Vaclev Havel has died. David Remnick composed a top-ten reading list of Vaclev Havel and Beyond -- non-fiction prose writers such as Vaclav Havel who "lived, and wrote, within the truth."
Also gone and not to be forgotten: Christopher Hitchens. Robert Birnbaum says "Good Bye, Hitch."
According to Galleycat, "The Best Gift You Can Give a Writer is Time."
And, BookRiot lets you in on "A Book Gift That Should Not Be Forgotten."
Finally, The Rumpus reviews Jim Harrison’s latest poetry collection, Songs of Unreason.
12.19.2011
12.13.2011
10 Best Books I Didn't Read in 2011
1. The Buddha in the Attic, by Julie Otsuka. Who wouldn't want a Buddha in the attic, watching over them from up above, dusting off the old high school yearbook and keeping the mice at bay by radiating eternal bliss? To top it off, this Buddha was a National Book Award finalist.
2. Train Dreams: A Novella, by Denis Johnson. Seriously. I go to Malaprop's all the time and pick this book up and read the praise and think, "Wow, this must be a fucking great book." Then I realize the praise is for Tree of Smoke. Time is a circle that way, until you can break free of habitual thinking, and I think dreams move in the pattern of train tracks that enable you to find the way home.
3. Kevin the Helpful Vampire Cat, by Harold "Catman" Sims. Just look at the thing:
Crazy cat ladies as far away as the District of Columbia have been begging me to drive over to City Lights Books in Sylva, North Carolina (near the author's home in Cullowhee) to grab a copy.
4. Zazen, By Vanessa Veselka. I do in fact own this book--thank you, Red Lemonade--but it accidentally got tucked away in a box in a basement in Vermont. And I can't ask Buddha to ship it to me because he is stuck in the attic. I'm pretty Zen about the whole situation, though. It's like Suzuki Roshi says in the video below, "Even though you do not try to include, you know, everything, actually everything is in your mind."
5. In The Night I Go Sailing, by Anna-Lynne Williams. The postman literally just drove up in his tricked-out Jeep and dropped this one on my doorstep as I was writing this post. Backstory: I sent a card and some cash to our music editor, Anna-Lynne, in Seattle in return for her new, very-limited-release book of poetry. The card was like Quebec in that it was half-French and half-English. It said, "Our head is round so we can easily change our minds," or maybe it said something else. Here is what I got in return:
6. Steve Jobs, by Walter Isaacson. Stephen Elliott used to write emails about the Jobs biography in The Daily Rumpus. Stephen Elliott writes good emails.
7. The Ecstasy of Influence: Nonfictions, Etc., by Jonathan Lethem. Hmm. Chronic City. The Ecstasy of Influence. Will the next illicit drug to creep into a Lethem title be meth or crack? The latter seems easier to incorporate. Unless he insists on throwing out a lame-ass pun on "meth"od. This reminds me: Have you seen Breaking Bad? Good show.
8. Jewball, by Neal Pollack. I think this wins the title of book mentioned most by its author in my Facebook news feed. "Who the hell doesn't want to read a book called Jewball?" is the essential selling point. Pollack calls himself "The Hot Jew of the Yoga Generation" on his website. What's not to like?
9. Rin Tin Tin: The Life and the Legend, by @susanorlean. I gather it's about dogs.
10. Through My Eyes: A Quarterback's Journey, by Tim Tebow. If I were to judge by his performances with the Broncos this season, I'd guess this book pains the reader to look at for the first 260 pages and then pulls off an amazing finish in the last two pages. But Tim Tebow taught me not to judge, so I'm going to pretend the whole book is awesome and give all the credit to God and his co-writers.
2. Train Dreams: A Novella, by Denis Johnson. Seriously. I go to Malaprop's all the time and pick this book up and read the praise and think, "Wow, this must be a fucking great book." Then I realize the praise is for Tree of Smoke. Time is a circle that way, until you can break free of habitual thinking, and I think dreams move in the pattern of train tracks that enable you to find the way home.
3. Kevin the Helpful Vampire Cat, by Harold "Catman" Sims. Just look at the thing:
Crazy cat ladies as far away as the District of Columbia have been begging me to drive over to City Lights Books in Sylva, North Carolina (near the author's home in Cullowhee) to grab a copy.
4. Zazen, By Vanessa Veselka. I do in fact own this book--thank you, Red Lemonade--but it accidentally got tucked away in a box in a basement in Vermont. And I can't ask Buddha to ship it to me because he is stuck in the attic. I'm pretty Zen about the whole situation, though. It's like Suzuki Roshi says in the video below, "Even though you do not try to include, you know, everything, actually everything is in your mind."
5. In The Night I Go Sailing, by Anna-Lynne Williams. The postman literally just drove up in his tricked-out Jeep and dropped this one on my doorstep as I was writing this post. Backstory: I sent a card and some cash to our music editor, Anna-Lynne, in Seattle in return for her new, very-limited-release book of poetry. The card was like Quebec in that it was half-French and half-English. It said, "Our head is round so we can easily change our minds," or maybe it said something else. Here is what I got in return:
6. Steve Jobs, by Walter Isaacson. Stephen Elliott used to write emails about the Jobs biography in The Daily Rumpus. Stephen Elliott writes good emails.
7. The Ecstasy of Influence: Nonfictions, Etc., by Jonathan Lethem. Hmm. Chronic City. The Ecstasy of Influence. Will the next illicit drug to creep into a Lethem title be meth or crack? The latter seems easier to incorporate. Unless he insists on throwing out a lame-ass pun on "meth"od. This reminds me: Have you seen Breaking Bad? Good show.
8. Jewball, by Neal Pollack. I think this wins the title of book mentioned most by its author in my Facebook news feed. "Who the hell doesn't want to read a book called Jewball?" is the essential selling point. Pollack calls himself "The Hot Jew of the Yoga Generation" on his website. What's not to like?
9. Rin Tin Tin: The Life and the Legend, by @susanorlean. I gather it's about dogs.
10. Through My Eyes: A Quarterback's Journey, by Tim Tebow. If I were to judge by his performances with the Broncos this season, I'd guess this book pains the reader to look at for the first 260 pages and then pulls off an amazing finish in the last two pages. But Tim Tebow taught me not to judge, so I'm going to pretend the whole book is awesome and give all the credit to God and his co-writers.
12.12.2011
Monday's Margins: Joyce Carol Oates; Amazon Bestsellers; Occupy!
Joyce Carol Oates appeared on The Bat Segundo Show.
Walter Isaacson's biography of Steve Jobs topped Amazon's Bestselling Books of 2011.
But, not everyone is buying from Amazon.
Robert Birnbaum on Occupy! Scenes from Occupied America (Verso), "a heart-warming anthology of the voices involved in this surprising grassroots movement."
And locally: Asheville-area writers have a new year-round, twice-monthly writing group, AsheNoWriMo.
Walter Isaacson's biography of Steve Jobs topped Amazon's Bestselling Books of 2011.
But, not everyone is buying from Amazon.
Robert Birnbaum on Occupy! Scenes from Occupied America (Verso), "a heart-warming anthology of the voices involved in this surprising grassroots movement."
And locally: Asheville-area writers have a new year-round, twice-monthly writing group, AsheNoWriMo.
12.05.2011
Monday's Margins: Murakami, The New Inquiry, A Year in Reading
"Is our world less real than an unreal world? And if our sense of reality
has fundamentally changed, how does that affect the stories we tell?" Bookforum reviews Haruki Murakami’s 1Q84.
The New York Times on the genesis of The New Inquiry, "a scrappy online journal and roving clubhouse that functions as an Intellectuals Anonymous of sorts for desperate members of the city’s literary underclass barred from the publishing establishment."
The Millions' "A Year in Reading" feature is underway. Colum McCann, Jennifer Egan and Michael Schaub are among the contributors in 2011.
Has book blogging hit a wall? Jacket Copy on a potential end to the free flow of galleys for literary bloggers.
The New York Times on the genesis of The New Inquiry, "a scrappy online journal and roving clubhouse that functions as an Intellectuals Anonymous of sorts for desperate members of the city’s literary underclass barred from the publishing establishment."
The Millions' "A Year in Reading" feature is underway. Colum McCann, Jennifer Egan and Michael Schaub are among the contributors in 2011.
Has book blogging hit a wall? Jacket Copy on a potential end to the free flow of galleys for literary bloggers.
11.28.2011
Monday's Margins: Shop Indie Bookstores; Obama's Holiday Reading; Vonnegut
Salon reminds you to support your indie bookstore this holiday season.
Barack Obama supported Small Business Saturday by buying books, including The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz and Norton Juster's The Phantom Tollbooth.
PEN American Center lists literary and advocacy events for the week of November 26-December 3.
The NY Times reviewed Charles J. Shields' Kurt Vonnegut: A Life.
Robert Birnbaum created his Best List of 2011.
We are reading Peter Matthiessen, Roberto Bolano, Jonathan Franzen, and more.
Barack Obama supported Small Business Saturday by buying books, including The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz and Norton Juster's The Phantom Tollbooth.
PEN American Center lists literary and advocacy events for the week of November 26-December 3.
The NY Times reviewed Charles J. Shields' Kurt Vonnegut: A Life.
Robert Birnbaum created his Best List of 2011.
We are reading Peter Matthiessen, Roberto Bolano, Jonathan Franzen, and more.
5.16.2011
Monday's Margins: The Future Sucks; Change It.
Newsflash: The future is boring, says Gary Shteyngart, author of Super Sad True Love Story.
"Comedies end in marriage, tragedies in death. Otherwise they aren't so different," says the protagonist of Siri Hustvedt's "exuberant" new novel, The Summer Without Men.
Only posting two stories is kinda lame, we admit. We'll work on blogging better in the future.
"Comedies end in marriage, tragedies in death. Otherwise they aren't so different," says the protagonist of Siri Hustvedt's "exuberant" new novel, The Summer Without Men.
Only posting two stories is kinda lame, we admit. We'll work on blogging better in the future.
5.02.2011
Monday's Margins: Bin Laden's Dead and We Aren't Going to Disney World; Famous Writers Self-Promoting from the Grave
Did you hear the news? Obama -- er, Osama -- was killed last night. (See facepalm above.) Terrorism died with him, of course.
To celebrate mankind's final and complete triumph over evil, we're going to Walt Disney World. Actually, according to Guernica, that might not be the best idea...
Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom: Each year at Disney World, thousands of interns earn academic credit for flipping burgers or parking cars. Ross Perlin details their vague assignments, long hours, and the meaning of the phrase “protein spill.”
Speaking of Walts, did you know Walt Whitman wrote anonymous reviews of his work?
“An American bard at last!” he raved in 1855. “Large, proud, affectionate, eating, drinking and breeding, his costume manly and free, his face sunburnt and bearded.”
Read more about his and other authors' self-promotion throughout history in the NY Times.
For some 19th century writers, the self-promotion has lasted well beyond death. The Atlantic features dead authors on Twitter, including Mark Twain (@TheMarkTwain), Charlotte Bronte (@charlottebronte), Edith Wharton (@edith_wharton) and, of course, Charles Dickens (@bozdickens).
(Not to be left out of the act: William Shakespeare.)
But enough about death and military operations -- who here is up for some existential Star Wars?
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