1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:27,760 Greetings everyone and welcome to the first ever Wednesday Night Book Club. 2 00:00:27,760 --> 00:00:35,080 I'm your host Andy Rice. This is part of the Fried Rice Podcast group I guess. 3 00:00:35,080 --> 00:00:39,880 And basically, I mean yeah, this is a book club. I'm going to be reviewing different 4 00:00:39,880 --> 00:00:46,200 books that I read each week. I typically get through about a book a week and fair warning 5 00:00:46,200 --> 00:00:53,680 now, you are going to be hearing a lot of Stephen King books because I am trying to 6 00:00:53,680 --> 00:01:00,780 get through all 79 of his books and novellas and short story collections and his Richard 7 00:01:00,780 --> 00:01:08,040 Bachman stuff. So it's a lot. I've gotten through well over half so far over the course 8 00:01:08,040 --> 00:01:13,080 of my life. I do read other things. I mean I would have gotten through this a lot sooner 9 00:01:13,080 --> 00:01:20,360 if I just focused on him to read. But I love sci-fi and there's a few other authors that 10 00:01:20,360 --> 00:01:31,000 I like to follow. John Scalzi and, oh is it John? I think it's John Scalzi. From the 11 00:01:31,000 --> 00:01:37,560 Old Man War series which is one of my absolute favorites and we will cover that at some point. 12 00:01:37,560 --> 00:01:45,080 This today we are going to be talking about a book called Rose Matter and it's a 1995 13 00:01:45,080 --> 00:01:53,720 Stephen King novel that deals with domestic violence. Kind of a bummer to start on. But 14 00:01:53,720 --> 00:01:59,380 it just happened to be the one that I read this week. I'm kind of on a Stephen King domestic 15 00:01:59,380 --> 00:02:05,160 violence kick I guess. I had just read Dolores Clayborne. Well I read Needful Things and 16 00:02:05,160 --> 00:02:10,240 then I read Dolores Clayborne and then I read Rose Matter in that order. I think I maybe 17 00:02:10,240 --> 00:02:18,760 threw Kujo in between two of those books. But regardless all three very much domestic 18 00:02:18,760 --> 00:02:28,240 violence cases. This one being the worst by a lot. So just a little bit before we get 19 00:02:28,240 --> 00:02:33,240 into the book. A little bit about me. If you're not a fan of the podcast and you're wondering 20 00:02:33,240 --> 00:02:38,880 why I took a big fat bong rip before starting a book club it's because that's what I do. 21 00:02:38,880 --> 00:02:43,720 I mean it's Fried Rice Podcast. I'm your host Andy Rice. Let's get fried. You know I like 22 00:02:43,720 --> 00:02:52,000 to smoke weed. I like to read. I wish I had a third thing that rhymed with those two others. 23 00:02:52,000 --> 00:03:00,480 I like Indeed.com. I don't know. I don't. But yeah I love doing the podcast and we talk 24 00:03:00,480 --> 00:03:05,920 about movies and life and other things and we kind of get into sometimes philosophical 25 00:03:05,920 --> 00:03:12,120 things which I love and maybe we'll get into that here. But it is with other people and 26 00:03:12,120 --> 00:03:17,720 sometimes it can get most of the time. All the time it's a little bit too hectic. There's 27 00:03:17,720 --> 00:03:22,000 a lot of us talking. We're working on getting a different set up so that it's a little bit 28 00:03:22,000 --> 00:03:25,900 cleaner audio and we're improving. Season three will be a lot better than what season 29 00:03:25,900 --> 00:03:30,680 two has been. But I did want to kind of just get into something that I'm very passionate 30 00:03:30,680 --> 00:03:39,640 about and that's reading. I also want to preface this because a lot of people I guess I don't 31 00:03:39,640 --> 00:03:47,280 even know. There's not a racist or an ableist or an ist that I can put to these people. 32 00:03:47,280 --> 00:03:52,640 But there's a lot of people that seem to think that when you listen to an audiobook as opposed 33 00:03:52,640 --> 00:04:00,160 to physically reading a book that it's somehow a diminished accomplishment. That somehow 34 00:04:00,160 --> 00:04:05,920 you didn't get the same amount of information that the person reading the book did. I am 35 00:04:05,920 --> 00:04:16,720 a huge proponent. I'm for or against it. Opponent would be against. Proponent would be for audiobooks. 36 00:04:16,720 --> 00:04:24,360 I am a huge fan. I've read of course in the lifetime of my... In my lifetime I've read 37 00:04:24,360 --> 00:04:33,040 dozens of just physical books. You know what I mean? I have a pretty healthy little collection 38 00:04:33,040 --> 00:04:40,880 at home. But I have read hundreds of audiobooks. And I'm going to say read this whole time. 39 00:04:40,880 --> 00:04:51,360 I'm not going to say listen to two because... And you can take that with whatever I guess 40 00:04:51,360 --> 00:05:00,960 however you want to feel. That's up to you. I say read. I can 100% if you finish reading 41 00:05:00,960 --> 00:05:05,000 a book after I've just finished listening to it and you want to sit there and have a 42 00:05:05,000 --> 00:05:11,120 conversation there is nothing that you will know that I don't know. Okay? It's the same 43 00:05:11,120 --> 00:05:16,720 information. It's just this way I can listen to it while driving. And I can actually use 44 00:05:16,720 --> 00:05:26,080 that brain space that I usually allocate to self destruction and harm most likely into 45 00:05:26,080 --> 00:05:37,080 story building or painting the picture of what's going on in the book. So anyway, that's 46 00:05:37,080 --> 00:05:44,960 the pre... That's the warning. The asterisk at the top is I definitely do audiobooks. 47 00:05:44,960 --> 00:05:52,440 And there's going to be a lot of Stephen King. Another thing is these are going to be pretty 48 00:05:52,440 --> 00:06:02,040 spoiler heavy I've decided. I mean this is a book club. This isn't a book recommendation 49 00:06:02,040 --> 00:06:08,920 I guess, channel. I might do that as well. I might do shorter things to try to get people 50 00:06:08,920 --> 00:06:11,680 to read the book before listening to this. But I mean yeah, I'm assuming that you've 51 00:06:11,680 --> 00:06:18,960 read this and I just want to give a few thoughts on it. So, Rose Matter. I didn't actually 52 00:06:18,960 --> 00:06:22,240 take any notes for this one so this is going to be kind of off the top of my head. But 53 00:06:22,240 --> 00:06:27,040 moving forward I'll be a little bit more prepared. It's Wednesday today. I wanted to do the first 54 00:06:27,040 --> 00:06:31,880 little one. Maybe this actually will be more of a recommendation than a review. I mean 55 00:06:31,880 --> 00:06:40,240 moving forward we'll do more review. But Rose Matter is a story about a woman named Rose. 56 00:06:40,240 --> 00:06:46,840 Rosie is what she likes to go by. Living in an extremely abusive relationship. Just for 57 00:06:46,840 --> 00:06:54,280 the fact that I don't want to trigger anyone or bring up anything. It's violent. It's not 58 00:06:54,280 --> 00:07:04,400 just verbally or emotionally violent. It's physically violent to some of the worst degree 59 00:07:04,400 --> 00:07:18,160 that you can read in just a typical novel. Anyway, she one day decides to get out of 60 00:07:18,160 --> 00:07:25,040 the... I love that it's not the time he hit her. It's not right after an abusive fight 61 00:07:25,040 --> 00:07:32,760 or anything like that. She wakes up and she sees a drop of blood on her pillow. It came 62 00:07:32,760 --> 00:07:41,180 from her nose probably. It's a regular occurrence that she would see blood on the sheets. She 63 00:07:41,180 --> 00:07:47,160 knows that if he sees this coming home that he's going to want to talk to her up close. 64 00:07:47,160 --> 00:07:55,120 Which is what he says when he's going to just assault her and hurt her. Punch her in the 65 00:07:55,120 --> 00:08:06,440 kidneys which comes into play later. It's in the morning and he's at work. He's a cop. 66 00:08:06,440 --> 00:08:19,640 She sees this blood and it hits her. What am I doing? Just leave. We've all been through 67 00:08:19,640 --> 00:08:24,040 this where you decide to do something and then that little voice inside your head tells 68 00:08:24,040 --> 00:08:31,360 you to stay in what you think is the right place. The comfortable spot to be in. But 69 00:08:31,360 --> 00:08:37,320 it's not. It's a dangerous situation. You need to get out of there. You need to change 70 00:08:37,320 --> 00:08:42,840 your life. You need to make it better but you stay in that spot. You stay in that job 71 00:08:42,840 --> 00:08:50,080 you don't want. You stay in that relationship that's bad for you. You stay because you... 72 00:08:50,080 --> 00:08:56,920 Just like those that experiment with ticks or fleas. They put these fleas which can jump 73 00:08:56,920 --> 00:09:03,720 super super super high. But they put them in a cup and they put a little wall on it. 74 00:09:03,720 --> 00:09:09,040 Something on top and the fleas start hitting the top of the ceiling. When you take that 75 00:09:09,040 --> 00:09:17,960 off that's as high as they can go from that point on. Because they stay. That's just their 76 00:09:17,960 --> 00:09:22,840 new... They don't want to move forward. They don't want to get better. I'm probably not 77 00:09:22,840 --> 00:09:28,960 explaining this right but she tells that voice to go fuck itself basically. And very scared 78 00:09:28,960 --> 00:09:35,200 she leaves. And she goes on a bus and she goes to a town, like a big sized town 800 79 00:09:35,200 --> 00:09:45,200 miles away and she starts a new life. Meanwhile her husband who is one of the scariest most 80 00:09:45,200 --> 00:09:57,400 well written antagonists that I've ever read in a book. I mean he's sadistic. He's a masochist. 81 00:09:57,400 --> 00:10:12,640 He's a sadist. I think he likes both. He likes pain and giving pain. So he's a biter. He's 82 00:10:12,640 --> 00:10:19,080 frightening. And he deliberately gets the time off from work, does everything right 83 00:10:19,080 --> 00:10:23,880 so that he can track her down. And so in the audiobook here's something that you don't 84 00:10:23,880 --> 00:10:29,000 get from reading it which is kind of cool. When you're reading it's just there. I don't 85 00:10:29,000 --> 00:10:34,400 know how the text would be broken up to differentiate the two character points of view. But when 86 00:10:34,400 --> 00:10:40,680 you're listening to the book you're listening to the female author, sorry the female narrator 87 00:10:40,680 --> 00:10:49,080 who is doing all of Rose's parts but then it cuts to when Norman, the ex-husband cop, 88 00:10:49,080 --> 00:10:56,200 the crazy guy, when he's doing things it's Stephen King reading it himself because he 89 00:10:56,200 --> 00:11:01,480 narrates quite a few of his books. Or at least a few of them. And he's a great audiobook 90 00:11:01,480 --> 00:11:05,920 narrator. He's got a good voice for it. And he's passionate about his own work. That comes 91 00:11:05,920 --> 00:11:15,320 through. Although he really likes his stupid jokes. And he likes his bad slang. If you 92 00:11:15,320 --> 00:11:19,720 read these books he's always got somebody in the... In 1995 he writes this and it still 93 00:11:19,720 --> 00:11:25,440 sounds like people are talking like the 70s. Like, ah, far out man. Like it's just silly 94 00:11:25,440 --> 00:11:33,840 things. But she goes to this town. She gets involved with this battered women's shelter. 95 00:11:33,840 --> 00:11:40,800 And through that she's able to find a place of her own. Now during all of this Norman 96 00:11:40,800 --> 00:11:47,240 is taking his time. He's trolling her is how he puts it. Which is a completely different 97 00:11:47,240 --> 00:11:53,320 connotation than what we use trolling to mean today. In this he uses it to get into the 98 00:11:53,320 --> 00:11:58,600 mind of her. And so that he can pretend to be her and make all the same decisions that 99 00:11:58,600 --> 00:12:04,080 she would make. Like he stops. He doesn't smoke because she doesn't smoke. You know 100 00:12:04,080 --> 00:12:08,480 like those kind of things. Just to get into the mindset. And then when he... So he's tracking 101 00:12:08,480 --> 00:12:14,200 her down. And he gets closer and closer and closer. And he starts doing some bad things. 102 00:12:14,200 --> 00:12:22,000 Which we'll get to in a sec. But she ends up going to this pawn shop and finding two things. 103 00:12:22,000 --> 00:12:29,840 One, a painting of this fierce looking blonde woman with her back turned on a cliff side. 104 00:12:29,840 --> 00:12:34,800 Is the best way that I can kind of think of it. With a temple up front. Kind of buried 105 00:12:34,800 --> 00:12:41,880 in the sand. And a second thing is a man named Bill. Who's handsome. Kind of younger than 106 00:12:41,880 --> 00:12:47,600 her. She thinks he's way younger than her because I think she in her mind thinks that 107 00:12:47,600 --> 00:12:53,000 she's older than she is because of the amount of extra years that she's probably had to 108 00:12:53,000 --> 00:13:00,000 live via abuse. You know like I'm sure if you're living in that kind of situation time 109 00:13:00,000 --> 00:13:05,380 goes by a lot slower. I would imagine. Because like when I'm at work. And it's a boring day 110 00:13:05,380 --> 00:13:11,800 at work. Which is of course not any sort of comparison. But I'm just using what... Like 111 00:13:11,800 --> 00:13:20,400 on a bad day they seem to go a lot slower. So I can imagine if that's the kind of situation 112 00:13:20,400 --> 00:13:25,080 you're in it just seems like a year could feel like a decade. And it's horrific. So 113 00:13:25,080 --> 00:13:28,980 when she meets this man who's really only like a handful of years younger than her she 114 00:13:28,980 --> 00:13:39,300 thinks she's ancient and he's this kid. But he very 1990s rom com situation ends up going 115 00:13:39,300 --> 00:13:46,860 to her work. Not her house. It might have been her house. But anyway knocking on her 116 00:13:46,860 --> 00:13:51,840 door asking her out on a date. She says yes. But that's the beginning of their relationship. 117 00:13:51,840 --> 00:13:56,240 He's got a motorcycle. She's looking forward to going on it. But the painting seems to 118 00:13:56,240 --> 00:14:01,840 keep changing a little bit when she's looking at it. And she's starting to have dreams that 119 00:14:01,840 --> 00:14:08,080 are kind of taking place inside this painting which is interesting. Meanwhile Norman is 120 00:14:08,080 --> 00:14:17,120 just going on at this point the beginning of an extremely unhinged killing spree. He 121 00:14:17,120 --> 00:14:22,640 finds the guy that gave Rose the information for the battered women's shelter and they 122 00:14:22,640 --> 00:14:28,840 don't show what happened. But again he's a biter. They talk about afterwards that he 123 00:14:28,840 --> 00:14:34,960 was bit over 80 something times. And that when you follow Norman the next day his jaw 124 00:14:34,960 --> 00:14:45,880 teeth really really really hurt. So that's fucked up. Other than that so that he's so 125 00:14:45,880 --> 00:14:53,320 he's tracking her down. He finds out that the battered women's shelter is having a 126 00:14:53,320 --> 00:15:02,120 picnic with the is it the indigo girls? Is that a real band? The indigo girls. The indigo 127 00:15:02,120 --> 00:15:08,720 girls. Oh indigo girls. That is a folk rock duo. So just two of them. They're very much 128 00:15:08,720 --> 00:15:14,080 still an active band 40 years later. And they're yeah okay. Well sorry I don't want to Google 129 00:15:14,080 --> 00:15:21,840 too many things but yeah. Melissa Etheridge. I've heard that name. Is that her? No. Oh 130 00:15:21,840 --> 00:15:29,140 no Amy Rae and Emily Sailors are the indigo. Anyway the indigo girls are playing with their 131 00:15:29,140 --> 00:15:36,280 classic hit Closer to Fine. No wait yeah that would have been out by then. Power of Two 132 00:15:36,280 --> 00:15:43,360 would have been out by then. And of course Shame on You. Wait yeah no wait those aren't 133 00:15:43,360 --> 00:15:52,280 even. Anyway fuck what am I doing? Kid Fears is another song. So indigo girls are playing. 134 00:15:52,280 --> 00:15:56,960 He thinks that she's going to be there. And then it gets to probably. I know I'm skipping 135 00:15:56,960 --> 00:16:01,240 around. These aren't going to be super in depth. This is just to be like you know. God 136 00:16:01,240 --> 00:16:07,120 maybe I don't want to ruin this because if you're interested in reading it. You know 137 00:16:07,120 --> 00:16:12,200 what I'm going to get to what I thought was like kind of like an extremely like gripping 138 00:16:12,200 --> 00:16:16,840 point and then I'm going to stop there and if you if this is interested you at all and 139 00:16:16,840 --> 00:16:20,680 it's not too much of a spoiler that I've given you already which I haven't. There's a lot 140 00:16:20,680 --> 00:16:27,800 that I haven't covered that maybe maybe you'd like to go read it but because this actually 141 00:16:27,800 --> 00:16:35,360 is one of Stephen King's few books that he's written that doesn't have a movie or TV show 142 00:16:35,360 --> 00:16:40,200 adaptation. It's got nothing. It's just a book. It's an audio book and it's a book. 143 00:16:40,200 --> 00:16:46,920 Book book. And it's so I mean I think they're going to maybe make a TV show down the line. 144 00:16:46,920 --> 00:16:50,440 It would definitely make for a good one especially in today's climate. You know people want to 145 00:16:50,440 --> 00:16:57,960 see these kind of true crime esque feeling things and in this particular book it's not 146 00:16:57,960 --> 00:17:04,120 too supernatural until the very end. So I mean like it's a it's a grounded kind of you 147 00:17:04,120 --> 00:17:14,040 know story and then it does get a little bit well a lot of bit over the top. But not in 148 00:17:14,040 --> 00:17:18,680 a way that that was jarring or unpleasant. It's just that if I were to start going into 149 00:17:18,680 --> 00:17:24,480 the crazy stuff involving the painting now without the build up that he has going into 150 00:17:24,480 --> 00:17:30,640 it then it would just sound nutty. But if you read the book and you you know it all 151 00:17:30,640 --> 00:17:39,080 adds up. Makes sense. So the day of the picnic I think is one of the best written Stephen 152 00:17:39,080 --> 00:17:49,280 King high adrenaline like edge of your seat sort of I don't know scene is the right word 153 00:17:49,280 --> 00:17:55,720 part. Chapter. But it's so you have Norman. He finally has figured out where the picnic 154 00:17:55,720 --> 00:18:04,280 is. I mean like he's he thinks okay I'm this big dude how do I differentiate myself. So 155 00:18:04,280 --> 00:18:08,720 like they don't know me. He's a cop right. So he knows what people look for. So he shaves 156 00:18:08,720 --> 00:18:14,400 his head. He gets a wheelchair. He puts like a feminist bumper sticker on the back and 157 00:18:14,400 --> 00:18:23,480 he gets this like crazy punk jacket or whatever. Not punk jacket. Like biker jacket. And he 158 00:18:23,480 --> 00:18:28,800 goes to the picnic. The problem is that he gets there too early like Rose isn't there 159 00:18:28,800 --> 00:18:34,720 yet. And then the other problem for him at least is that somebody recognizes him as the 160 00:18:34,720 --> 00:18:40,320 husband right in the middle of the picnic. Now this is a picnic at a fairground with 161 00:18:40,320 --> 00:18:49,120 a ton of people around. And you now have Norman boxed in. This crazy fucking guy. And I think 162 00:18:49,120 --> 00:18:57,760 I'm going to leave it there. Because he gets recognized by one of the women of the battered 163 00:18:57,760 --> 00:19:04,680 women shelter. She's a badass. So and that's not even the end of the book by any means. 164 00:19:04,680 --> 00:19:11,120 There's still quite a bit to come after that. So yeah fuck it. I'll keep this episode around 165 00:19:11,120 --> 00:19:17,920 20 minutes. I mean general thoughts. Let me give this a grade that's not our stupid movie 166 00:19:17,920 --> 00:19:21,760 grade that we have on the podcast which I'm still trying to come up with a way to change. 167 00:19:21,760 --> 00:19:33,720 Let me just think about this for a second. How would I want to grade books? I mean I 168 00:19:33,720 --> 00:19:45,920 might just do a Stephen King based. Okay. Let's do. Oh god this isn't interesting. Let me 169 00:19:45,920 --> 00:19:51,280 pause this while I think about this for a second. Okay I couldn't think of fucking shit. 170 00:19:51,280 --> 00:19:56,640 I paused that for about way longer than I thought. Anyway I'm going to base this on 171 00:19:56,640 --> 00:20:01,000 and this is only not even that funny unless you read the book. But I'm going to base this 172 00:20:01,000 --> 00:20:09,880 on out of five yogurts in the fridge. That's Gertz in the fridge if you get what I'm saying. 173 00:20:09,880 --> 00:20:16,120 Out of five this gets a full five yogurts. Full five Gertz in the fridge for sure. By 174 00:20:16,120 --> 00:20:19,920 the way Rose Matter that's a color. I didn't know if you knew that. It's not the name of 175 00:20:19,920 --> 00:20:25,920 the character. I mean it is the name of a character but Rose Matter is a color. It's 176 00:20:25,920 --> 00:20:31,360 like a pinkish red. So that's kind of cool. I bet you the color of the book is Rose Matter. 177 00:20:31,360 --> 00:20:38,960 It should be. At least the audiobook cover was. So anyway yeah that's the first episode 178 00:20:38,960 --> 00:20:44,680 of Wednesday Night Book Club. I'm going to keep it brief. Maybe I'll go further later. 179 00:20:44,680 --> 00:20:52,320 Maybe I won't. Who knows? Anyway thanks for joining me. Let me know in the comments because 180 00:20:52,320 --> 00:21:00,080 I am going to put this on YouTube if you enjoyed the book. What I should read next. If you 181 00:21:00,080 --> 00:21:05,320 have any thoughts that I didn't cover tell me if this gets you to want to read the book 182 00:21:05,320 --> 00:21:08,400 or if I gave away too much information. Maybe I'll do a little bit less next time. But anyway 183 00:21:08,400 --> 00:21:18,200 let me know. Oh wait wrong one. This is the worst AI song I've come up with. Have a good 184 00:21:18,200 --> 00:21:41,240 night guys.