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Tuesday, September 16, 2008

House of Pancakes

posted by on September 16 at 4:15 PM

If you've ever read Mark Danielewski's House of Leaves and found yourself unimpressed by its obnoxious Blair Witch-with-a-Microsoft-Word-draw-on-application-gone-wild feel, this cartoon is for you. Here's a tiny excerpt:

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I wish this cartoon was 25 pages long.

(Thanks to Slog tipper Jesse.)


I Was Never a Fan of David Foster Wallace

posted by on September 16 at 3:53 PM

One of the most brutal articles I wrote for The Stranger was not a review of a play (as my fondest detractors might suspect) but a cruel vivisection of David Foster Wallace's Everything and More: A Compact History of ∞. I stand by my verdict: It is a shitty, useless book.

But even I, DFW hater extraordinaire, felt compelled to pay tribute in that review to a grammatical quirk the man just couldn't quit:

Everything is the first volume in the "Great Discoveries" series, through which the publisher, W. W. Norton & Company, intends to "bring new voices to the telling of stories of scientific achievement." Which goal, as DFW's habitual syntax would have it, is somewhat suspicious.

He does it within the first 600 words of the Rolling Stone John McCain story Paul linked to:

In October of '67 McCain was himself still a Young Voter and flying his 23rd Vietnam combat mission and his A-4 Skyhawk plane got shot down over Hanoi and he had to eject, which basically means setting off an explosive charge that blows your seat out of the plane, which ejection broke both McCain's arms and one leg and gave him a concussion and he started falling out of the skies right over Hanoi.

I never had a class in grammar as a kid, which neglect almost certainly condemned me to a life spent obsessing over the subject. So, my question for grammarians and those with access to Ask a Librarian: What do you call this construction? An adjectival dependent pronoun followed by—err, I'm getting lost here—a relative clause? Are any of those things even things? Is my "which neglect" proper above, or do you have to have some version of "neglect" in the original sentence?

I'm confused. And I'm really sad that David Foster Wallace isn't around to answer my question.

Revolutionary Ideas

posted by on September 16 at 2:57 PM

A few months ago on Slog, I reported on the world debut of the American Booksellers' Association's independent bookseller branding campaign, named IndieBound.

...(T)here was a little light show and then [The A.B.A.] announced that the new slogan/website/philosophy of independent bookstores around the country was going to be…

…IndieBound.

As in, “I’m bound to be going to an independent store,” I guess. When they announced that bookstores around the county were going to start carrying IndieBound fliers (Changed from the BookSense 76 to the hipper-than-thou ‘NextList.’), suddenly the hall was filled with skipping girls handing out IndieBound Declarations of Indpendence and IndieBound pins and those plastic glow-necklaces that people wear at raves, only in the official color of IndieBound, which is red. People said things like “Welcome to the revolution” and “The revolution is now.” Apparently, independent bookstores are becoming Russian revolutionaries.

I wrote more about IndieBound's debut in my Book Expo America wrap-up piece in June. The next step of IndieBound has just launched. It's a social networking site where you can identify yourself as a fan of local independent bookstores and other independent businesses.

Add your favorite Indie retailers to the IndieBound.org database—so everyone can shop indie everywhere they go!

Just added: the Waddle n' Swaddle, in Poughkeepsie, New York. The revolution continues.

Why You Should Care About David Foster Wallace (If You Don't Already)

posted by on September 16 at 1:17 PM

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I've already written about why I was so sad about David Foster Wallace's death. But if you don't know much about DFW, or you've only read (or tried to read) his fiction, there are some things you really ought to read.

Harper's has benevolently posted a number of Foster Walllace's essays for free on their website. They're PDFs, so if you work in an office-type environment, you might be able to pass them off as work. I wholeheartedly recommend "Shipping Out: On the (nearly lethal) comforts of a luxury cruise," which would eventually become the title essay in A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again. The others are very good, too. The whole page, if read in its entirety, practically serves as a free e-book primer for the Foster Wallace initiate who doesn't want to do the morbid dance of going to a bookstore and asking for the work of a recently deceased author. You've gotta love the internet.

And this essay at Rolling Stone, about one week he spent with the John McCain presidential campaign of 2000, is the one I call "one particularly important essay about John McCain that every American should be required by law to read before November 4." The essay was recently republished as a book called McCain's Promise, and it has a foreword that's very useful in contextualizing the 2000 McCain with the 2008 McCain. You should read this essay, in one of its forms, soon.

Slog Commenter Book Report 3: Aislinn Visits The Land of No Right Angles

posted by on September 16 at 12:02 PM

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As you know by now, I bring a batch of advance reader copies to Slog Happy, with the caveat that the person who reads (or tries to read) the book has to review it for all of us here on Slog.

Today's reviewer is the lovely and talented (and, perhaps most importantly, fellow born-in-Mainer) Aislinn. Aislinn will be reviewing In the Land of No Right Angles, by Daphne Beal. Anything you don't like about this review no doubt is due to the editing process and not at all Aislinn's fault and you should blame the editor. I am the editor.

Have you met the lady who has spent too much time traveling the world? She wears ill-fitting clothes, generally a combination of one thing that's too big and one thing that's too small, and loves Chacos because they're so versatile. No matter the topic, she is always able to steer the conversation to something that happened to her while she was abroad, because it was truly a Life-Changing Experience. She was in my creative writing class at Seattle Central, actually. Maybe you've seen her around.

Daphne Beal's In the Land of No Right Angles reminded me a lot of that lady. Each mewling chapter spirals further into condescension, narcissism, and clichés, until it peters out into a climax-free ending that is as pointless as it is boring.

The blurb hypes a hot interracial love triangle (the main appeal, apparently), but it was hard to believe that anything about the book was going to be sexy after reading:

I was twenty and about to go trekking in the central Hill Region of Nepal by myself after living in the country for almost eight months when I mentioned it to my friend Will.

That is the second sentence. The first sentence is no gem either, but this one almost made me put the book down. I was able to press on only by reminding myself that this was a galley copy, and such poor construction was unlikely to have made it through to the final cut. (ED NOTE: It totally made it through to the final cut.) It would be unfair to say this sentence is representative of Ms. Beal's overall style, as she does write some nice descriptions of scenery, but this was one of many sentences that made me disappointed in everyone who ever told her that she was a good writer.

Aside from exploiting Nepali culture and faking her way through the most lukewarm love triangle in the history of sexual tension, my biggest problem was the main character, Alex Larson's general unbelievability. She inexplicably became a crier in the last few chapters, despite showing no sign of this tendency for the first eight years of the story. Also, she usually cried when faced with semi-romantic hardships of the most banal variety, and never when confronted with anything actually sad, like women sold into sexual slavery or people dying of AIDS. I wondered if this was supposed to be a comment on Western women growing more self-centered as they age, but I’m pretty sure it was just poor character control. Those last, meandering chapters also include the introduction of unnecessary swear words, and the most infuriating passage of the book:

”You seemed to be having a good time.”
“A great time, and now I’m going back.”
“What if I won’t let you go?” He held my wrists.
“You will,” I said, refusing to wriggle. “It’s too much like commitment.”
“Okay, then,” he said, rolling to the side. “But surely you have time for one more?” His fingertips trailed down my sternum.
“Surely,” I said. Sluttiness could be its own reward.


Sluttiness!? Alex sleeps with a total of four men in EIGHT YEARS. She rebuffs all sexual advances from her female Nepali friend. One man was “self-conscious and insecure,” and another was crying as he asked her if they could “make love.” Three of the four (one isn’t described physically) are blond and American, despite two of the encounters taking place in India. Oh, and they’re all well-off and/or successful, and she knows each of them well before things get physical. Alex is not a “slut” at all, and characterizing her as such honestly offended me. Also, the statement “sluttiness could be its own reward” is nonsensical, unless she’s referring to orgasms. In which case: duh.

If you like travel, or sex, or yourself, don't read this book.

Many thanks to Aislinn.

Reading Tonight

posted by on September 16 at 9:58 AM

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We have a book about the wine trails of Washington and four other readings tonight.

Marc Brown and Judy Serra read at Third Place Books tonight from Born to Read, which is a book for children about the importance of reading. But if the children don't know about the importance of reading, how will they come to read the book in the first place? Nobody knows the answer to this puzzle.

At the University Book Store, Brian Herbert continues to cash in on his dead dad's Dune book, with a continuation of the long-since-uninteresting series. Herbert will be joined by his alleged "co"writer, Kevin J. Anderson.

At the Central Branch of the Seattle Public Library, Christopher Buckley reads from Supreme Courtship, which is his newest humorous novel about government. Buckley wrote Thank You For Smoking and other funny books. He's also written No Way To Treat a First Lady, which was not funny, and other not-funny books. This one looks like it might be one of the funny ones, but attending the reading could be a good way to figure that out.

Finally, at the University Book Store, at 5 pm today, Philip Roth is going to be doing a reading from his new book, Indignation, on a large video screen live via satellite. Which is kind of weird, I know, but Philip Roth never goes on tour. So unless Seattle Arts and Lectures manages to snag him for an appearance at some undetermined future date—it would have to be at least 2010, because SAL has already announced their 08-09 series, and Roth ain't on it—this is as close to Philip Roth as you will ever be. I hope he has a sense of humor about it and shows up in a leather chair, stroking a large, hairy cat like a James Bond villain.

The full readings calendar, including the next week or so, is here.


Monday, September 15, 2008

Finite Jest

posted by on September 15 at 1:58 PM

This week's Constant Reader is online right now, a few days before the print edition. It's about David Foster Wallace.

Laura Miller on David Foster Wallace

posted by on September 15 at 11:38 AM

From Salon:

He talked about how difficult it was to be a novelist in a world seething with advertisements and entertainment and knee-jerk knowingness and facile irony. He wrote about the maddening impossibility of scrutinizing yourself without also scrutinizing yourself scrutinizing yourself and so on, ad infinitum, a vertiginous spiral of narcissism--because not even the most merciless self-examination can ignore the probability that you are simultaneously congratulating yourself for your soul-searching, that you are posing. He tried so hard to be sincere and to attend to the world around him because he was excruciatingly aware of how often we are merely "sincere" and "attentive" and all too willing to leave it at that. He spoke of the discipline and of the abrading, daily labor such efforts require because the one imperative that runs throughout all of his work is the intimate connection between humility and wisdom.

Like a lot of us at The Stranger, I found out in the aged grandeur of the Moore's lobby, at the Genius Awards party on Saturday night, when someone handed me an iPhone with a news story on it. It seemed impossible that the pixels on the screen were actually shaped into these letters, spelling out this news. David Foster Wallace? Hanged? Wife found him? Wha--? There were things to celebrate on Saturday, but gravity had just shifted, the lights had just flickered, and it was with a lot of stomach sadness that we went on celebrating.

Here is Laura Miller talking about stomach sadness with DFW in 1996, right after Infinite Jest was published. (The whole interview is fascinating--click on the link at the bottom of that first page to keep going.) And here is DFW's most recent--generous, intrepid, unlikely--short story for The New Yorker. (Representative sentence: "The appointment was for afternoon, but when the doorbell had rung so early and his mother’d called to him up the stairs, he had known, and a terrible kind of blankness had commenced falling through him.")

Reading Tonight

posted by on September 15 at 10:15 AM

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There's a ton of readings tonight.

There'll be a Suggests box popping up in regards to Neal Stephenson in a couple minutes, so I'll keep it short. I'm reading his new one, Anathem, and I quite like it. I'm not usually crazy about books set on another planet that's not Earth, but it's pretty ballsy to write a space opera about the history of philosophy. We should encourage that.

Up at Third Place Books, Kathleen Finn reads from The Sharper the Knife, the Less You Cry. It's a memoir that's also a romance set in culinary school. Wow.

Then there are two readings I don't care at all about: Garrison Keillor reads at Town Hall. Fuck Garrison Keillor. And then at Elliott Bay Book Company, Linda Cohn reads from Cohn-Head: A No-Holds Barred Account of Breaking Into the Boys' Club. I think she's a TV sports reporter or something like that, but that title—the awful pun, followed by the cliches "no-holds barred" and "boys' club," says that this is a book by an author who would as soon urinate on her readers as provide anything new or insightful.

And at First Presbyterian Church, Jonathan Mahler reads from The Challenge: Hamdan V. Rumsfeld and the Battle over Presidential Power. This is important, because presidential power is a vital subtext of this election season. It's a worthwhile reading just for the question and answer session, and Mahler's take on the two candidates.

The full readings calendar, including the next week or so, is here.

Eli Just Linked This Story...

posted by on September 15 at 7:40 AM

... but it's worth its own post.

The New York Times explores Sarah Palin's history of vindictiveness and favoritism as an elected official. Of particular interest to Slog readers: More on the censorship saga.

The new mayor also tended carefully to her evangelical base. She appointed a pastor to the town planning board. And she began to eye the library. For years, social conservatives had pressed the library director to remove books they considered immoral.

“People would bring books back censored,” recalled former Mayor John Stein, Ms. Palin’s predecessor. “Pages would get marked up or torn out.”

Witnesses and contemporary news accounts say Ms. Palin asked the librarian about removing books from the shelves. The McCain-Palin presidential campaign says Ms. Palin never advocated censorship.

But in 1995, Ms. Palin, then a city councilwoman, told colleagues that she had noticed the book “Daddy’s Roommate” on the shelves and that it did not belong there, according to Ms. [Laura] Chase[, Palin's campaign manager during her first mayoral campaign,] and Mr. Stein. Ms. Chase read the book, which helps children understand homosexuality, and said it was inoffensive; she suggested that Ms. Palin read it.

“Sarah said she didn’t need to read that stuff,” Ms. Chase said. “It was disturbing that someone would be willing to remove a book from the library and she didn’t even read it.”

“I’m still proud of Sarah,” she added, “but she scares the bejeebers out of me.”

When she became mayor, of course, Palin asked "rhetorical" questions about censoring books, and proceeded to fire and then rehire the town librarian, who didn't much like censorship. A little flexing of power over perfectly capable city employees who happened to disagree with the mayor—nothing to concern voters, of course.


Sunday, September 14, 2008

Reading Today

posted by on September 14 at 10:00 AM

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Thank God it's fall. We have two interesting readings today—Sunday!—and the two pretty much cover the spectrum of readings.

At Elliott Bay Book Company, Katie Hafner reads from Romance on Three Legs: Glenn Gould's Obsessive Quest for the Perfect Piano. I think it sounds like a brilliant choice of subject for a book, and the question and answer session could be really interesting here.

And up at Third Place Books, Neal Stephenson reads from his new novel, Anathem, which is a space opera starring monks. Stephenson is reading tomorrow, too, at a church in the U District, but that's a ticketed event that requires a purchase of a book to attend. I suggest this one to folks who are unsure if they want to give Stephenson another chance—his last trilogy turned some readers off. You should go to this one. He never does public appearances.

The full readings calendar, including the next week or so, is here.


Saturday, September 13, 2008

David Foster Wallace

posted by on September 13 at 7:47 PM

R.I.P.

Reading Today

posted by on September 13 at 10:00 AM

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The big event of the day is the Hugo House's Zine Library grand re-opening celebration. I wrote about this yesterday, but it's important enough that I'll repeat myself: ZAPP is possibly the largest collection of zines in the world, and it finally has a little bit of organization, which is almost unthinkable. I've visited the new digs, and they're really nice. It's not quite as spacious as the old ZAPP, but it's also not as prone to flooding, since it's on the second floor. The party goes from 3 to 7 pm, and you should go check it out before coming to The Genius Awards. Zines are an important part of modern literary history, and it's really interesting to watch them change in the face of the internet and blogs. Most zines nowadays are beautiful objects, many with silk-screening and fancy design. Go and take a look, really. It's free.

At Elliott Bay Book Company this afternoon, Lily Koppel reads from The Red Leather Diary, which is about a red leather diary that Koppel finds and then delivers to its long-lost, 90-year-old author. Later in the day, California Representative Barbara Lee reads from Renegade for Peace & Justice, which is about her efforts in Congress to fight the Iraq War. Before you think, "This lady was Barack Obama before there was a Barack Obama," Lee also voted against the use of force after September 11th. Which I think pretty much means she's the biggest pacifist in Washington D.C. And that's worth checking out.

And at Elliott Bay Book Company in the evening, John Witte reads from his new book of poems, Second Nature. He's a very good poet whose work has appeared everywhere. You can preview one of his books of poetry, The Hurtling, at Google Books. But you shouldn't go to this reading. You should come to the Genius Awards instead.


UPDATE:
Commenter --MC writes:

Aw, Paul. No mention of the TYPHON signing tonight at the Fantagraphics Bookstore at 1201 S Vale St. in hip and fattening Georgetown? From six to nine, TYPHON editor Danny Hellman will sign copies of his groundbreaking new comics anthology, along with contributors D. J. Bryant, Dalton Webb, Pat Moriarity, Max Clotfelter, and Mark Campos. Hellman will present a multimedia cartoon performance and Moriarity will perform a short music set with his 10-year-old son Jack – as seen on Willie Nelson’s website! This event coincides with the colorful Georgetown Second Saturday Art Attack, featuring exciting visual and performing arts at 30 locations throughout the historic neighborhood. Fantagraphics Bookstore & Gallery is located at 1201 S. Vale St. at Airport Way S., only minutes from downtown Seattle. Phone: 206.658.0110. Open daily 11:30 – 8:00 PM, Sundays until 5:00. Admission is always free to the public. And you didn't say anything about it! Aw, but that's all right, you're a busy guy.

I apologize, --MC. That one slipped right by me.I don't know some of the other names, but Campos, Webb, and Hellman are all excellent comics people and they should have had their spot on the calendar with a little green star next to them. Sorry to --MC and to Fantagraphics and to everyone involved with the reading. (But I'm still going to the Genius Awards.)

The full readings calendar, including the next week or so, is here.


Friday, September 12, 2008

Now Even Joyfuller

posted by on September 12 at 4:00 PM

The Joy of Sex has been updated. There is apparently much more about pleasing women in the book—the female orgasm wasn't discovered until 1998, after all—and the book now includes cybersex, including something called "teledildonics." There's also a whole section devoted to horseplay. As in equine role play. It remains to be seen if the illustrations are still those same hairy hippies who were getting it on when the book was introduced in 1972:

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ZAPP!

posted by on September 12 at 1:00 PM

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My books section was tiny this week due to massive Genius profiling, but if I had the space, I would've written about this: Tomorrow is the day that ZAPP (the House's zine library) reopens to the public at the Hugo House, from 3 to 7. I highly recommend going.

I know some commenters have smart-assy things to say about zines—mostly comments of the "Is it 1994 again?" variety—but they're missing the point. This is a zine library, possibly the largest zine library in the world, and as an archive of the period just before the Internet, it's invaluable. They have zines from the Riot Grrl scene in Olympia archived away, including the original Bikini Kill zine. There's also early work by Miranda July and dozens of other comics artists, musicians, and writers you'd recognize.

ZAPP has been closed for about a year now, because its former basement home was flooded, and the new digs are a little smaller but much more organized. It's actually possible to find a particular zine now, which is a nice change from before. There's still dedicated areas and supplies to make zines, and the library is still taking on new zines.

On the whole, zines have become a little more sophisticated in the time since the Internet: as objects, many are beautiful, and the content is often reliant on the format, making it the sort of thing that can't be duplicated in a blog. The free, four-hour celebration of ZAPP's reopening will involve zine readings and tours of the new space. It's a pretty great precursor to the Genius awards, too: After all, how often do we get to celebrate the re-opening of a library in this town? I think the Hugo House deserves credit for being custodians of a little-celebrated branch of literature and providing a place for people to explore this unique store of information.

Lunch Date: Salvation Boulevard

posted by on September 12 at 12:10 PM

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(A few times a week, I take a new book with me to lunch and give it a half an hour or so to grab my attention. Lunch Date is my judgment on that speed-dating experience.)

Who's your date today? Salvation Boulevard, by Larry Beinhart.

Where'd you go? Mirch Masala. I was inspired by Dave's review this week.

What'd you eat? I had the lunch buffet ($7.95.)

How was the food? Delicious! The butter chicken and the paneer curry were my favorites, but the piping-hot naan delivered to the table was great, too. This is by far the best Indian lunch buffet I've had in Seattle. But the other options are so depressing I stopped going to Indian lunch buffets quite some time ago.

What does your date say about itself? It's a thriller by the man who wrote the novel American Hero, which was the basis for Wag the Dog. American Hero was kind of crazy—the author wrote himself into the book, and it was very different from Mamet's script for Dog, basically claiming that the first Gulf War was a plot to get the first Bush re-elected. If your tolerance for conspiracy theorists is all right, I recommend Hero. This new one is about religion and politics, and it's more of a legal thriller.

Is there a representative quote? "Manny slammed his fist down on the desk. He was wearing a shirt that cost $300, $350. A $150 tie, wide and straight, pimp my neck. The jacket of his $2,400 suit hung over the back of his chair. The view out his window made it the priciest real estate in the city. Manny loved money, and Manny made money. But here he was, slamming his fist down on the desk so hard his coffee mug took a little hop and clack. "Not if I can fuckin' help it.""

Will you two end up in bed together? Yes, but I'm losing patience. I got 39 pages into it and I'm on Chapter 9, and the characters aren't really characters yet. As with the above quote, they have one attribute (in Manny's case, love of expensive things.) If I don't see a little more depth soon, I might abandon ship.

The One Book Left Behind

posted by on September 12 at 11:39 AM

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Something like 25 books found new homes at last night's Slog Happy, and hopefully we'll be running commenter reviews of those books very soon. Unfortunately, there was one book that nobody wanted to read. Sitting on the bench at 9:20, all alone amidst the empty beer bottles and melted ice, was Babylon Rolling, by Amanda Boyden. It's a novel about people in New Orleans.

Here's what Toronto's Globe and Mail had to say about Babylon Rolling:

“Few contemporary novels are, at their root, as compelling about the relationship between a city and the people who live there. Boyden’s Babylon Rolling is a love letter, sometimes sad, sometimes angry, sometimes beautiful, between New Orleans and five people who live on one of its streets.”

I know that Sherman Alexie loved the book, too. He was walking around Book Expo America this year with an armload of advance copies, handing them out to everyone with a gushing recommendation.

So why didn't anyone take home the free copy of Babylon Rolling? Speaking for myself, I've got kind of a bad case of New Orleans fatigue in my fiction. I've read so many bad books and seen so many bad movies about New Orleans since Katrina that I'm naturally fearful of any new ones. (I can't read enough non-fiction about New Orleans, though. The newest issue of the Oxford American is all about New Orleans and it's amazing.) I shall consign Babylon Rolling to the Island of Misfit Books, where it will play with remaindered Anne Geddes books and Atkins Diet Carb Counters.


Reading Tonight

posted by on September 12 at 10:06 AM

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Boy, there sure are some readings tonight.

Up at Third Place Books, there's a book about developing feline empathy titled Be the Cat. And the University Book Store has an author who found a diary in a dumpster and then returned it to its proper (and very old) owner. That one's called The Red Leather Diary. That author's reading in town tomorrow, also.

Then, at Elliott Bay Book Company, we have Brian "Head" Welch. Welch used to be in Korn. He used a lot of meth. He stopped doing meth and is now incredibly high on Jesus, as in evangelically high on Jesus. So if you've got a thing about hearing former members of very bad bands talk at homoerotic length about Jesus, tonight's your night. The book—do I even have to point out that it's terrible?—has a whole lot of pictures, too.

Then, at Open Books, John Witte reads from his new book of poems, Second Nature. It's good to have Open Books back in the readings game—they always take the summer off—and it's good to have Witte reading in town. He's a very good poet whose work has appeared everywhere. You can preview one of his books of poetry, The Hurtling, at Google Books.

The full readings calendar, including the next week or so, is here.


Thursday, September 11, 2008

Changes at the Hugo House

posted by on September 11 at 2:58 PM

As of yesterday, Lyall Bush is no longer employed at the Richard Hugo House. Bush has been Executive Director there since February 9, 2006.

Brian McGuigan, the Hugo House's Program Associate, says that Hugo House "plan(s) to launch a national search for a new ED and will be announcing an interim director soon."

More information as it comes.

"Can you twirl it?"

posted by on September 11 at 10:58 AM

I swear to God I'm not getting kickbacks from Plastic Logic, but here's a video of their upcoming e-reader:

This is honestly the first e-reader I can see myself owning. It's not perfect—I understand the complaints in the complaints from two days ago about it not being foldable, although I bet the next edition of the Plastic Logic reader will be—but it looks like the first draft of something really good.

Reading Tonight

posted by on September 11 at 10:12 AM

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There's an open mic and many readings tonight.

Erin Hunter reads at Adams Elementary School, in Ballard. She's written something called Eclipse: Warriors: Power of 3: Book 4 , which my intern, Ashley Wearly, says "seems to be a kid's fantasy series revolving around mystical cats." It's bad news when a title confuses the fuck out of you. But I must admit that I'm charmed by the cover. I kind of want that airbrushed on a van.

At the Central Branch of the Seattle Public Library, Eric Liu and Nick Hanauer discuss civil liberties. You will note that today is September 11th. Coincidence? I think not.

Up at Third Place Books, Cheryl Jarvis reads from The Necklace, which is about a bunch of women buying an expensive necklace and trying to share it. (Valuable life lesson about sharing alert!) And at Town Hall, David Servan-Schreiber reads from Anti-Cancer, which is a memoir that studies the causes of cancer.

Finally, at Elliott Bay Book Company, there is a reading involving Michael Meade and a book called The World Behind the World. Here is what Elliott Bay's calendar has to say about it:

From his Vashon Island home, and from Seattle-based non-profit organization Mosaic, (Meade) has long worked a rarely-worked line, that of working with the intimate and immediate (as simple as a room with a few people and a story), and, at the same time, with mythological or cosmological material that would seem to transcend time and place, at least in measure we are used to reckoning in the day-to-day.

If you can figure out what that means, maybe you should go to the reading.

The full readings calendar, including the next week or so, is here.


Wednesday, September 10, 2008

Finally, a Use for Books!

posted by on September 10 at 5:22 PM

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Slog tipper The General pointed me to this blog post, about visual artists transforming books into art objects. Some of the resulting objects are really quite striking.

Unfortunately, as The General points out, the blog's writing about the books is America's-Funniest-Home-Videos-interstitial-patter bad. (About the artist who makes guns out of books, they write "The pen may be mightier than the sword, but book artist Robert The takes things one step further with his stark book-art guns. " Hork!) So look at the pictures and don't read the words. You know, like the rest of the internet.

For Those Who Love Useless Maps

posted by on September 10 at 4:00 PM

Amazon now has a 2008 page, which shows who's buying which political books. They've divided up politically themed books into red, blue, and purple, and kept track of the sales.

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Most everybody is reading more Republican-themed books. I'm sure somebody will try to turn this into political news, but really the only sure thing is that more Republicans buy their political books from Amazon.com. Frankly, this doesn't surprise me, as most independent booksellers are slanted toward the liberal, and a lot of Democrats are inclined to buy locally.

Most Sadly Hopeful Blog Headline of the Day

posted by on September 10 at 2:00 PM

"Excitement Builds for The Best American Poetry 2008."

"I hate people."

posted by on September 10 at 1:00 PM

Michael from Bailey/Coy books just called to ask if I'd read this recounting of an interview with Maurice Sendak. It's funny and sad and sweet and bitter, just like...well, just like Maurice Sendak.

He talks about all his many hates (including Salman Rushdie, an uncle of his, and, apparently, himself) and his sexuality.

Was there anything he had never been asked? He paused for a few moments and answered, “Well, that I’m gay.”

“I just didn’t think it was anybody’s business,” Mr. Sendak added. He lived with Eugene Glynn, a psychoanalyst, for 50 years before Dr. Glynn’s death in May 2007. He never told his parents: “All I wanted was to be straight so my parents could be happy. They never, never, never knew.”

It's a wonderful interview, and you should read it. Many thanks to Michael for letting me know about it.

Reading Tonight

posted by on September 10 at 10:04 AM

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Oh, there are readings tonight. There are readings a-plenty.

Local authors Garth Stein, Jennie Shortridge, and Thor Hanson will be at Fremont Place Books tonight, talking about the craft of storytelling. There's also a reception after the discussion. I think Fremont Place Books is a lovely bookstore and they should have more events, if just to give people more opportunities to go visit with them.

Out at Queen Anne Books, Mary Daheim reads from Vi Agara Falls, which I refuse to italicize, as it is such a bad title.

Up at Third Place Books, Glenda Burgess reads from The Geography of Love, which is a memoir about love and cancer and other horrible things. Lawney Reyes is at the University Book Store with B Street, which is a history about the smutty, seamy underbelly of the construction of the Coulee Dam. Apparently, lots of prostitutes were involved. Both of these readings look good.

At Town Hall, Nena Baker discusses The Body Toxic, which is about household chemicals and cancer. If you go, you will probably hear something awful about Febreze that you didn't want to know. I've always suspected Febreze is a ginormous cancer threat.

And at Elliott Bay Book Company, Vincent Bugliosi, who wrote Helter Skelter, reads from his newest book, The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder. This book wound up on the New York Times Bestseller List without any assistance from a major publisher's advertising budget, which is pretty impressive. I can't imagine that this reading would be boring.

The full readings calendar, including the next week or so, is here.


Tuesday, September 9, 2008

Dept. of Bad Ideas, Poetry Edition

posted by on September 9 at 5:15 PM

There will be a film version of Allen Ginsberg's "Howl," focusing on the obscenity trial against Ginsberg's publisher.

David Strathairn, Alan Alda, Jeff Daniels, Mary-Louise Parker and Paul Rudd will join the cast of the film "Howl," according to today's Hollywood Reporter. Actor James Franco has already signed on to portray poet Allen Ginsberg.

Wow.

Robin Plasters on the Makeup Like a Trollop

posted by on September 9 at 3:51 PM

Funnybook Babylon has broken the story that DC comics tried to recall a comic book, All Star Batman & Robin the Boy Wonder # 10, because the black bars that were printed over swears in word balloons were see-through. This means you could see words like "fucking" and "dickwad" and this one, which a criminal says about Batgirl:

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This is the same Batman comic book that had the following panel, which has become quite the joke in the comics community:

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Goddamn right.

The Long Now

posted by on September 9 at 3:02 PM

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It's possible that those of you who care about this already know it, but Neal Stephenson's new novel, Anathem, is officially released today. It's his first book in four years. If you buy Anathem at the University Book Store, you can buy a ticket to Stephenson's reading there next week.

If you'd like to know more about Anathem before you buy it, The Long Now Foundation is hosting a live webcast with Stephenson at 7 pm tonight. He'll discuss the book and maybe read a little bit, also. And it's free.

I'm kind of fond of the Long Now folks. They're trying to build a 10,000 year clock. Here's their mission:

The Long Now Foundation uses five digit dates, the extra zero is to solve the deca-millennium bug which will come into effect in about 8,000 years.

The Y10K problem is real, folks, and if we don't get started on it now, we'll be in real trouble.

Curried Books

posted by on September 9 at 2:00 PM

John Sutherland, who famously swore that he would curry and eat his copy of Salman Rushdie's The Enchantress of Florence if it did not win this year's Booker Prize, is going back on his pledge. The book was not even shortlisted. He says:

Particularly interesting for me, I should add, since I vowed - publicly - to curry and eat my proof copy of The Enchantress of Florence if it didn't win. It won't. And I won't. So there.

I might manage a custard pie on October 10, though.

You will note that I have not vowed to consume any books in my tenure as The Stranger's books editor. This is why.

For those interested, this year's Booker shortlist is as follows:

Aravind Adiga, The White Tiger

Sebastian Barry, The Secret Scripture

Amtiv Ghosh, Sea of Poppies

Linda Grant, The Clothes on Their Backs

Philip Hensher, The Northern Clemency

Steve Toltz, A Fraction of the Whole

I'm a little ashamed to admit I haven't read any of these, although I love Amitav Ghosh and I like Sebastian Barry. In my defense, many of them aren't available over here yet.

A Better Idea

posted by on September 9 at 1:08 PM

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Yesterday, Plastic Logic unveiled their e-reading device. It's a flat 8 1/2 by 11 inch piece of plastic, allegedly thinner than a pad of paper:

The Plastic Logic reader supports a full range of business document formats, such as Microsoft Word, Excel and Powerpoint, and Adobe PDFs, as well as newspapers, periodicals and books. It has an easy gesture-based user interface and powerful software tools that will help business users to organize and manage their information. Users can connect to their information either wired or wirelessly and store thousands of documents on the device. The reader incorporates E Ink technology for great readability and features low power consumption and long battery life. The Plastic Logic reader is scheduled to ship in the first half of 2009

It's going to be initially targeted at business readers, but I think this could really take off. Some are calling it a Kindle-killer. With an intelligent payment plan, it could be the thing to save newspapers, at any rate.

This Sounds Horrible

posted by on September 9 at 11:36 AM

Anthony Zuiker, the man who gave the world CSI, is going to produce a series of digital thriller novels.

At the conclusion of each five chapters, readers will be given codes to log onto a website that will feature two-minute filmed vignettes providing a cinematic bridge to the next five chapters. At the book’s conclusion, readers can join an online community in which they can interact with others and hatch characters and storylines. The best suggestions will be incorporated into future titles, Zuiker said.

The books will be about a "rogue forensics investigator" who takes cases "that are too grim and graphic for "CSI."" He'll be like Dirty Harry crossed with David Caruso. In that spirit, here is a YouTube classic about CSI: Miami.

Reading Tonight

posted by on September 9 at 10:13 AM

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There are several readings of note tonight.

At the University Book Store, Matthew Kangas talks about Northwest art from the 1920s to the 1960s. Hey, Jen Graves has written about Matthew Kangas before! You should read her awesome story about Matthew Kangas if you're planning on going to the reading. And maybe ask him about it.

At the Hugo House, Nancy Pagh reads from After, which won the Floating Bridge Press chapbook award. I got an e-mail from someone promoting this reading that literally rewrote my calendar listing for this reading, asking me to change it. Apparently, he was miffed because I didn't mention the other readers at this event. Frankly, I've never heard of the other readers at this event, and my reading calendar space is small. Since space on the Internet is endless, however, I will list those readers here:

Lana Hechtman Ayers, Joan Fiset, Steve Quig and Derek Sheffield.

Are you convinced yet?

At Elliott Bay Book Company, Stuart Archer Cohen reads from The Army of the Republic, which is a book about what happens in the future when corporations rule the world. It looks great and I was planning on reading it, but I just ran out of time. If you're into thrillers at all, this looks like a smart one.

And finally, up at Third Place Books, David Ebershoff reads from his new book, The 19th Wife. There'll be a Suggests about this book popping up any second now, but you should also read this week's Constant Reader, in which I talk about this book and Ebershoff's previous book, The Danish Girl. He's a rare talent.

The full readings calendar, including the next week or so, is here.


Monday, September 8, 2008

HOLY SHIT ITS THE FUTURE

posted by on September 8 at 3:45 PM

Here is Esquire's e-ink cover. I'm sure that, like September 11th, you will remember exactly where you were when you first saw this post. We should make today January 1st, 2000 all over again.

My New Book Will Be Called Bindler's List

posted by on September 8 at 3:00 PM

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British mystery author Lynda LaPlante (shown at left) has been accused of plagiarizing part of one of her mysteries "from a 1947 book called Five Chimneys, by a Holocaust survivor, Olga Lengyel."

In the face of these allegations that she stole part of a Holocaust denier's book, LaPlante is taking the classy route: she's blaming the error on a research assistant. Which doesn't make much sense, as it would mean that LaPlante's research assistant wrote huge passages of her own book. But whatever. Damned assistants!

...And Your Little Harry Potter Book, Too

posted by on September 8 at 1:14 PM

J.K. Rowling has won a copyright infringement case against an author who was trying to publish a Harry Potter encyclopedia. The bajillionaire author also won $6,750 in damages.

This is a bad thing for copyright cases. Rowling claimed that this particular book, The Harry Potter Lexicon, has too much content copied directly out of the source material and is profiting directly from Rowling's success. But I can see this sort of thing being used as a precedent to further attack publishers of unofficial guides to just about anything.

Reading a Little Later Today

posted by on September 8 at 12:54 PM

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Holy shit I have been banging my head against the keyboard since 9:45 this morning and it's finally worked. Happy early afternoon, everyone. There are a lot of readings tonight.

Up at Third Place Books is Stuart Archer Cohen, with a very interesting-looking futuristic thriller called The Army of the Republic. It's about when corporations rule the world. So possibly this coming November.

At Elliott Bay Book Company, Sandra Tsing Loh reads from Mother on Fire: A True Motherf%#$@ Story About Parenting! The exclamation point is the author's choice, not mine. I believe that the censored word is "fucking."

At the University Book Store, Christopher Sandford reads from his biography of Roman Polanski, which is cleverly titled Polanski. This looks like the only reading of the night when you might be able to talk about anal sex and statutory rape, except maybe for the Zizek reading at Town Hall, which has been Suggested below. Charles wrote a lovely books lead about Zizek this week. Here's a sample:

Slavoj Zizek is the most popular philosopher of our day. In his work, we primarily find the influence of Jacques Lacan, Karl Marx, and Georg Hegel. We also find many references to the filmmaker Alfred Hitchcock and the writer Gilbert Chesterton. We also find that almost nothing on earth is alien to his mind. Everything can be grasped and processed by his muscular theory machine.

Zizek looks like a bear.

It's kind of a love letter. You should read the whole thing.

The full readings calendar, including the next week or so, is here.


Sunday, September 7, 2008

Reading Today

posted by on September 7 at 10:00 AM

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An open mic and two readings today.

At Town Hall, Brian Greene reads. Greene wrote the fabulously popular string theory book The Elegant Universe a few years ago. That's good. Unfortunately his new book, Icarus at the Edge of Time, is about his relationship with his son. That doesn't sound so good. But the man himself should be good, even if his book sounds a bit touchy-feely.

And at the Ballard Library, Brunonia Barry reads from The Lace Reader. It's a novel about people who can read the future in the patterns of lace. I'm vaguely interested in it—the premise reminds me of The Intuitionist, and I tend to be a sucker for somebody-knows-the-future novels—but it also looks a little book clubby. Plus, the book's website is incredibly annoying, which is not the author's fault, but still.

The full readings calendar, including the next week or so, is here.


Saturday, September 6, 2008

Reading Today

posted by on September 6 at 10:00 AM

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There are a whole bunch of readings today.

Sam Green, who is Washington state's poet laureate (I know...we have a poet laureate? It's news to me) will be reading at the Ballard Library. In other poetry news, Steven Nightingale will be reading his book of poems, Cinnamon Theologies, at Elliott Bay Book Company. If I had to choose, I'd pick Nightingale. One, because his last name is Nightingale. But two because it's a book of sonnets and, frankly, you've got to admire someone who's still sticking to sonnets. It shows a real bull-headedness.

At Third Place Books, Richard Fielding reads from Awakening Mindfulness, which frankly looks like a huge load of hooey to me. Also, if you're looking for crazy reading to go to, Truthers are trumpeting a reading by Dr. Paul Zarembka from his new book The Hidden History of 9/11, at a church in Ballard. Why does it seem like every Truther has a PhD? And why do they have to trumpet their PhD to anyone who'll listen? I generally don't trust doctors any more than I trust lawyers. But, you know, if you need a laugh or two, you might want to head to Ballard tonight.

The full readings calendar, including the next week or so, is here.


Friday, September 5, 2008

Trash Publisher Saves the Day

posted by on September 5 at 11:00 AM

I wrote 2 days ago about Random House refusing to publish a novel about Muhammad’s wife Aishah due to threats from Muslims. The novel, called The Jewel of Medina, has been picked up by several publishers in Europe and it looks as though Jewel might have been picked up in America by Beaufort Books.

Beaufort Books, of course, published the icky If I Did It book by O.J. Simpson. They seem to be making a living off of publishing controversial books that nobody else will touch. In the case of Simpson's book, that's kind of creepy. In the case of Jewel, it's commendable, but still obviously a money-grab. Jewel of Medina might be published as early as late October.