Sam Eisenstein

Nudibranchia Sam Eisenstein

A novel in four voices, bedeviled by one-line throwaways: ". . . their eyes falling around her like chains, so that she dragged by the time she reached the bathroom . . ." ?this one outrageously about culturally shamed African-American students taken with Adrianna?s steatopygia, settled on her?an angel required to show her mettle against her twin, a fallen angel?by a seriously bored, mischievous deity. Adrianna defines herself as Charismatic and Catholic, but Dr. Lloyd, one of the lascivious faculty members destined?doomed?to have his life totally shaken by her, jokes about this insult to the "Primate?I don?t mean the monkey," while Adrianna ruminates sadly on the Creator?s joke of settling on her butt what she pines to display in front. Dr. Frank observes, "I served (my country) when sub wasn?t part of a sandwich." He believes the Department is like a submarine coursing silent depths, a kind of ark to keep evil, always lurking, at bay. Chair?ahh, Chair?utterly lacking reason, he eagerly anticipates abduction by thuggish Tibetan Buddhists, whisked to Potala, Tibet, to be utterly trans-formed, no longer doomed to umpire vain squabbles among faculty of a dying junior college English department. Sucked into Dr. Lloyd?s filthy office by a teasing offering of the PBS special entitled, "Llamas I Have Lloved," humiliated by nagging attachment to things of the flesh, he awaits transmogrification. Anor, a demon only recently a snake, has horror of actually becoming one of the creatures he impersonates. He tries to strew disorder, but chaos is already so pervasive he finds little to do.