ToBS R2: discussion of gender in publishing vs. dinner at Chili’s
[matchup #44 in Tournament of Bookshit]
I’m pretty sure that Chili’s is really fucking gross. In fairness, I don’t think I’ve been there in over fifteen years or so. I’ve been riding that wave a lot of us are on, where I justify my lack of actual political actions by my worldly, educated decision making and feeling like it is something akin to “personal protest.” I eat organic kale often, and I feel superior packing it in my reusable tote, is what I’m saying. However, Chili’s has one thing that self-congratulation does not– the Awesome Blossom, which, for the sadly uninformed, is a “bloomed” and deep fried sweet onion with a dipping sauce topping out at 2,710 calories that often sparks large waves of passion and controversy. The texture is oddly light and easy to digest, a hint of spice in both the breading and the sauce. It finishes on the palate as a well-balanced dish, surprisingly light on the acidity. Once, when I was about ten, I remember my sister attempting to order an Awesome Blossom as an entrée for herself. It left the family with disturbing questions to answer. Will she also be eating her fair share of the Awesome Blossom ordered as its proper course, an appetizer for the entire family? Could this possibly sustain her for the rest of the night? Etc. etc. etc. READ MORE >
Boudinot! An Appreciation by Aaron Burch
[Massive Novel Alert #2! Here's a Boudinot appreciation, a little bit of online journal history, and a "This Is Your Life," sort of piece by Mr. Aaron Burch, the man behind the unstoppable Hobart journal. The occasion for this appreciation? The publication of Ryan Boudinot's stellar new novel, Blueprints of the Afterlife.]
In 2003, I think it was, I still lived in Seattle. I’d moved away, and then moved back, and had been doing Hobart for a couple of years. I’d just put out #3, a joint issue with Monkeybicycle, because they (Steven Seighman and Shya Scanlon) were also on their third issue, and we were all in Seattle, and none of us really knew what we were doing, but we were figuring it out and everything seemed new and exciting. And readings! Steven and Shya started a Monkeybike reading series and brought together people in and around the northwest (Kevin Sampsell! Matthew Simmons! Ed Page! Sean Carman! Matthew Stadler! Adam Voith!) and we formed something of a lit community, reading with each other, hanging out and drinking, seeing one another at other readings – at Elliott Bay or University Bookstore or various cafes and bars and even a makeshift garage or warehouse or someone’s living room. READ MORE >
Home for the Holidays’s “What is your book about?”
One Holiday gift you can expect from friends and relatives is the question, “What is your book about?” or, “What are you working on?” In need of advisement, I asked several authors how they reply to Uncle Scott while enjoying the crown roast.
I don’t blink–I think that is important. I say that I’m working on a novel whose style can best be described as the lovechild of John Grisham and Dan Brown, and that it’s the first book of a trilogy set entirely in an Applebee’s restaurant. I transform my voice into a strained whisper at this point and admit that the pressure is causing me to have a crisis of faith, then I make vague allusions to something I state I may or may not have done at a rural truckstop. If they’re extra-persistent, I say, “Let me just explain the book’s main plot,” and then I describe the most recent Hoarders episode I saw on A&E. – Alissa Nutting, author of Unclean Jobs For Women And Girls
ToBS R2: ‘short-short’ referring to whiskey consumption vs. ‘curating’ a reading series
[matchup #43 in Tournament of Bookshit]
“short-short” referring to whiskey consumption
A “short-short” when referring to whiskey consumption is when a short person is drinking from a short glass of whiskey. The short person is almost always less than four feet tall and the glass must only be a shot glass but they sip from it, so it’s like a regular glass for them. Often times the short person is also wearing really short shorts but just like the glass, the shortness of the shorts looks normal against the scale of the short person. When the short person is a woman drinking from a short glass of whiskey, they are called a “short-shorty” (see also: Dr. Ruth (http://drruth.com/)). It’s recommended that you know the “short-shorty” before calling her this, as short women are habitually feisty and like to climb things. “Short-shorties” tend to get drunk rather quickly, so if you are looking to hook up with a “short-shortie”, its best if you holler right at or before her third drink.
The first recorded “short-short” was a man named Carrey O’Carroll in 1542. O’Carroll was 14 when he traveled from Ireland to work in the court of King Henry VIII of England as the official merkin adjuster of the Queen’s ladies-in-waiting. A few historians have disputed that he is the real father of Queen Elizabeth I but others say she may be too tall to be his. He is also credited as the creator of the “body shot” as he frequently spilled his whiskey on the women whose merkins he adjusted. Later descendants of O’Carroll were known to have perfected a method of distilling rye that yielded 273 proof scotch, but after several “short-shorties” drank the beverage and went blind, the method was quickly abandoned. READ MORE >
ToBS R2: Celeb fiction vs. talking shit about the New Yorker while submitting frequently to the New Yorker
[matchup #42 in Tournament of Bookshit]
Since 2004, Katie Price, the British glamour model, singer and actress, has written four autobiographies and seven novels. Her novels are called Angel, Crystal, Angel Uncovered, Sapphire, Paradise, The comeback girl and Santa Baby. Lots of people love to read these wonderful books because they give realistic insights into the ultimate human lifestyle that everyone aspires to live in 2011: CELEB/CELEB-SPOUSE. The novels contain a lot of very detailed descriptions of outfits and accessories and perfumes and luxury products that everyone wants to buy. The main characters of the novels are usually the wives of footballers or glamour models. Everyone wants to be a wife or model so it makes sense that the books are so popular. Also they are beautifully written. Here are examples of the writing in Santa Baby: READ MORE >
ToBS R2: Daily facebook updates of what you ate / listened to while writing today vs. Gordon lish
[Matchup #39 in Tournament of Bookshit]
Daily Facebook Food Updates
As I write this comparison I am eating a burrito composed of Eden Organic Black Beans (no salt added), Seapoint Farms Veggie Blends with Edamame (the wonder veggie), Sunripe sweet grape tomatoes, and Sabra brand, all natural spicy guacamole; the burrito is topped with diced red onions, Polly-O shredded low-moisture part-skim mozzarella (an excellent source of calcium), and Cholula Chili Lime flavor hot sauce, and while enjoying it very much, I admit that my meal is tainted by a somewhat wistful wish that I had a liberal dollop or sour cream or perhaps even crème fresh with which to adorn one of the two large whole wheat tortillas given to me, gratis, by Rock, the Korean owner/operator of the grocery on the first floor of my building in downtown Manhattan’s Financial District. I feel I should explain that my wistfulness is perhaps due primarily to the fact that I’ve only recently returned from a vacation in Tulum, Mexico—an important vacation for a variety of reasons not relevant here—wherein I was continually treated to vast quantities of high quality, though often quite simple, Mexican food, made from fresh local (though doubtless not “organic”) ingredients, and prepared with dutiful attention and care by people whose sincere smiles smashed through my preconceived notions about the disdain and disgruntled attitudes my presence might inspire in the local population. READ MORE >
ToBS R2: ‘everybody has a story’ vs. following several thousand people on twitter
[Matchup #37 in Tournament of Bookshit]
‘everybody has a story’
Right off I’ll bypass the obvious sphincter analogy here and instead say: I’m willing to embrace this everybody-has-a-story-notion as a hypothetical. At an abstract level, it speaks to the unlimited potential for human creativity, the idea that if we turn inward long enough and well enough we can eventually locate and activate that nascent Shakespeare hidden in all of us. Okay, pretty trippy, but sure. It all reminds me of that psychedelic scene from the gnostic gospel of St. Thomas when Jesus turns to his disciples and says: “If you bring forth what is within you, what you bring forth will save you. If you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you.” Of course it’s not the easiest of orders if what you’re attempting to bring forth is serious literature or great art. With stakes like that suddenly self-destruction seems not only possible, but plausible, maybe even inevitable. This, I suppose, is why it seems like so many of our best scribes are bad livers with bad livers. In saecula saeculorum. READ MORE >
ToBS R2: Calling yourself the editor-in-chief of an online journal vs. bowties
[Matchup #36 in Tournament of Bookshit]
I know what you’re thinking: clearly the answer is “Having an opinion about MFA rankings.”
But we have to work with what’s given us which means other possible solutions (“Garamond,” and “Fetishizing experimentation while hating on those who fetishize narrative” among them) are left unavailable as is information seemingly vital to out trial. Do these online literary journals actually have sub-editors? Are these bowties pre-tied? Is this a wedding? If the editor-and-chief marries a sub-editor does the sub-editor move up in rank? Does the rank require a uniform? Does the uniform require a bowtie?
Clearly the answer is “Writing a Story That Uses the Word Pus.” READ MORE >
ToBS R2: [yourauthorname].com vs. working at Best Buy
[Matchup #35 in Tournament of Bookshit]
adamrobinson.com redirects to some Sarasota Real Estate company. That’s stupid. adamrobinson.org is “The Truth,” a Christian dude’s fervent website. He was married in November. Congratulations to you both! adamrobinson.blogspot.combelongs to a bass player who hasn’t updated since 2004. So basically [yourauthorname.com] sucks for my fellow Adam Robinsons. Except for maybe the preacher and his Dreamweaving and his wife/husband and his devotional books which are available at bulk pricing in case you’re interested. But enough about myauthorname.com – how’re things for yours? I do appreciate being able to go to one site and seeing all of your publications listed, for when I’m bored and hiding out in the bathroom at my job working at Best Buy, crying and scrolling through your mobile site on my Samsung Vibrant S2, reading your sweet poems on the toilet with my pants up. Plus that blue shirt matches my eyes and I happen to know a lot about RAM anyway, and sound cards (SOUND CARDS!!! People upgrade your SOUND CARDS!!!), and how Dell’s GX270 desktop form factor has a known issue with the nodes leaking on the motherboard so, sorry mister, you’ll probably need to buy a whole new machine if you’re going to finish that manuscript which I hope you saved to one of our external harddrives. But in this challonge I need to hearken to the best authorname.com case study, which was aboutjatyler.com, made famous by those early Stamp Stories. I mean, damn, that’s how you get your name out there, on the backs of little slips of paper.
- – – READ MORE >
Other People: An Interview with Brad Listi
Other People with Brad Listi is a twice-weekly author interview show with a unique literary emphasis. Rather than focusing on their books, Listi asks his writer guests to open up about their lives as writers, what’s driving them, how they work, their personal philosophies and their opinions of other writers’ books. Sometimes an episode seems to be about everything except the subject’s latest book. Whatever they talk about, the shows—which typically clock in at just over an hour—are almost always filled with interesting conversation, and Listi has, in just a few months, had a lot of terrific guests, including Blake Butler, Steve Almond, Victoria Patterson, Joshua Mohr, and Dennis Cooper.
Hearing it for the first time, one wonders why it took so long for this podcast to arrive. The thread that runs through every show is Listi himself: intelligent, self-conscious and completely open about his own idiosyncratic approach to life as a writer and reader. In addition to posting two new episodes of Other People each week and serving as editor at his online culture magazine, The Nervous Breakdown, Listi works as a novelist. His first novel, Attention. Deficit. Disorder. was released in 2007. READ MORE >
ToBS R2: the guy who goes 20 minutes over the suggested reading time vs. AWP
[Matchup #34 in Tournament of Bookshit]
To locate the source of a power that’s true and absolute, a power that comes from the center of the integrity of the essence of each contestant, one must not go through hate, but love. So hear you this, Guy Who Goes 20 Minutes Over the Suggested Reading Time—GWG20MOTSRT, if I may be so bold—you have made me love you. You’re right, for the first 50 minutes, I wasn’t really even paying attention to you or the carefully coiffured bedhead you clutched as if in pain in between poems, though I did come up with some handy new ways to discreetly check my email on my phone, and looking back now, it’s safe to say I was taking you for granted, GWG20MOTSRT, or GWG20MO, can I call you GWG20MO? But G-MO, a few moments before it’s been suggested by who knows what power (probably that guy sitting in the front row who introduced you not 57 minutes earlier) or what authority (God’s) that you step down or at least cede the floor to a Q&A, I begin, at last, to notice you. I notice your breath, the speed and cadence of your voice, the way you shift from foot to foot, with an increasing and increasingly wild alertness, as if there is some kind of pattern to be discerned there, a pattern that might gesture towards a greater, future happiness. Perhaps two swipes through that hair, now drooping despite its coif, means two more poems; perhaps when you’ve leaned on your right elbow’s jacket patch for the length of three gossamer moons and a grackle, the task of supporting of your own admirably well-kept head will become too much and you’ll be forced to shut the book—GWG20MO, I can’t take my eyes off you. It’s as if we’re the only two people in the room. You’re sweating now and I can see it and it’s so intimate. Do you give even one good God damn for me? Can you hear me shift and sigh and slouch towards you? Is this punishment for those times I very suavely deleted messages from Groupon about 25% off tanning with the heel of my boot while American starlings combed pensively those vast and lyric skies? I am rapt. I have failed to resist you. I have, so very badly, to pee. READ MORE >
ToBS R1: middle age white male sex scene vs. middle age white male self published sci fi novel pt 1 of 4
[Matchup #31 in Tournament of Bookshit]
Holy receding hairlines! This is quite the week for middle-aged men, with no less than two new texts targeting the graying templed-set: Middle Aged White Male Heterosexual Sex Scene AND Middle Age White Male Self-Published Sci Fi Novel Pt 1! TJY and the Actionettes have made no secret of our fetish for hot, pot-bellied daddies – so this is the kind of news that has us sweating off our makeup, creaming our sequins and quaking in our stilettos! READ MORE >
ToBS R1: trolling for spelling errors in blog posts vs. changing your facebook picture daily
[Matchup #27 in Tournament of Bookshit]
I don’t know.
I’ve never had a blog.
I haven’t been on Facebook in almost a year.
I don’t know what I’m supposed to do with this, what the fuck “Trolling for spelling errors in your blog vs. changing your Facebook profile pic daily” means.
This would be so much easier if I’d been given something easy, like:
Jimmy Chen vs. every woman on HTMLGIANT.
Or HTMLGIANT 2009 vs. HTMLGIANT 2011.
Or being Matt Bell vs. not being Matt Bell.
Or telling Blake no vs. telling him yes.
(Is it possible for the gender with the vagina to tell Blake Butler no?)
Fuck Blake Butler. Fuck HTMLGIANT. Fuck “mean week.” READ MORE >
ToBS R1: horny middle aged balding poetry professor on campus vs. horny college age dude-bro poet on facebook
[Matchup #26 in Tournament of Bookshit]
internet vs. intellect
i’ll probably never get a facebook friend request from a dude or an email from a male professor again, but:
horny middle aged balding poetry professor on campus vs.
horny college aged dude-bro poet on facebook
starts talking to you about gender and offers you an independent study on Judith Butler
starts talking to you about gender and offers to publish you in his online journal
winner: if the journal is well put together with other impressive contributors, bro READ MORE >
ToBS R1: lit blogging at age 35 vs. tweeting at age 45
[Matchup #22 in Tournament of Bookshit]
Using two specific examples I will discuss lit blogging at age 35 versus tweeting at age 45 and declare a winner. I’d like to note that this entry is merely in the spirit of Mean Week. I respect both Matt and Deb. The idea alone that I thought of their names when considering this topic should only be aligned with admiration. And neither is a true winner. If you’re involved in any way – writer, reader, twitter user, lit blogger – in the “lit scene,” you’re a loser by default. Happy Mean Week, nerds.
Example One: Lit blogging at age 35 READ MORE >
ToBS R1: calling anything you write a manuscript vs. author photos
[Matchup #22 in Tournament of Bookshit]
Calling Anything You Write A Manuscript
I just copypasted my blogger into google docs for a 45,000 word count. My nanowrimo just feels right. The manuscript I drafted and polished in February is complete. A novel in tweets. Everything I write is gold. This is like _______ meets ________. It’s _________ with a twist. I think people want to read about my breakup. It’s 50,000 on my daily bathroom experiences. I oulipo’d this baby without the first half of the alphabet. It’s called ‘beastial fiction’. I just wrote down everything my mother said. I’m a method writer. Why do you think the title is “Cock In Hand”? I used a typewriter for authenticity. The blank spaces represent epic minimalism. READ MORE >
ToBS R1: ‘curating’ a reading series vs. crossing off typed name & signing your name below it in yr book
[Matchup #20 in Tournament of Bookshit]
‘curating’ a reading series
pros: you will have something to do, you will have a legitimate reason to talk to and meet writers you like, you will be able to promote writers you like which may distract you from shit-talking writers you dislike
cons: ~90% of readings i’ve been to have ‘seemed bleak,’ you will quickly ‘run out of’ readers to ask to read, you might feel pressure to promote the readings so it won’t be awkward when the audience is small, you might feel pressure to introduce every reader with enthusiasm and to appear happy/excited that they’re reading for your series, you will be in positions where you might have to either ignore or reject certain people who want to read for your series READ MORE >
ToBS R1: characters that ‘just have to have their stories told’ vs. celebrity fiction
[Matchup #17 in Tournament of Bookshit]
I don’t how many people who hate this novel, or just want to make fun of it (here, here, here, and here for a random smattering of the shit-talking) cite the following passage as an example of bad writing: “Gia danced around a little, shaking her peaches for show. She shook it hard. Too hard. In the middle of a shimmy, her stomach cramped. A fart slipped out. A loud one. And stinky.” Snooki’s “novel” might be bad (I wouldn’t know; I’ve only read one excerpt enough to write this), but shall I compare this to a summer’s day–I mean to Ayn fucking Rand, in particular from Atlas Shrugged (a book I read when I was 19 and won’t bother with again because it’s Ayn fucking Rand)?: “Do not let your fire go out, spark by irreplacable spark. In the hopeless swamps of the not quite, the not yet, and the not at all, do not let the hero in your soul perish and leave only frustration for the life you deserved, but never have been able to reach. The world you desire can be won, it exists, it is real, it is possible, it is yours.” READ MORE >
