The wrong man - John Katzenbach

For three days, I’ve been attached to “The wrong man”, great suspense novel of the American author John Katzenbach.

Really, I couldn’t put the book down while I was reading it. And this is because Katzenbach knows exactly how to hook his readers to his books pages. Every chapter contains the exact amount of drug that you will need to take in the next one as soon as possible. Katzenbach is a master. On Youtube, I searched for some of his interviews regarding “The wrong man”, but I find none. Instead, I found interviews about his many other books. I realized that this Katzenbach had a large amount of fans here in Latin-American. And this is because those fans know what I have discovered: John knows how to provide the precise doses of this narcotic called suspense.  

As usual, I found that novel on one of my visits to my favorite second-hand bookshop in the Jirón Quilca: the Mister Luna’s second-hand bookshop. “The wrong man” cost me 3 soles. But with my discount of preferred customer, the price went down to 2.5 soles. I chose “the wrong man” because its first pages were so inviting. On Mister’s Luna second-hand bookshop I always buy 8 to 10 books with 10 or 15 soles. It’s paradise to me.

To this day, I’ve watched a whole bunch of Katzenbach’s interviews on Youtube. I would like to share this quote of his:

“People say that I write books that are psychological thrillers. All good books should be psychological thrillers. All good books should make you want to turn the page. Every book should be exciting.”

That’s right. No matter what technique is used to build a novel, but that technique and other craftwork used by the author should be capable of ignite the reader’s curiosity, so he could be easily drawn throughout the book pages till the last one.

So, let’s talk a little bit about “The wrong man”. You could not easily forget the psychopath Michael O’Connell. This is an awesome bad guy. He had a quick intercourse episode with Ashley, the only daughter of the ex-married couple formed by Scott Freeman, History college professor, and Sally Freeman-Richards, who decided to live with Hope Frazer, a soccer coach at a female school. Sally, a somewhat successful lawyer, had decided to live next to the person she felt happy with, despite what people’s prejudices could argue.

Michael desires Ashley so bad above anything else in the world that he would try anything to have her by his side even ruin the lives of her parents and relatives.

Suspense, violence, menaces and murders are carefully intertwined in “The wrong man”. But there’s also love. After you finish reading the book, you will agree with me that love is the main ingredient in the novel, love in all of its forms: The twisted and obsessive love that Michael O’Connell offers to his victim and the love of Ashley’s parents that will take them to undertake a brutal enterprise, an enterprise that will leave its signature on their lives forever.

Now, I will have to wait for my lady to buy for me one of the other Katzenbach’s books: “The madman’s tale”, “A day of reckoning”, “The analyst”, and others. Because the odds that another second-hand Katzenbach’s book reaching Mister Luna’s bookshop are rare. I count on you, babe.   

My prepuce itches hard. What can I do?

I was going to start this new serial of posts talking about the hypnotic book of John Katzenbach “The wrong man” (I said “hypnotic” to me. I can’t assure that what is magnetic to me would have to be magnetic to somebody else). Anyway, I hope I will finish that post after writing and uploading this one. We’ll see.

That’s right. Just as the tittle of this post reads, yesterday I had the most irritating pineal itching that I’ve ever experienced in these 31 years of existence.

I’ve been suffering these itchings for some few months now. They appear with little frequency, but when they do, as time goes by, they get ferocious and impious. The zenith of those itchings arrived yesterday.  

After doing some businesses at the office, while walking along Arenales avenue, the trouble started to grow, this trouble that wouldn’t decay until I reached the bus stop. That pain was so intense that I was forced to put my shyness aside and start scratching frantically my penis (over my blue jeans, of course). I was longing to be suddenly alone so I could scratch my naked penis and see what was going on down there.

For what I saw in these days, my itching is focused on my prepuce (I’m not circumcised) and it tends to get red, slightly swollen and, when not wet by some preseminal liquid, it gets the softness of a cardboard. Besides, in my glans appear some little pink spots which change position and, all of a sudden, they disappear to reappear days after in some different places on my bullet-shaped glans.

I was, then, walking along Wilson Avenue, looking for a drugstore in which a male clerk could take care of my request. I wouldn’t dare to tell my pineal problems to some lady just to get a “go away, you pervert filthy monkey” face. My search was not fruitful. Any of the drugstores I visited had a single male clerk. Damn! What’s with you guys that don’t want to study Pharmacy anymore? Or is it that the fucking drugstores prefer to hire only ladies? Too bad! A man is only confortable, to talk about this penis unknown diseases, in front of other males. At least that’s my case, son. Remember that, stupid Peruvian drugstores.

My itching was so extreme that I had this impulse to ask to any kind of older guy “excuse me, sir, by any chance, are you an urologist? Yes? You think you can check out my penis and tell me what on earth is giving me these never felt before itchings? Please?” Unfortunately, I wasn’t brave enough to ask that. Shame on me!

The itching diminished its intensity when I got the bus to my home. A little bit relieved, I was able to take out from my bag the new Marco Aurelio Denegri’s book “Poliantea”. You know, to me it’s always a pleasure to read to Marco Aurelio. Reading his stuff enriches my vocabulary and teaches me how to write properly so I can use that knowledge to write the stupid things I use to write some time on this bloody page.

The five blocks of Bertello Avenue were walked along by a relaxed me. But, I was not going to allow that itching to come back again. Fuck, no! I knew who could help me. A block away from home there’s a drugstore run by two guys and two ladies. Luck had to be on my side this time. And it was. But not as I wanted it to be. There were the two guys. You know what I mean? Two guys. It feels uncomfortable to relate you penis issues to one stranger; so imagine have to do that shit in front of two. Well, at least, at that moment, there were no customers around.

I told the guy that, by his nerdy looks looked like the best student of some Peruvian Pharmacy Institute, that I had this itching for some time ago and it was getting very painful as days were going by. The itching, I was saying to him, is mainly focused on my prepuce, and is constant. I am constantly attacked by that itching. I intentionally skipped the part of my glans spotted by pink stains. You know, that’s not the problem. It could be a visual problem, if you like. Once the woman I regularly fuck asked me about that and I told her that that was the way my glans has always been. Case closed.

-Take these pills.

Just like that? That quick? Wouldn’t you want to see my cock and give me a weighed prescription, motherfucker?

-But those pills will be effective? I mean, they will eradicate my problem at once?-I asked, mistrustful.

-Of course. If not, take two doses. Take one dose every twelve hours.

-And what do you think is causing my problem?

-It must be some kind of allergy-he said, with all the confidence that the look of a brilliant student of some Pharmacy Institute can give you.

Allergy to what, idiot? Allergy to the pussy of the woman I regularly fuck? Besides, I wash my cock more times than I wash my hands. What allergy could affect my little cock? I didn’t ask more and left.

Today in the morning I had my last dose. And I’ve been feeling that that itching was only hiding somewhere, getting ready to jump out and start ripping my soul bloodily any unexpected time. I know, from the bottom of my brain and heart that those pills wouldn’t solve shit.

I was going to travel to Chimbote this week to visit my father and brother and sisters, but I had something on the way and I’m afraid I will stay home this week. It’s sad because I really wanted to see my relatives there. I’m a bad person, you know. I don’t take the proper time to visit them at least once in a while. And also, I’m sad because I am not going to be able to tell my dad to get some of his urologist friends to take a look to my penis and, for God sake, take my pain out and away for good.

Well, it seems that my minuscule boy (my cock) will have to wait a little longer.