As with my actual life, Concrete Jungle is full of evil people who do wonderfully noble things and good people who benignly incorporate some level of hypocrisy and corruption. With people who love without sacrifice. It is ruthlessly, giddily cynical with a dash of hope tossed in, hope being the most invented part of the piece. It’s got crime and sex and politics and ancient mysticism and modern religion, with heaping doses of black humor and wrenching terror. And, threaded through the complex layers, it’s got what I know to be true. Just a little piece of it. Maybe that’s enough.
Traded the jungle for the veldt.
There are times when I read your writing here and want nothing more than to give you a big hug. A manly hug, but a hug nonetheless. I’m glad you made it out of your jungle.
“A manly hug.” Not sure how to take that! LOL! What I find odd is, as a kid, I didn’t have language to express much of this. In fact, I didn’t entirely realize this wasn’t the normal order of things until I gained some perspective on it. For whatever reason, I am now feeling terribly introspective and discovering language to fit these experiences. A lot of it is simple tribalism: it all seems normal because you have nothing else to compare it to.
Always felt it was a shame that Concrete Jungle never made it past #1.
Thanks for sharing. Not a fun read, but a thought-provoking one.