I will not say anything smarmy about the fact I like Sam Pink’s writing

I don’t think it’s unethical to say some words about Sam Pink’s forthcoming first book on here, even though Sam writes for the site. I have been salivating for someone to release a Sam Pink book for a while now, and finally the newly fashioned and surely balls out Paper Hero Press, run by Barry Graham and Peter Schwartz.

I mention it now because they just put up a preorder link for the book. It is $12 worth spending. I would say more about what I think of Sam’s writing but my blurb on the book I think says it all:

“Sam Pink exists in all things. Sam Pink’s tremor is threaded through the dark sections of scenes in the first Back to the Future, the sections we generally think of as ‘night.’ Sam Pink gored his way to the center of the child Russell Edson and ate all the beautiful / smart / wicked / fucked / riotous / smarmy / unconditional parts about him, then went to incubate and redouble. Sam Pink absorbed the passing souls of Andy Kaufman, Anton LaVey, Klaus Kinski and Shel Silverstein and fried them in his mother’s blood. When Sam Pink emerged he wasn’t crying, but everyone in the hospital was, tears of whiskey, liquid gold and smegma, and within seconds of his first breath, all our Bibles were ripped in half, prefiguring this book here, this tumor, this thing that should not have a name. It is no exaggeration to say now, with a mouth full of blood, that Sam Pink is dire, is hilarious, is chewing up our future.”

Do yourself a favor and go prebuy the book. You will enjoy. If you know Sam’s writing, you already know this. If you don’t know Sam’s writing, go to his blog and find out.

The cover itself is worth jacking off on. As is the title of the book: I AM GOING TO CLONE MYSELF THEN KILL THE CLONE AND EAT IT.

He is also a bastard, don’t you like bastards?

Author Spotlight & Presses / 4 Comments
October 2nd, 2008 / 12:58 am

NOW IT’S BUCK-DANCING TIME!

“Abner Jay, the first of the original black musicians. The only electric six string banjo you’ll ever hear.  Abner says the original thirteen are dead, and he is half dead. For forty two years Abner has been playing banjo, drums, harmonica, and singing all at the same time.”  I don’t know when that was written, but he died sometime in the ’90s. I don’t really know a whole lot about him, except that if you click the link you can listen to a whole LP’s worth of his rad music at the WFMU site. I prefer side one–mostly because of the opener, “The Backbone of America is a Mule and Cotton,” which explains in great detail the advantages of owning a mule rather than a horse, and also because of “Oh Susanna”–but you should really listen to the whole thing.

 

And PS if you were wondering- This totes counts as literary because I got the link from Ariana Reines whose new poetry collection, Coeur de Lion got some love this morning from Ben Mirov at Coldfront.

Uncategorized / 2 Comments
October 2nd, 2008 / 12:44 am

NewPages Book Reviews & Waste

This month’s crop of new book review are live at NewPages. NewPages does a pretty slammin’ ass job of bringing a boatload of good indie press reviews every month, once again headed up by the ever present Matt Bell.

Salvation :: The End of the Straight and Narrow :: Based on a True Story :: The Lost Episodes of Beatie Scareli :: The Waitress Was New :: The Cosmopolitan :: Signs of Life :: Of Kids & Parents :: Waste :: Keep This Forever :: Mind Games

Among these reviews, Mr. Bell himself pens a review of one of my favorite new discoveries of the year as far as writers I needed to find, Eugene Marten, whose WASTE, new from Ellipsis Press, ate my head alive, not even shitting. That book is incredible, and Matt does it justice. You should seriously go buy the book right now, it’s about a fucked up janitor, case closed.

Uncategorized / Comments Off on NewPages Book Reviews & Waste
October 1st, 2008 / 11:50 pm

shane jones writes amazing post about writing amazing story

only htmlgiant.com can bring you the rippingest, the virgin-ass rippingest, barbed wire tattooed, raw awesomeness of shane jones, who wrote an amazing post about an amazing story he wrote.  his amazing post about his amazing story has spawned this amazing post about his amazing post about his amazing story.  htmlgiant.com has already proven itself a contender in the small lit scene and hopefully this post will reach its already established readership.

Author News / 6 Comments
October 1st, 2008 / 10:48 pm

scrape my arm and give me AIDS

i like this blog.  it is by chris killen and socrates adams florou.  here is a description of my first encounter with the blog:

(said ‘huh’ while noticing a link on chris killen’s blog)

(clicked the link and looked at the ground, waiting for the page to upload)

(waited and kept checking but my computer was slow)

(got really upset, like menopause upset, and just sat there)

(saw the page had uploaded)

(read the entire blog)

(lol-ed like a motherfucker)

(had nothing to do)

(pushed sexual organs back into body)

(checked email)

Web Hype / 6 Comments
October 1st, 2008 / 10:44 pm

Shane Jones Writes Amazing Story

Shane Jones wrote an amazing story this week, telling himself “this is so amazing” over and over again, breathing like a convicted sex offender, and climaxing several times before submitting the story to over ten small press journals who swiftly responded with “go fuck yourself.”

Jones had been working on the piece for several days in which his comments to himself went from “this sucks balls,” to “this will at least get accepted by Typo because I’m not black” to “i can probably send this piece of shit to Six Sentences because they take any piece of shit” to the eventual sexually gratifying “this is so amazing.”

From Albany, Jones says to htmlgiant: “It was a rough couple days, but I can finally say my story is amazing.  Fuck you Paris Review!!!”  Jones then floated into mid-air, masturbated once more to the image of Sweet Face Kevin Sampsell, and proceeded to shoot rainbows from his fingertips.

Author Spotlight / 7 Comments
October 1st, 2008 / 9:53 pm

Rachel B Glaser

Rachel BubblerRising literary fiction star and sinus headache Cheerios consumer Rachel B Glaser has started a new blog. Currently up are two stories previously published in Columbia and [sic]: “Michael Jordan, in general” and “The Sad Girlfriend.” Soon Glaser will be interviewed by all-star Kelly Spitzer. She also has stories recent or forthcoming in New York Tyrant, Barrelhouse, and American Short Fiction.

Asked for a quote, Glaser said: “It smells weird because I just turned on the oven then I turned it off.”

Author News & Author Spotlight / 6 Comments
October 1st, 2008 / 5:04 pm

Ad lib, stress out

Up for a quick challenge? Go to oneword. You’ll have 60 seconds to write a story based on a random word prompt. No editor*, so instant publishing success!

It’s nice to see Oulipo constraints applied in this internet age. Back in the ol’ days, you’d need a stop-watch and someone with a large fist to knock you out.

*Thus, not exactly the most refined writing, but that’s where YOU come in. Just don’t freak out, like I did.

Uncategorized / 8 Comments
October 1st, 2008 / 2:47 pm

The Corduroy Mtn.

The Greying Ghost has been one of my favorite chapbook publishers for a while now. Their books are always well designed and hand made in small editions. La la la lovely, yes. They printed my favorite chapbook of 2008, Shane Jones’, I Will Unfold You With My Hairy Hands. I’m looking forward to their rad list of upcoming chapbooks by many super special writers such as Kathryn Regina, Zachary Schomburg, and Brandon Scott Gorrell. 

Greying Ghost

 

So to get to the point- something exciting is happening over there. The same kids who make Greying Ghost are now accepting submissions for their new print magazine, The Corduroy Mtn. Yeah, ya’ll should submit to this shit because hell, you know it’s going to look good and be filled with cool shit. Hooray!

Presses / 14 Comments
October 1st, 2008 / 2:46 pm

Surgery of Modern Warfare

I’ve been thinking about places that published me when I was just starting out. Some sites I loved are now gone. Here are three:

Surgery of Modern Warfare

Second site to ever publish me. I met Amy Fusselman, author of the incredible book The Pharmacist’s Mate, on her book tour. She was pregnant. She had one of those acoustic guitars Buck Owens used to play, the ones painted red, white, and blue. She played the songs “Hell’s Bells,” on it. She was possibly the nicest person I ever met.

I sent her at least four stories, and she rejected all of them. Eventually, though, I broke through.

Surgery went away a while back. When I was the web editor at Monkeybicycle, I convinced a bunch of sites to undergo a month long redesign so that they all looked like Surgery. This is what Monkeybicycle looked like.

Reinventing the World

Reinventing the World was emailed out to people on a list. It was a nice looking Word Doc. I think I still have the one I was in on the hard drive of my old iMac.

What happened, I wonder, to Patrick Reynolds? Patrick, are you out there? Last I heard, you were at Yaddo or McDowell.

The American Journal of Print

First place to ever publish me. The very short piece I sent them is now the pituitary gland of a much longer, still homeless story about love and the faked moon landing. A couple of years ago, I tracked down the editor who accepted the piece, and sent him a fawning love letter. Who forgets their first?

We should put together a list. A canonical list of long gone lit sites. Comment or send me a note:

giantblinditems at gmail dot com

Uncategorized / 20 Comments
October 1st, 2008 / 2:01 pm