Post Twentieth Century Fiction, made by the young, rigourously nurtured
Issue 2 available now

	The day-long seminar had been entitled, "You Oughta Be in Pictures… But You're Not: Strategies for Dealing with Rejection in the New Hollywood." Now that it was over, the panel of hugely successful industry professionals had sent them back out into the world with the admonition that each and every one of them "Make the dream real." Those in attendance sauntered slowly down from the ballroom of the glamorous Universal City hotel and out the automatic doors into the sunshiny late-afternoon haze.             That few of those now returning to their desperate lives were hanging back to network had to be a clear function of the deep knowledge that a fellow drowning man makes a lousy life preserver, and that anyone attending today's seminar could not possibly be in a position to help anyone else. Still, the human imperative to seek others, to create community, to bond with someone, could give rise in moments of diminished expectation like these to last-minute curbside introductions, the kind where any impartial observer who'd been in L.A. for over five years could safely assume that the parties exchanging phone numbers were both roughly thinking the following:             "Well… I haven't managed to sell a genre picture, maybe what I'll do is hang around with this guy, get to know him, then I'll use him as a character: he's just the kind of hopeless L.A. loser-type who thinks he's gonna make it but never will, the kind someone like Hoffman could have a field day with. Of course, Hoffman would have to play younger."
	Excerpt from "You're in the Army Now" by Scott Fivelson
	A blue ghost of smoke dances across Jennifer's lips, spreads itself thin, then dissipates into the night through the pickup's half-open driver's side window. Jennifer drums the fingers of her left hand against the hard plastic steering wheel, matching time with the outro of Stevie Wonder's "Ordinary Pain" as it plays through the truck's antiquated 8-Track stereo. She keeps perfect time even though the cacophonic sixteenth-note assault that spills from Madame Sook's Pleasure Palace into the gravel parking lot threatens to bury Stevie and the rest of the world in unwelcome noise. Jennifer turns to face the passenger seat, then offers Jen the spliff smoldering between her right thumb and index finger. Jen doesn't take it. Instead, she stares out the open passenger window, oblivious, drifting. The 8-Track deck squeaks, then changes programs with a clunk. With a sweet choral coo, "Love's In the Need of Love Today" begins to play.             "Hey, Stoner," interrupts Jennifer, "Your turn on the swingset."             "Huh?" starts Jen. "Oh, thanks." She takes the joint between left thumb and forefinger, brushing the side of Jennifer's hand as she draws it to her own mouth. Jen takes a hit, then glances down towards the floor to the empty beer bottles at her feet.
	Excerpt from "Jennifer Army" by Ross E. Lockhart

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