Monthly Archive for June, 2009

Publishers Weekly.

Published on June 22, 2009 in AM/PM and Featherproof Books. Closed

AM/PM Amelia Gray. Featherproof (PGW, dist.), $12.95 paper (144p) ISBN 978-0-9771992-7-3
A series of brief, anecdotal episodes featuring occasionally recurring characters marks this delectable debut from Gray. Numbered from 14 to 133, and appearing on facing pages marked AM and PM, these vignettes explore the love tangles of characters like Betty and Simon, listening through the window to a screaming argument by neighbors on the street and discussing whether they should react as Raymond Carver or Superman, or Martha and Emily as they test glass tabletops (and each other) while shopping for furniture. Muted, humorous epiphanies occur: Carla, a woman with two daughters, is moving out on Andrew and trying to pack up her glassware in newspaper (“softened by the humid air”) without waking him; later, she dates the Amazing Chet, who makes his living guessing people’s weight. Friends Missy and Chastity do yoga and debate the attributes of attractive men, while Hazel, on the facing page, ponders her universal “need to express something inside of her.” At moments screwy, prickly and pleasantly surprising, Gray’s short shorts deliver youthful snapshots about being nuts in love. (Aug.)

The IRS Mission.

Published on June 20, 2009 in Cooking and Five Things. 4 Comments
I owe the IRS $106.64

I owe the IRS $106.64

Nothing is new. I don’t want to read it too quickly or else it will be over. I also felt that way about Slow Wave.

It is hot today in Texas. I used to longboard to work and school when I lived in Arizona and on days like this I could feel the asphalt grabbing the wheels.

I’m getting pretty good at making lasagna. The secret is a homemade sauce with wine and a pinch of sugar.

Thinking of ideas for September Five Things with the help of thoughtful friends. Topics include school, criminals, fetishes. Wolfe suggested Austin neighborhoods, which is a good idea that deserves its own show. I like stories about ideas, but I’m thinking that going back to the visual element is a wise choice. The photograph show went really well. Including an object makes it feel like show-and-tell, which charms everyone. If we’re doing a live reading instead of a podcast or a journal, we should be taking advantage of the extra senses we get. Smell-o-vision.

Good morning (real talk).

Published on June 18, 2009 in Cats and Pictures. Closed

My fat cat Turkish woke me up before dawn this morning by throwing herself at the closed blinds and wailing. I opened the blinds and she sat and looked out the window for a while and had a wheezing fit and left the room. I rolled out of bed and bought four blackout curtains on Overstock before I knew what I was doing.

Damn you Turkish

Damn you Turkish

The fellows at HTMLGIANT are always on the lookout for interesting things. Of note, McSweeney’s is holding a contest for a new columnist. The top three selections will each receive $500 and a one-year contract to write your column (twice a month or thereabouts) for McSweeney’s Internet Tendency. (Also of note.)

I think someone could write an interesting article about Twitter. You could quote interesting or funny Twitter feeds, like Shaq‘s feed or that senator who can’t spell words. You could write about how Twitter is good for newscasters to talk about on CNN, because they get to say fun phrases like “Tweeting the News” and still get paid. You could talk about how interesting it is that 10% of all Twitter users create 90% of the content and how 99.5% of that content is made up of stuff nobody cares about ever.

In later columns you could start suggesting that Twitter makes a low buzzing sound when left alone in the dark. You could write speculative fiction about what the world would be like if Twitter was the only way we could communicate. Maybe you could write a column composed entirely of what Kafka would Tweet.

boycott tacobell (please RT)
1:09 PM Jun 8th from txt

wtff taco bell dosnt sell steak burrito
1:08 PM Jun 8th from txt

1st sign of begn. of understanding = wish to die
12:45 PM Jun 8th from txt

@heykim shhhhh dnt tell nobody
11:05 AM Jun 8th from txt

This week, I am writing short articles for children. I’ll be writing about rare flowers, Kobe beef, a magician named Juliana Chen, and the Rockettes. I bought all my tickets for travel this summer, including my first train ticket (Seattle to Portland). If I had a Twitter you’d best believe I would be Tweeting about all of this.

An exciting review.

Published on June 15, 2009 in AM/PM and Reviews. 1 Comment

Check out John Madera’s review of AM/PM, which functions as an excellent standalone piece. I can’t choose but I think my favorite might be #81: AM/PM is a word horde like Beowulf or something. Thanks, John.

EVER by Blake Butler.

Published on June 12, 2009 in Blake Butler. Closed

EVERThough it doesn’t exactly suit the book, I have to think about EVER in terms of plot, character, and (I know, I know) author biography. Talking about it any other way would require the use of color fields and degenerating tones, though, and that shit does not translate to the blogosphere.

Blake’s booknotes offer hints to EVER, which otherwise stands un-annotated as a series of rooms folding in on itself, a girl folding into rooms and finding rooms. Apparently he wrote it after the Atlanta tornado destroyed his house and he went to live at his parents’ house. He talks about the tornado here and it’s very clear the state he’s in that would give rise to a book like EVER. (I’m done talking about Blake like I am his biographer because he is my friend. The fucked claustrophobic nature [to borrow a phrase] of this book would make me curious about the author’s state regardless.)house1

EVER is all full of brackets, which suggests the open/closed roomlike/womblike construction of the thing. I thought of it in terms of HTML but a normal parenthetical kind of thing would work I think. Here’s a little bit:

[I could see the door still a little.

  [I could -- still could -- see the door.

    [Door(s)(s).

      [Def.: door (n): 1. a thing I'd noticed.

        [2. A thing through once I'd --

          [once I'd -- been. ]]]]]]]

The brackets are important to the book, which is all about open and closed spaces and yawning chasms and riddles. I’m picky about layout and typographic tricks in fiction; if you’re not writing what you’d call a hybrid, anything beyond the traditional or slightly modified words and punctuation of your language are all you get, unless you have a very good reason, such as expressing the idea that a girl thinks in terms of small spaces.

There’s one part where the narrator is licking the bathtub and she tastes a layer of herself and a layer of Comet and a layer of her mother. That pretty passage is the book distilled; layer upon unsettling layer, intriguing even as it attempts at times to repulse.

Incidentally, when I was showing the book to a friend of mine, he flipped it over and read the Gary Lutz blurb:

[B.B.] is a daring invigorator of the literary sentence, and the room-ridden narrator of his debut novella, EVER, nerves her way into a hallucinative ruckus of rousing originality.

Semiotician friend noted, “ridden has two definitions, Lutz” and then I looked it up and realized that Gary Lutz Was Right—a phrase I would wear on a t-shirt if the opportunity was presented.

house2The deal with this book is that it offers a puzzle like The Exquisite but instead of dissecting reality, it dissects surreality as it wobbles in a frame of reality, which essentially turns you on your ass and shoves a prism up there. Needless to say, I recommend reading EVER in the bathtub.

Tour Dates Announced.

Published on June 11, 2009 in AM/PM, Blake Butler, Featherproof Books, Interviews and Zach Dodson. Closed

dollar store logo

Featherproof Books is excited, no, totally pumped, to announce our biggest event the year: The Dollar Store Summer Mega Tour!  That’s right, we’re taking this renowned reading series on the road: packing 7+ of our beloved writers in a van, buying tons of dollar store junk, and hitting 11 cities in 14 days.

For three years, The Dollar Store has sold out its hometown venue with its blue-collar literature, absurdist humor, and a circus of junk. This summer, Zach Dodson, co-founder of featherproof books, will host a month long Dollar Store tour that kicks off June 28th, and will hit Austin, on Sunday July 5th at 8 PM , at Scoot Inn.

Austin, Sunday July 5th
8pm, $1
Scoot Inn
1308 E. 4th Street @ Navasota
Austin, TX 78702

Stealing from the improv community’s bag of tricks, The Dollar Store uses a “suggestion” for the pieces performed in the show. Each writer or comedian is given an item purchased at a local dollar store (mundane to insane) and a month to craft a story that involves the item as directly or obliquely as the performer wishes.  The show has been featured on National Public Radio and in newspapers such as the Chicago Tribune and The New York Times.

The tour will include the following authors: Amelia Gray (AM/PM, Featherproof, 5 Things Austin reading series) Aaron Burch (Hobart), Caroline Picard (Green Lantern Press, The Parlor reading series), Zach Dodson (boring, boring, boring, Featherproof, the Show ‘n Tell Series), Mary Hamilton, (Quickies! reading series) Jac Jemc ( My Only Wife, Dzanc Books), and Blake Butler (Scorch Atlas, Featherproof, Ever, Calamari, Lamination Colony). It will also feature local Austin writers Ryan Markel and Owen Egerton.

These performers can’t wait to hit Austin as they spread dollar store junk throughout the United States. Zach Dodson, as well as the other touring performers are available for interviews. More information for the Dollar Store reading series can be found at www.dollarstoreshow.com.

<!– /* Font Definitions */ @font-face {font-family:”Cambria Math”; panose-1:2 4 5 3 5 4 6 3 2 4; mso-font-charset:1; mso-generic-font-family:roman; mso-font-format:other; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:0 0 0 0 0 0;} @font-face {font-family:Calibri; panose-1:2 15 5 2 2 2 4 3 2 4; mso-font-charset:0; mso-generic-font-family:swiss; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:-1610611985 1073750139 0 0 159 0;} @font-face {font-family:”Bookman Old Style”; panose-1:2 5 6 4 5 5 5 2 2 4; mso-font-charset:0; mso-generic-font-family:roman; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:647 0 0 0 159 0;} /* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {mso-style-unhide:no; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:”"; margin:0in; margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt; font-family:”Times New Roman”,”serif”; mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:”Times New Roman”; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} a:link, span.MsoHyperlink {mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; color:blue; text-decoration:underline; text-underline:single;} a:visited, span.MsoHyperlinkFollowed {mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; color:purple; mso-themecolor:followedhyperlink; text-decoration:underline; text-underline:single;} .MsoChpDefault {mso-style-type:export-only; mso-default-props:yes; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:”Times New Roman”; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} .MsoPapDefault {mso-style-type:export-only; margin-bottom:10.0pt; line-height:115%;} @page Section1 {size:8.5in 11.0in; margin:1.0in 1.0in 1.0in 1.0in; mso-header-margin:.5in; mso-footer-margin:.5in; mso-paper-source:0;} div.Section1 {page:Section1;} –>

Featherproof Books is excited, no, totally pumped, to announce our biggest event the year: The Dollar Store Summer Mega Tour!  That’s right, we’re taking this renowned reading series on the road: packing 7+ of our beloved writers in a van, buying tons of dollar store junk, and hitting 11 cities in 14 days.

For three years, The Dollar Store has sold out its hometown venue with its blue-collar literature, absurdist humor, and a circus of junk. This summer, Zach Dodson, co-founder of featherproof books, will host a month long Dollar Store tour that kicks off June 28th, and will hit Austin, on Sunday July 5th at 8 PM , at Scoot Inn.

Austin, Sunday July 5th

8pm, $1
Scoot Inn
1308 E. 4th Street @ Navasota
Austin, TX 78702

Stealing from the improv community’s bag of tricks, The Dollar Store uses a “suggestion” for the pieces performed in the show. Each writer or comedian is given an item purchased at a local dollar store (mundane to insane) and a month to craft a story that involves the item as directly or obliquely as the performer wishes.  The show has been featured on National Public Radio and in newspapers such as the Chicago Tribune and The New York Times.


The tour will include the following authors: Amelia Gray (AM/PM, Featherproof, 5 Things Austin reading series) Aaron Burch (Hobart), Caroline Picard (Green Lantern Press, The Parlor reading series), Zach Dodson (boring, boring, boring, Featherproof, the Show ‘n Tell Series), Mary Hamilton, (Quickies! reading series) Jac Jemc ( My Only Wife, Dzanc Books), and Blake Butler (Scorch Atlas, Featherproof, Ever, Calamari, Lamination Colony). It will also feature local Austin writers Ryan Markel and Owen Egerton.

These performers can’t wait to hit Austin as they spread dollar store junk throughout the United States. Zach Dodson, as well as the other touring performers are available for interviews. More information for the Dollar Store reading series can be found at www.dollarstoreshow.com.

Featherproof Books is excited, no, totally pumped, to announce our biggest event the year: The Dollar Store Summer Mega Tour!  That’s right, we’re taking this renowned reading series on the road: packing 7+ of our beloved writers in a van, buying tons of dollar store junk, and hitting 11 cities in 14 days.

For three years, The Dollar Store has sold out its hometown venue with its blue-collar literature, absurdist humor, and a circus of junk. This summer, Zach Dodson, co-founder of featherproof books, will host a month long Dollar Store tour that kicks off June 28th, and will hit Austin, on Sunday July 5th at 8 PM , at Scoot Inn.

Austin, Sunday July 5th

8pm, $1
Scoot Inn
1308 E. 4th Street @ Navasota
Austin, TX 78702

Stealing from the improv community’s bag of tricks, The Dollar Store uses a “suggestion” for the pieces performed in the show. Each writer or comedian is given an item purchased at a local dollar store (mundane to insane) and a month to craft a story that involves the item as directly or obliquely as the performer wishes.  The show has been featured on National Public Radio and in newspapers such as the Chicago Tribune and The New York Times.


The tour will include the following authors: Amelia Gray (AM/PM, Featherproof, 5 Things Austin reading series) Aaron Burch (Hobart), Caroline Picard (Green Lantern Press, The Parlor reading series), Zach Dodson (boring, boring, boring, Featherproof, the Show ‘n Tell Series), Mary Hamilton, (Quickies! reading series) Jac Jemc ( My Only Wife, Dzanc Books), and Blake Butler (Scorch Atlas, Featherproof, Ever, Calamari, Lamination Colony). It will also feature local Austin writers Ryan Markel and Owen Egerton.

These performers can’t wait to hit Austin as they spread dollar store junk throughout the United States. Zach Dodson, as well as the other touring performers are available for interviews. More information for the Dollar Store reading series can be found at www.dollarstoreshow.com.

Largehearted Boy Book Notes.

Published on June 10, 2009 in AM/PM and Interviews. 1 Comment

Check out my Book Notes for AM/PM at Largehearted Boy.

When I listen to music, I usually end up looping one or two songs for months. I’m trying to get out of the habit because it makes me kind of boring to talk to about music, but for the purposes of this playlist it comes in handy. For this I took the songs I listened to a lot during the writing and editing and assigned them to characters they might represent.

Interview at The Scowl.

Published on June 4, 2009 in Five Things, Interviews and Teaching. 2 Comments

Today at The Scowl you will find a conversation between Tobias Carroll and myself. I talk about teaching, writing, and Five Things. It was fun; thank you, Toby.

Another squirrel ran by the window with a pancake in its mouth. Somebody in this neighborhood is handing out pancakes.

About a month ago, a few nice folks wrote me long, polite letters referring to my position on the stimulus bill. I think I just figured out why.

Airplane accidents.

Published on June 2, 2009 in Blake Butler and Shane Jones. Closed

This recent sadness off the coast of Brazil has me thinking about aviation disasters. The worst accident in aviation history was in 1977, at the Tenerife airport on the Canary Islands. KLM 4805 collided with Pan Am 1736 in the fog, killing 583. A series of accidents and miscommunication. In 2007 a monument went up at Tenerife:

Quoted from the monument website:

The monument for the victims of Tenerife is a sculpture which is a spiral staircase, and a spiral staircase which is a sculpture. The spiral theme is a symbol of infinity.

The sculpture will not be immediately recognized as such, and yet neither is it in practical terms a staircase. There is no banister, and the ‘steps’ are not intended to be used. The 18-metre-high sculpture is not what it seems, which is emphasized by the 12-metre-high fence that has been placed around it. The transparent fence encloses and protects the sculpture.

Rudi van de Wint once said: people either like or dislike a monument, but a monument is about so much more. The ritual significance of the location is of prime importance. Monuments are often places of yearning; they are projections of impotence, of the brokenness of the human spirit and of the universal drama.

A monument which encapsulates a yearning for reconciliation or acceptance can never be too sober, because the real drama cannot be expressed in art. Art can only provide a subtle hint.

For a moment, the sculpture appears to move endlessly upwards, but the spiraling movement of the steps has been abruptly interrupted. It can be seen as having an open ending, but also as a never-ending motion. It appears to be an unfinished form, cut off suddenly, like the victims’ lives. But the staircase, high up on the mountain, also makes minimal contact with the sky above, with the infinite star-spangled heavens which it appears to touch ever so briefly.

I finished Blake Butler’s lovely strange EVER and I’m currently reading Shane Jones’s strange lovely Light Boxes. I will talk about them more once I get my head out of the sky.