Bix, who is Black, imagined the internet in the ’90s as a “new metaphysical sphere” where “Black people would be delivered from the hatred that hemmed and stymied them in the physical world.” The idea, he concedes, “looked comically naïve from a 2010 perspective.” Nonetheless, we try, try again. We’ve seen how that kind of vision plays out - surely the more we know about one another, the better we’ll understand one another? Right? - and so has its creator. The name of the product, Own Your Unconscious, suggests a lofty, even spiritual aspiration, as does the name of Bix’s company, Mandala. His next big idea, built on an experimental technology that can digitally capture animal consciousness, allows people to upload a life’s worth of memories - even long-forgotten ones - share them in a collective archive and access others’, as if traveling in a cranial time machine. The killer app that defines the alternative reality of “The Candy House” is dreamed up in 2010 by Bix Bouton, briefly introduced as an early-90s internet obsessive in “Goon Squad,” now a social-media mogul. It is also, though it wears the fine cloth of idealism, big business. Tech may not be the new rock ’n’ roll, but it serves an analogous function in “The Candy House.” It’s the world-shifting phenomenon that defines an era and connects strangers. It is a spectacular palace built out of rabbit holes. But given its subject matter, it might be better to describe it as a social network, the literary version of the collaborative novel written by your friends and friends of friends on Facebook or Instagram, each link opening on a new protagonist. “The Candy House,” which passes the microphone to a number of peripheral “Goon Squad” characters, is similar in its anti-chronological structure and chameleonic virtuosity. Following a tangle of characters in and adjacent to the music business across decades, it switched voices and techniques in a kaleidoscopic extended-family portrait. But you could also call it a concept album. The photograph below was taken in Brocksburgh, Nebraska, which is completely abandoned.Jennifer Egan’s 2010 “ A Visit From the Goon Squad” was, depending whom you asked, a novel, or a collection, or a story cycle. Trish Eklund’s personal experiences with the places, and stories of those associated with them, accompany the author’s enchanting images. Abandoned Nebraska: Echoes of Our Past is a photographic adventure through the hauntingly beautiful neglected places of Nebraska, including schools, asylums, colleges, factories, churches, countless farmhouses, and even entire towns. The Nebraska countryside is rich with history, from the dilapidated houses near the Fort Robinson area where Crazy Horse was killed, to the near deserted village, Monowi–population of one. It is on someone’s property next to their house, and I received permission to photograph the home from the outside. The photo above was taken outside of Wayne, NE. Though the people have moved on, the remnants of their lives remain, left for us to wonder what once was. ![]() ![]() These are the words uttered by the souls who once lived and worked in abandoned communities and homesteads, places that once pulsed with laughter. I remember when the house was full of life. I remember when the light poured from the vacant windows, and a tractor rumbled through the fields. I remember when … the three words surface as a splintered, sun-bleached farmhouse looms on the horizon. The light sprayed between tangled branches, showering the farm in gold. Two splintered barns, a corn crib, farm equipment, and this beautiful car remain on the property. There is not much left of the actual house only the stone foundation remains. The photograph from the cover of my book was taken at the same decaying farm as the feature photo. I have signed copies available, just click on the Shop Now Link.Īvailable at Arcadia Publishing and History Press: Link.Ībandoned Nebraska: Echoes of Our Past by Trish Eklund is now available on Amazon, CLICK HERE. The feature photo was taken at an abandoned property near Mahoney State Park.
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