Whoops, I thought. Welcome to the night train.

I was hoping for the night train. For more bits of HST's non-sequiters that are a bit of stream-of-consciousness, gonzo truth.

This wasn't it. _Screwjack_, a publication of a 90s, private printing only collection of 3 of HST's shorts (2 pieces out of 3 are straight fiction, I think I've read, but not sure). "Mescalito" was messy-- fun, but messy. Better done in _Fear and Loathing_. (although it's still impressive any time I read any writing committed while a human being was that utterly ripped.)

"Death of a Poet" was promising, but felt like it was bailed out on very abruptly. Like perhaps it could have gone on, and even ended the same abrupt way, but instead, the author just cut to the chase, put a period, and forgot to start a next sentence.

I wanted to like "Screwjack". Stylistically, it's one of the voices I expect when I want to read Thompson. But it seemed pretty pointless to me. I read it twice: yep, still pointless. But it does contain this passage which was absolutely worth the double reading

I am guilty, Lord, but I am also a lover-- and I am one of your best people, as you know; and yea tho I have walked in many strange shadows and acted crazy from time to time and even drooled on many High Priests, I have not been an embarrassment to you....

Passages like this are why I keep coming back to Thompson, no matter how twisted, violent, immoral, amoral, nauseating, and depressing it can be. Like no other writer I know, he can find the beauty in a shitheap of desperation. ( )

I named my cat after this book! Love Hunter's shorts stories. ( )

Just not for me, I think, I didn't enjoy it, and only persisted because it was short. ( )

A short one. Money-maker perhaps? ( )

Crazy and frenetic as only Hunter can be! "Mescalito" was my favorite story of the three, as it reminded me so much of "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas", which I love! ( )