Teeth and Tongue Landscape

by Carlton Mellick III

In a world made out of meat, a socially-obsessive monophobic man finds himself to be the last human being on the face of the planet. Desperate for social interaction, he explores the landscape of flesh and blood, teeth and tongue, trying to befriend any strange creature or community that he comes across.

Genres: Bizarro Fiction, Horror, Surreal, Fantasy, Fiction

112 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2006

About the author

Carlton Mellick III (July 2, 1977, Phoenix, Arizona) is an American author currently residing in Portland, Oregon. He calls his style of writing "avant-punk," and is currently one of the leading authors in the recent 'Bizarro' movement in underground literature[citation needed] with Steve Aylett, Chris Genoa and D. Harlan Wilson.

Mellick's work has been described as a combination of trashy schlock sci-fi/horror and postmodern literary art. His novels explore surreal versions of earth in contemporary society and imagined futures, commonly focusing on social absurdities and satire.

Carlton Mellick III started writing at the age of ten and completed twelve novels by the age of eighteen. Only one of these early novels, "Electric Jesus Corpse", ever made it to print.

He is best known for his first novel Satan Burger and its sequel Punk Land. Satan Burger was translated into Russian and published by Ultra Culture in 2005. It was part of a four book series called Brave New World, which also featured Virtual Light by William Gibson, City Come A Walkin by John Shirley, and Tea from an Empty Cup by Pat Cadigan.

In the late 90's, he formed a collective for offbeat authors which included D. Harlan Wilson, Kevin L. Donihe, Vincent Sakowski, among others, and the publishing company Eraserhead Press. This scene evolved into the Bizarro fiction movement in 2005.

In addition to writing, Mellick is an artist and musician.

Reviews

[Alexa · Rating 2 out of 5]

The concept was very interesting, but the writing was terrible. I couldn’t stand the main character any longer because he's just that insufferable.

ALSO JUSTICE FOR THE METAL WOMAN!!!

[Amy Noire · Rating 4 out of 5]

Who do I turn in my complaint for the mishandling of Metal Woman to? I don’t know if this story is just f*cked or if it’s absolute genius.

[Leila Anani · Rating 3 out of 5]

Teeth and Tongue Landscape is another surreal nightmare committed to prose.

Our nameless hero wanders through a fleshy landscape: It seems the Earth has transformed into a (living?) being and we are just parasites upon it. He finds all the other humans have disappeared and he meets a metal woman he takes as his wife. But then he encounters a society of Themrocs and they eat his wife which he allows simply to fit in. They are ruled by a permanently depressed God. Meanwhile the last bastion of human civilization exists in the Themroc's basement.

As with all CM3 works, it's startlingly original, fabulously nightmare-ish using poetic language to evoke smell, touch and taste. The bio-setting is amazing. My problem with this is its lack of plot - it simply meanders and if it was making any sort of point it eluded me - It feels like a dream fragment. The main character isn't sympathetic. He's utterly reactionary, spineless and allows the only really likeable character (his metal wife) to be killed.

The ideas buzzing in this are great; it deals with the afterlife, a post apocalyptic? future and human alienation, but it frustratingly never really gets to grips with any of these. Still there's lots to enjoy for Bizarro and it does deliver in spades what the title promises: A Teeth and Tongue Landscape. Just not much else.

[Allison | crazypageturner · Rating 2 out of 5]

I honestly was so intrigued about a planet made of flesh. As if Earth is a living breathing being. It sounded gross and fascinating. But almost right from the beginning I wish I had more detail, more detail, more something to envelop me into this world.

Perhaps it’s because this is one of his older/first books but the writing feels off to me. Short. Blunt. Fast. Elementary even.

I didn’t connect with this book at all.

SO. MANY. HYPHENATED. WORDS. HOLY CRAP.

The ending was weird and rushed and I didn’t like it.

A big disappointment and my lease favorite Mellick book so far. On to the next!

[Demi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Though this is my first read of Carlton Mellick III (for now), I am an avid fan of the strange depths from which he pulls his ideas. Teeth and Tongue Landscape was an extremely unique and memorable read, following one man in his search for companionship in the populations of a fleshy planet. The weird ways in which familiar images meet and interact on this meat planet are forever carved into my memory, clicky-clicky. The subtly woven social commentary coupled with the bizarre yet almost tangibly developed setting makes alien all signs of humanity and life. I very much look forward to reading more by CMIII.

[Weathervane · Rating 4 out of 5]

The first Mellick book I've read -- and I'm reasonably impressed. His imagery is fantastic and suitably revolting. Didn't like the constant fusion words with slashes. They work at times, but the gimmick gets overused.

Interesting stuff. The story is sincere, and it works.

[Readerstein13 · Rating 3 out of 5]

Here are my list of notes with no explanation. There may be spoilers, but I will try to edit any that are important to the plot…

-A monophobic man living on an Earth made of meat

-Monophobic - extreme anxiety about being alone

-Blood & gut thunderstorms

-scabbing holes

-Robot wife = “Clicky-click.”

-Themroc - race of people who are all identical and called
Themroc

-Our narrator becomes Themroc cause he has a name tag

-Beetle living

-Morning Dog - a creature that is dog shaped and made of human parts, must make its rounds every day to be pet, or the world ends

-Feeding the last of humans to Earth’s giant mouth

-Narrator wants to conform so bad he goes along with (redacted) his robot bride

-….ends

-Basement is gateway to the place where interesting
People live

-Return to see the ruins of meat world and watch Earth’s new children

This is a traveling adventure tale to find community, but also to point out that conforming just to fit in is a terrible idea

“I love (redacted) so much, but I can’t save (redacted). Themroc will probably think ill of me if they discover I am in love with food. It would definitely be death to my social life. And life is worthless without a social life.”

It was a good read, I like it! Much better works from Mellick are still on the horizon though.

[Sellmeagod · Rating 1 out of 5]

I think I want to like the Bizarro stuff more than it deserves. The label is supposed to mean punk rock prose! It is sparse writing with quirky, gross, sexual, shocking content. The style is inconsistent and the voice is bad, making it hard to feel immersed even if there are wild images constantly. Impossible to not compare this to The Road, the other bombed-out last-man apocalypse book from 2006, but it is not getting close to that in shocks or messaging. It is more like Anthem or worse I Who Have Never Known Men in that there is just straightforward first-person depthless depictions of meandering while the protagonist finds his way in a lonely landscape, but there are no answers or even plausible scenarios. This type of story is very much "first thought/best thought" and the contradictions and illogic are facets of the genre, but it also comes across as imitation Harlan Ellison at his laziest.

[Wenerd · Rating 4 out of 5]

A surreal look at an Earth that got fed up with humans and decided to turn into meat and a guy who just wants to fit in and find a community at all cost. CM3 works great in this format: concise, alien worlds, where you can immerse yourself in the bizarre. Is this a social statement about how we all want to be accepted by whatever group will have us or just wanting to be loved until something better comes along or is it just a crazy story about a flesh, infected world with weird sex? I guess whichever you want.

[Ven Corbet · Rating 3 out of 5]

I love gore and absurdism and surrealism. This book is pretty nasty. That's not the problem.

The protagonist is incredibly unlikable and the only likable character dies midway through because of him. The book doesn't actually have real plotting or much of a punch, and kind of just grossed me out. I guess that was half the purpose, but I was left wondering... why?

[R. Allen Lewis · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is just sort of beyond explanation. Its a sad, unyielding look at one man's desperate desires to be accepted by society, any society. In this quest, he goes through what I can only describe as a fleshy nightmare.

It was all sorts of strange, weird, and bizarre. Will definitely be reading more from this author. only 4 stars because come on, Metal Woman didnt deserve her ending :(

[Samaire Wynne · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very weird and random.
Not bad, really.
I miss the clicks robot woman, she was the best character in the book.

[Jordan]

I don’t know what I just read. I can’t say for sure if I’m better or worse for having read it. All I know is that something has changed because of this book.

[Kristoffer Bolton · Rating 3 out of 5]

What a ride

[Shane Sinsapaugh · Rating 2 out of 5]

A planet entirely made of meat, a weirdo who doesn’t like to be away from others and will conform no matter what? If that sounds like something you’d want to read, then you probably know that this is this book already or you wouldn’t be here, so the question is, is it worth the read?

Eeehhh. Like a lot of early Mellick books, the ideas are always fantastic, and you’ll never read anything from him that has been written elsewhere, I mean, a planet people live on…that’s made of flesh, and night time and day time is just red time and green time, and when it rains, blood and guts fall from the sky? Yeah, that’s not a common thing in our cookie cutter world of literature.

But, once again, it’s written so strangely that it becomes annoying to read.

So I’d say once again, read anything else he has written, and if interested in GREAT early Mellick, I’d go grab The Steel Breakfast Era, that one is amazing and needs to be a movie.

“The world has herpes here.”

[Dean Harris · Rating 2 out of 5]

Wasn't much of a fan of this one. It was like a fever dream with not much direction. "earthmeat"

[Kat · Rating 3 out of 5]

So I guess I'm going to be a downer here, as I gave this book less stars than the other reviewers. It is not for lack of approving this novella...more that it is nowhere near one of my favorites by CM3. I love his work, but for whatever reason, this one just couldn't keep my attention like most of his others.

The lead character lives in a world made of flesh. After returning home and realizing everyone is gone, he sets out to find what he assumes must be the last of humankind, if there are any to find. At the beginning of his journey, he meets and falls in love with a metal woman, who's form of communication comes in a series of "clicks." The odd lovebirds eventually run into a being called Themroc, who is from Themroc where he sends the pair off to. After reaching their destination, otherwise known as Heaven, our protagonist soon discovers that, while he has found other life, it was not exactly what he was searching for. The Night Serpent can help him, but will he like what awaits him?

This book is full of Mellick's usual oddities and outlandish characters. One thing CM3 is good at is having a "moral to the story" without spelling it out to the reader. While this was not one of my favorites, I still like this work and recommend it to any fan of bizarro. You can't go wrong with Mellick.

[Joshua Friesen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bizarro fiction at its best.

[Andrew Stone · Rating 3 out of 5]

There were aspects of this book I really liked. The world is amazing. I dug the relationship between the protagonist and the metal woman. Also, I think CM3 experimented a lot with writing style in this book. I like the way he played with dialogue; however, I think a lot of the experimentation here didn't work out so well. There were a lot of hyphenated words, and consequently, the language in this book is really choppy. As a result, I found this book kind of frustrating to read.

This book clearly on of CM3's earlier works. I can't see him writing something like this again (in regards to the experimentation). But even though his writing isn't at his best, the world is certainly just as wonderful as any of his other books. And overall, this was a real enjoyable read.

[James Dunphy · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is my first Carlton Mellick read. I enjoy it thoroughly. Describing it is uniquely difficult, but it is basically a post-apocalyptic fantasy set on a human face-world. The world is so interesting, and (what I believe is) thought out. It is forever going to stick in the fantasy worlds in my head. Behind this bizarro exterior there are some deep and interesting thoughts and themes that stick out in this book. Isolation, companionship, & appearances all being highlights.

I loved this book. I plan on reading it a lot (I wrote an ass load of notes in my margins) more in future.

Definitely going to be digging into more Mellick stuff

[Amanda · Rating 5 out of 5]

Crazy descriptive weird stuff... this world is very imaginative.

[Tasha-Lynn · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not my fave Mellick book

[Pedro Proença · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thank you, Laser Roboto, for having written this book. Top 5 CMIII for me.

[James · Rating 3 out of 5]

Bizarre indeed!

[Colette · Rating 4 out of 5]

Shows better than anything why you can't live to impress.