Feeling Theocidal

- Author's Afterword -

Double-click on rollover for complete cover of "Feeling Theocidal"

A number of Phantacea Publications, specifically "Feeling Theocidal", "The War of the Apocalyptics" the three mini-novels constituting "The 1000 Days of Disbelief" (namely "The Death's Head Hellion", "Contagion Collectors" and "Janna Fangfingers"), and "Goddess Gambit", can be ordered from amazon.com and its affiliates, including amazon.ca and amazon.co.uk, as well as from Barnes & Noble.

Until the end of March 2012, e-versions of "Feeling Theocidal", "The Death's Head Hellion", "Contagion Collectors" and "Janna Fangfingers" can be ordered on the Kindle format exclusively from amazon.com, amazon.co.uk and four of amazon's additional European affiliates.

Libraries, bookstores and bookseller collectives can place bulk orders through Ingram Books, Ingram International, Coutts Information (and Library) Services, Baker & Taylor, and a large network of other distributors worldwide.

Or, if you prefer to order directly from the publisher, email or send your order(s) via surface mail. No matter where you live or what currency you prefer to use, I'll figure out a way to fill your order(s) myself.

As an introductory offer, I will absorb shipping costs and government taxes on "The Death's Head Hellion", "Contagion Collectors" and "Janna Fangfingers" only. Just be aware that I can only accept certified cheques or money orders.

For all the other PHANTACEA Mythos print publications, I'll have to charge an additional 12% to cover Canadian and provincial taxes as well as Canada Post rates for shipping. I do use bubble mailers, though.

BookFinder.com lists both mosaic novels: "Feeling Theocidal" and "The War of the Apocalyptics". Also listed therein are most of the other PHANTACEA Mythos print publications.

Another interesting option for the curious is Chegg, which has a rent-a-book program. Thus far its search engine shows no results for phantacea (any style or permutation thereof) but it does recognize Jim McPherson (a variety of them) and the titles of the novels.

As for the Whole Earth (other than the Hidden Continent of Sedon's Head, at least as far as I can say), well, this page contains a list of a few other websites where you can probably order the novels in a variety of currencies and with credit cards.

Double-click rollover for complete alternative cover as prepared by Jim McPherson, circa 2007; click here for much more on this cover, including an image map and details on the characters pictured herein

© Jim McPherson, 2011

AUTHOR’S AFTERWORD

Text reads Datong Harmonia, the Unity of Panharmonium, photo of Siqueiros Nueva Democracia taken by Jim McPherson, 2008, in Bellas Artes, Mexico City

- double click on images below in order to enlarge -

========

Next time you’re strolling from the Museo Mural Diego Rivera to the Palacio de Bellas Artes in Mexico City, walk along Avenida Juarez rather than through Alameda Park. An Attis type spotted in Alameda Park in Mexico City, photo by Jim McPherson, 2008 That way you’ll spot a statue on the park’s perimeter of a muscular, nearly naked fellow with a cloak-like strip of cloth strategically draped over one arm and one leg. He’s depicted wearing a Phrygian cap (without a Brainrock quill stuck into it) and wielding a Roman-style ‘gladius’ or straight, stabbing sword. There’s also a belt and pouch strapped over his chest.

True, the statue’s a bronze monochrome but, especially when you’re blessed or cursed with a phantacea like mine (that’s Greek for imagination), it isn’t much of a stretch to see his skin golden-brown, his cloak having many colours, his pouch as a bottomless bag and his blade curved. There’s no indication as to whom the statue represents but every other statue in the park is based on Greek and/or Mediterranean mythology so, mostly from the Liberty Cap, I’m thinking it is Phrygian Attis. In other words I’m seeing Feel Theo’s Taurus Chrysaor Attis.

Attis rides Peg outside the Bellas Artes opera house in Mexico City, photo by Jim McPherson, 2008 On four separate pedestals outside the Palacio de Bellas Artes rear magnificent renditions of Winged Pegasus, presumably with either Perseus or Bellerophon riding them. In PHANTACEA terms they’d be, once again, the Attis, this time astride Peg, his unimaginatively named psychopomp.

Go inside the Palace, up the stairs to the third level. Lo, there’s David Alfaro Siqueiros’s Nueva democracia (“New Democracy”), probably the most famous Mexican mural ever done. Me, I don’t see Siqueiros’s wife, Angelica Arenal de Siqueiros, as the iconic, bare-breasted woman breaking out of chains. I see the whole mural as representing Datong Harmonia, Feel Theo’s self-proclaimed Unity of Panharmonium.

Right Side of Rivera's Controller mural, photo by Jim McPherson, 2004 Along the same wall to its left is another triptych: Jorge Gonzalez Camarena’s Humanidad librándose (“Humanity Liberating Itself”). Who’s the woman shown on its right third? Surely – better make that serendipitously – it’s Pyrame Silverstar, albeit with a normal head and eyes. She’s definitely got Pyrame’s silvery hair. As for the crucified fellow smashing apart the wooden cross to which he’s been tethered, that has to signify Terrible Tethys from Pre-Theo, doesn’t it.

To Humanity’s left, occupying the entire west wall of the mezzanine, is Diego Rivera’s “Man, Controller of the Universe”. Nelson Rockefeller commissioned the original in 1933 for New York City’s RCA Building. When Rivera refused to remove the figure of Vladimir Lenin, Rockefeller had the entire mural chiselled off the wall. Needless to say, New York’s loss thereafter became Mexico’s gain.

On the right third of the Rivera mural, he shows a decapitated statue of a Great God. Below it, note the peasant sitting on its severed head as if a cushion. Who do you suppose the god might be? Opposite it, way across the stairwell on the mezzanine’s east wall is La Katharsis by José Clemente Orozco. Could that red-skinned voluptuary be beguiling Belialma, Sinistral Lust of Satanwyck? Of course it could (not).

Siqueiros's hellhound, shot in the Palacio de Bellas Artes, Mexico City, by Jim McPherson, circa 2008 There, on the south wall, in the midst of Siqueiros’s “Torment of Cuauhtemoc” (Attacking Eagle), is that a Keres Hellhound? Is the distraught woman dressed in various shades of red Hot Stuff, Methandra Thanatos, minus the mask and 3rd eye? And, on the front-facing balcony outside the Palace’s second level, is that statue of the mother of the muses really Mnemosyne, the Sophia to Helios’s Sophos? Is that therefore a rendition of the miraculous Female Principal once humanized? Wouldn’t want to speculate would I.

Telescopic shot of statue spotted on a balcony off Bellas Artes, Mexico City, photo by Jim McPherson, 2008 Until now I haven’t even mentioned the massive statuary found along the Paseo de la Reforma, which runs north and south of Av Juarez. Wilderwitch as Diana Cazadora (Huntress) is to the south, near the Bosque de Chaputec, whilst an arguable Raven’s Head caw-whinnies outside the Torre El Caballito, at the Juarez intersection. Between them, at Insurgentes, there are a couple of John Sundown types within the Monumento de Cuauhtemoc and, closer to Diana Cazadora, a Gloriel D’Angelo type atop the Monumento de la Independencia in the ’glorieta’ of the same name.

Who’d have thought Mexico City would provide a veritable hotbed of imagery applicable to the PHANTACEA Mythos? I’m the obvious answer to that. But, now that you’ve read “Feeling Theocidal”, and are about to embark upon the opening chapter of “The War of the Apocalyptics”, which I’ve included immediately after this missive as a bonus, maybe you’re another answer.

Wilderwitch as Diana the Hunter, photo by Jim McPherson, 2004 But wait! Which is to say: Whoa! Wilderwitch, Raven’s Head, Blind Sundown, Gloriel D’Angelo: weren’t they characters from the six issue PHANTACEA comic book series that came out between 1977 and 1980? They were indeed; members of the Cerebrus-proclaimed D-Brig (Damnation Brigade), as it happens. So were the four Primary Apocalyptics: War, Plague, Disaster and Mother Murder, who you’ll have noted also appear in 'Feel Theo'.

Collage featuring the Damnation Brigade, prepared by Jim McPherson, circa 2002 And that’s what’s coming your way next down the PHANTACEA Mythos print publication pipeline. “The War of the Apocalyptics” is the first book in a series of prose novels not so much based on the comic books as retelling their as yet not-quite finished storylines.

So how does this jibe with “Feeling Theocidal” being Book One in “The Thrice-Cursed Godly Glories” Trilogy? Let me put it this way: Book Three in the trilogy is set immediately after War-Pox. Like Book Two in the trilogy, it’s already written.The pair just need some more of my undivided attention. Which I’ll be giving them after War-Pox is ready to roll off the presses in all its thousands.

You can probably find jpegs of every one of the Mexico City murals or monuments I refer to above online. You can definitely find some of them among the stacks of personal photos I’ve mounted on my long-running website: PHANTACEA on the Web. A few have even creapt onto phantacea.com, which is solely dedicated to the various PHANTACEA Mythos print publications.

A potential image for the cover of the War of the Apocalyptics, prepared by Jim McPherson circa 2002 I invite you to visit both websites next time you’re in the mood. My email address is on their navigation bars, if you want to get hold of me. Every so often I’ve been known to respond to readers’ queries.

********

A potential dust cover for "The Triggregos Gambit", prepared on PHOTOSHOP by Jim McPherson, 2005 *OFF PAGE NOTES*: With respect to the murals referred to in this piece, I took pictures of all of them. Unfortunately I'm not happy with most of them. There are lynx, though, and in the interests of 'hey, that's hardly all they did' here are some of them: