Ten Minutes of Forever, by Andrew London (Master of Copy-Paste Fiction)

Post date: Feb 18, 2010 5:30:34 AM

3/12/2010 Editor's Note: Evidently, this review has shamed Mr. London into deleting his YouTube account, removing his manuscript from Scribd, and (possibly, though I'm not 100% sure) pulling most copies of his book from Amazon. As a testament to the power of honest criticism, I'm leaving this review as-is, broken links, embarassing comments, and all. And judging by Google Analytics' traffic source statistics (showing referral links from Gmail and Yahoo mail accounts), London or one of his friends has circulated a link to this review via email, most likely asking that his fans flame my blog. I welcome you to it.

8/28/2010 Editor's Note: Hard to believe, but more than six months later, the comments section flaming continues by Andrew London's multiple personalities.

Copy-Paste Fiction: A Bold New Genre

All hail Andrew London of Jerseyville, Illinois for revitalizing the "Romantic Nautical Adventure" genre and inventing another one: Copy-Paste Fiction. More details on that later.

Ten Minutes of Forever tells the harrowing tale of Bartholomew Hart Peterson, a.k.a. Percy, nicknamed after his faraway lover's favorite poet, "Percy Shelly" (not to be confused with Percy Shelley). He's a thirty-year-old lonesome marina worker and seems to have come down with "the cancer" (London's expression). For

reasons so obvious that they go unexplained in the novel, he has "never been a believer in modern medicine." After all, "What is worse: the cancer or the physician's knife?" Well, the answer to that goes without saying, right? I mean, it definitely wasn't improvements in medicine that extended American life expectancies over the past century.Percy doesn't have a passport or a lot of money, but he does have a thirty-foot yacht, and since he's certainly too enlightened to be treated through scientific means (pah! science shmience!), what the hell, might as well face certain death and sail all the way to meet Wren, the love of his life, in China. Yes, you read correctly: Percy is sailing halfway around the world. In a thirty foot yacht. To meet someone he has never met before. And knows only through fifteen years of weekly pen pal letters, as part of a Social Studies class project. How bold. How sane. How romantic. Yes, dear readers, this is an excellent belated Valentine's Day read if there ever was one. Just watch and listen for yourself to this totally un-creepy and authentically vintage (hence its grainy quality) footage of the bearded bard, Mr. London himself, reading from a steamy scene. After viewing that, I imagine that some of my older readers won't be needing Viagra tonight!

As if the love story weren't enough, he artfully coins the terms "overwhich" and "afterwhich," spells "champagne" as "Champaign," leaves out the period at the end of a sentence, and lavishes us with the following scenes of Percy:

• Riding on and communicating with dolphins, whom he thinks of as brothers
• Looking on as cannibals examine his yacht (How he knows they're cannibals and not just indigenous people having a look, we don't know -- that is the magic of Percy's intuition!)
• Patting himself on the back for being a vegetarian -- because no animal, human or otherwise, should cause harm to another living being
• Watching animals eat other animals and not minding, unless they're "scary" animals, like sharks, since they have big teeth and eat things that bleed a lot
• Being very hungry
• Thinking nonviolent thoughts
• Blowing away two speedboats of pirates in the Straits of Magellan -- without being fired upon -- using his grandfather's Tommy Gun, a World War II souvenir
• Wondering why he forgot to send a letter to Wren to let her know he was coming, which totally does NOT prove that he's doing this for selfish reasons (wants to be a martyr, wants to see what it's like to be on the high seas in a tiny-ass boat for a year-and-a-half, etc.) instead of loving ones
• Giving super-intellectual, mind-blowing, and utterly revolutionary rants on religion that are repeated nearly verbatim multiple times throughout the novel -- just to make sure we thick-skulled readers get the point

London is just too generous.

And what a master! As written by a personal friend who's also probably a talentless hack that has to self-publish because he'd never be published otherwise -- err -- I mean, "The Wayne Thomas Gallery Review of Books, Missouri,"

Andrew London has written the Great American Novel . . . It's the best debut novel by a new author that we've seen in years, perhaps decades! . . . (It is) an excitingly profound romantic nautical adventure that completely encapsulates the essence of true love at its most primitive level: ultimate trust, ultimate hope, and the ultimate sacrifice of unconditional love; a contemporary masterpiece that is destined to become an immediate and timeless classic!

Too true.

But I'm shocked that Mr. Thomas failed to mention London's trademark copy-paste technique. London's writing, in its pure postmodern, experimental glory, begs the reader Why write varying descriptions? What is the point of description, really? Why not just write the same thing twice? Why even put forth an effort, beyond pressing Ctrl + C, Ctrl + V? You'll get the point.

Why does he do it, you ask? Because he can. This, my friends, is existentialism in its purest form, put to paper for your reading pleasure.

Take, for example, the young and saucy Blanquita, a seductress of Spanish-Creole descent whose passionate ways threaten everything Percy -- ever the noble virgin -- stands for. Compare the descriptions of her from pages 45 and 85 side-by-side, and you begin to understand the sheer genius behind Ten Minutes of Forever.

(Page 45) He saw her beautiful face, those honey-brown almond shaped eyes laced with flecks of gold hidden under long dark lashes; that narrow aquiline nose, slightly upturned at its tip, with a faint hint of freckles splashed across the bridge; the high cheekbones; the classic jaw line; her long and slender neck; the thick dark chestnut hair that cascaded down over her naked shoulders. But it was her mouth that held him captive; that luscious passionflower blossom of a mouth, lotus lipped, soft and warm and wet.

(Page 85) Her lovely face was mere inches from his own; those almond shaped eyes, honey-brown with flecks of gold, hidden under unbelievably long, inky lashes; that slender aquiline nose, slightly upturned at the tip with a seductively sensual splash of light freckles across its bridge; the slender jaw line; the high cheek bones; the erotically enticing long and slender neck; and that mouth, that exquisitely soft, full-lipped, rose blossom of a mouth, which slightly curled at the corners in a cruel and hungry smile.

Note London's care to not only use the same words and phrases, but also to place them in the same order! Rest assured, this is only one of many instances of the copy-paste technique in action. For proof, read the entire novel online or purchase today from Amazon!

I'm a generous person, but don't let yourself think that means I will lend you my copy. This is one I plan to hold close and cherish for all time. Or until I pass a dumpster.