Ryan Call

Ryan Call is the author of The Weather Stations (Caketrain). He and his wife live in Houston.


what are you reading now

I'm reading Tongue Party by Sarah Rose Etter.


classic you’ve been meaning to read

I've been meaning to read Crime and Punishment.


last book you finished in a single sitting

I don't think I've finished a book in a single sitting in a very long time, so this might not be an accurate answer; however, the last book I remember reading in a single sitting was Log of the S.S. the Mrs. Unguentine by Stanley Crawford. I read it over two years ago, but I still remember what it felt like to encounter it all in one night.


book you borrowed and never returned

Before I traveled to Russia with my wife and her family, I tried to read as much Russian literature as possible. One of my students at the time lent me We by Yevgeny Zamyatin. I still haven't returned this book, and I probably won't ever, as I'm no longer teaching at the University of Houston and I've lost touch with all my students.


book you’ve planted on a coffee table to impress someone

I've never done this with a coffee table book, I guess, though I once 'conveniently' left a book in my car on my way to pick up a friend to go play darts. The book was In the Train by Christian Oster, published by Object Press. My friend picked it up and read through it a little, and then asked if he could borrow it. He and I had talked quite a lot about Jean-Philippe Toussaint, so I figured he'd like Oster.


most scribbled-ridden book in your collection

I think White Noise by Don DeLillo has the most scribbles, but I no longer write in my books.


strangest dream involving a book, writer, or literary character

This is probably not the strangest dream I've had in this category, but one night earlier this week, I had a dream that I had moved into the garrett in Thomas Bernhard's Correction, and in the dream, I opened a trap door in the floor of this garrett one night, and I fell into the hole, and then zombies appeared from somewhere and attacked me and then the dream turned into a shooting video game and then I woke up.


if you could subscribe to only one literary journal

I have a handful that I love, but if I had to pick one, I would pick Caketrain.


most anticipated upcoming release

Well, it's no longer upcoming, but I remember feeling excited about Nothing by Blake Butler.


recommended reading list:


Weather Passages, A Meteorological Reading List


- The first paragraph of The Man Without Qualities by Robert Musil

- "Bird to the North, Act of Wind" from The Age of Wire and String by Ben Marcus

- Any of the intermediary chapters, especially "Flesh," in Scorch Atlas by Blake Butler

- The second paragraph from "Cold France and Other Permutations" by Wythe Marschall (published in McSweeney's #12)

- The last thirty sentences of Molloy by Samuel Beckett

- "Crutches Used as Weapon" from Super Flat Times by Matthew Derby

- Any of Shelp's weather reports in Motorman by David Ohle

- Light Boxes by Shane Jones

- Log Of the S.S. the Mrs. Unguentine by Stanley Crawford

- "The Pedersen Kid" by William Gass