Archive for the 'LBC' Category

Every season, turn turn turn

paperhaus April 25th, 2007

At the LBC, nominated author Mark Binelli (Sacco & Vanzetti Must Die!) is posting some thoughts on writing in today’s marketplace. He starts with a quote from Ian Jack, the editor of Granta, about the magazine’s new “Best Young American Novelists” issue.

Finnegan’s Wake would really be hard-pressed now to find a publisher. Whether that’s good or bad, different discussion…

And Binelli offers this terrific response:

I’m going to go out on a limb and say that Finnegan’s Wake being unpublishable today is unquestionably “bad.” It’s surprising to me that the editor of a major literary magazine would find this point debatable. Though I’d love to hear the counter-argument. (“No, man, fuck Joyce!”)

I am writing writing writing (and backspace backspace backspacing) for school so I can’t jump in and play, but I think it’s obvious that I’m with Binelli on this one. Add your two cents at the LBC.

Read this! LBC announces spring pick

paperhaus April 16th, 2007

The LitBlog Coop announces its spring 2007 Read This! pick today: Alan DeNiro’s debut short story collection, Skinny Dipping in the Lake of the Dead. I was the nominator, so I’m thrilled that my colleagues at the LBC found it to be a worthy read. Pleasantly surprised, even.

See, I’m in an MFA program, studying fiction. In one of my classes, each student was instructed to bring in a story that impressed them, and to write up a short paper/presentation on its outstanding qualities. There were two Hemingways, a Tobias Wolff, a John Cheever, a Ring Lardner, a Mary Gaitskill. Many of them were stories that the grad students had been taught in previous classes. I wanted to bring in something new, so I chose the title story from this collection.

They hated it.

I thought that, being in Pittsburgh, my classmates would be charmed by the story’s setting — a futuristic Pittsburgh dystopia. I had thought that they would, like me, find the story funny and smart. That they’d appreciate the craft of it, especially how the story’s end illuminates the beginning; it’s surprising, yet it’s all there, right from the get-go. I had thought they’d notice the language, the love story, the creepy almost-real details like the augmented chickens. But I was wrong.

And I had already nominated the book as a spring pick for the LBC.

When the voting came around, I awaited the inevitable smackdown, the e-mailed cries of “why did you make us read this,” the terrible, horrible anger of these hardworking, hard-reading litbloggers. But the harangues never came. To my surprise, they actually liked it. I felt like one of Mikey’s brothers in that Life commerical.

The LBC will be discussing this book in a few weeks, talking about what they liked (or didn’t) about it. I tentatively suggest that you read it and join in with your own thoughts. You might like it, too.

New nominees at the LBC

paperhaus February 13th, 2007

For the first time I got to nominate a book for the LBC. Which one is it? Maybe you can guess. The three spring nominees are now online at the LitBlog Coop.

Wizard further ado

paperhaus February 9th, 2007

It would be remiss of me not to point to this brand new podcast interview with Ngugi Wa Thiong’O, author of Wizard of the Crow, the LitBlog Coop’s latest Read This! pick. Way cool.

LBC podcast: Stephen Graham Jones

paperhaus February 2nd, 2007

How better than a podacst interview to peek behind the scary curtain of Stephen Graham Jones‘ Demon Theory? Don’t be afraid. He’s really quite congenial. Although he does tell a true story, which is maybe the scariest thing of all relating to his book. Also featured: our nominator Scott McKenzie and what he likes best about Demon Theory.

This, like all LBC podcasts, is a co-production of the LBC, The Bat Segundo Show, and me.

Topics covered: imaginary editors, accidental test-taking, bloody ATV wrecks, literary heroes, writing from Texas, monkey torture, classic slasher films, footnotes v. endnotes and more.

Ew, that’s excellent

paperhaus February 1st, 2007

I’ve got class in 53 minutes and am sitting not so far from 50 or more undergraduates, so I’ve got the iPod cranked. I’m getting some writing done (other than this blog post, I swear). A kind of punk rock song catches my attention — I’m working on kind of a punk rock story, see, so it fits. So I look and it’s called “Rock and Roll” by a band called The Clutters. Some people might think the name is about being messy, but you and I, dear literate ones, know it’s the family that died so Truman Capote could write In Cold Blood. Literate but creepy.

Which reminds me, you still have a few hours to enter the contests to win a copy of Stephen Graham Jones’ Demon Theory over at the LitBlog Coop.

Me, I’ve now got 45 minutes before class. And Lefty Frizzel on the iPod.

Jonesing at the LBC

paperhaus January 30th, 2007

Don’t miss Stephen Graham Jones week at the LBC. Today Jones, author of the nominated book Demon Theory, answers some questions from our own Dan Wickett. Lots of things are discussed, from hair metal to writing as a Native American to Hello Kitty bags filled with rocks. Trust me: read the whole thing.

LBC podcast: Valerie Trueblood & Anne Fernald

paperhaus January 26th, 2007

Get a look (listen?) inside Valerie Trueblood’s book Seven Loves, with a lovely intro from our nominator Anne Fernald. Seven Loves was one of the finalists for the LBC’s first Read This! pick of 2007.

Once again, Ed Champion has done all the hard work putting this podcast together. I owe that man a quesedilla.

A reading assignment

paperhaus November 22nd, 2006

Not so long ago my Litblog Coop cohorts nominated a set of books for the first Read This! selection of 2007. We’d love it if you joined us in our discussion of them, so why not put one (or two or three) on your reading list? You’ve got until January 15. They are:

Demon Theory by Stephen Graham Jones (nominated by Slushpile)
Seven Loves by Valerie Trueblood (nominated by Fernham)
Wizard of the Crow by Ngugi Wa Thiong’O (nominated by Tingle Alley)

I haven’t started yet, but they look awfully good.

Read this! Sam Savage podcast

paperhaus November 10th, 2006

All week the LBC has been celebrating the fall top pick, Firmin by Sam Savage. Don’t miss the podcast, in which Ed talks to Savage in person, with much enthusiasm.

Altho Ed says I assisted, I did little more than peep over the transom on this one. Mr. Champion deserves all the credit.

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