Big thanks to January Magazine and Cameron Hughes.

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I used to think that the 1998 film American History X was hardcore, that it pushed the envelope and was a really brave story about what hatred can do to you. But then I read Nathan Singer’s masterpiece. Now American History X seems like a Disney flick. In the Light of You takes place during the mid-1990s, around the time of Los Angeles’ Rodney King riots, the Rampart police scandals, and O.J. Simpson’s murder trial. It features Mikal Fanon, a 17-year-old kid in a nameless Ohio city. He has no identity and a very scary home life, with distant and abusive parents. He craves an identity, the comfort of people like him. Now, most teenagers put on different identities like a snake sheds skin; but Mikal makes the very unfortunate decision to be friendly with the local skinhead, a charismatic young man named Richard Lovecraft. Lovecraft is the leader of an up-and-coming skinhead gang called the Fifth Reich, and author Singer doesn’t shy away from exploring that subculture. Now, I have to go back to American History X, because that’s what this story will most likely be compared to, once it gets the attention it deserves. In that movie, we’re shown what today’s skinheads look like, but we never live with them, never feel their filth or understand why young people enlist in their ranks. Singer uses first-person narration in In the Light of You, so we’re with Mikal every step of the way. The biggest myth is that the leaders of modern neo-Nazi organizations are stupid. Wrong and ignorant and very often evil, yes, but they’re not stupid. To build their numbers, they have to be smart and charismatic. They have to sell their dream of racial pride and segregation. Lovecraft repeats often that he doesn’t want black people killed, just separated from the whites. In one very interesting scene, he calls a black preacher an intelligent man, because he preaches about living away from white society. He is a good salesman, and Mikal buys in slowly but surely. Lovecraft finds out at one point that the kid is interested in the environment, so he concocts a story about how Adolf Hitler was very concerned with preserving nature and Earth’s health. In another scene, so intimate that it approaches the erotic, Lovecraft shaves Mikal’s head and gives him his uniform, promising that he’ll be tattooed to signify that he belongs to his new “family.” This is very much a coming-of-age story. Mikal is like every other sarcastic American teenager out there, angry and confused, but also humorous on occasion. You have to ask yourself, how could such a funny kid take part in so many ugly things, just because his leader says it’s the right thing to do? This should be required reading for teenagers, but only if they can talk with their parents about what happens in it. It’d be educational for both sides. — Cameron Hughes

http://januarymagazine.com/2008/12/best-books-of-2008-fiction.html

http://www.bookgasm.com/features/cameron-hughes-10-best-novels-of-2008/

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I don’t believe in god. But I believe in you.
I don’t believe in the basic goodness of humankind. But I believe in you.
I don’t believe in the intrinsic rightness of democracy. But I believe in you.

I know you are a moderate. I am not. I know you are an “incrementalist.” I am not.
I know you believe that flexing military muscle in the middle east is justified and necessary.
I most certainly do not.

But I believe that you believe in science. I believe that you believe in rational thought. I believe that you believe in open debate, common sense, and a reasonable mix of the practical and the compassionate. After eight years of greedy, brutal, backward, incompetent crypto-fascism these basic ideals which should be a given are a cool drink of water in a scorching and poisoned desert. I’ll take my victories where I can get them.

We believe in you. We honor you. We respect you. We hail you as the chief, whatever that means. Do not fuck us over. The stakes are too high, do not fuck this up. And do not get in our way, those whom you’ve at least partially liberated. We are the engine, and we have a new fuel. For you see, change has not yet come to the US. But it is coming now, and it will come fast and hard. It never would have even occurred to me to invite any elected authority along for the ride, let alone a president. But, Mr. President, consider yourself invited. Just make sure you strap yourself in.
It’s about it get wild.