Our Research Notes series invites authors to describe their process for a recent book, with “research” defined as broadly as they like. This week, Juan Martinez writes about Best Worst Americans from Small Beer Press.
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Necessary Photobombs
The short stories in Best Worst American draw from, among other places, a flotsam of visual arcana that I adore and am super glad I have a chance to share here. For a while I was lobbying hard to put in way more images in the book itself, and it turns out that it’s tricky to do so, partly because of copyright and image-quality issues, and partly because it turns out not all of us are W.G. Sebald, and so the flotsam ends up looking a little distracting or gimmicky. So I’m putting in here what I couldn’t there.
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1.
One initial actual research note: Editor- and writer- and metalhead-extraordinaire Jarret Keene gave me the initial inspiration for the story “Northern,” and I’m still not sure if he meant it as a joke or not, but he said, “Write me a story about this,” and included a link to this news item about Vegas botanicas and illegal (and deadly) butt-enhancing plastic-surgery.
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2.
This is the mother-and-daughter showgirl photo that inspired “On Paradise”:
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3.
This is a copy of Yosip Ibrahim’s alien-abduction narrative Yo Visite Ganimedes mentioned in “Souvenirs from Ganydeme.” My parents totally owned this book, but they don’t remember why:
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4.
This is a detail from the painting mentioned in “Debtor,” where the narrator says that the wealthy patrons looked like they had Photoshopped themselves into a Pieta and were vaguely apologetic for photobombing Jesus:
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5.
This is the actual poster for The Deathless Devil, a 1972 Turkish action/superhero/WTF movie mentioned in “Big Wheel Boiling Hot”:
And here’s the trailer!
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6.
One last thing: I wrote “Liner Notes for Renegade, the Opening Sequence” without actually rewatching the opening sequence to Renegade, nor do I intend to watch it now, but here is the actual opening sequence. Watch it! Somebody should:
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