Because Reading Is Fundamental

11/19-11/25

I was lucky to have gotten this much reading in, what with the holiday travel and all.

  • Sarah Shun-Lien Bynum, “The Young Wife’s Tale”
  • J.G. Ballard, “Deep End”
  • Ryan Boudinot, “Drugs and Toys”
  • Ryan Boudinot, “Contaminant”
  • Kelly Link, “Lull”
  • J.G. Ballard, “The Overloaded Man”

11/26-12/2

  • Ryan Boudinot, the remainder of his collection The Littlest Hitler
  • M. Rickert, “Don’t Ask”
  • Stuart Dybek, “Farwell”
  • S.L. Gilbow, “Who Brought Tulips to the Moon?”
  • J.G. Ballard, “Billennium”
  • Stuart Dybek, “Chopin in Winter”

I think I made some decent headway with things I’ve purchased over the Thanksgiving holiday, used and new. The stories from Gilbow and Rickert are from the December ’07 issue of F&SF–I’ve accepted the fact that I’ll buy just about anything with M. Rickert’s name on it, including whatever collection “Don’t Ask” might end up in. Sort of like I keep downloading buying all those greatest hits compilations that the band Chicago keeps putting out.

No Tough Love Today

The crit group was cancelled due to inclement weather, so that sucked. Just as well, because I didn’t have anything to contribute this week aside from my usual half-baked opinions of other folks’ writing, much like the half-baked thinking I’m about to share with you now.

I’ve come across a bunch of stories lately that make me wonder what would happen if I re-typed them and submitted them to the crit group. What would they say about unclear narration, too many points of view, or just plain too many adverbs ending in -ly in a story I tried to pass off as mine? Would they have the same comments regardless of who wrote the story?

And, I’m not talking about the authors everybody loves to hate, either. I’m talking about writers whose talent I’d gladly sell a testicle to Ol’ Scratch to have. So, I’m not hatin’ on anyone.

Makes me go, “Hmm…”

Where’s My War Face?

A couple of folks in the crit group have tried to tell me about the need to let a story cool sometimes. I’m almost afraid to allow that. I’ve gotten to a point where my first drafts are coming at the sort of clip I’d like, thanks to my Inner Drill Sergeant. The truth is I’m frustrated that my editing hasn’t reached that point yet. I’ve got two pieces on the burner right now. I know I have all the parts I need; I just need to make them fit better. And I wanted it done yesterday!


“I will motivate you!”

I might as well give them a rest though–a little one–while I try to unfuck myself, lest my Inner Drill Sergeant unscrews my head and shits down my neck. I’ve been hitting my head against brick walls anyway, so why not? I didn’t go idle today, though. I shot a piece off to 6S, so we’ll see what happens with that.

Story Log

From the week of 11/12/07-11/18/07. Two weeks ago, sure. I’d spent that week reading more prose poetry from Great American Prose Poetry and Simic’s The World Doesn’t End, but I still managed to sneak in…

I’ll put up last week’s tomorrow, or something.

“I guess you’re just what I needed”

Still with the family for the holiday. Before the trip though, the wife and I swore we wouldn’t go near the Half-Price Books this time around. We just got home about an hour or so ago, and I’m not ashamed to say I’m fucking glad I went, because finding this made the whole 6-hour drive worthwhile…

I was, no joke, going to order this earlier today, hoping it would arrive shortly after we returned home. I had absolutely no logical reason to think I would find this at any bookstore, but here it was! Oh, and I found the last issue of Conjunctions too, along with a couple of other books.