Furniture may be explicit or implicit, visible or invisible, may bear the duty of conveying social and economic detail or be merely cursorily functional, may be stolen or purchased, borrowed, destroyed, replaced, sprinkled with crumbs of food or splashed with drink, may remain immaculate, may be transformed into artworks by aspiring bohemians, may be inherited by characters from uncles who die before the action of the novel begins, may reward careful inspection of the cushions and seams for loose change that has fallen from pockets, may be collapsible, portable, may even be dragged into the house from the beach where it properly belongs, but in any event it must absolutely exist. Anything less is cruelty.

It certainly didn't hurt that Jonathan Lethem (my favorite author this week) was one of the guests of honor.  Although a disapointingly large portion of the conference seemed to be dedicated to making him defend the path of his career (from a genre author to a literary one according to quite a few critics).  There was even an entire hour dedicated to an interview on the subject (apart from the typical guest of honor interview).  However, the session was very revealing, both of Lethems views and of the regard that fandom holds him in.

Another interesting trend this year was a focus on modern horror, largely due to the inclusion at the convention of the first Shirley Jackson awards.  Hosting the awards ceremony at Readercon was great in that it attracted a number of newer writers to the con, and allowed for one of the highlights for me, namely getting to see Caitlin R. Kiernan recall the words to Come Sail Away (one of the odder panels).

As for other highlights for me.  The large focus on Stanislaw Lem, another of my favorite writers, particularly in regards to both his reoccuring theme of language barriers and the effects translators have on literature, with a lot of input from the great Michael Kandel.  There was a particularly good reading by Michael Swanwick and his wife Sunday morning.  And of course the Saturday night entertainment (two one act plays by guest of honor James Patrick Kelly followed by the annual Kirk Poland Memorial Bad Prose Competition) were a great cap to the entire thing.  I think I'm going to have nightmare of enduring Yves Meynard's alphabetic onslaught on Robert E. Howard for quite some time (I think it took a good 10 minutes to fully recover my breathe from laughter after that).

Joel meets Adam again as adults, and there's still something that ain't quite right about Adam. When Joel re-introduces himself, Adam says,

Possibly I remember you.

He don't have a girlfriend, but a "paramour," Roberta Jar. And he invites Joel over to play Mafia.

I enjoyed watching Joel trying to play, mostly because I've been suckered into trying to play it online, and I think I managed to do even worse than Joel does. Annoyed by the game, Joel doesn't like the way Adam and Roberta control things. So in the second stage of the party, Joel proposes I Never. He plays cagily, with an unpleasant air of superiority. The more Joel tries to take Adam down, the more his forays go astray. In the end, Joel gets in his dig at Adam, but he doesn't get the girl. And I didn't think he deserved to.

What struck me about this story was how I found myself emotionally involved from beginning to end, despite the lack of things I usually expect to enjoy in a story. While I didn't like the characters, they were interesting. There was no action, not even a shouting match. There were no cool ideas or neat magic. The story just gets you deep inside the heads of other people and that's strange enough.

Oh and since the guests this year are Jonathan Lethem and James Patrick Kelly (along with Stanislaw Lem as the ghost of honor) this is the must attend con this year.  I'll be back on Monday.

The recordable cassette represents the momentmusic was first put in the hands of the masses. For those who couldn’t strum a guitar, a mix tape was the ultimate expression of youthful (self-)obsession. And an underground cassette culture continues to flourish, courtesy of a new online coalition. Each month, the members of the International Mix Tape Project put a home-made cassette in a Jiffy bag and send it to one of their 1,200 fellow participants, in 30 countries on six continents. All it takes is for Ryan Goldman, the project’s founder, to email each member with another member’s name and address and – hey presto – music-sharing the old-school way. Cassette from my Ex is a blog where writers share their mix-tape memories of past flings and stream the resulting soundtrack for everyone to enjoy. 

They also have pointed out a bunch of great sites for sharing and listening to real mixtapes:

• Foundtrack.com - uploads a monthly mix-tape of new music
• The Art of the Mix - 10-year-old community of mix-tape lovers, forum for suggested tracks
• International Mix Tape Project - puts a home-made cassette in a Jiffy bag and send it to one of their 1,200 fellow participants, in 30 countries on six continents.
• Cassette from my Ex - blog where writers share their mix-tape memories of past flings and stream the resulting soundtrack for everyone to enjoy. 

The Independent also includes interviews with 10 artists, writers, and editors including Jamie Lidell (song writer), Jonathan Lethem (novelist), Conor McNicholas (editor NME), and Paul Smith (Maximo Park) who talk about past experiences with making mixtapes. Each also contributes a playlist of songs from a mixtape they've made in the past or they'd make now.

Link to article

So, with that little disclaimer out of the way, on to the review.  This Shape We're In is a very odd and incredibly tightly written story.  It focuses on two characters searching for one of their sons who has run away to join a cult, as well as the purpose of their lives, oh and lest I forget the purpose of their environment as well.  The environment in question, the shape, is a body that may or may not be human.  It could also be a generational ship, a fallout shelter, or possibly a trojan horse.

The brilliance of the story comes from the craft on display.  For nearly any other writer a story this ambitious would form a novel.  For Lethem, the tale encompases a total of 55 pages and feels like it's exactly the length it ought to be.  This is world building of the first order, there is no extraneous exposition (or really any exposition at all for that matter), yet the environment feels fully realized.

This story (if you can still find a copy) makes a great introduction to Lethem's work, very highly recommended.

In a Locus interview, Jonathan Lethem says while he was writing it, he was obsessed with John Ford's Westerns, especially The Searchers and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance. There's such a feeling of emptiness in this book and so much that's only suggested, I think I would have liked it better if I had seen either of them. I can only get as far as understanding why he calls it "a Southern Gothic Western set on Mars."

After her mother's sudden death, Pella Marsh and her family emigrate to The Planet of the Archbuilders. Once it was home to a great civilization, but most of them left to conquer other stars. Their descendants still call themselves Archbuilders, but they spend their time puttering about in the ruins. Now a tiny settlement of humans is joining them in a desert landscape, where the level of invention is so sparse, it feels more like a movie desert than a real desert.

Those few inventions are pretty neat. First are the Archbuilders themselves, curious big furry, scaly, shelly beings with double-jointed limbs. Then there are the "potatoes," genetically engineered tubers that grow in various forms. The most wonderful and disgusting are "fish" potatoes, which slosh even before you cut them open and let out a batch of tadpole things with legs. My favorites are the "household deer," tiny little giraffe-like creatures that get underfoot and shooed away and ignored. I like the use of "deer" in the old sense of random small animal. I like the allusion to the Roman household spirits. And I really like how it turns out that people are only pretending to ignore them.

As Pella discovers, you can drift into sleep and run with the household deer and spy on people. She drifts in and out of waking and dream life, poking into the inevitable dark secrets of the town. One of the secrets seems to be that everyone knows what the deer really are, and won't admit they know, because that would suggest how they learned about it. I think. It's hard to say because the more anyone knows about the Archbuilders the more elliptically they speak. I suppose this is the Southern Gothic aspect.

There are things I liked and an awful lot that I just didn't get, which made it feel incredibly slow. The first three chapters form a 40 page prologue on the Earth they leave behind. After that, it took another 100 pages just to get me interested. Eventually, Pella grows up, and confronts the truths and lies in her world, and in the end mades her place in it. I just couldn't bring the right things to my reading of it to come away satisfied.

My husband, who gets two shelves and still has piles of books all over the floor, has suggested that we solve the problem by getting another bookcase for the bedroom.

In the meantime, I am trying not to buy any new books until I make a dent in the pile. But that doesn't mean I've stopped adding books to my wishlist. Here are a few that I don't know if I can wait for:

• The Pesthouse by Jim Crace just came out in trade paperback. I'm a sucker for post-apocalyptic books, and this looks like a good one.
• The Children's Hospital by Chris Adrian is another clever post-apocalyptic book I heard about on NPR.
• Speaking of post-apocalyptic, Amazon recommended a new release: Wastelands: Stories of the Apocalypse. It has stories by Stephen King, Octavia Butler and Jonathan Lethem, among others. I don't think they're new stories, but I can't resist.
• Then We Came to the End by Joshua Ferris - I have been wanting to read this for a long time. Its cynical, "cubicle culture" themes strike a chord with me. And to continue the theme, it has a post-apocalyptic title.
• 20th Century Ghosts by Joe Hill - I don't usually like story collections, but I enjoyed his debut novel Heart-Shaped Box immensely.

How about you -- are there any books you're particularly looking forward to? Anyone have any recommendations for (relatively) new books to add to my wishlist?

1. Who is your all-time favorite author, and why?

This is quite difficult to answer, because there are lots of authors I adore. Geez! I guess if I absolutely had to choose one, it would have to be Mark Twain. He was very prolific: he wrote novels, short stories, essays and (not so good) poetry. He had a razor-sharp wit, and there was no better satirist than Twain. I love The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and Life on the Mississippi (and should reread both of these books). What I like most about Twain is that he was kind of a prophet. Many of the things he said way back when still hold true today, like this quote: "The Mississippi River will always have its own way; no engineering skill can persuade it to do otherwise..." Twain hated war and man’s inhumanity to man—and he was one of America’s first true libertarians.

Hemingway said, "…all modern American literature comes from one book by Mark Twain called Huckleberry Finn." I totally agree.

2. Who was your first favorite author, and why? Do you still consider him or her among your favorites?

My first favorite author was A. A. Milne--unequivocally and without question. When We Were Very Young is still my favorite book of poetry, and I occasionally reread a Winnie the Pooh story, especially if I’m having a bad day. This sounds so dumb, but the major characters in Winnie the Pooh speak to me when I read about them because every one of them shows a different aspect of my personality.

• Pooh = selfishness & generosity
• Piglet (my favorite) = fear & courage
• Rabbit = OCD to the max!
• Owl = intelligence & single-mindedness
• Eeyore = self-pity and moroseness

I have issues with Tigger, because he’s way too happy and he’s a total moron.

One of the most traumatic experiences of my childhood occurred when Mom washed my Piglet doll, and he lost an eye. She fixed him, but I never felt the same about him after that. Why do Mom’s do that? Sure, he was filthy, but it was my filth, so it was okay. A little bacteria never hurt anyone!

3. Who is the most recent addition to your list of favorite authors, and why?

This one's easy. It’s Kazuo Ishiguro, and it’s due to this book: Never Let Me Go. (See my review here). He’s not very prolific, but I’m sure his novels will live on for a long, long time. Never Let Me Go should be taught to lit. majors. It should be dissected and examined by the best literary minds in academia. I will be reading When We Were Orphans soon, and I’m totally psyched about it.

4. If someone asked you who your favorite authors were right now, which authors would first pop out of your mouth? Are there any you’d add on after a moment of further reflection?

Okay, here they are, in no particular order:

• George R. R. Martin
• S. M. Stirling
• Paul Auster
• Michael Chabon
• Neil Gaiman
• Kate Atkinson

Upon further reflection, I’d add Jonathan Lethem and Douglas Coupland. Oh, and Carl Hiassen too!

Go ahead and give this a shot. It really makes you think! If you write about your favorites, let me know in the comments and I'll go to your site and check them out.

From the kid who brought you Fargo Rock City -- the first book in history to garner the praise of Stephen King, David Byrne, Donna Gaines, Sebastian Bach, Jonathan Lethem, and Rivers Cuomo -- comes Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs -- the first book in history to examine breakfast cereal, reality television, tribute bands, Internet porn, serial killers, and the Dixie Chicks. Countless writers and artists have spoken for a generation, but no one has done it quite like Chuck Klosterman -- with an exhaustive knowledge of popular culture and a seemingly effortless ability to spin brilliant prose out of unlikely subject matter. Whether deconstructing Saved by the Bell episodes or the artistic legacy of Billy Joel, the symbolic importance of The Empire Strikes Back or the Celtics/Lakers rivalry of the 1980s, Chuck will make you think, he'll make you laugh, and he'll drive you insane -- usually all at once. Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs is ostensibly about movies, sports, television, music, books, video games, and kittens...but, really, it's about us. All of us. As Klosterman realizes late at night, in the moment before he falls asleep, "In and of itself, nothing really matters. What matters is that nothing is ever 'in and of itself.'"

There's quite a bit of intelligent analysis and thought-provoking insight packed into the pages of Chuck Klosterman's Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs, which is a little surprising considering how darn stupid most of Klosterman's subject matter actually is. Klosterman, one of the few members of the so-called "Generation X" to proudly embrace that label and the stereotypical image of disaffected slackers that often accompanies it, takes the reader on a witty and highly entertaining tour through portions of pop culture not usually subjected to analysis and presents his thoughts on Saved by the Bell, Billy Joel, amateur porn, MTV's The Real World, and much more. It would be easy in dealing with such subject matter to simply pile on some undergraduate level deconstruction, make a few jokes, and have yourself a clever little book. But Klosterman goes deeper than that, often employing his own life spent as a member of the lowbrow target demographic to measure the cultural impact of his subjects. While the book never quite lives up to the use of the word "manifesto" in the title (it's really more of a survey mixed with elements of memoir), there is much here to entertain and illuminate, particularly passages on the psychoses and motivations of breakfast cereal mascots, the difference between Celtic fans and Laker fans, and The Empire Strikes Back. Sections on a Guns n' Roses tribute band, The Sims, and soccer feel more like magazine pieces included to fill space than part of a cohesive whole. But when you're talking about a book based on a section of cultural history so reliant on a lack of attention span, even the incongruities feel somehow appropriate. --John Moe

Order Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs from Amazon for $9.59

Don't have Amazon Kindle? You can always purchase it from here
Or if you prefer to read the Print editions instead, you can get it from here

Other Kindle Books of Interest
Fargo Rock City: A Heavy Metal Odyssey in Rural North Dakota
I Hope They Serve Beer In Hell
Choke: A Novel
Look at My Striped Shirt!: Confessions of the People You Love to Hate
High Fidelity

It was a fascinating read - when I was younger I always dreamt of becoming a neurologist and curing Tourette's. Those dreams abruptly ended when I discovered that I had to know chemistry for it to come true. Nevertheless, I still retained a fascination with it (and other neurological disorders). My curiousity was pretty satisfied by the read.

Lionel's case of Tourette's rather severe, his tics range from shoulder-tapping over counting to echolalia. You get used quickly to his tics and it gets weird when he doesn't have to do them. You keep thinking that something's missing.
The echolalia was the perfect "excuse" for Lethem to make some experiments with language which were amazing, opening up new layers of meaning just beyond what would have been written without it. [And I love the phrase dickweed. Just waiting for a chance to use it.]

The story itself is thoroughly thought through [(c) Stephen Fry] but not really surprising.

It definitely made me want to read Fortress of Solitude. And it also made me look forward to the movie even more. Additionally to Edward Norton.

Part One

Part Two

Part Three

Via: SF Signal

In my neighborhood there is a useful, well-written, matte-finished magazine called Edible Brooklyn, which can be found in many cafes and restaurants. Edible Brooklyn is not on its own, of course, there are Edible (insert city name here) almost everywhere, all part of a magazine company which has managed to produce small, smart regional magazines about eating. Edible Brooklyn's focus tends to be on restaurants, undiscovered treasures in the borough, eating oddities, and specific chefs or people who support Brooklyn food culture. In such an historic and heterogeneous borough, the magazine should have many issues slated for the future.

One of my favorite sections in the magazine is a section called The Brooklyn Fridge. In it, a writer intrudes on the home and the fridge of a locally-known foodie or writer, or personality. Past victims have included author Jonathan Lethem, dancer Mark Morris, and James McNew of Yo La Tenga. The most recent issue, Spring 2008, invades the home of Josh Ozersky, editor of New York Magazine's Grub Street food blog. Ozersky is a professed meat fanatic, packing his fridge with items such as chicken fat, and a variety of salts for dry rubs and to finish meats with. In his freezer: a duck and boneless short ribs. For a man who eats out for living he imparts some interesting but not surprising advice on eating in Brooklyn. He denies the chic bistros their spot in the sunlight, and true to an adventurous foodie's nature, praises the take-out from the small Russian restaurants in out of-the-way Brighton Beach. He can't say enough about his favorite Brooklyn pizza place, DiFara Pizza. Interestingly enough, he also says that Brooklyn has nothing on Manhattan, and that the East Village and Lower East Side have more good eating than all of Brooklyn. Harsh words in a magazine called Edible Brooklyn. But, nonetheless, the magazine is a great read, especially for Brooklyn residents who want to learn more about their borough.

--Nick

UPDATED

-- Things might be a little stop and go around here for the next week and a half or so. Miss L and I are headed down to L.A. on a business trip. We're renting a car so I can poke around my storage locker in Atwater Village while we're there and retrieve most of my books and DVDs.

-- According to this article in the S.F. Chronicle, the weakening dollar is causing all sorts of new frugality and belt-tightening in households across the land. In an IN/OUT chart accompanying the article, book stores are "out" and libraries are "in" for cash-strapped Americans. Except maybe for some folks in L.A.

From LAist:

The Los Angeles Public Library is under pressure from Mayor Villaraigosa and the City Council to cut spending and raise fees to help decrease LA's $400 million budget deficit. If the budget goes through unchanged on May 1, drastic cuts would force eight regional branch libraries to close their doors on Sundays, the book buying budget would be slashed by $2 million and library staff may be subject to “mandatory furlough days or reduced work weeks.”

The libraries targeted for close on Sundays are North Hollywood, Mid-Valley Regional, Arroyo Seco, West Los Angeles, Hollywood (Goldwyn Branch), Exposition Park, San Pedro and West Valley. The move would eliminate 36.5 staff positions. Book buying funds have already been reduced by 22% from last year and as a result these monies were tapped out four months early in 2008.

You can read the entire article here.

-- "RoboCop" and "Basic Instinct" director Paul Verhoeven has written a book that suggests that Jesus might have been fathered by a Roman soldier who raped Mary. Oh, those wacky Dutch filmmakers .

-- Had some fun over at Joseph Mailander's Mainbrace a couple of days ago. J.M. posted an erudite list of "favorites" (including citing Carver's Dog as a favorite blog -- thank you, Joseph) and I responded in kind in the comments section.

UPDATE

Even though I've been shirking my editorial duties due to looming work deadlines, we're still publishing some good stuff at Hemingway's Shotgun: an excellent haiku by Christopher Dean; Ghost Writing Distance in Vowels by Mr. Zach; the haunting Grave of William Wordsworth by Eric D. Lehman; and A Writing Life by your humble editor.

And if you're fan of Nathanel West's 1933 novella Miss Lonelyhearts, you just might enjoy our Carver's Dog Book Club dialogue on the book. 33 terrific and insightful ponderings to date. For our next club selection I am recommending one of the many titles I am enjoying right now, Gun, With Occasional Music (1994) by Jonathan Lethem, a delightful blend of hardboiled noir and sci-fi. It has been properly hailed as a marriage between Raymond Chandler's style and Philip K. Dick's vision.  

I'm also pleased to report that plans are moving ahead for a 50-page chapbook of the Mr. Bukowski's Wild Ride adventures. I've fortuitously located an investor who is willing to finance the initial run of approximately 64 trade paperback editions that will soon be available online and through City Lights Books in San Francisco. We'll keep ya posted on that.

Jonathan Lethem's novel Gun, with Occasional Music blends hardboiled crime noir with trippy sci-fi to examine the ethical ramifications of murder in a dystopian future where evolved animals work along side humans, mind altering drugs are not only free but encouraged by the authorities, and asking questions requires a license. Conrad Metcalf is a Private Inquisitor trying to solve a murder case involving a urologist, a baby-head (a failed evolved baby), and a gun-wielding kangaroo.

Two of the blurbs for Lethem's debut describe the work as a marriage of Philip K. Dick and Raymond Chandler, but for my taste their wasn't enough PKD. The details involving the "make" that Metcalf compulsively snorts, the genetic evolution techniques society now uses to produce children, and the genital nerve-ending swaps that people now enjoy are never fully explored. Sometimes bizarre details left unexplained create the dramatic immersion that the best SF achieves; Gun seems to throw ideas up against a wall to see if any stick. Many of the SF tropes that Lethem evokes are simply under-utilized. His ideas are playful, so why doesn't he play with them more?

On the noir, end, the book also disappoints a little. The case is solved, but Metcalf's solution--delivered entirely in a brief chapter crammed with exposition--seems hardly believable, or even really that interesting. This isn't to suggest that Lethem's/Conrad's Chandlerisms aren't enjoyable, and at times downright genius. Even when Lethem cranks out a clunker of a simile--and there's more than one here--the rhetoric comes across more as satire of the genre as opposed to bad writing. The book also moves at a nice clip, with short, snappy chapters that always propel the narrative action. Eventually though, it just runs out steam. The story doesn't really add up, and towards the end, it becomes clear that Lethem's not going to fill us in on all of the cool ideas he initiated. I recommend those new to Lethem start with Motherless Brooklyn or The Fortress of Solitude instead. Or Men and Cartoons. Or The Disappointment Artist. Avoid You Don't Love Me Yet like the plague.

All three of these genres have one thing in common: The stories concern elements that do not exist in the so-called real world. In other words, they speculate about what might be possible but, in our everyday experience, isn't.

In science fiction, the speculations must be grounded in the principles of science; they might not be possible now, but someday they could be, which is why science fiction is often set on future Earth or on another planet. The subjects of science fiction are space travel, dimensional travel, time travel, post-apocalyptic societies and technological innovations.

In fantasy, however, the speculations are usually based on magic and the supernatural. These speculations must follow rules, but they are not the rules of science. Generally, fantasy stories take place in imagined worlds (but not necessarily another planet) or on a fictional historical Earth.

Horror, on the other hand, most often takes place in the present day, in the world in which we live. But it introduces a fantastic or supernatural element, usually a monster of some kind. Horror also differs from fantasy in that it, by definition, should be frightening and dark.

But what about fiction that doesn't fit neatly into one of these three categories? For instance, where would Neil Gaiman's American Gods be classified? It is set in the modern-day world, but with its cast of mythical gods, it shades more toward fantasy than horror, although it does have horrific elements. Or what about David Mitchell's excellent novel Cloud Atlas? This experimental novel is set in several different times, in the past, present and future, including a post-apocalyptic society. But it doesn't read like traditional science fiction.

That's where the label speculative fiction is useful. It covers any work of fiction that posits a "what if" question and then attempts to answer that question. That includes science fiction, fantasy and horror, plus narrower genres like alternate history and magical realism, as well as works that defy any neat label.

More contemporary writers who aren't often associated with genre writing are stepping out of the bounds of literary fiction and into the realm of the speculative, and I'm glad because they are turning out some great works. For example, Michael Chabon's The Yiddish Policeman's Union is a fascinating alternate history, and one-third of Michael Cunningham's Specimen Days is set on a future Earth, with aliens and space travel. I first started reading Jonathan Lethem via his genre-defying novels Gun, with Occasional Music, As She Climbed Across the Table and Amnesia Moon.

I like the speculative fiction label because it describes my favorite kind of writing but is much more open than the traditional genres. When I read speculative fiction, I can read hard sci-fi, traditional fantasy, contemporary horror or experimental literary fiction. The label also encourages good authors to experiment and stretch themselves without fear of being pigeonholed into an undesirable section of the bookstore. The stigma of writing about such subjects seems to have been dropped. For proof, just look at Cormac McCarthy's Pulitzer Prize-winning (and Oprah Book Club pick) post-apocalyptic novel The Road or Kazuo Ishiguro's foray into science fiction, Never Let Me Go, which was shortlisted for the Booker Prize and named one of Time's 100 Best Novels of All Time.

Want to know more? Check out these sites:

• The Internet Speculative Fiction Database
• Speculative Fiction Wikiportal
• Speculative Fiction Blog

Il 19 marzo c'è stato un compleanno molto importante: Philip Roth ha compiuto settantacinque anni. Per festeggiare lo scrittore, la Columbia University ha organizzato per venerdì una giornata di celebrazioni. "La Repubblica" di mercoledì 9 aprile ha pubblicato una interessante intervista a Nathan Englander e a Jonathan Lethem, che aveva come argomento il lavoro di Philip Roth.

Sull'importanza che riveste Roth per la letteratura americana Lethem ha detto:

"A me appare come l'ultimo esempio di energia iconoclasta. [...] Attraverso i suo libri ha rifiutato di andare via dal centro della cultura, generando un caos meravigliosamente distruttivo".

Il romanzo più significativo?

Englander: "Amo molto Goodbye Columbus, ma non posso non citare Pastorale Americana e Ghost Writer, che considero una mia guida personale alla scrittura".

Lethem: "Anche io adoro Ghost Writer. È un libro che riesce ad essere servaggio e pieno di grazia".

Parlando di Roth non potevano tralasciare un personaggio importantissimo, anzi, il suo protagonista per antonomasia, il suo alterego. Nathan Zuckerman è interamente Roth?

Englander: "Per alcuni aspetti lo è totalmente, per altri no. [...] La verità è che ci troviamo di fronte ad uno scrittore puro, che ama la creazione di fantasia".

Lethem: "Zuckerman è un personaggio che cambia da un libro ad un altro".

Io sono completamente d'accordo con quello che dicono Englander e Lethem. Una confessione: "Lo scrittore fantasma" non è solo il libro che mi ha fatto scoprire Roth, ma è anche quello che mi ha indotto a scrivere. Almeno a provarci...

Voto 3 su 5

(Coming soon: “Libro di sangue – Parte 3: Sudario” di Clive Barker)

The AV Club has an interview with Sam Rockwell.

That hypocrite Rhianna has rid her concerts of umbrellas.

A Dexter video game sounds flippin' insane...

Pitchfork has a review of the new Autechre record.

The Onion Movie is coming to DVD.

John Dickerson runs a fine rule over the Hillary wins.

Hillary's hinting that she and Obama should rock on a joint ticket vibe.

Bjork has spoken out about Kosovan independence.

Check out the latest New Yorker fiction podcasts with Jonathan Lethem reading 'Wood Duck' by James Thurber.

Dylan Loewe just isn't buying in to the Clinton myth.

Obama lining up superdelegates?

Check out the line-up for the V Festival.

Reese Witherspoon is kicking domestic violence's ass. I bet Phillippe never did anything like that.

One of the really great features the Library’s website offers is book reviews from real live library workers!  From cookbooks to poetry, there is absolutely something for every reader’s taste.  Databases such as Novelist allow you to explore recommendations by using keyword, title and author searches.  Try searching a title you’ve recently enjoyed and find similar books.

If you consider yourself to be more of an adventurous patron, you should become acquainted with Readers’ Advisory.  This term really just means connecting people to books they’ll like.  A service that’s sometimes overlooked in the library, patrons can simply ask librarians to recommend a book to them.  The typical Readers’ Advisory question is conducted in a loose interview format.  Basically, we’ll ask you questions about the kind of books or genres that interest you, what you like about them and what authors you enjoy.  Can’t get to the library?  Get a book recommendation by emailing us! 

- Lisa

Un altro appuntamento all’insegna dell’incontro d’autore in Galleria Mirada – Libreria Interno 4 di Ravenna: sabato 1 marzo il disegnatore romano Marco Petrella presenta l’elegante libro edito da Mattioli 1885, Racconti per ascensore.
Ogni settimana Marco Petrella fa capolino sulle pagine de "l'Unità", con una sua recensione disegnata, un modo nuovo di 'vedere' un romanzo attraverso le sue tavole a china. In questo è insieme lettore, critico e autore. Ma la passione per la letteratura e la volontà di raccontare disegnando hanno portato l’autore a raccogliere 27 storie originali di Jonathan Lethem ,Rick Moody, Maurizio Maggiani, Aimee Bender,Paolo Nori,Aldo Gianolio ed altri: una modalità sperimentale, che ha portato una manciata di parole a diventare un libro curioso e raffinato.
Icastici racconti, uniti dal tratto del disegnatore romano che dimostrano come anche nel fumetto sia possibile cimentarsi con il racconto breve e fulminante.

Nota biografica
Marco Petrella ha collaborato con quotidiani e riviste quali "il Manifesto", "Diario", "Musica!" di "Repubblica", "Cuore", "Liberazione". Come disegnatore per bambini ha illustrato un “Istrice” di Salani. Attualmente collabora settimanalmente con "l'Unità" dove recensisce romanzi attraverso il linguaggio del fumetto. È in uscita per Cooper Libri in tavola, raccolta delle migliori recensioni comparse sul quotidiano.

Prossimo appuntamento del mese
Sabato 15 marzo ore 18 Vanna Vinci presenta “La bambina filosofica”, Kappa Edizioni: Vanna Vinci (Cagliari 1964) è una disegnatrice che riesce a spaziare dalle serie Bonelli, al manga d’autore, alla creazione di libri autoriali fortemente caratterizzati dalla mano e dalla testa dell’autrice. “La bambina filosofica” è la sua realizzazione più sovversiva e al contempo delicata. La bambina filosofica è nichilista. Il mondo che la circonda è barbarie, e come unico alleato ha ormai solo l'opera di Thomas Bernard, che legge e rilegge condividendone appieno ogni concetto. È sicuramente un nuovo classico da posizionare accanto a Mafalda e Calvin & Hobbes.

Presegue fino al 5 aprile la mostra di Mara Cerri in Galleria Mirada
La mostra di Mara Cerri al Teatro Rasi è invece aperta fino al 9 marzo

Per info:

Galleria MIRADA – Libreria Interno 4
Via Mazzini 83 Ravenna
Tel +39 0544 217359
info@mirada.it
www.mirada.it
Orari di apertura Galleria Mirada:
dal lunedì al sabato dalle 10 alle 13 e dalle 16 alle 20 chiuso il giovedì pomeriggio e la domenica.

Teatro Rasi
Via di Roma n.39, Ravenna
Tel ++39 0544 36239
nobodaddy@ravennateatro.com
www.ravennateatro.com/nobodaddy
Orari di apertura Teatro Rasi:
dal martedì al venerdì dalle 10 alle 13 e dalle 15 alle 18 e durante tutte le aperture di spettacolo.

Franzen
Safran Foer
Lethem

Each have written some of the best novels I've read in recent years. It's something to think about.

Non mi ami ancora (Saggiatore) è potenzialmente il mio libro preferito. C'è una rock band e il compositore di questa rock band adora Alex Chilton e i Big Star. Questo basterebbe per rendere il tutto perfetto. Del resto, da qualche anno a questa parte ho deciso di frequentare solo persone che conoscono i Big Star (... il che spiega molte cose). Ma non basta una buona intuizione per fare un gran libro. O meglio, non sempre. Certo, conoscessi l'opera omnia di Lethem potrei parlare con più cognizione, ma certo empirismo può bastare per quello che, in fin dei conti, è un cazzo di blog. Allora, c'è questa Lucinda, una gatta morta della peggior specie che si è fatta tutti i personaggi maschili del romanzo. E' fastidiosa, presuntuosa, vuole sempre avere ragione e non ha nemmeno l'arma di argomentazioni forti a suo favore che non siano l'isterismo e il sesso. Non so come mai, ma leggendo mi sono immaginato Michela Quattrociocche che, smessi i panni di cretina mocciana, diventa una cretina indie-rock con la stessa dose di presunzione americanoide. Ma non è tutto qui, ci stanno i personaggi fastidiosi ed io ne so qualcosa (come ne sanno tutti quelli che hanno letto il mio primo romanzo). Lo stile di Lethem si distacca sensibilmente da quello della tipica narrazione americana. Quella secca, quella che ti prende a pugni. Quella che se usa parole più lunghe di tre sillabe sta male. Lethem è acquoso, appiccicaticcio e voluttuoso, dipinge i suoi personaggi con una sensibilità perversa e le sue descrizioni camminano sul filo del rasoio tra voyeurismo e naturalismo. Non si risparmia pindariche baroccoidi ben celate in un meccanismo in ogni caso affascinante ai limiti del furbetto. Però qualcosa di buono c'è. Si legge con piacere, con vero piacere. Il ritmo è giusto, nonostante ci metta un po' a decollare. Parte da un background culturale giusto, rock'n'roll, di quelli che vanno comunque supportati. Ed è anche vero che i trentenni americani sono paranoici come quelli italiani, ma almeno quelli americani sanno tirarci fuori qualcosa di davvero interessante. Forse siamo esterofili, forse ci siamo rotti le palle del vittimismo e del patetismo. Forse no, Lethem, di fatto io non ti amo ancora, ma qualcosa è rimasto. E potrei anche consigliarti in giro. Infondo Bedwin ha una maglietta dei Big Star.