Category: Reading

Last week, I got through some awesome stuff…

• Mary Robison, “In Jewel”
• Amy Hempel, “Three Popes Walk Into a Bar”
• Karen Joy Fowler, “Heartland”
• Barry Hannah, “Green Gets It”
• Barry Hannah, “Our Secret Home”
• Amy Hempel, “The Man in Bogotá”
• Amy Hempel, “When It’s Human Instead of Dog”
• Amy Hempel, “Breathing Jesus”
• Ray Vukcevich, “Pretending”
• Jeffery Ford, “What’s Sure to Come”

With that, I’ve finished off the first quarter of The Collected Stories of Amy Hempel, which was originally the collection Reasons to Live–so, I’ve technically finally finished one of the many collections I’m multitasking on. And, at the rate I’m going, I’m going be done with Hannah’s Airships in pretty short order, too.

I know it looks like I just buried my nose in a book the whole weekend. In fact, I took my Saturday and went to the local comic show where I got to hang for a few minutes with an editor from VERTIGO comics. I’ll talk about that next time, maybe.

• Italo Calvino, “Good for Nothing”
• Karen Jordan Allen, “Alternate Anxieties”
• Amy Hempel, “Pool Night”
• Rachel Pollack, “Burning Beard: The Dreams and Visions of Jacob ben Joseph, Lord Viceroy of Egypt”
• Barry Hannah, “Water Liars”
• Barry Hannah, “Love Too Long”
• Barry Hannah, “Coming Close to Donna”
• Mary Robison, “I Am Twenty-One”
• Barry Hannah, “Quo Vadis, Smut?”
  (Comments on it, here)

You’d think that since my last entry, I hadn’t read any stories since June. So untrue. I’ve had other things to write but my reading list, but I figure I’d just try to get back into the swing of it.

So, some (but not all) of the cooler short stories I’ve read this past week…

• K. Tempest Bradford, “Black Feather”
• Amy Hempel, “Beg, Sl Tog, Inc, Cont, Rep”
  (Some thoughts on it here)
• Csilla Kleinheincz, “A Drop of Raspberry”
• Michael DeLuca, “The Utter Proximity of God”
• Amy Hempel, “Going”
• Rista Abouradi-Hoffman, “While Smoking”
• Nalo Hopkinson, “Tan-Tan and Dry Bone”

I know what I’ve said about commenting on short stories. But I’ve read a couple of things worth talking about at certain places. All of these stories are worthy of comment, but alas–so many stories, so little time.

• Raymond Carver, “Popular Mechanics”
  (comments at Raketenwerfer)
• Tara F. T. Sering, “Preview”
  (comments at ricebowljournals.org)
• T.J. McIntyre, “The Tree Hugger”
• Kelly Spitzer, “Ladies’ Man”
• Alan DeNiro, “Skinny Dipping in the Lake of the Dead”

Back in the day, I used to post a list on the other blog of the short stories I’d read in a week and say a few words about them. I started to get worried though when I started noticing that the blog was coming up in search results for some of the more “classic” stories, Babel’s “My First Goose,” for instance. And these visitors would spend more than enough time to copy and paste, too. I’m probably paranoid, and I can’t actually say I’ve ever said anything of substance. Still, I’m sure there was at least one desparate individual out there, cramming to get a last minute extra-credit assignment done and tried to Google and doodle his way to an easy essay. Well, screw him/her.

I felt I read through a lot of stuff lately worth mentioning, so I figure there’s nothing wrong with putting a list together of stuff you should check out if you have the chance:

• Alan DeNiro, “If I Leap” (EDIT: Found a link)
• Kathy Fish, “Bless You”
• Dawn Corrigan, “An Interrupted Meeting”
• Chris Tripoulas, “Illusions of Victory”
• Michael Wolfe, “To Catch a Predator”
• Ben Myers, “A Short Order Romance in Amarillo, Texas”