what are you reading now
AM/PM by Amelia Gray. It’s a book of interrelated microfictions (several interrelations going on at once) that’s just beautifully well done. Funny and earnest and smart.
classic you’ve been meaning to read
I’d love to get back to Anna Karenina. I started reading it a few years ago and got sidetracked. Problem is, I’d have to start over, I think. Too many names there to just jump back in!
last book you finished in a single sitting
Not sure of any book I’ve read in a single session, none that I can remember. I finished Cormac McCarthy’s The Road in a couple days, a few years ago. It was like living in a waking nightmare, one of the most compelling books I’ve ever read. There’s pretty much no plot, just the man and his son trying to get to the ocean, but it’s intensely gripping. I read A Jello Horse by Matthew Simmons in a couple sittings not too long ago. A very moving book.
most treasured book in your collection
A Passage to India killed me. The last 30 pages or so are so incredible, nearly a religious experience. I actually gave it away, though, at a book exchange that was part of a friend’s art opening. But that it exists in another person’s collection makes me feel like I have it even more, somehow.
book you borrowed and never returned
This Is Not a Novel by David Markson. One of the most fascinating books I never finished. And never returned. I don’t think it requires finishing to be good. Or returning.
weirdest dream involving a book, writer, or literary character
I dreamt about Kurt Vonnegut once. We were somehow both involved in a flood, a little seaside town being overtaken by a tsunami. The whole town was covered in beautiful yellow sand. Not sure what Vonnegut had to do with the whole thing, but I know he put in an appearance.
most challenging book you’ve ever read
Probably The Sound and the Fury. It was a challenge worth the effort. By the time I got to Dilsey’s section I thought I’d never read something so impressive.
book you’ve planted on a coffee table to impress someone
Hmm, I don’t have a coffee table. I might have strewn books on the floor to impress a girl or something but I don’t remember what the books might have been. “Look at my impressive mess” was probably more what I was after.
if you could subscribe to only one literary journal
I subscribe to the Internet, does that count? So many good online journals. I feel too bad picking just one out, whether online or print. Is that a cop out?
best thing you’ve read online recently
Well, this is hard too, just because there’s so much. But I’ll pick one of the very most recent things, Mark Leidner’s poem “Lily Pad” at ACTION YES.
most anticipated upcoming release
This will probably sound like nepotism, but I’m really looking forward to Adam Robinson’s book of poetry, Adam Robison and Other Poems, coming out from Narrow House. These poems are just so effective, and affective. Funny, sincere, and heady all at the same time.
recommended reading list:
Judge a Book: Good Books with Good Art (On the Cover)
- Big World by Mary Miller
- Fences by Ben Brooks
- The Contemporary Art of the Novella series, various books by Melville House
- The Drunk Sonnets by Daniel Bailey
- You Shall Know Our Velocity by Dave Eggers
- Less Shiny by Mary Miller
- Poemland by Chelsey Minnis
- How Some People Like Their Eggs by Sean Lovelace
- The Complete Collection of people, places, & things by John Dermot Woods
- I. by Stephen Dixon
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