Pseudopod 214: Wendigo

[Unblinking]

I'm really bored of the no-name stories; they seem to pop up more and more. I get the impression it's meant to give the story a timeless, universal significance, or something, but I just find it makes it hard to connect to or picture the people in the story. I didn't finish listening to this one as I just could not get into it.

I also find it harder to connect to the characters, and it just strikes me as lazy writing.

[Dave]

If the disturbing beauty of Claire Suzanne Elizabeth Cooney's "My Body, Your Banquet" were take to its logical extreme (and I do mean extreme), both the lyric eroticism and gut churning horror elevated to dizzying heights, you might have this story.

Really sick, sick stuff.

Well done.

[Dave]

The cannibalism itself was no big deal. I mean, the story is called "Wendigo", so you know from the start somebody's gonna get et. The disturbing part was the minds and behaviors of the cannibals. The insight into what sort of person might act that way was all too plausible.

Also it was pretty clear that the narrator was unreliable, not lying necessarily, but delusional. In this case, the dreamy mental fog we all swam through with her worked for me, and the WW's reading was spot on.

For myself, I enjoyed the Companion.

[Boggled Coriander]

Description in my own fiction tends to be sparse.  It's not that I don't like long descriptive passages; it's that I never really learned how to write them.  

I really liked the descriptions in this story.  They motivated me to try to learn to write better descriptive passages myself.  And I think it's because of food.

I like food.  I like eating all kinds of food.  The descriptions of food in this story got to me.  They stimulated the food-wanting parts of my brain, and made me want to improve my own writing so I can write like that.

And you're all thinking "Ew" because of the story's subject matter.  The really sick thing is, I'm not kidding about any of this.  Yeah, I've managed to disturb myself a little.

[Loz]

I'm not sure if we've had such a food-filled story since The Girlfriends of Dorian Gray right back at the very dawn of time and I enjoyed it. Any story about gourmands, even perverse ones, has to have lots of OTT descriptions of food and feasting, people generally don't complain that Dracula stories have a tall and wan East European snacking on people's necks before Grand Moff Tarkin comes to finish them off after all. That said it did slow things down and I did lose my way a bit at times but this was a wonderful reading by the Word Whore with the right level of dreamy detachment from the reality of the character's actual situation.

[stePH]

The cannibalism itself was no big deal. I mean, the story is called "Wendigo", so you know from the start somebody's gonna get et.

...unless you don't know what "wendigo" means. I only just thought to Google it now.

[Unblinking]

I'm not sure if we've had such a food-filled story since The Girlfriends of Dorian Gray right back at the very dawn of time and I enjoyed it. Any story about gourmands, even perverse ones, has to have lots of OTT descriptions of food and feasting, people generally don't complain that Dracula stories have a tall and wan East European snacking on people's necks before Grand Moff Tarkin comes to finish them off after all. That said it did slow things down and I did lose my way a bit at times but this was a wonderful reading by the Word Whore with the right level of dreamy detachment from the reality of the character's actual situation.

If you listen to EP, there was "This, My Body" definitely food-oriented.

[Scattercat]

Also Smidgen.

[Listener]

TWW is an excellent reader.

I was very much bothered by the eating of the fingertip, but that's personal to me -- I nearly lost a fingertip when I was six. Literally hanging on by a thread. It's fine now, but still. Blergh.

I felt the story went on far too long, and I didn't really care enough about the MC. The gradual reveal of the companion was cool.

[Loz]

I'm not sure if we've had such a food-filled story since The Girlfriends of Dorian Gray right back at the very dawn of time and I enjoyed it. Any story about gourmands, even perverse ones, has to have lots of OTT descriptions of food and feasting, people generally don't complain that Dracula stories have a tall and wan East European snacking on people's necks before Grand Moff Tarkin comes to finish them off after all. That said it did slow things down and I did lose my way a bit at times but this was a wonderful reading by the Word Whore with the right level of dreamy detachment from the reality of the character's actual situation.

If you listen to EP, there was "This, My Body" definitely food-oriented.

Also Smidgen.

All right, but apart from 'This, My Body' and 'Smidgen', what stories about food have the Romans ever given us?

[The Word Whore]

    thank you so much for all the very kind comments RE the reading.....   it was quite a struggle.   deeply sorry for the echo / poor sound quality!!

[Unblinking]

   thank you so much for all the very kind comments RE the reading.....   it was quite a struggle.   deeply sorry for the echo / poor sound quality!!

There was an echo/poor sound quality?

[The Word Whore]

   thank you so much for all the very kind comments RE the reading.....   it was quite a struggle.   deeply sorry for the echo / poor sound quality!!

There was an echo/poor sound quality?

i thought so      suffered many technical difficulties during this recording.  very relieved listeners didn't reject on that basis!!

[Hafwit]

   thank you so much for all the very kind comments RE the reading.....   it was quite a struggle.   deeply sorry for the echo / poor sound quality!!

There was an echo/poor sound quality?

i thought so      suffered many technical difficulties during this recording.  very relieved listeners didn't reject on that basis!!

I didn't notice this, so I don't think it's terribly pronounced. 

[The Far Stairs]

how elaborate are they?

As baroque and filigreed as a faberge egg sculptor's laudanum-induced fever-dreams.

LOL! But I've read your stories! (They're very good.) I always thought your writing style was pretty direct and to-the-point.

For myself, I enjoyed the Companion.

You, er... enjoyed him? As in... well...

All right, but apart from 'This, My Body' and 'Smidgen', what stories about food have the Romans ever given us?

"The Evil-Eater"?

[AliceNred]

I think the poetry of the words with its romance, decadence of food,  balanced the subject matter nicely.

The food is presented in both a glorious way and gross.

Where I understand that Windgos, are humans whom consume human flesh, it did not seem like they gained anything extra for doing so, and windgos do: strength, speed and healing. You can say, of course they did, because of the way they could go on, where others would have perished. BUT... in this universe that just seems part of the course.

To me, they are not windgos. But since they aren't real, I guess the author and reader, can feel free to change what makes up one imaginary creature from another. And at least, they didn't sparkle.

Food is at best as an expression of love. Cake anyone?

[Scattercat]

As baroque and filigreed as a faberge egg sculptor's laudanum-induced fever-dreams.

LOL! But I've read your stories! (They're very good.) I always thought your writing style was pretty direct and to-the-point.

I appreciate that.  But that just means that I have learned to save my metaphors for when they count and introduce them more subtly.  You'll notice, if you look for it, an unusually high proportion of "like" and "as" in my writing, as I constantly compare things to other, dissimilar things.  I try to catch myself if I notice I've put three of them all in a row.

[Unblinking]

   thank you so much for all the very kind comments RE the reading.....   it was quite a struggle.   deeply sorry for the echo / poor sound quality!!

There was an echo/poor sound quality?

i thought so      suffered many technical difficulties during this recording.  very relieved listeners didn't reject on that basis!!

I didn't notice this, so I don't think it's terribly pronounced. 

I didn't notice any problems whatsoever.  I didn't dig the story, but that was just because I didn't dig the story, not because of the reading or recording.

[The Far Stairs]

I appreciate that.  But that just means that I have learned to save my metaphors for when they count and introduce them more subtly.  You'll notice, if you look for it, an unusually high proportion of "like" and "as" in my writing, as I constantly compare things to other, dissimilar things.  I try to catch myself if I notice I've put three of them all in a row.

Fair enough!

[jeroen94704]

I really dig the reading by TWW for this one. Her voice was exceptionally appropriate here.

As for the story, I felt it was more slipstream than horror (which is not a bad thing!). Eating human meat in itself does not necessarily disturb me. I've always said that if anyone ever survives plane crash in which I perish, and they find themselves stranded and without food, go ahead and eat me! I'd do the same in the reverse situation.

Nevertheless, this story succeeded in disturbing me because of the way it handled the subject. I guess the significant difference is cannibalism as a means of nourishment versus cannibalism as an end in itself. That, and the ritualistic, almost religious way in which the characters approach their habit is what made it work.

This, combined with the rich prose, made it give me quite a slipstream feeling.

Jeroen

[Lift]

An enjoyable, if elaborate "clinic" on the use of description. A grotesque, "Bizarro" plunge into surreal cannibalism.

I appreciated it greatly, but after the fifth or sixth minute was already growing seasick on the high waves of language (not to mention the language itself!) And it seemed the greatest focus was this and only this.

Sort of like a Jazz-Fusion concert, amazing, inventive, intricate, but largely without melody.

[kibitzer]

Sort of like a Jazz-Fusion concert, amazing, inventive, intricate, but largely without melody.

Nice analogy -- can feel that sensation/experience very clearly.

[Bete]

Just listened to this and wanted to say how much I enjoyed the story and the reading.

From the first opening lines, I was drawn into the sensuality - despite the horror.  Something about food and sex that gets me every time. 

I will admit I was a bit lost at the end and didn't quite understand what I had just witnessed.  I am ok with being left somewhat confused and for things to be vague, but I'd hate to think I missed an important note or thought or theme.

Thanks to all involved who made the podcast happen.

[Fenrix]

   thank you so much for all the very kind comments RE the reading.....   it was quite a struggle.   deeply sorry for the echo / poor sound quality!!

I did get the echo while listening on the car speakers, but teh Word Whore was amazing as usual so it is forgiven. It was a hard story to listen to, so I can only imagine how difficult it was to get into the character and read it.

Their love of her is self-love, fundamentally grasping and greedy rather than wholesome and giving, just as their desire to be eaten is selfish rather than altruistic.  She realizes this after deluding herself for a long time that her desire to give of herself was a generous impulse.  Such a love is ultimately self-defeating.

I think Scattercat nails the heart of the story. This was a rough listen, but there was so much more than just body horror that it kept me listening.