riley michael parker runs “wonder lust magazine” and wonder lust press. parker is the author of “Our Beloved 26th” (Future Tense Publishing), Boys, and Sophie’s Choice (Wonderlust Publishing – parker’s own private press). i conducted an interview with riley michael parker and it yielded results most pleasant.
[interview after break]
molly gaudry (see blog for complete list of duties, honors, writings, amateur boxing record, etc.) has created a poem that is culled from various blogs. each line is a link. fucking cool.
At Writers Digest, Robert Lee Brewer talks to Justin Marks about his first book, A Million in Prizes, which won the New Issues prize and which is out now.
One of the things a book is to me is in some ways a chart of a person’s development/growth as a writer during the time in which the book was written.
At Jezebel, Anna is talking to Feministing.com’s Jessica Valenti, whose new book, The Purity Myth: How America’s Obsession with Virginity is Hurting Young Women, came out just last month.
After all, how is it not focusing on young women’s sexuality by talking constantly about their virginity or bringing them to purity balls? If you are telling young women over and over that what’s most important is their virginity, that what makes them valuable is their chastity – then you’re sending the message that it’s the body and sexuality that defines who they are.
And Emily Nonko talks to Tao over at the Bomb magazine website.
The next two books are completely autobiographical. I just think about the most interesting parts of last two years. And then for the ending, I just ask: does it work?
As I was sitting around watching an 8 hour tape of tennis happening in Madrid, I also perused the English Metal Magazine Terrorizer and, as always, learned some new words and in this case, also increased my knoweldge of ancient cultures. READ MORE >
If I went to a bookstore and saw this book, I would buy it without even reading the blurbs. Seriously, this is an open call for any writers to do this. If your manuscript gets accepted, you may use the book cover idea — I don’t even need credits or royalties, I just want this book to exist. Thanks for your attention.
Context, if you’re confused.
A few years ago, I worked at a used bookstore in Fairfax, Virginia. I found a lot of interesting stuff tucked into various books or written on their pages as I sorted through the incoming boxes, but my favorite discovery fell out of a copy of Robert Olen Butler’s A Good Scent From A Strange Mountain: the following handwritten letter, dated 2/22/99, which I’ve done my best to type out below the picture.
Peter,
You deserve so much more than this loose leaf notebook paper but if I don’t say what I want to now I’m afraid the time will pass. As I laid next to you with a herd of camels in my mouth and the cast of STOMP in my head and a 20yr. marriage falling apart – I felt soft and safe and wanted. There was no way I was going to let any more abandonment and indiscretion into my friendship with you. I love your spirit, your genius, your unlimited style, your Whiting-Davis, your energy – just you Peter, The Person – and I am forever in your debt for how you watched over me.
Sincerely,
Your Queen Priscus,
Wini
I cannot bring myself to get rid of this letter. I’m fascinated by it. I hope these past ten years have been kind to Wini and Peter’s friendship.
If you have interesting used bookstore finds, feel free to email us.
Sorry I’m posting twice in a row, but I feel that I must post this probably old news: you should know that Dave Madden and Rebecca Livingston admit to having new websites.
You ought to visit them!
Dave Madden has moved from here to here.
Rebecca Livingston, on whom I crush hard, has moved from here to here.
Update your links.
Hooray!
I went through high school without having read One Day In The Life Of Ivan Denisovich. I read other common high school books, such as A Separate Piece, Catcher In The Rye, A Tale of Two Cities, and a few ones that strike me as odd for high school (Ridley Walker?), but never this one.
I finally read it in January, and I’ve just now got a chance to type some thoughts, which will be very brief, because I did not take notes as I read this one.
Like Night by Elie Wiesel and Survival in Auschwitz by Primo Levi, One Day In The Life tells in rather plain, unadorned language (as far as I can tell through the translation) of how a human copes under massive, institutional cruelty, though in this case Denisovich is ‘fictional.’ I’m assuming most of you are very familiar with this book, so I’m not going to really summarize it or anything: there’s the usual intense description of prison camp procedure, the remarking of odd traditions, the listing of ways one might die, etc. The main character must constantly position himself to survive the day. And what I found fascinating in these books is how the daily routine, the little microcosms of the camps, sometimes gave the prisoners respite. I’m thinking here of how Primo Levi’s background as a chemist helped him receive a work detail as an assistant in a laboratory, thus protecting him from the harsh winter.
Follow this link to see that poster, but big and readable.
I’d say it was shameless, but I do in fact feel some shame. Frankly, it feels pretty good.
Laura Ellen Scott was cute as shit, (stolen from the Plots With Guns site.)
Laura Ellen Scott is funny. She is not only funny, but her humor is laced with a wickedness that warrants highlighting. Scott employs an outrageousness in her fiction that makes me make strange faces at the page, or screen, when reading her work and often think “what the fuck?” in the best possible way. She is never predictable. READ MORE >