slideshow

"Voyeur with Dog" was the first of many slideshow fiction works created by Richard Holeton. The text tells the story of a lonely middle-aged man, coming to terms with the potential loss of his aging, canine companion. The slides describe the behavior of the main character (simply called "The Man") after his divorce, his relationship with his dog and his struggle to connect with others. He has few relationships and spends his time dwelling on memories of his ex-wife and musing about the lives of his (female) neighbors, like the "Girl Next Door" and "Woman at the Sink." Though the Man describes his own appearance and demenour as off-putting, he notices that people, especially women, are drawn to his "beautiful" dog. In contrast to the Man, "the Dog" attracts and delights everyone without effort. Walking the Dog becomes a reprieve from solitude and a source of comfort. However, as the Dog ages and acquires health problems, the Man realizes that he will not always be able to rely on his pet for support. 

Holeton continued to experiment with the slideshow format in the works: "Custom Orthotics Changed My Life" (2010), "Do You Have Balls?" (2011) and "Postmodern: An Anagrammatic Slideshow Fiction" (2017). As with his other slideshow fiction creations, "Voyeur with Dog" incorporate elements like: bullet points, large, easy-to-read text, still images, graphs and tables, a summary of key points, and even a closing Thank You slide.

"Do You Have Balls?" is a slideshow prose-poem by Richard Holeton that explores issues of masculinity and the body. The presenter muses about how the presence or absence of testes affects his feelings of self-worth and way of relating to others. Each of the section headings is an iteration of the Seussian mantra: "Yes, I have ___ ball(s), and you have ___" Holeton previously experimented with the slideshow format in his works: "Voyeur With Dog" (2009) and "Custom Orthotics Changed My Life" (2010). As with these other slideshow fiction pieces, "Do You Have Balls?" incorporates elements like: bullet points, large, easy-to-read text, still images, graphs and tables, a summary of key points, and even a closing Thank You slide.

Afterwords(s): Take a Book/Leave a Book is a found poem series by Richard Holeton. As Holeton explained in his ELO 2019 presentation, the series was inspired by Joan Retallack's poem "Not a Cage" (1990), in which she recycled lines of text from books that she was discarding. Instead of using books from his personal library, Holeton sourced the texts from his local "take a book/leave a book" book sharing box. Each line of the poem is taken from the final passage of a different book. He completed the work over ten days, swapping out a new book each day, to create the finished 10-line poem.

The print version of Afterword(s) appeared in print form in Forklift, Ohio #37 and the multimedia version was exhibited at the &Now 2018 Festival of Innovative Writing.

The tragic tale of two marriages, the death of a son and severe foot problems, followed by miraculous improved life thanks to custom orthotics, is all told using bullet pointed lists, slide transitions and simple graphs generated from presentation templates.

Other slideshow fiction works by Holeton include: "Voyeur with Dog" (2009), "Do You Have Balls?" (2011) and "Postmodern: An Anagrammatic Slideshow Fiction" (2017).