The Invention of Air

I thought that Steven Johnson’s non-fiction book The Ghost Map was spectacular.  When I recently heard the author on NPR, Colbert, and just about every other talk show around, I raced out to pick up his new book The Invention of Air: A Story of Science, Faith, Revolution, and The Birth of America.   That subtitle aims to cover a lot of ground.  The Invention of Air mostly succeeds in doing so.

The book’s preface contains a quote from a candidate running for President When asked about his opinions on evolution, the candidate says: 

“It’s interesting that the question would even be asked of someone running for president,” he said.  ”I’m not planning on writing the curriculum for an eighth-grade science book.  I’m asking for the opportunity to be president of the United States.”

Steven Johnson says this attitude is directly contrary to the worldview of the founders of our country and the leading men of the Enlightenment.  These men, ”refused to compartmentalize science, faith, and politics.”

As an example of such a man, Johnson selects the Englishman Joseph Priestly who is credited with discovering that plants create oxygen and consume carbon dioxide – the titular invention of air.  (Although, he was completely wrong about what was actually happening in the cycle.)

In addition to his scientific studies, Johnson was a minister and one of the founders of the Unitarian Church.  He authored religious and philosophical polemics, and he wrote a popular history of the emerging science of electricity that lauded the accomplishments of his good friend Benjamin Franklin.  The history was among the first scientific publications intended for a popular audience and was written in English rather than Latin, which was the custom.  

Priestly is eventually forced to flee religious and political persecution in England, and heads to the newly formed United States.  He becomes friends with both John Adams and Thomas Jefferson.  Johnson notes that in the former Presidents’ correspondence, the elder statesmen refer to Priestly by name more often than they discuss Washington, Franklin, or Madison.   Science lives among the Washington elite!

Following the example of Priestly, Johnson has established a name for himself by writing several popular books about scientific history.  Johnson refers to the “long lens view of history,” and he alternately looks backwards and forwards in time.  The idea is to tie historical figures or ideas to not only their own time but also to their predecessors and ultimately to us.  

In The Invention Of Air, Johnson’s lens occasionally lacks focus.  A section about revolutions in thought and how/when they occur rambles in long stretches.  At times, too, Priestly is stretched a bit thin in all that he is expected to represent.  And then the long lens briefly pans back to the dinosaurs, which is actually a very interesting aside, but it still reads as an aside.  These are mainly quibbles, but they distracted from a good book that I think would have been excellent with a tighter focus.

Southern Fried Stimulus

A stimulus plan for southern indie book sellers is afoot.  Unlike TARP, this is an easy to understand three step process.

1. Buy a book at any of these fine southern independent book stores
2. Mail in your receipt with a form
3. Free book in the mail

Wanda Jewell, Executive Director of the Southern Independent Booksellers Association (SIBA) picks the book from her personal library.  

In other news, the April/May classes for the Agnes Writes creative writing series offered at Agnes Scott College have been announced.  The class offerings include Fiction Shop, Eat/Drink/Travel writing, and the Art and Craft of Revision.

Glitch in the Matrix

We were disappeared for reasons unknown yesterday afternoon, and it took until this afternoon to get the lights back on.  Weird.   We’re working on site maintenance now and will be back next week.  Thanks!

Wild Things Trailer

The first trailer is now out for the Spike Jonze/Dave Eggers adaptation of Where the Wild Things Are.  (Many thanks to Dan for providing the link!) The music in the clip is a song by Arcade Fire.  There’s no chance that I won’t be there opening day.  This time next year, Dave Eggers could conceivably be looking at two Academy Awards – best original screenplay and best adapted screenplay.  Just throwing that out there.

Speaking of adapted screenplays, word on the book-to-movie scene is that the Coen Brothers will postpone their adaptation of  The Yiddish Policmen’s Union in favor of bringing a new version of Charles Portis’s True Grit to the screen.

Steven Johnson on Colbert

Steven Johnson, author of The Invention of Air, discusses Robert Cornhole, the forgotten founding father, and DJ Jazzy Priestly on the Colbert Report.

This is a prequel to my review of the book, which is coming soon.  Do your homework, people.

Mid-Week Must Read

Check out Carolyn Kellog’s appreciation of Lawrence Ferlinghetti on the occasion of his 90th birthday.  Happy Birthday, Larry.

Rivka Galchen on her next novel

GalleyCat caught up with Rivka Galchen, author of personal favorite Atmospheric Disturbances, at the Young Lion literary awards.  Galchen’s book did not win, sadly.  In this video she talks about her next book and the future of publishing.

There’s one in all of us

Amazon’s Omnivoracious and Armchair Commentary blogs have word that the Dave Eggers penned/Spike Jonze directed adaption of the children’s classic Where the Wild Things Are is only seven month saway from the screen.  The movie poster, below, makes me giddy. 

Friday Miscellany

Hey, kids, Daren Wang, the director of the Decatur Book Festival has an excellent blog, Verb, that you should be adding to your daily reading ASAP. He has the most comprehensive Atlanta book event listings that you are going to find anywhere.  Until I checked out Daren’ s blog, I did not know that Junot Diaz will be reading at Agnes Scott College next Thursday night.  It’s true!  If you want to go, admission is free, but you have to have a ticket.  Call the events office at 404 471-6043 to line it up. Tell ‘em Daren sent ya.

In other news, author Vendela Vida and her husband Dave Eggers are the co-writers of the upcoming film, Away We Go.  Based on the trailer, it looks pretty good.  I’m a big, big fan of both authors.  And it stars Maya Rudolph and Jim Halpert.  I’ll be at the cineplex.

Also: Check out Neil Gaiman on The Colbert Report.

Finally, it pays to read BGB.  Here’s an example.  If you had read this post from 2006, you would have come across the following:

…build your Word Power with BGB! Vocabulary Case Study: This morning my boss came by and asked me if I knew what a word meant. I thought that I might know the definition in a vague way, but surely it couldn’t be what I was thinking of because (a) he’s my boss and (b) the word appeared in a work-related e-mail that he had received. The word: merkin. After looking it up, I didn’t ask the context, and he sort of wandered off.

Then! – when you watched 30 Rock last night and Jenna said that she was donating her hair to the charity Merkins for Hope you would have laughed and laughed while your wife asked what was so funny. Stick with us.

And if you haven’t seen it yet, Google is celebrating the first day of glorious spring with this Eric Carle creation:

Futureproof: An interview with N. Frank Daniels

Reading N. Frank Daniels’ first novel futureproof left me shaking and stunned, as though I’d just collided head-first with solid concrete. Thinly-veiled references to places I encountered during my adolescence in Marietta, GA are juxtaposed with Daniels’ intriguing, infuriating narrator slowly growing up and failing, time and again, to be in the right place at the right time to advance himself in his life, all adding up to a story that (yes I’m going to say it) serves as my generation’s Catcher In The Rye-namely, a hyper-focused narrative on the all-important meaninglessness of what happens during our teenage years.

Despite the rampant and blatant language, drug use and (at times violent) sex within futureproof, I’d recommend it as a high-end young adult novel for a teenager looking for a book that holds more truth about their world and speaks to their experiences or those of their peers, or if they genuinely need a book that won’t talk down to them. That said? This is a violent, at-times-hard-to-read, incredibly powerful and emotional experience. It’s a wild and worthwhile ride…straight into the pavement.

Frank was kind enough to take some time out of his hectic schedule and life to answer a few questions (admittedly written when I was still deliriously book-drunk over having just finished futureproof, adrenaline pounding my veins as a result-read the book, you’ll see what I mean) for Baby Got Books.

Baby Got Books interview with N. Frank Daniels, author of futureproof

Baby Got Books:I was first pointed towards futureproof as a result of it being compared to one of my favorite authors of all time, Bret Easton Ellis. In the book, though, I see less of Ellis and more of what Catcher In The Rye would be if it still had the ability to speak to modern adolescent experience. What books would you point to that you first read that really, really moved you?

N. Frank Daniels: I’ve always been surprised that more people haven’t made the connection between the style I employed in futureproof and that of Catcher. That book was hugely influential on me, and was, aside from Whitman’s Leaves of Grass, probably the book that impacted me the most in high school. Also Wilson Rawls’ Where the Red Fern Grows. That book still destroys me. The last time I read it was a few years ago when I read it aloud to my son. Still breaks me up. In fifth grade as an assignment we were to write a letter to a favorite author. I chose Wilson Rawls. He never responded. I never blamed it on him though. I always figured the publishers in all of their infinite wisdom found something lacking in my 10 yr. old writing ability.

BGB:Where did you grow up, and how much do you feel the events of your childhood influenced futureproof?

NFD: Well, as Luke does in futureproof, I grew up in the Atlanta suburbs. Prior to that I lived in bumfuck south-central PA. I always like saying ‘south-central PA’ because despite the fact that I did grow up close to Harrisburg, which is geographically south-central PA, somehow when you say ‘south-central’ it evokes grit. Thank you Tupac (who isnt even from Cali), Eazy E, and Snoop. Yeah, south-central Pennsylvania is more Amish and northern rednecks than it is anything else. Also a giant hub for Richard Petty fans. So it wasn’t much of a change when my parents moved us down to Atlanta. Except without the Amish. They stay up North, but for some inexplicable reason decided at some point to migrate west to Ohio.

BGB urely on a personal level, I have to tell you I was immediately hooked, from the level of “I can completely relate”, when I read about the school that you in the book call Peckerbrook. I know the school you’re talking about-as a high school theater kid in Marietta we did many a one-act competition there-and I always had the same thoughts about the juxtaposition between the theatrical side and the rest of the school. Nicely written.

NFD:Well, Russ, this isnt really a question, but I feel I need to respond anyway. First, thanks for the compliment. Second, if you went to Marietta H.S., and were there at the same time I was attending ‘Peckerbrook’, then you will also relate to how much we hated you bastards, with Eric Zeier at QB on the football team, with his unbelievable numbers and his goddam 10,000 touchdowns a season. But, just like the Amish, he ended up in Ohio, and the Cleveland Browns destroyed his NFL possibilities. And believe it or not I took no solace in that. It just felt like he was yet another casualty of the Atlanta bad luck I’d grown accustomed to by that point.

BGB:The character of Luke-I’ve talked to some people who’ve read the book who feel that Luke’s hell-bent on self-destruction. My read on him is that he’s simply exposing a side of modern teenage angst that too often gets either ignored or glossed over. What’s your take on your character’s desire to end himself in any way possible?

NFD:You know, this is an impossible question to answer honestly. I don’t know what to say on this. I mean, I wrote the book, the book is admittedly semi-autobiographical, and I am somehow supposed to analyze whether or not the main character is suicidal in small increments or just a symbol of modern, completely fucked-up teen angst?–I guess I think it’s both. Because as teen angst has been allowed to progress over the decades since we haven’t been forced to work in factories at the age of eight, we have been given more time to realize what a shitty hand we’ve been dealt. And if that doesn’t make you suicidal nothing will. I also think that Luke wants to live and can’t figure out how to do that in a positive way because he’s never been given a positive role model in that arena. So it becomes live in this fucked up way or die in that fucked up way. In the end, remember, he only chooses life because his son is born and had no choice in the matter. So Luke really only ends up continuing to live for THAT life, that innocence that has yet to be corrupted.

BGB:The book’s graphic depiction of the circle of abuse of/by and addiction to drugs hit me really, really hard. I literally put the book down shaking and stunned. Were any points of futureproof more difficult emotionally to get down and then go back and edit/tighten up than others?

NFD:So strange to get this question now, as I was asked something very similar in an interview conducted by Frank Reiss of Atlanta’s A Capella Books on a GPB radio interview that aired this past Sunday. I can speak more freely here though, since I couldn’t cuss on public radio. Yeah, writing parts of this book fucked me up big time. There are parts of this novel that I still have trouble reading because they trigger a despair in me that is bottomless. I remember my wife telling me that I needed to walk away from writing it because it was so obviously traumatizing me. She would have to hold me at night for hours sometimes. When you are really tapping demons like this it is really hard to reconcile your stable life with the chaotic life being depicted. My wife has since left me and there are still nights when I don’t know how I am going to make it through. This book is in many ways a testament to everything that has ever haunted me, and its repercussions still reverberate through my life now. Even answering this question now is traumatizing because it forces me to acknowledge everything that I try to force myself to ignore on a daily basis. Is there a fucking therapist in the house? Please tell my wife I am dead on the inside…or do therapists not do that?

BGB:In the back of futureproof, you thank “the futureproof 500.” For those who don’t know, your book has a really interesting story about how it came to be a Harper-Perennial paperback. I’m sure you’re sick of talking about it, but would you care to summarize, briefly, how it came to catch the attention of a major publisher?

NFD:You’re right, I am sick of telling this story, Russ. More than anything because I only recently realized that the ‘story’ behind futureproof‘s being published was the main reason why HarperCollins decided to pursue me to publish this book. They saw this story–me wrecking my entire life in order to get my lauded novel ‘traditionally’ published–as a good way to sell it in the market. I guess this was what was decided on as what would be my book’s gimmick. Look back on any of my blogs prior to August of ’07 and you can see how disillusioned I am with Big Publishing, in that they couldn’t see how futureproof would speak to many readers. I only realized a few weeks ago that their main interest was in the immediately exploitable angle of my having gone from self-published wunderkind to mainstream published phenom. These people could give a shit about the real emotion and craft behind the book. They want to make the fast buck and get out. Which is fine, I guess. But it makes me angrier and even more disillusioned, and makes me question motives and true intentions even more. But maybe I was born to fill that place. I just want to meet one motherfucker embedded in the mainstream publishing industry who is what (s)he says (s)he is.

BGB:you submitted a brief piece for one of the most interesting collections I saw last year, Santi-The Lives of Modern Saints. Talk about how you came to be involved in that collection and how your piece in that came to be

NFD:I became involved with that anthology in much the same way that I got my book deal with Harper–I was approached by the people behind the scenes. Unlike my deal with Harper, I don’t have a bad taste left in my mouth, in gratuitous need of a sorbet to get that taste out of my mouth. Luca Dipierro, the editor of Santi, read a self-published copy of futureproof, and asked me if I’d be interested in both contributing a story as well as co-editing the anthology with him. I jumped at the chance. I will always jump at the chance to do something outside of mainstream publishing like that. Unfortunately the shitty economy has closed the doors (for now) on Black Arrow Press (Santi’s publisher), but I would still recommend that anthology to anyone, and not just because I am its co-editor. That anthology of stories is still one of the tightest, most-well-written anthologies I have ever come across. When I saw the roster of writers Luca had secured for that collection I immediately signed on. It was a win-win situation. I still wish I had the resources open to me to make that collection more well-known. Please link it to Amazon or whatever when you publish this.

BGB:What are you reading AND listening to right now?

NFD:I am currently severely limited in my reading, as I am couch-hopping like a shell-shocked kangaroo and am therefore very limited in how many books I can carry with me. But I was in L.A. last week for the final reading of my book tour and while out there I met with Henry Baum, of Self Publishing Review (selfpublishingreview.com). He gave me his recently re-released THE GOLDEN CALF, which I find to be just stellar writing. I’d recommend it to anybody. I would also be reading Jerry Stahl’s PAINKILLERS if he had offered to give me a copy (I read with him at my L.A. Book Soup reading). But he didn’t. So I’m not. I was disappointed by that at first, then realized it was probably a blessing as it would have made my duffel bag another pound heavier and my back is breaking as it is.

Music-wise I’m not as limited, what with downloadable tunes. I’m currently obsessing over old pre-Postal Service Death Cab for Cutie. And Fleet Foxes, who I fear have seen their zenith come and go, because really, how far can bluegrass go, outside of the odd Oh Brother, Where Art Thou soundtrack?

Beat the Reaper

Josh Bazell’s Beat the Reaper seems to have a lot going against it.  There’s the laundry detergent inspired cover. The title sounds uninspired to my ear.  Then there’s the plot summary seemingly designed around a 1-minute pitch – a medical resident at a hard luck New York City hospital is really —-  wait for it —- a former mob hit man in the witness protection program.   And there’s a Holocaust subplot.  And sharks!  

I was going to describe it as House meets The Sopranos.  However, the book is also pretty funny (mostly the footnotes).  So then I was going to describe it as Scrubs meets Analyze This, but it’s more intense than that would imply. So let’s stick with the first comparison, House/Sopranos.  

The author happens to be a medical resident himself.  Accordingly, the novel is full of great details about the medical profession that will make you want to stay clear of public hospitals for a long, long time.  Bazell also slyly inverts our expectaions, making medicine sound like the criminal racket while making the hit man profession sound more like the science. For example, our protagonist Dr. Peter Brown (pssst…it’s not his real name) tells us:

Most bottled water in hospitals has 5 percent dextrose. This is to prevent the phrase “Liter of plain fucking water: $35″ from appearing on your bill. 

Bastards!  Meawhile, when choosing your next box of ammo rounds, you may want to consider this: 

Conservation of momentum, on the other hand, is easy to do the math on. For example, if a bullet weighing 230 grains (15 grams, the width of a .45 bullet, which is 45 percent of an inch across) goes from the speed of sound (slow for a bullet) to a complete stop inside your body (much easier to achieve with a big bullet than a small one), then 15 grams of your body has to accelerate to the speed of sound to make up for it.  Or 150 grams of your body to one-tenth the speed of sound, and so on.  It’s much less demanding to think about.  

The action takes place over a single day.  Our sleep deprived doctor begins the day by hospitalizing a would-be mugger, and his day only goes down hill from there.  To say much more about the plot would spoil the fun of reading about Dr. Brown’s very. very bad day.  Suffice it to say that it is no wonder that the doctor’s bed side manner seems subpar, even by Dr. House’s standards:

“Jesus,” he says.  ”For all I know I have cancer anyway.”

“You do have cancer,” I say.

“What do you mean?”

“I just read your biopsy results.”

“Jesus!  Is it bad?”

“No, it’s fantastic.  That’s why everybody wants it.”

Rest assured that any seemingly incidental (but always funny or interesting) medical, biological, or organized crime trivia that the doctor dispenses early in the novel will pay dividends later on.   Perhaps the most implausible scene in the entire book depends on the reader having paid careful attention to a discussion of vestigial human anatomy.  It’s this attention to plot and placing that elevates the book from a very well done pulp thriller to something more. 

If you’re willing to suspend a little (or maybe a lot of) disbelief, Beat the Reaper is an action-packed and wildly entertaining  novel.  This is an excellent novel to have on standby for your first trip to the beach/pool. According to IMDb, the movie is coming in 2010.

My Country Tis Of Me

I rarely miss a chance here to disparage Ayn Rand, her books, or her “philosophy.”  The Guardian, The Telegraph, and The Economist have all reported recently that sales of  Rand’s novel Atlas Shrugged have been increasing as our economy worsens.  In the book, Rand “…championed selfishness as a positive means of doing business, earning as many critics as she did advocates.”  From The Guardian:

Atlas Shrugged tends to inspire either cult-like devotion or sarcastic mockery in readers, who are either thrilled or appalled by Rand’s vision of a world in which the “men of the mind” – inventors, entrepreneurs and industrialists – withdraw their labour from a society intent on bleeding them dry with taxes and regulations.

The call for a “strike of the wealth producers” depicted in the novel is being called “Going Galt” by conservatives — after John Galt, the novel’s protagonist.  Because what the situation clearly calls for is more greed…oh, irony.

Stephen Colbert has this wonderful take on “Going Galt,” which The Guardian calls “the rightwing equivalent of “moving to Canada”‘:

Books by Southwest (or “more news from nowhere”)

The publishing industry model as a giant, archaic dinosaur lumbering towards its own demise? Maybe so, maybe not, depending upon who you are, where you stand and who cuts your checks. At the very least, our beloved bookish folks can be counted on to give good face at the current epicenter of the new & social media world, namely South By Southwest (aka SXSW), going on in Texas right now, yes?

Not so. From a spine-tingling, enraging and enlightening recap of a publishing industry SXSW panel by Booksquare:

Let me be clear. Absolutely clear. Not one word spoken in that session, either from the panelists or from the audience, was new or innovative.

You seriously, absolutely MUST read the rest of this post here. It both lays very clearly on the table how much room for innovation exists in the book world and makes it clear that we should all just listen to Kreepie Kats.

Book Awards & Bad Timing

First round action in The Tournament of Books is well underway.  Here’s how the match-ups have gone so far…

• Roberto Bolano’s 2666 hog-tied Steer Toward Rock by Fae Myenne Ng
• A Partisan’s Daughter by Louis de Bernieres edged out Joseph O’Neill’s Netherland in a contest in which neither team looked sharp
• This year’s Cinderella, Harry, Revised by debut novelist Mark Sarvas upended this year’s Booker Prize winner, Aravind Agida’s White Tiger
• Perennial all-star Jhumpa Lahiri (Unaccustomed Earth) was sent packing early by Tom Piazza’s City of Refuge
• Peter Matthiessen’s Shadow Country, the National Book Award winner, defeated The Disreputable History of Frankie-Landau Banks by E. Lockhart, a Young Adult novel that was the finalist for The National Book Award for Young People’s Literature
• The Lazarus Porject by Aleksandr Hemon (my pick to take it all) gets the tourney started by defeating Philip Hensher’s The Northern Clemency

As in most year’s, some of the best action takes place in the announcer’s booth with the color commentary by Kevin Guilfoile & John Warner.  Warner has an outstanding rant about the state of the publishing industry that you should read in its entirety.  Here’s the Reader’s Digest version:

…due to the frankly, totally fucked-up nature of the book business, I could not acquire a copy of the book in order to read it…Publishing treats books like they’re the McRib or Shamrock Shake, available for a limited time only before mothballing them…it doesn’t really hit home until one of the (apparently) best books of the year can’t be purchased in a bookstore outside of an initial three-month window. Is there any other industry that treats their product this way?

Anyone who uses a Shamrock Shake reference in a rant wins, as far as I’m concerned.

Meanwhile, the National Book Critics Circle handed out their awards in a ceremony last week in New York City.  Check out all of the winners at the NBCC web site.  I was in NYC a few hours after the nominees read from their works on the 11th. Then I left a few hours before the prize ceremony on the 12th.  Timing is everything.

today i wrote this thing about this collection

I’ve been strangely fond/jealous of the Brooklyn-based writer/poet/hipster lit media it-boy Tao Lin for some time now. His first novel, Eeeee Eee Eeee, was about, um…hang on, I have to consult my notes…ok, here, I found my review of that book, written right after I read it:

Tao Linn’s (sic) first novel, Eeeee Eee Eeee, if listed by plot points, would include: Elijah Wood, dolphins, pizza delivery, sadness, more pizza delivery. At times painfully mundane, at times razor-sharp with emotional truth, Linn’s novel is the sound of ennui on an iPod being listened to on the morning train to somewhere. Is this the result of the 20something overeducated hipster putting pen to paper? Yes. Does his voice sound like anyone else’s ever could, or would? No.

Obviously, I was so struck by the book that I couldn’t even spell Lin’s last name properly. He didn’t care, however, and sent me this as a “thank you”:

In case you can’t make it out, that’s a copy of Lin’s first poetry collection, You Are A Little Bit Happier Than I Am, inscribed to me and with a picture of a squid and a puffball looking thing.

Given how frequently Lin pops up on Gawker these days (he recently sold profit shares to help finance his forthcoming novel and there’s a bit of bluster that he might be the force behind my current favorite “scenester” blog, hipster runoff), I could probably sell that on e-bay for a pretty penny, or at least a $50 American Apparel gift certificate. Also given his cultural near-ubiquitousness (at least for those of us whose sole definition of “culture” is “what’s going on at Galleycat at the moment?”), it makes sense that Tao Lin would swoop in and take some of his over-educated under-paid chain-smoking vegan friends and publish them, as Muuumuu House.

(Full disclosure: I want to be one of Tao Lin’s friends.)

The first of those books is Sometimes My Heart Pushes My Ribs, a prose and poetry collection by Ellen Kennedy. Despite the fact that her bio lists her as living in “northeast Pennsylvania”, I’d peg her as a Brooklynite on par with Tao Lin, if, you know, I had enough of a schema about such things to make such statements.

I say that because Ellen Kennedy writes the sort of pop-culture stream-of-consciousness-if-your-consciousness-is-both-emotionally-wounded-and-deficit-of-attention prosaic poetry that instantly reminds me of Tao Lin. In fact, if I didn’t know Tao Lin was Kennedy’s publisher, I would write to Tao Lin and say “Tao Lin, you need to read Ellen Kennedy. She has a poem in her book called ‘I Went to the Grocery Store Today’ and the first line goes ‘I bought blueberries, raspberries, pears, grapes, a pizza/and a giant orange’. You would like it. You are a lot more famous than I am and so you can probably afford to buy a copy but I am sure she would send you one.”

That’s what I would say, but I needn’t.

Kennedy’s collection obsesses over the mundane-sex and bodily functions and food and heartbreak. Hers, akin to Lin’s and very much a product of an emergent literary scene, is a writing style that requires appreciation of self-absorption to the point of laceration, pretense, and heartbreak. It’s conversational and tossed-off and possibly trite and also possibly brilliant at the same time. If beauty’s in the eye of the beholder, why can’t those obnoxious Moulin Rouge themes of truth and love and justice and brilliance and all that other stuff be, also? Poems like “I Like Every Time We Have Sex” are everything and nothing, depending upon the way you read them. Some will see nothing, some will see everything.

The two pieces that bookend the collection, “Eoody Mobby” and “Norm Macdonald”, are rapid-fire Gilmore-Girls-dialogue paced celeb-namechecking pieces of Gawkerpoetry that basically serve as gatekeepers for the intimate flesh-and-blood beating in the rest of the book. If you can make it through the door, you’re the type of person who needs what Kennedy’s writing is serving. If random dips into Woody Allen taking out cash from an ATM machine seem too much like fan-fiction to you, Sometimes My Heart Pushes My Ribs will be lost on you. It’s all just a matter of perspective. For me? That title poem broke my heart.

The Latest Word from Sweden

Bokhora’s Johanna L has posted a two part interview with author Junot Diaz, who is apparently touring Sweden – Part 1 and Part 2, or if you prefer to read in the non-translated Swedish, Del1 and Del 2.

Jessica reports that Nick Cave will be doing the music for the movie adaptation of Cormac McCarthy’s The Road.  (in Swedish) Spooky!

Johanna K reviews the Swedish movie adapation of Stieg Larsson’s international bestseller The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (which was titled Men who Hate Women in Sweden) – (in Swedish)

Road Trip

The Pirate’s Alley Faulkner Society (New Orleans) is hosting a Meet the Authors Event this Friday night, March 13, in conjunction with the Louisiana State Museum.  The evening will feature readings by Tim Gautreaux(GO-trow) and Andre Codrescu. Gautreaux will be reading from his new novel The Missing and Codrescu will be reading from a bound sheaf of papers called The Posthuman Dada Guide: Tzara and Lenin Play Chess.  The latter is described as:

…a Dadaist chop suey showcasing the astonishing intellectual range of English professor and NPR commentator Codrescu, is arranged alphabetically and topically, which permits one to dip in or to read it all. The occasionally outrageous encyclopedic juxtapositions of entries give a firsthand experience similar to the effect of Dada cutups and collages.

Okayyyyy… I’d actually like to check out Gautreaux.  I’ve always meant to read his books, and people routinely assume that I have.  I’ve meant to, really.  Added bonus: the event is being helf at The Cabildo, which is where the Lousiana Purchase was signed.   If you’re within driving distance, check it out.

A Contrary Indicator

Despite what The Journal would have you believe, it is not all rainbows and unicorns for those who make and sell books.   McSweeney’s is pulling out all of the stops to move some books.  The latest sales pitch:

If this email finds you somewhere on the populated Earth, you may have heard a lot of talk of doom and gloom recently. We here at McSweeney’s object. Look, we like Paul Krugman as much as anyone, and who doesn’t love a good stimulus package, but all this focus on the negative can be a little counterproductive. Look around you! This is still a world full of wonders, and among these wonders are fine printed books, some of which are created by us here at McSweeney’s.

We want to help you remember these wonders within easy reach. And so: This week, every book on our site is $15. Wait, not every — some are $5. Not cheap enough? Okay, a few are $1. Go to it! Fill up a bag and help us spread the joy. Help us save America!

Michael Chabon’s Maps and Legends is $5.  You’re insane if you don’t pick up a copy at that price.  Insane!  Also: The “What happens in the La Brea Tar Pits stays in the La Brea Tar Pits” shirts are only $15.  Cheap.

Turning the Page

Contrary to the doom and gloom you hear everywhere else, The Wall Street Journal says that some new business models may help to revive the flagging book industry.  Don’t look for indie bookstores among the new models.

Downtown Owl

I expected to enjoy Chuck Klosterman’s Downtown Owl.  I’ve enjoyed his skewed view of pop culture in his non-fiction essays, such as the collection Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs.  However, I wasn’t prepared for his first novel, Downtown Owl, to be flat out amazing.

The novel takes place in the town of Owl, North Dakota, population – about 700.  It’s the kind of place that gets flown over and derided by city people on the coasts.  It’s the kind of place where we assume that nothing ever happens and boredom reigns.   To an extent that’s true, but to a larger extent, it’s not true at all.  

The story is told (mostly) from the perspective of three Owl residents.  Mitch Hrlicka is the third-string quarterback for the Owl High Screaming Lobos (formerly the Screaming Satans). Horace Jones is an old-timer whose days revolve around an afternoon coffee ritual that has been ongoing for decades. Julia Rabia is a new teacher from Madison, Wisconsin who immediately questions her decision to teach at a rural school when the principal gives her a sales pitch that begins with this:

…it’s not like this is some kind of wonderland. This isn’t anyone’s destination city.  It’s not Las Vegas. It’s not Monaco.  It’s not like you’ll be phoning your gal pals every night and saying, ‘I’m living in Owl, North Dakota, and it’s a dream come true.’ But you will like it here…

Most o fthe action takes palce at Owl High School or the town’s few bars.  The novel takes place in 1983-84, and the Owl High students have been assigned the George Orwell classic.  Unfortunatley, their ssuper creepy English teacher (and football coach) provides thoughtful insights like these to his students:

…you’re supposed to be 106 pages into this story. I’m sure many of you feel like nothing is happening.  Do not be alarmed.  All great books are like this. All great books seem boring until you’re finished reading them.  

and

…There is, however, an extremely long book called Atlas Shrugged that’s about what would happen if all of the most brilliant individuals in the world separated themselves from the flotsam and jetsam of society and built a utopia.  Rebecca, you should read this book,  You’d probably relate to it, especially if you’re interested in trains.  But here is my larger point…

For the most part, this a novel about ordinary people living their lives. There are plenty of colorful characters that breathe life into the small town. Owl is the kind of place where grown men have inscrutable nicknames like Little Johnny Horse-n-Phone and Ass Jam (and his little brother, Baby Ass Jam).  The trick that Klosterman pulls off rather well is pulling us into this familiar but infinitely strange world and making us care about what happens to these people.  And then he places them, all of them, in a precarious situation where the outcome is never certain.  I couldn’t put it down.  

Chuck Klosterman is from North Dakota, and this novel seems determined to undermine what we think we know about small town life in the frozen north. The book is dedicated to North Dakota.  As much as this is a love-letter to his home state, Klosterman also includes a note below the dedication that reads, “This story is a non-autobiographical work of fiction”  - in case you were wondering.  

Also:  if you’ve read the book and enjoyed it as much as I did, you may want to check out these Klosterman-approved Owl High t-shirts available in both Screaming Lobos/Screaming Satans varieties.  Proceeds benefit a children’s charity.