teaching positions in case you ever want to do that and can you guess: he is also very good at it:

But not even dazzlin em ‘keeps Orson safe, here comes a older lady, one Sister LeSeaur who doesnt 100% agree with the sunday school lesson, what is she, some kinda subvert!? And then she talks to Orsons son after church without his permission. That means: Orson Was Right about her! Thats it, he’s calling her husband right now:

Yes, just lay down and stay down Sister LeFleur, the lamentations of Brother LeFleur are so sweet to Orsons ears. But whats this!? DeAnne says maybe there son whos havin trouble adjusting and havin imaginary friends and no real ones should meet with a therapist? No no no Orson understands EXACTLY what they all do:

But even though he is too smart for therapy, Orson loves his wife and will endulge her irrationals sometimes so they take the son to a sikeiatrist who at first doesnt wanna collaborate with Orson, doctor-to-doctor, but i think she forgot who shes dealin with here:

So the doctor relents and says maybe the imaginary friends could be related to what he learns in church every week about a male holy-ghost companion that talks to him and guides him? Which, you know what that means: ORSON WAS RIGHT about her Lies and Poison and thats bad enough but then she makes the error that several other fools make in this book which is: think for even a second that Orson might not know what a word means:

Can you imagine!? He dispatches this sectular seduct dress by never taking his son back there again.

Next is the young guy in the book at Orsons job who said he would babysit, like Orson said he used to when he was a teenager, but the way THIS guy said it you know what I just bet…

BOOM! ORSON WAS RIGHT this Bubba Glass kid is a total pee dough but he is also laid low by Orsons verbal blade. Not even the shared sacred Fraternity of Programmers will protect thy neck Bubba! Some might say if you catch a molester molestin you should warn somebody but Orson knows the true wisest strategy is more witherin words where Bubba cant’ hear him:

This…feeling…such a righteous burnin in my bosum! This is so much better than feelin small and worried I might be wrong about somethin. Lets keep it goin okay like I said the son Stevie is having a rough time at school: who has done this that Orson may slay them!? Some mean kids, you say? Well maybe, but you know what I bet its also his first-grade teacher who didnt give a perfect score to a phd haver’s son’s project. I suspect shes actually a sub human piece of shit. Forswith! Orson sallys to the elementary school after work to confront this horribal gore gone!

ORSON WAS RIGHT SHE IS A MONSTER. Hahaha: “Never Ocotpi.” he virtously sneered, ill probly try that one out at the Maverik when i get a chance.

You silly bint of a educator. Just because you said sorry and that youd fix the issue doesnt mean that Orson hasnt thought 14 steps ahead and trapped you quite neatly indeed. But it is not enough for him to destroy you utterly, his God compels him to extend to you the mercy of showing you your True Face before you meet Him:

Victoriness.

Then we have a moment when a clear threat arrives in the mail (a record of Every Breath You Take) and Orson takes a moment to consider the suspecks:

Yes, there are more than I wrote about. And Orson, for a minute thinks huh thats kinda a lot of enemies for a software manual writer…could it be…?

No he is Sure and Righteous they are all deservin of his wrath and you know who else agrees, when he plays the tape for her AFTER the children are in their pjs?

In the Name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

…

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