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[–] Dakegra 1998 points
That sounds very serious! Are you safe?
[–] Jonno Haim [S] 9264 points
I’m just saying if I suddenly die in a car crash or a freak cinema shooting, ask questions. A LOT of questions.
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[–] Oolex 6102 points
Was it real?
[–] Jonno Haim [S] 6868 points
Yes. It was all real. It lives in me now. If you’ve seen it, there’s a splinter of it in you too. We can change the world. You just have to open the door.
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UPFEED: 10 Reasons The Homeless Hero Is More Bad-ass Than Anyone You Know
1. When he was fourteen years old, he shot the man who stabbed his mother to death, Wild West revenge-style.
‘It’s on my record, you want to look it up. I don’t want to talk about that. That was some sad, messed-up shit.’
2. He carries a home-made machete hidden in his walking stick.
‘Haven’t had to use it. Usually it’s enough to show it to someone.’
3. He really hates it when you tell him he’s a hero.
‘Who the fuck saying that?’
4. He was a slumlord when he was thirteen, renting out rooms in an abandoned building.
‘I was looking after my friends.’
5. Speaking of friends, his best buddy, Ramón Flores, got killed by notorious serial killer, Clayton Broom – The Detroit Monster, who stuck a toy head on his body. (click for pics)
‘You think that’s something to brag about? What’s wrong with you?’
6. He tracked down the Detroit Monster and tipped off the cops. (click to listen to the police hotline calls)
‘You think I was gonna let the bastard who did this to my friend walk away? Hell no.’
7. He’s very modest.
‘I had nothing to do with it. It was my higher power.’
8. And grumpy. (He also helps out ex-offenders at the local church)
‘Screw you and your stupid questions. I’m a busy man. You see those people out there, they waiting on me to help them type up their CVs. Wasting my time like this. Yeah, I type. I can do sixty words a minute.’
9. He tried to take down the Detroit Monster by himself.
‘It wasn’t like that. I thought maybe I could take it on, take it into myself, you know. I could carry it inside me and I wouldn’t let it break me the way it broke him. Shit I’ve seen in my life, stuff I’ve been through, ain’t nothing I can’t handle. I could have taken that on. In a way I did. Part of it’s in me. A dream doesn’t have to be bad. It’s what you do with it. Like I’m building me a house. That’s my dream right there.’
10. Ain’t nothing he can’t handle.
‘We done here?’
Click here to donate to Help Buy The Homeless Hero a House Fund!
MORE UPSTUFF:
If you liked this, you might also want to check out:
5 SERIAL KILLERS EVEN MORE SCREWED UP THAN THE DETROIT MONSTER
10 SIGNS YOUR GIRLFRIEND MAY BE A PSYCHOPATH
22 CELEBRITIES WHO ARE TERRIBLE PARENTS
The Things that Follow You
Layla’s gotten used to it. Being that girl. The one who knocked Travis’s teeth out. The one whose mom killed the psychopath. And of course the rumors swirl that she’s Mystery Girl in the video.
Cas’s dad helped with that. Faked surveillance footage from a convenience store that showed she wasn’t even there at the time. Bumped it up in the search results, bought opinions in bulk from an Indian company that uses English-speaking students for one cent per comment with their own choice of words to cast doubt on the theory in the forums on Reddit and 4Chan. Andy Holt is convinced the human touch is going to be what sets Walled Garden apart from other reputation management services. Maybe he’s right.
She did spend a few months in Atlanta with her dad while it all blew over. She actually got on with her step-sibs, Julie and Wilson, and had them performing a Christmas play with a Transformer as Santa Claus and Wilson in reindeer horns making hee-haw noises, which made her step-mom thaw a little, although she still treats Layla like she’s a pack of rotted dynamite that might go off at any moment.
They took the little ones to Six Flags, which was great, but her dad took her on her own to an experimental re-imagining of Othello with puppets that she had to explain to him afterwards over dinner. Just the two of them, and it felt like old times, back when they did finicky craft stuff together, or went out into the woods to look at the stars with binoculars.
And she met a boy. Armand. Who is seventeen and wants to study molecular science, but still likes video games and movies and weird theater. She can’t handle art galleries any more, but she took him to see the Othello remake after she’d seen it with her dad. They messed around, but didn’t have sex. It was intense, like love, even though they never said it and they didn’t talk about what had happened to her, although they have since on both counts. He’s promised to try and visit over the summer, because she’s come back to Detroit.
She missed NyanCat, and after much fiery family debate, with Gabi threatening to pack her off to her grandparents in Miami, it was decided that what she really needed was stability and familiarity, at least until she finished school. So she was back in time to start in the new year.
They talked about transferring her to a different school, switching to her dad’s name only. But she likes being Layla Stirling-Versado. She’s proud of her mom, even if things are sometimes fraught between them, and they’re both seeing psychologists once a week to try to deal with what happened, which they can’t agree on and probably never will.
Cas is Cas, although she’s more open now. It’s easier when you’re not living underneath the weight of a secret. She even gave a talk in lifeskills about sexual harassment. It was awkward, but a lot of kids came up to her afterwards to tell her how brave she was. They’re veterans, the two of them. Scarred, but alive.
So, let the rumors fly. Bring on the Mystery Girl fanmail, which she dumps straight into the trash. She can handle it.
This is the way the world is now. Everything is public. You have to find other people who understand.
You have to find a way to live with it.
Acknowledgements
I’ve had many generous guides to the city of Detroit, beyond the evocative ruin porn and doom on the news. I’m grateful for all your personal insights, and I hope you’ll forgive me the artistic liberties.
Anna Clarke was the best kind of well-connected fixer, who brought her own journalist’s eye to the places we visited and people we spoke to, and read the manuscript when it was done.
Robert-David Jones introduced me to the arts scene, told me wild stories (including the one about the séance), took me dancing in Eastern Market and drove me around town in a big black mortuary van.
The NOAH Project at the Central United Methodist Church allowed me to work in their soup kitchen for a morning. I’m grateful to all the people who were willing to sit and talk to me about their lives, especially James Harris, who gave me permission to use aspects of his personal history. You can donate to NOAH to help them continue their work via their website http://www.noahprojectdetroit.org/.
Julia Cuneo arranged for me to visit the Detroit Arts Academy and hang out with the students, who were all the best kinds of surprising and awesome. Thank you all for being so open. The Mosaic Theater School gave me a backstage pass to their performance of Hastings Street (and roped me into the warm-up exercises). Thanks especially to Ta-Shaun and Shennell for our chats online about the perils of being a theater geek.
Sergeant Robert ‘Bubble’ Haig advised me on police procedure, let me read an early draft of his memoir, Ten Little Police Chiefs, about his long service in the Detroit Police Department, lent me his dead baby in the basement story, and, along with Commander Joseph O’Sullivan, gave me invaluable feedback on po
lice procedure in this novel. Any errors or discrepancies are mine.
Keith Weir and Randall Hauk made introductions possible to homicide detectives William Peterson and Paul Thomas, who let me take them to lunch. Thanks especially to Sergeant Kenneth ‘The Reverend’ Gardner, who took me to visit Beaubien, and everyone at DPD Homicide. I appreciate your personal perspectives on the very fine and very difficult work you do.
Zara Trafford and Amanda Stone helped me to make invaluable connections. Sherry Sparks introduced me to Pewabic Pottery, Saladin Ahmed took me to a concert with his family, Dean Philip shared stories about real estate and new journalism, Norene Cashen Smith provided a poet’s insight and pancakes, Clinton Snider talked dreams and art and took me round the Powerhouse District, and Scott Hanselman demonstrated diabetes treatment over Skype from Portland.
Photographer and artist Scott Hocking let me hijack him for the day, introduced me to the DelRay Angels and the border patrol, burial mounds and ghost factories, and told me about finding the body in the ice, which I couldn’t squeeze into the novel.
Mickey Alice Kwapis from the Detroit Academy of Taxidermy explained how to peel a really gross orange and lent me the kangaroo story, and Chef Wylie Dufresne of WD50 walked me through the particulars of using meatglue. I have taken liberties with science. Cynthia Duncan Eñi Acho Iya of AboutSanteria.com candidly discussed her faith, dispelled the easy clichés and introduced me to broken heads.
Thanks Danah Boyd for the thing you weren’t supposed to do, and Scott Westerfeld for facilitating, to Katherine and Kendaa Fitzpatrick for your personal insight into growing up bi-racial, and Janee Cifuentes for the Cuban leads.
Megan Abbot, Anna Clark, Anne Perry, Emma Cook, Matthew Brown, Helen Moffett, Sarah Lotz and Emad Akhtar all read early drafts of this book and helped to shape the beast.
Behind the scenes, I owe everything to my agent, Oli Munson, for making it happen. Thanks to Jennifer Custer, Hélène Ferey and Vickie Dillon at AM Heath, as well as everyone at Blake Friedmann, also Lawrence Mattis at Circle of Confusion.
I’m grateful to Julia Wisdom, Joshua Kendall and Fourie Botha for your faith and perspective.
On a personal level, I’m thankful for my friends and family, especially Dale Halvorsen, Nophumla Nobomvu, Craig Madeley, Monene Watson, Roxy and Ella, Sarah Lotz, Keitu and Matthew Brown, whose love and friendship mean the world and make all things possible.
This book is what it is because of my editor, Helen Moffett, who pushed the story harder and higher, and caught me when I fell.
Thank you.
About the Author
Lauren Beukes writes novels, comics and screenplays and has worked in journalism, kids TV and documentary-making. Her critically acclaimed novel, The Shining Girls, was a Sunday Times bestseller and 2013 Richard & Judy Book Club choice which has been translated into 22 languages. Her previous novel, Zoo City, a black magic noir, set in Johannesburg won the coveted Arthur C. Clarke Award. She is also the author of the neo-political thriller Moxyland. She lives in Cape Town, South Africa.
LaurenBeukes.com
facebook.com/laurenbeukes
@laurenbeukes
Books by Lauren Beukes
Moxyland
Zoo City
The Shining Girls
Copyright
HarperCollinsPublishers
First published in the UK in 2014
by HarperCollinsPublishers
First published in Australia in 2014
This edition published in 2014
by HarperCollinsPublishers Australia Pty Limited
ABN 36 009 913 517
harpercollins.com.au
Copyright © Lauren Beukes 2014
The right of Lauren Beukes to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright Amendment (Moral Rights) Act 2000.
This work is copyright. Apart from any use as permitted under the Copyright Act 1968, no part may be reproduced, copied, scanned, stored in a retrieval system, recorded, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
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ISBN 978 0 7322 9554 7 (pbk)
ISBN 978 1 7430 9667 3 (epub)
Cover design © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2014
Cover illustration © Craig Ward – www.wordsarepictures.co.uk
Cover photography © Henry Steadman (girl); Stuart Free; SNWEB.ORG/Getty Images (buildings)
Author photograph © Ulrich Knoblauch
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