It's Happening Again

Dan Wickett at Emerging Writers Network has declared May to be Short Story Month, and will be reading and writing about a lot of stories over the next few weeks. I joined in a couple of years ago in a big way. I won't be able to do a book a day as I tried to do that year, but I've got a bunch of story collections lying around that need to be read and dozens of journals, so I should have no shortage of stories to add to the mix.

Redbud

Dogwood

Gardening

New experience this year. I tried a garden when I first moved into this house in 2001, but I didn't know what I was doing and I gave up--except for the herbs--when deer and/or groundhogs and/or rabbits ate everything else. This year, though, because of the economy and as a way to help the environment, I decided to get more serious. I found a friend to co-garden with, someone who knew what was what when it came to planting, and with some help I built a fence that I'm hopeful will keep the critters out. The picture shows part of the fence and some of the seed trays, along with some of the lettuces we planted this weekend.

The garden is enormous. If this works, we're going to be swimming in vegetables.

"Books That Will Make You a Better Man"

I think Esquire is kind of a waste of paper these days, but they practically give the thing away--right now, online, you can subscribe for 2 years for $12, or 1 year for $8. You can ignore the content and just look at the ads, from which you will learn what the unrepentant rich are aquiring these days.

But I digress. The May issue has some reading recommendations.

"Everybody says men don't read novels anymore. I tell them that's why so many men are asses. Good novels don't just describe the lives of men; they make arguments about the kind of men we ought to be. They inspire improvement."

This is a quip that doesn't hold up under close analysis, but then not much in this magazine does. Never mind: books are being recommended and I can always get bind that. And the books are:
The Signal, by Ron Carlson; Road Dogs, by Elmore Leonard; How to Sell, by Clancy Martin, and Waveland, by Frederick Barthelme; and Pygmy, by Chuck Palahniuk.

Okay, now that I've tried to redeem myself after trashing the magazine, let me try a little harder. I was pleasantly surprised to discover a fair amount of fiction available at the magazine's website, and an announcement that this is a new regular feature. Check out Esquire Fiction. And I was further pleasantly surprised to discover that the magazine is running another fiction contest. Lots of time to enter. The deadline is August 1.

New Issue: failbetter.com Spring 2009

There's some very good stuff in the new issue of failbetter.com, which is now live, including an interview with Sherman Alexie, by Margo Rabb, and fiction by Jess Row and others.

The New Yorker: "Vast Hell" by Guillermo Martínez

Oooh, a nice twist here, and so I’ll try not to reveal too much of the plot. The narrator works in the grocery store and occasionally thinks back to the arrival of nameless young man. The village is full of gossips—there’s little else to do—and so when the wife of one of the barbers in town seems to take a shine to the boy, there is talk. It doesn’t help that the woman, known as “the French Woman,” is already under a cloud of suspicion, especially by the women of the village. Beside this nice conflict, there is the battle between the two barbers in the village, each outdoing the other with service, perks of various kinds, color T.V., etc. But then the boy and the French Woman disappear, and half the town figures they just ran off together and the other half figures that the barber did away with them somehow.

And that’s where I’ll leave the discussion. It’s short. Read it.

Although I call the ending a twist, it is not at all an incredible twist, and in fact, on rereading, there are clues, or at least there is a foundation, and that’s what makes the ending satisfying.

It’s a good, meaty story, I think.

April 27, 2009: “Vast Hell” by Guillermo Martínez

Interview with Tom Lombardo

Check out this interview with poet Tom Lombardo in advance of the upcoming reading at The Writers Center of poets featured in the anthology After Shocks: The Poetry of Recovery, of which Lombardo is the editor.

New Issue: Waccamaw #3

The latest issue of Waccamaw is now up.

The Lonely Voice

This new column by Peter Orner--a Bread Loaf friend with whom I reconnected at the Virginia Festival of the Book last month--looks like it will be terrific: The Lonely Voice. I don't think Peter explains the origins of the title, but readers may recognize the name of Frank O'Connor's classic, The Lonely Voice, A Study of the Short Story

New Issue: The Short Review

There's another fine issue of The Short Review now available, and it includes, among other tasty treats, an interview with Jim Tomlinson, whose second story collection, Nothing Like an Ocean, is calling to me from my to-be-read pile of books.

"Branch Library" by Edward Hirsch

Reader's Circle

Looking for a book club? Looking for author events? Check out Reader's Circle. From the front page:

Reader's Circle seeks to renew the spirit of dialogue that animated the coffeehouses of early modern England and the salons of Enlightenment France. Franklin's Junto and the Lyceums of the 19th century also suggest the tone of American life we hope to facilitate.

New Issue: Carve Magazine Spring 2009

The Spring 2009 issue of Carve is now live.

The New Yorker: "A Tiny Feast" by Chris Adrian

I hate cancer stories. There are too many of them and it is too easy to make them overly sentimental and melodramatic. But this one is different. This one is so highly original (in a Shakespeare-derivative way) that it overcomes all of my objections. I think this is one terrific story. Brad, son of Trudy and Bob, is suffering from leukemia. I mean, “Boy,” the changeling of Tatania and Oberon, is suffering from leukemia. They do everything that real parents do, including smuggling in food that the boy isn’t supposed to have, bringing in familiar items from home (even if some of them are invisible to mortals like the nurses and doctors), and inviting friends to visit—mostly other faeries. At first the boy responds to treatment, but then he starts to get worse. Since he can’t keep down food, even though he begs for it, Oberon and Tatania prepare a tiny feast for him, with the help of the faeries. They chop tiny vegetables and cook tiny chickens, and bake a tiny cake.

Tatania’s magic can do nothing to save the boy, although it does manage to help other children. And when the boy eventually dies, the faeries hold a grand funeral procession through the hospital and back to the faerie home under the hill.

It’s a wonderful creation, and one of my favorites of the year so far.

April 20, 2009: “A Tiny Feast” by Chris Adrian

Pulitzer Prizes Announced

Congratulations to Elizabeth Strout, author of Olive Kitteridge, for her Pulitzer Prize in Fiction! Such awesome news for her.

Talk Like Shakespeare Day

Richard Daley, Mayor of Chicago, is announcing this morning that Thursday (Shakespeare's birthday) will be Talk Like Shakespeare Day in the city. Check out the article in the Chicago Tribune: Talk Like Shakespeare Day. With Chicago accents, that ought to be amusing. (Actually, the story's pretty funny without the accents.)

H/T Kathy

Speaking of Shakespeare's birthday, the American Shakespeare Center is celebrating all this week: Shakespeare Birthday Week, including tours, free shows, a party, and the Stark Raving Sane Benefit (with live auction of cool stuff).

And all of this Shakespeare talk reminds me of this Shakespearean Insulter. Here's a good example, which I send out to my good friend Chris G.: "Thou puking fly-bitten barnacle!"

CLMP Litmag Marathon

The Council of Literary Magazines and Presses is hosting a Litmag Marathon Weekend in New York, May 30-31. It sounds great, and I wish I could be there.

Online Literary Journals

Edward Byrne, Editor of the Valparaiso Poetry Review, has an interesting discussion about online magazines at One Poet's Notes. He's referring to an article in the new Poets & Writers that I haven't yet seen--I'm at the end of their distribution list, it would seem--but I'm looking forward to reading it. (The article is by Sandra Beasley, the second time in a week I've mentioned her!)

There is no doubt that online literary journals have arrived. As with print magazines, there are many online journals that are awful, publish junk, provide little or no editorial oversight, and aren't worth reading. Serious writers and readers will recognize those magazines quickly. But it is beginning to be recognized that some online magazines do first-rate work, comparable to their prize-winning print-based siblings. There has been a stigma against online publishing, but that is beginning to fade.

FRiGG's Microfiction Issue

Check out the new, all-microfiction issue of FRiGG. It's got stories by such short-writers as Scott Garson, Jennifer Pieroni, Kathy Fish, and many more!

HTML Giant Secret Santa/Bunny Comes Through

Three cheers for HTML Giant! Last week, with my tongue firmly in cheek, I complained that I never got got my Secret Santa gift in the HTML Giant scheme back at Christmas, and I speculated that maybe the HTML Giant Secret Easter Bunny would come through instead. Not so secret Ryan, one of the HTML Giant contributors and, as I recall, the brains behind the Secret Santa venture, this week sent me three books.

And now I feel guilty for my whining. Thanks, Ryan.

American Academy of Arts and Letters

The American Academy of Arts and Letters this week announced its literature award winners for 2009.

Congratulations to Ron Currie and all the other winners!

Report from the Road

No, I'm not on the road, but Kevin Wilson is, to promote his book Tunneling to the Center of the Earth, and he is providing running commentary on the process.

Also, check out this Mini-Interview with Kevin Wilson at Andrew's Book Club.

Garden of Eatin'

The previous owner of my house had a garden. I used part of that plot the first year I was in the house and attempted to grow a few things: herbs, peppers, squash. The herbs made it. The vegetables did not, falling victim to critters of one kind or another. The next year I stuck with herbs, and while I loved the pesto I was able to produce with the basil, and the flavor provided by the other herbs, it just didn't seem to be worth the trouble. End of garden.

But . . . it seems like the right thing to do, doesn't it? I've got a big yard, too much of which is devoted to grass that has to be mowed, and too much of what I eat comes from too far away. Localizing what we eat is good for the environment and [my] economy. I happened to mention this a month or so ago to a friend and it turned out that she was anxious to get back into gardening, having traded her house and yard for an apartment where gardening just wasn't possible. I often agonize about such decisions, but this arrangement seemed too perfect: she knew what she was doing, I had the land. And so our co-garden was born.

For me, the first challenge was tilling, but with the aid of a rear-tine tiller (a major capital investment--so much for economy!) I plowed a plot in the yard where my predecessor had his garden. But we needed to do something to protect our produce from critters, so I started planning a fence. With the advice of a very helpful employee of the local Tractor Supply Store, I picked out the materials for our fence. Last Saturday, we built the basic fence--which was an even bigger job than the big job I'd imagined. You can see the result in the picture above. (The picture is taken from my porch and doesn't convey the size of the thing; the plot is 50' x 25'.) I have some more work to do on the fence to build the rabbit guard and also to take it higher by another 18 inches, but that should be done in a few days.

Next step will be planting, and we've already got some plants to put in the ground (currently resting under the grow-light I've installed in my shed) plus lots of seeds. I know there is a lot of work ahead of us, but it is going to be a real pleasure to watch this garden develop!

Update on Amazon Mess

As noted yesterday, Amazon.com was in hot water for what appeared to be censorship of gay and lesbian-themed titles. Lots of people (me included) signed a petition in protest, and many others contacted Amazon directly. Those who contacted Amazon may have received the following reply, as at least one friend of mine did:

Hello,

Thank you for contacting Amazon.com.

This is an embarrassing and ham-fisted cataloging error for a company that prides itself on offering complete selection.

It has been misreported that the issue was limited to Gay & Lesbian themed titles - in fact, it impacted 57,310 books in a number of broad categories such as Health, Mind & Body, Reproductive & Sexual Medicine, and Erotica. This problem impacted books not just in the United States but globally. It affected not just sales rank but also had the effect of removing the books from Amazon's main product search.

Many books have now been fixed and we're in the process of fixing the remainder as quickly as possible, and we intend to implement new measures to make this kind of accident less likely to occur in the future.

Thanks for contacting us. We hope to see you again soon.


Sincerely,

Customer Service Department
Amazon.com

I find this plausible.

Amazonian Travesty

What in the hell were they thinking? In his blog post, Amazon Follies, Mark Probst explains how he learned about Amazon.com's recent move that restricts information about "adult" literature, which seems to include all gay-themed literature, although the precise policy isn't clear to me--if it is to them. One practical outcome is that salses rankings for affected books are no longer available, which will mean that those books may not show up in certain searches or best seller lists. This is serious for the authors.

I recommend that readers explore this situation and if it concerns you as it does me, consider altering your relationship with Amazon.

Here's a partial list of affected titles.

One thing you might consider doing is signing this petition, as I have done. Another is to contact Amazon directly at: connect-help@amazon.com

Recent Acquisitions: Tunneling to the Center of the Earth by Kevin Wilson

I've been looking forward to this book for a long time, even before I knew it was going to be a book. When I first heard Kevin Wilson read one of his stories at the Sewanee Writers Conference in 2004, I knew the day would come. He's a fine writer and I know this is going to be a fun book to read.

The New Yorker: "The Color of Shadows" by Colm Toibin

This is a sneaky little story. Not much is happening, although there are some questions in the back of the reader’s mind, like—where’s the mother? who is this narrator and does he have any other family?—and these are important questions. So here’s the situation: Paul lives in Dublin but is a dutiful nephew to his Aunt Josie who lives out in Enniscorthy, which seems to be an hour or so outside the city. Paul was raised by the Aunt, although we don’t at first know why. As the story begins, though, she takes a fall and needs care, which leads Paul to place her in a nursing home, a home that seems to be pretty nice. She hates it, of course, and wants to go home, even though Paul’s visit to the house tells the reader that the house isn’t so great. Still, he understands it’s all about independence and he feels guilty for leaving her.

So, what is their relationship? It turns out that his mother was an alcoholic and it further is revealed that the mother who many years ago had left the area has now returned. Will she come back into Paul’s life? Aunt Josie seems to want him to promise that he won’t see his mother, although that is partly guesswork on Paul’s part. It also is revealed that Paul is gay, and that it isn’t entirely clear whether Aunt Josie ever knew that. When Josie finally dies, Paul ponders the promise that he made never to see his mother, and it is this on which the story really hangs.

It’s a quiet story. Too quiet, maybe.

April 13, 2009: “The Color of Shadows” by Colm Toibin

Retreat!

Very interesting article in the NYT about book advances: About that Book Advance, which says, among lots of other things:

The numbers can sound much bigger than they are. Take a reported six-figure advance, Roy Blount Jr., the president of the Authors Guild, said in an e-mail message. “That may mean $100,000, minus 15 percent agent’s commission and self-employment tax, and if we’re comparing it to a salary let us recall (a) that it does not include any fringes like a desk, let alone health insurance, and (b) that the book might take two years to write and three years to get published. . . . So a six-figure advance, while in my experience gratefully received, is not necessarily enough, in itself, for most adults to live on.”

There's more. For authors in search of a publisher, it's a worthwhile read.

Tacky?

Or maybe that's too nice a word? In the past, I've heard criticism of anthology editors who include their own work in the books they've been asked to put together. There's an unwritten notion that this just "isn't done." When it DOES happen, eyebrows are raised.

And what about literary magazines? It's not uncommon for a magazine editor to include an "Editor's Note." Often the note is long and self-focused, and not terribly relevant to the issue at hand, which is the issue in hand, but still such a note isn't considered inappropriate.

But, yesterday, the latest issue of The Paris Review arrived in the mail. TPR has for a few years been edited by Philip Gourevitch. The current issue, No. 188, includes a piece of fiction by Philip Gourevitch. It's the same Philip Gourevitch. (The issue also includes a full-page advertisement for a Penguin Books book: The Ballad of Abu Ghraib, by Philip Gourevitch, which raises a different question about what the advertisers expectations of TPR readers might be.) I don't recall seeing an issue of a magazine that included fiction by the editor of that magazine. I suppose it has happened, but I'm sure not often. I've asked some friends, and it doesn't sit well with them, either.

So, I ask you, what was Gourevitch thinking? It's not a long story, just five pages. Maybe he found that he had a few pages to fill at the last minute and so rather than dipping into the slush pile he just took one of his own? Or rather than call on one of the established fiction writers to provide a short piece he just decided to save everyone the trouble and come up with something himself? Or maybe it's a cost-cutting move? Did he save the magazine a few bucks by foregoing compensation for the story?

I'm interested in opinions, and also of other examples where an editor printed his or her own work.

Best Face Forward: Building a Website

I recently participated in a seminar on book marketing. It was useful, in large part because it put together in an organized fashion bits and pieces and ideas that I'd heard or thought of before. Now I feel that I can be a bit more systematic in my approach, and I've begun doing a little each day to prepare for my book's launch in September.

I definitely knew that I needed a website and I had a good idea of what needed to go into that website. So I already had purchased the domain name and had some ideas of what I thought the site should look like. With the seminar behind me, I've begun now to build that site, something I mentioned today in my Facebook Status Update. Poet Sandra Beasley, a friend from Sewanee, notice the update and commented that she had just blogged on the subject. Indeed, she had: Where I'm Going, Where I've Been. And Sandra makes some very useful observations about what works and what doesn't in a writer's website. I can't say I disagree with anything she's saying there, and I whole-heartedly agree with a lot of it.

So, what to expect from mine? It won't be white text on a black background, but there may be a little light text on a darker background. Not much though. The main focus will be the book cover, and some of the colors and images from the cover will be repeated throughout. I think that will look nice. I'm not a big fan of pictures of me, but I'll include at least the headshot on the bio page, and since Sandra notes she likes to see an "action" photo from a reading or signing, I may try to do something along those lines, too. I'm planning a brief excerpt, and a Q&A, and I'll do my very best to keep my scheduled appearances page up to date and relevant.

I'm working on this now and may launch it in the next week or so. Any suggestions? Requests?

Recent Acquisitions: Secret Son by Laila Lalami

Between writing, teaching, gardening and other stuff, I'm not getting as much reading done just now. But new books keep coming out and they're piling up. So I may not actually get to read these books any time soon, but I at least want to mention books by friends.

One that I recently acquired is Secret Son by Laila Lalami. Like everyone else, I loved Laila's first book, Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits, and since I was fortunate enough to read Secret Son in an early draft I'm confident that I'll like it as well.

HTML Giant Secret Bunny?

I went out to lunch today--needed to tap into some wireless for downloading purposes--and while I was in town I stopped into my favorite wine shop (The Wine Cellar, at the Wharf in Staunton). As I was paying for my purchases I realized that the CD that was playing in the store was an instrumental Christmas carol. I said, "Easter carols?" And the woman at the register sheepishly said, "There's a connection, you know."

Actually she was playing the CD because it was pleasant, relaxing stuff, but for some reason it reminded me of the Secret Santa operation that HTML Giant put together last year. I participated, but, sadly, never got the gift I was supposed to get from my secret santa. Pitiful, right? But the woman at the store was right about that Christmas-Easter connection, no? So maybe my secret santa has an Easter gift in mind? It was supposed to be a book or a literary magazine, but maybe some chocolate? I wouldn't complain.

ASC Auction

Bid on swashbuckling lessons! A stage debut! Scansion lessons from Dr. Ralph himself! And other stuff, with the proceeds benefiting the American Shakespeare Center. It's a great idea, and a great cause.

Short Praise

A.O. Scott's piece in Saturday's New York Times (In Praise of the American Short Story) makes some very good points.

A young writer who turns up at the office of an editor or literary agent with a volume of stories is all but guaranteed a chilly, pitying welcome.

And yet, Scott notes, there are wonderful examples of stellar short story writers, including masters such as Melville, James, Hawthorne, and Poe, and also turns to three writers known mostly for their short work who are the subjects of recently released biographies: Barthelme, Cheever, and Flannery O'Connor.

Reading through their collected stories, you wonder if novels are even necessary. The imperial ambitions of a certain kind of swaggering, self-important American novel — to comprehend the totality of modern life, to limn the social, existential, sexual and political strivings of its citizens — start to seem misguided and buffoonish. More of life is glimpsed, and glimpsed more clearly, through Barthelme’s fragments, Cheever’s finely ground lenses or the pinhole camera of O’Connor’s crystalline prose.

And then Scott suggests that the short story may be due for a resurgence, and here he cites the recent publication of the Wells Tower collection, Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned. Basically, Scott is saying, "why write long?"

The death of the novel is yesterday’s news. The death of print may be tomorrow’s headline. But the great American short story is still being written, and awaits its readers.

I'll write to that.

Musical Interlude

I visited the Blackfriars Playhouse tonight, but not for Shakespeare. Well, it was, in a way, since part of the proceeds of the concert I attended will be contributed to the American Shakespeare Center's Invest in Imagination fund drive. So that was great, but the real reason for the show was the music. And the words.

Because songwriters are really poets, and when they're good songwriters, the poetry can be really good. And this was really good stuff.

First up was Devon Sproule, a young performer from Charlottesville. She has a lovely voice, plays serious guitar, and writes some amazing songs. She did songs from her last album and her next, and I especially liked those on the forthcoming album.

Most people in the audience, though, were there to see Nathan Moore, who is local but developing a national reputation. And while I've met Nathan, I'd never seen him perform before. It turns out he's excellent. Not only are the songs great, but he's got a really pleasing voice, and he, too, is quite a musician, playing both guitar and harmonica. Tonight's concert was something of a "rock opera" in that there was a story that the performance was telling. Sort of. It made the concert different, anyway. Nathan was backed by "The Dreams"--three women with beautiful voices, and was helped by some other musicians on bass, fiddle, and harmonica.

A very nice evening of music/poetry.

Tunneling to the Center of the Earth by Kevin Wilson

I've mentioned this book by Kevin Wilson a couple of times before, and no doubt will again when I actually hold the thing in my hands and have read it (although I've read many of the stories when they first appeared, I expect), it now gets mentioned because it was reviewed in today's New York Times: Little Explosions of Man. That's a big deal.

Buy this book!

"Hedgehog" by Paul Muldoon

Check out other poetry animations at Poetry Everywhere.

The New Yorker: "Visitation" by Brad Watson

Visitation, as in the right of a parent to visit a child under a decree of divorce or separation. Visitation, as in a calamitous event or experience. Visitation, as in the appearance or arrival of a supernatural being. And let’s not even talk about Visitation, as in the visit of the Virgin Mary to her cousin Elizabeth. The point is, I believe the first three meanings, at least, are at play, here and that’s the first thing I love about this story. The second thing is the protagonist, the story’s anti-hero, Loomis. The reader may at first feel some sympathy for Loomis who has to drag himself across the country in order to visit his son, but drag he does. Good for him; he’s not letting this divorce thing get in the way of parenting. But he’s not very good at it, as it turns out, even though he does sort of try. And we eventually learn why he’s divorced, and that he’s gone through a string of therapists, that he drinks way too much, and he’s not the most likable character in the world of fiction. And yet on some level we can probably relate, because it turns out he’s a misfit. He’s desperate. (“He’d been painfully aware of his own despair for most of his life.”) And to the extent that he’s lived a normal life at all he realizes that it’s all been a pretense. He’s tried “to adapt, to pass as a believer, a hoper.” And he can’t pretend anymore.

As he’s trying to have one of these futile “visitations” with his son, he meets a woman at the miserable motel where he stays with the boy. She seems to be a Gypsy, although she denies this, and yet she tells fortunes. She tells him about leaving his girlfriend, the cause of his marriage’s end: “And now you have left her, too, or she has left you, because . . . because you are a ghost. Walking between two worlds, you know?”

And this is the third reason I love this story. Loomis, who is basically a loser whose life is never going to get any better, is a ghost. And his son, in a way, is also a ghost, a boy whose birth was so difficult that he wasn’t expected to live. And yet he did. And that still wasn’t enough to cure Loomis-the-ghost of his despair.
Normally I’m not a fan of the divorce short story, especially the miserable father coping with limited custody of the kids. But this metaphor of Loomis as ghost, is a good one, and makes this story fresh for me.

April 6, 2009: “Visitation” by Brad Watson

Fiction Writers Review

I'm not sure how Fiction Writers Review has escaped my attention until now, but there is a lot to explore at the site, including the most recent post: an interview with Tobias Wolff.

"The Dead" by Billy Collins

Poetry Month

It's April. And April means Poetry. Whether we have Eliot to thank for this or Chaucer, I don't know, but in honor of Poetry Month I thought I would draw readers' attention not so much to individual poets--although I'll probably do that, too--but to poetry presses.

To start things off, check out Milkweed Editions, because they send me eVerse every week and it happened to arrive this morning when I was thinking about doing a poetry post. Milkweed is also known for great fiction, but in poetry they publish such greats as Patiann Rogers, Alex Lemon, and Katrina Vandenberg. Definitely a press worth checking out.

Andrew's Book Club: April Selections

Andrew's Book Club picked some winners for the April selections. Two of them I've already bought, which makes my life easier, and in fact I've already read many of the stories in the books by Kevin Wilson (Tunneling to the Center of the Earth) and Paul Yoon (Once the Shore) in various magazines or have heard them read by the authors at Sewanee (Kevin) or Bread Loaf (Paul). Oh, and the other choice this month also looks good: Mrs. Somebody Somebody by Tracy Winn