The Book Stall at Chestnut Court

I'm looking forward to my visit to The Book Stall in Winnetka this Saturday at 2pm!

The Book Stall at Chestnut Court

Clifford Garstang - In an Uncharted Country | Seminary Co-Operative Bookstore, Inc.

I'll be at 57th Street Books on Thursday at 6pm. Stop by and say hello!

Clifford Garstang - In an Uncharted Country | Seminary Co-Operative Bookstore, Inc.

Truth or Something Like It by Curtis Smith

Truth or Something Like It

Curtis Smith

Casperian Books, 2010

Sex. Murder. Drugs. Religion. Politics. This novel has it all. It’s even got sports! And despite a somewhat predictable plot, the book hangs together for an exciting romp through a dangerous world that isn’t as unbelievable as it sometimes seems.

Glen Tate is a high school wrestling coach and minder of the school’s misfits. He’s also in triple recovery: from the death of his brother, from the collapse of his engagement, and from an accident in which the son of presidential candidate Arthur Lyndon has been killed. Tate is a good guy, who relates well to his oddball students and others on society’s fringe, but this triple-trauma gives him one spectacularly bad idea: to visit his home town in order to stop his ex–fiancé’s wedding to a rich used car dealer. And so, with sidekick Charlie as his “moral rudder,” he sets off on his quixotic adventure. Along the way, he does battle with the politico’s goons and rescues a damsel in distress from her boss (it’s worse than that, though—she’s the proverbial hooker with a heart of gold), and eventually gets his priorities right.

So there are some familiar elements and stock characters here, which in some books might be bothersome, but two things make this book stand out.

First, the principal antagonist, the billionaire presidential candidate Arthur Lyndon, is truly scary, given this disturbing age of shrill public discourse and deluded, mindless followers of political movements based on lies. The message here is that devotion can be bought, and it doesn’t matter what the truth is. It doesn’t matter that the candidate’s son was a meth freak, and it doesn’t matter that the miracle of his image appearing on the wall where he died is a fraud. It doesn’t matter that the guy’s henchmen will stoop at nothing to protect their leader. The man has stirred up a mob of followers who cannot be reasoned with and who won’t listen—and they remind me of the crazy Tea Partiers who are currently making a lot of noise, at least in my part of the country. The irony is that the fictional campaign’s slogan is “Lyndon = Truth,” and our hero knows that’s nonsense.

Second, though, Glen Tate, who at first seems no better than Lyndon’s gutless followers, turns out to be character with a lot of depth, and a worthy adversary for Lyndon. Tate is flawed, in a big way, but of course that’s what makes him interesting. He says the wrong things sometimes and he makes some really bad decisions. He has relationship problems, to put it mildly. But he’s a character who makes sense. He had deep admiration for his late brother, and is still struggling to come to grips with a senseless death and also to repair ties with his divorced parents. And there are the women in his life—Linda, whose marriage he wants to stop, and his current girlfriend, Mel, who’s got some problems of her own. I like this Tate.

Then there’s the language of the novel, which is crisp, clever, and fast paced. Here’s a sample from Tate’s interaction with a fellow teacher:

“Metal doors slammed in the locker room. The rolling undertones of newly deepened voices echoed off the concrete floors and shower tile. Glen knocked on the pebbled glass of the gym teacher’s office door and peeked inside. Nick Price had drawn the department’s short stick in this, his last year before retirement, and since September, he’d made his displeasure about working with the dungeon crew painfully obvious, their classes full of eye rolls and disgusted sighs. Nick sported a squared-off flattop that would have made Johnny Unitas jealous, and his ever-present white T-shirt wrapped his bullish torso like a second skin.”

So even if the reader has a sense of where this story is going, there are enough twists and turns and bells and whistles to make the ride great fun and worthwhile—and memorable.

A Reader's Advice to Writers

I recently wrote about the Ten Rules for Fiction Writers from The Guardian that writers are still chatting about online. Now comes, in Salon, A Reader's Advice to Writers, specifically aimed at novelists.

What do readers want?

1. A protagonist who wants something.
2. A protagonist who does something.
3. Story/Characters/Theme/Setting, in that order.
4. Beautiful prose style isn't that important.
5. "A sense of humor couldn't hurt."

Hmm. Okay. Thanks to this reader for this advice. But I'm a reader, too, in addition to being a writer. I find that "funny" gets in the way, often. That's not the kind of book I like to read, and that's not the kind of book I write. And while I recognize that "beautiful prose style" isn't important to many/most readers (otherwise John Grisham would still be practicing law in Mississippi), it does help set the ordinary book apart from the extraordinary, and I don't know any writer who is thrilled about ordinary. I can't argue with the first three on the list though, and they're good to remember as I put the finishing touches on my novel.

Virginia Legislature Endangers Art Funding

I could write a whole new post about this, about how budget slashing in Virginia endangers the arts in SO many ways. But it's spelled out in great detail here. The bottom line is that the Virginia House of Delegates is on the verge of eliminating funding for the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities and the Virginia Arts Commission. These cuts would be devastating to the arts in Virginia, and the arts are critical--to quality of life, to incomes for many Virginians, and to related industries such as tourism. These cuts would be a mistake, and all Virginians are urged to tell their delegates to preserve these important institutions.

You can find the contact information for your delegate here. Pleade the case.

Gray Baby by Scott Loring Sanders

Gray Baby

Scott Loring Sanders

Houghton Mifflin 2009

Although this is technically a “young adult” novel (like the author's first book, The Hanging Woods), Gray Baby managed to hold my interest from start to finish, and then some. It’s the story of a boy, Clifton Carlson, who is growing up at difficult point of the South’s evolution. His father, who was black, is beaten to death by white cops on Clifton’s eighth birthday. Because Clifton’s mother is white (and a drunk, suffering from depression), the boy, now sixteen, doesn’t feel that he fits in. Or rather, he doesn’t see himself as being any race at all (although the high school bully calls him “Skunk”). But because of his mother’s problems, he’s often on his own, and that leads him to imagine what the world is like beyond his own neighborhood. Eventually, that curiosity leads him to meet Swamper, an old white man who lives down on the river. Swamper is kind to him and Clifton is able to help the old man catch and sell catfish.

But there are complications, naturally. A little girl in town goes missing, and Clifton is a witness, which puts him in danger. Because the mother is a mess, and no help at all, Clifton runs to Swamper, who turns out to be something other than what he has claimed to be.

The book is set in Southwest Virginia (where the author lives) on the New River. It’s a beautiful area, and the novel captures the landscape and the people well. But the book also captures the psychological landscape—the shifting race relations as well as the tensions between classes. The brutal killing in the novel’s opening pages is a shocking reminder of what people are capable of, and the suspense that carries the reader through the remainder of the book is built on the fear things haven’t changed all that much.

While the plot is filled with satisfying twists, the real enjoyment here is the character portrait of Clifton and his growing relationship with Swamper. Clifton is struggling. He’s doing his best, but given his background and his mother’s problems, the deck is stacked against him. But he’s a good kid—look for his connection to Bosco, the neighbor’s dog—and the reader is pulling for him all the way. He’s not perfect, either, but his flaws are credible and understandable. Swamper, too, is a round character with plenty of nicks and bruises, and he sure knows his catfish. (If there was research involved in getting the details of Swamper’s fishing just right, it must have been enjoyable.)

All in all, it’s a terrific book. Buy it for some teenager you know. But read it before you hand it over.

Ten Rules for Writing Fiction

Writer friends are passing around an amusing link that's actually two links. First we've got Elmore Leonard's Ten Rules for Writing Fiction. With the preamble that "using adverbs is a mortal sin," he offers such sound advice as "never use a verb other than 'said' to carry dialogue" and "use regional dialect, patois, sparingly." It's a good list, I recommend it; people shell out big bucks for MFAs and this is basically what they learn.

But then there's Ten Rules for Writing Fiction (Part Two) in which several writers offer their own versions. Booker prize-winner Hilary Mantel suggests (among other things) getting an accountant. Joyce Carol Oates (who, for some reason, could only come up with seven rules), advises writers to "be alert to the possibilities of paragraphing." Hmm. Annie Proulx (only five rules!) is all about taking it slow, and doing things, like writing longhand, to ensure that you do. Ian Rankin thinks all we need to do is be persistent and get lucky. Jeanette Winterson says, "Trust your creativity!" And that's probably the best advice of all.

Review of In an Uncharted Country

Today's Virginian-Pilot has a review of my collection of linked short stories,In an Uncharted Country. Subscribers (the paper, based in Norfolk/Hampton Roads, has the largest circulation of all Virginia newspapers) can see the review here: A Heartfelt collection of Virginia People. An excerpt is available to all: here.

Here's the reviewer's conclusion:

Garstang's collection is a hopeful, heartfelt book, the stories of people struggling with and against one another and finding mutual territory in which to breathe and be content.

I'll take that.

ASC: Henry VI, Part 2

Last night was opening night for Henry VI Part 2 at Staunton's American Shakespeare Center. Once again, it is astounding how this company can put together such a wonderful performance in such a short time--less than two weeks from the beginning of rehearsal to opening night. But that's the Actors' Renaissance Season, and it's a special experience. (This season I've already seen Twelfth Night, Doctor Faustus, and The Alchemist, with only The Roman Actor to go, although if I have the time I'll certainly want to see some of these shows a second time.)

2 Henry VI is part of the history cycle, and it's not too difficult to get up to speed in this one. Henry VI is on the throne, aided by the Lord Protector, the Duke of Gloucester. But the peace between the Houses of Lancaster and York is fragile, and the arrival of Queen Margaret upsets the balance, so that eventually the Duke of York raises an army and the War of the Roses commences. Along the way there are a number of beheadings, some secret romance, and a commoner uprising that I'll come back to.

The production isn't flawless. But it is always imaginative, and it has moments of great comedy as well as fine emotional scenes. And, as usual, there are some standout performances. First, Denice Burbach is excellent as Henry VI. She portrayed Henry's naivete beautifully, and later, upon the death of Humphrey, did the same with his sorrow. When Queen Margaret, played powerfully by Sarah Fallon, is flirting openly with the Duke of Suffolk, Burbach's surprise and hurt are plain on her face. Benjamin Curns turns in another great performance, this time as the Lord Protector. His devotion to Henry is clear and their scenes are wonderful, but I especially like his interaction with Eleanor, acted by Allison Glenzer in one of her best performances. Eleanor, like Margaret, is ambitious, but her means are more subtle, and Glenzer is a pleasure to watch. Rene Thornton, Jr. is Richard, Duke of York, constantly frustrated by the machinations of the Lancaster crew, although he gets the last laugh. We've also got strong performances from Gregory Jon Phelps as the Duke of Suffolk, Chris Johnston as Duke of Buckingham, Daniel Kennedy as Earl of Salisbury and also Jack Cade, and Tyler Moss as Earl of Warwick and Dick the Butcher.

And I can't forget to mention John Harrell as the Bishop of Winchester. As usual, Harrell is terrific in his role (he also plays Lord Clifford) but he was especially funny during the pre-show, where he appeared in his guise as the Bishop and delivered the traditional instructions (no pictures, turn off the cell phones, etc.) as a catechism. Hilarious.

One more thing about this play. This is the play from which we get the line, "First thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers." It's spoken by Dick the Butcher during the uprising of Jack Cade, and it's simply part of the mob's mistrust of anyone with learning. In fact, they so hate the learned (or anyone who can read), that Jack Cade's mob put me in mind of the Tea Party rabble, the anti-intellectuals who are opposed to all government. They were soundly defeated by the King's army, which gives me some hope.

Dave Beck

Check out the sculptures by Dave Beck. Dave was at the Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts at the same time I was last summer and he was working on these, running around town with his GPS. It's very cool to see the results!

And take a look at his award-winning jellyfish burger.

Writers.com: Publishing the Short Story

A new section of Publishing the Short Story, an eight-week course I teach through Writers.com, begins March 22. The course covers the nuts and bolts of document preparation, market research, and the mechanics of submission. If you've got stories that you want to get published but you've hesitated because you don't know how to go about it, this is the class for you!

Book Tour: Chicago

Next week I'm off to Chicago for several events to promote In an Uncharted Country. I hope my Chicago friends (those who haven't fled to warmer climes) will join me for one (or all)!

On Thursday, February 25, at 6:00pm, I'll be at 57th St. Books in Hyde Park for a reading and signing.

On Saturday, February 27, at 2:00pm, I'll be at The Book Stall at Chestnut Court in Winnetka for a reading and signing.

On Sunday, February 28, at 3:30pm, I'll be at Northwestern University for a fireside chat with students and alums. Please leave a comment here if you want more information about that event.

Work in Progress: Report

I recently finished a draft of my novel. It's 320 pages and 83,000 words long. And as soon as I finished it I made a list of things I know I want to do to it before I send it to my agent. (My agent doesn't know what she's in for. I've told her the title and a very rough idea of what it's about. I have no idea how she's going to react.) I also sent the novel to my friend Mary to get her reaction, because it has been sooo long since anyone has read any part of this book, and I've lost perspective. I got Mary's feedback today and I am excited to start work on the "final" push!

The New Yorker: "Foster" by Claire Keegan

I don’t know the work of the Irish writer Claire Keegan, but I like this story very much. Although the precise conflict isn’t immediately clear, from the first paragraph, questions arise. Why is the father driving the narrator to her “mother’s people” instead of taking her home? And where is the mother. As it turns out, the girl’s parents are strapped for money. One thing they have in abundance is children: the narrator, her two younger sisters, a baby brother, and another child on the way. Her “mother’s people” though are childless it seems, and there is plenty of food and money. So the narrator is coming to live, for the summer at least.

She’s uncertain at first, but then grows comfortable in the loving household. Until, that is, she discovers—from a nosy, loudmouthed neighbor—that her relatives had a boy who drowned. Which explains their nervousness about the well, and their enormous concern when the narrator does, in fact, fall in.

But the summer comes to an end and the narrator must go home to her family. And it seems she doesn’t want to. “When I finally open my eyes and look over his shoulder, it is my father I see, coming along strong and steady, his walking stick in his hand. I hold on as though I’ll drown if I let go . . .” While her father is her “Da,” this man is “Daddy” and she’s torn between the two.

Although I don’t love the ending—it’s a bit too sentimental for my tastes—the rest of the story is a charming glimpse into rural Ireland.

February 15 & 22, 2010: “Foster” by Claire Keegan

UPDATE: Anonymous alerted me to the fact that Keegan has a short novel coming out in July (in the UK, as it turns out, not in the US) called Foster. On examination, this appears to be a peculiar situation where the book is an expansion on the story, rather than the story being an excerpt from the novel. From the publisher, concerning the book:

A small girl is sent to live with foster parents on a farm in rural Ireland, without knowing when she will return home. In the strangers' house, she finds a warmth and affection she has not known before and slowly begins to blossom in their care. And then a secret is revealed and suddenly, she realizes how fragile her idyll is. Winner of the Davy Byrnes Memorial Prize, "Foster" is now published in a revised and expanded version. Beautiful, sad and eerie, it is a story of astonishing emotional depth, showcasing Claire Keegan's great accomplishment and talent.

Happy New Year!

February 14 is the first day of the Year of the Tiger! Gong Xi Fa Cai!

Press53 Cruise from New York

Press53 Cruise from New York is a unique opportunity--take a beautiful, scenic cruise while exploring the world of writing with Press 53 and several of its authors, including me. Join us!

ASC: The Alchemist by Ben Jonson

Although this is the American Shakespeare Center, the company likes to shake things up a little each season and do some non-Shakespeare, usually a play by one of Will's contemporaries. This season (the Actors' Renaissance Season, in which the actors stage productions without benefit of directors, costumers, or much rehearsal time), we get two. The Roman Actor by Phillip Massinger opens March 10, and The Alchemist by Ben Jonson opened last week.

The Jonson play is hilarious. It features a trio of con artists and a host of gullible marks all too willing to believe that the "alchemist" can turn worthless metal into gold. And of course, he can -- gold coins and jewelry for the bad guys. The charming bad guys, that is. John Harrell is Subtle, the alchemist, and he's terrific, as always as he blinds his victims with pseudo-science, smoke, and mirrors, appearing in many guises depending on the desires of the greedy seeker. Benjamin Curns turns in another great performance as Face, the housekeeper, the shill who delivers victims to the clutches of Subtle. He's especially funny when he takes on the role of "Lung," who operates the alchemy furnaces. Dol Common, played by Allison Glenzer, rounds out the trio, and in this part she gets to move beyond "lusty wench" (although there's some of that, too) as she takes on the different roles the con requires.

While these three are the core of the play, orbiting around them are the victims. There's Denice Burbach as Dapper, a clerk with a gambling problem; Miriam Donald as Abel Drugger, who wants his shop to succeed; Bob Jones and Chris Johnston as Tribulation and Ananias, Brethren seeking to raise money for the church; and Tyler Moss as Kastril, the angry boy who wants to learn the art of quarreling (Moss's cowboy drawl is hilarious) and his widowed sister Dame Pliant, played by Sarah Fallon. But most of all there is Epicure Mammon, a greedy glutton played by Gregory Jon Phelps. He above all the others has his sights set on accumulating vast riches (riches that will buy food and drink, primarily) and so falls the farthest when the scheme is revealed. Phelps in this part doesn't have to open his mouth to be funny--there's the wig, the fat-suit, the high heels--but he's even funnier when he does. Jonson must have had a blast writing the part of Sir Epicure, and it looks like Phelps is having fun playing the part. The only one who sees through the plan is Surly, played by Daniel Kennedy, who manages some deception of his own. And the game is going very nicely until Lovewit (played by Rene Thornton, Jr.), who owns the house where all this is happening, arrives home unexpectedly. Uh oh.

It's great fun, with lots of excellent performances.

Note: This isn't the first time ASC has produced The Alchemist at the Blackfriars. During the inaugural season at the theater, back in 2001, the "Odyssey Tour" did the play with David Loar as Subtle the alchemist. It's nice to see it appear again.

Harper's: "Once an Empire" by Rivka Galchen

I remember the excerpt from Galchen’s Atmospheric Disturbances that was in The New Yorker awhile ago. It was quirky and interesting, and so that’s what I was expecting from this new story in Harper’s (which you can only read the first paragraph online unless you're a subscriber). I guess that’s what I got. But it’s a tough story to crack. What’s it all about? I struggled to come up with any kind of an interpretation (some of my readers, one in particular, may say that there’s no need to interpret—why can’t it just be what it is?) until I remembered the advice that I give students: sometimes the key is in the title. And surely that’s the case here.

So the story is this: the narrator once lived in a studio apartment in Brooklyn. She came home one evening after seeing a movie and noticed that not only were her windows dark—she always left the lights on—but her possessions were escaping, climbing down the fire escape and running away. Devastated, she moved into a dormitory but kept looking for her possessions, especially her favorite fork? (Fork? I figure Galchen picked that utensil so she could use the line “Oh, fork.”) Eventually she does recover the fork and a quilt, a little worse for the wear.
This narrator is, to say the least, odd. The reader senses that in her voice (“I prefer the taciturn company of my things. I love my things. I have a great capacity for love, I think.) but also in her relationship with her mother, her lack of relationships with anyone else, and her obsession with the sign that flashes the time and temperature.

Great, but what’s it all mean? The title of the story comes from a paragraph that occurs just after she’s watched her things flee: “Britain, once an empire, now a small island off Europe—that was my thought.” Huh? Okay, so as keys go, this may not be entirely helpful, but it seems to me with this line the story becomes a two-way allegory. The narrator, like Britain, has lost all her possessions. Like Britain, she’s now a shadow of her former self. But her possessions also represent her connection to her past, specifically her mother. The fork is one that her mother bought her on a visit to the Colorado Rockies, and when they are gone her tenuous connection to her past is severed. In the end, she does manage to get the fork back—but in a damaged, diminished state. She’s flailing to connect to her past, but she can’t: “I stepped back out into the salubrious cold. My mom. I knew where she lived. Or used to live. When had we last spoken? Had we argued?” And she thinks she could go stay with her mother for a while. Or not.

Clang. That’s how the story ends, with the kind of resonance that a reader can think about for a long time.

This is my kind of story. I like it a lot.

February: “Once an Empire” by Rivka Galchen

Book Tour

I remembered today that I needed to update the Events page on my website because I've recently scheduled a lot of appearances in the coming weeks to promote In an Uncharted Country. And when I finished, I realized that March is going to be a heck of a busy month. Check out my Book Tour Events on my website. [Courtesy of BookTour.com, most of these events are also listed in the sidebar to the right here on Perpetual Folly.] If you're near one of these events, I hope you can join me.

Jessie Carty interviews Cliff Garstang

Must be an ego thing, but I like being interviewed. Check out this very nice conversation I recently had with Jessie Carty: Interview with Cliff Garstang.

Thanks, Jessie!

Snow

Lots of it, and it can't be ignored any longer. We've been hit by two huge storms this season along with several smaller storms that in other years would have been considered major. The first big one was shortly before Christmas. I was at VCCA at the time, where we had even more snow, but at my house about 20 inches fell. Which would have been fine, but I wasn't here to deal with it, and when I got home two days later -- I couldn't get in my driveway. I had to park in the neighbor's driveway, hop through huge drifts to get to my door, and then shovel enough space to hold the jeep until I could clear a path to get the thing into the garage. That snow was still around a month later. . .

Last weekend we had another doozy -- 18 inches fell by Saturday night, and that was on top of six inches we'd had earlier in the week. I had gone out a few times during the storm to shovel a path to the road, for newspaper and mail collecting purposes, and also in case of some emergency, but on Sunday morning you could hardly tell. I didn't need to go anywhere, really, but I figured I should start the process of digging out. After all, on Monday afternoon I'd need to leave to teach my class. Shovel. Shovel. Shovel. And then I heard classes for today were canceled. But that was fine. I needed to get out anyway, so I did the rest of the shoveling, got the car out, and did some errands.

We now have 5 to 10 inches of snow in the forecast for Tuesday and Wednesday.

The picture above is from my porch, which also gathered a significant amount of snow.

New Issue: The Short Review

The February issue of The Short Review is up and filled with lots of reviews of short story collections, as usual. This month there are reviews of collections by Russell Bittner, Tom Lee, Stefanie Freele, Joseph Young, Betty Sera-Rojas, James Buchanan, Alisa Cox, Davy Byrnes, and anthologies from McSweeneys and Oxfam. Not to mention interviews and various other goodies.

The New Yorker: "William Burns" by Roberto Bolaño

I have little to say about this story. It is framed, as some other Bolaño stories are, as a story told to him by someone else. It involves Burns, an American who becomes involved with two women who live together, along with their dogs. They ask for his protection against a killer and in the process of his protection, he kills the “killer.” He eventually realizes that the man he has killed is no killer. Later, Burns himself is killed, presumably by his successor, just as he was apparently his victim’s successor. And that’s about it. I have no idea why The New Yorker thought this was worthy of publication.

February 8, 2010: “William Burns” by Roberto Bolaño

Andrew's Book Club: February

It's time for the February picks from Andrew's Book Club, and this time he's chosen a couple of books about which I know little.

The "Indie Pick" is Lyn Kilpatrick's In the House from FC2.

The "Big House Pick" is Everything Here is the Best Thing Ever by Justin Taylor from Harper.

Print vs. Online

This really isn't about that, at least not in any conclusive way. I mostly aim to publish my longer work in print and shorter work online. That's not any kind of a judgment on my part; it's just where those pieces seem to me to fit best. Since I've been working "long" lately, I haven't been publishing much on line. But I know that there are lots of very fine online publications--more, in fact, than I can keep up with.

Which is why I wanted to mention two websites that keep up with those online magazines so I don't have to. The first is one I've just heard about -- Fiction Daily. Fiction Daily (which looks suspiciously like Andrew's Book Club) is an aggregator, of sorts:

It’s hard to know where to go, what to read, or why. FictionDaily’s goal is to help aggregate and organize this sea of new literature. We try to make it accessible to readers who want to see what literature is up to. We aim to help others find the pulse of literature.

In addition to snippets of new stories in online magazines, with links, Fiction Daily includes a list of links to a lot of online resources, including magazines.

The second one is something I've mentioned before: Five Star Literary Stories. Five Star invites the editors of online magazines to nominate a story and then finds a reviewer for that story, giving exposure to the magazine, the author, and the reviewer all at the same time. Very nice.

There are no doubt other sites that help promote online literature. I'd love to hear from readers if you know of others.