Oh, boy— Oh, boy— Oh, boy—
That blonde girl is Bob in a wig!
Spurley sped for cover
in shield of tendril-rooted teasel
but Bob wields his wild mallet
POPPITY POP!! . . . will drop the weasel.
Spurley concusses like a canvas
its skin splayed from its easel
drops a load in his dewy drawers
spreading a sewery stench of diesel.
No humanity of hows
nor witness to whys
He coughs up his gas bloating guts
bends over desk
and dies.
Cascades of curdling blood
pour past Annie’s eyes.
Though she now screams in horror,
so finally complicit is she,
Sounds a bit like us, don’t it?
In love and killing . . .
completely complicit
are we!
And Bob Honey?
A being.
Unbranded,
unbridled,
and free.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The author wishes to thank his children for their challenging brains, wit, and sometimes biting wisdom. His comrades in the daily grind of getting printed words to page, Joseph Sacks and Sato Masuzawa. David Blum for his excellent early guidance and Audible advisement. Brilliant Bob Kerstetter for kicking in fifty of this book’s best words. Mollie Glick for navigating new waters in publishing, and my many friends whose diversified array of professional experience and expertise has rubbed off just enough to let Pappy play at profundity with the proverbs of their professions and nobility of their nomenclature. Finally, to Peter Borland, my first and best written word editor, for showing me such a smart and supportive process, and never balking at the bizarre. Without the above, this novel would not be. —s.p.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Sean Penn won the Academy Award for Best Actor for his performances in Mystic River and Milk, and received Academy Award nominations as Best Actor for Dead Man Walking, Sweet and Lowdown, and I Am Sam. He has worked as an actor, writer, producer, and director on more than one hundred theater and film productions. His journalism has appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle, The Nation, and The Huffington Post. This is his first novel.
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CREDITS AND PERMISSIONS
“Love Me, I’m A Liberal”
Lyrics and Music by Phil Ochs
Copyright © 1965, Renewed 1993, Almo Music Corporation on behalf of Barricade Music, Inc.
Used by Permission. All Rights Reserved.
“I Kill Therefore I Am”
Lyrics and Music by Phil Ochs
Copyright © 1971, Almo Music Corporation on behalf of Barricade Music, Inc.
“When I’m Gone”
Lyrics and Music by Phil Ochs
Copyright © 1963, Renewed 1991, Almo Music Corporation on behalf of Barricade Music, Inc.
Used by Permission. All Rights Reserved.
“Pretty Smart On My Part”
Lyrics and Music by Phil Ochs
Copyright © 1971, Renewed 1999, Almo Music Corporation on behalf of Barricade Music, Inc.
Used by Permission. All Rights Reserved.
“Chords Of Fame”
Lyrics and Music by Phil Ochs
Copyright © 1971, Almo Music Corporation on behalf of Barricade Music, Inc.
Used by Permission. All Rights Reserved.
“War Is Over”
Lyrics and Music by Phil Ochs
Copyright © 1968, Almo Music Corporation on behalf of Barricade Music, Inc.
Used by Permission. All Rights Reserved.
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This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2016, 2018 by Clyde Is Hungry Films, Inc.
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First Atria Books hardcover edition March 2018
Portions of this material were previously published in audio format under the same title in 2016.
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Interior design by Amy Trombat
Jacket design by June Park/Rodrigo Corral Studio
Author photograph by Pappy Pariah
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Penn, Sean, 1960– author.
Title: Bob Honey who just do stuff : a novel / Sean Penn.
Description: New York : Atria Books, 2018.
Identifiers: LCCN 2017060020 (print) | LCCN 2018002029 (ebook) |
ISBN 9781501189067 (ebook) | ISBN 9781501189043 (hardback)
Subjects: | BISAC: FICTION / Literary. | FICTION / Satire.
Classification: LCC PS3616.E5555 (ebook) | LCC PS3616.E5555 B63 2018 (print)
| DDC 813/.6—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017060020
ISBN 978-1-5011-8904-3
ISBN 978-1-5011-8906-7 (ebook)