Dear Clusterflock,
What are you currently reading?
Boomtown Rats
today in the classroom…
student (muffled voice due to covering nose with a tissue): “Mr. Hobson? Can I step into the hall to blow my nose?”
me: “Pardon?”
student: “Can I go to the hall to blow my nose?”
me: “Sure.”
a question.
Twice in the past 5 years, I have heard a voice whisper my name in my ear. This happened as I was in bed, waking up. I was awake so it wasn’t a dream. I’m pretty sure the voice was female, and no, I’m not schizophrenic. Anyone else ever experienced anything like this?
Hmm
Is it just me, or does the New Yorker’s fiction really suck lately?
queen
The Woman Down the Hall–a review of an ebook by Lily Hoang
Here’s what I know about Lily Hoang: that her book Parabola won the Chiasmus Press First Book Prize in 2007, and that her book Changing is forthcoming from Fairy Tale Review Press. Now, over at Blake Butler’s Lamination Colony (Blake is becoming conspicuously ubiquitous, not only writing great fiction himself but managing to publish seemingly everywhere while at the same time putting up other people’s work as well), Hoang’s The Woman Down the Hall is available to read for free. It’s short, edgy, and I’ve read it three times tonight.
Lily Hoang’s narrator says this about the old woman who is asleep down the hall: “I wanted to be the first to propose murder, but I restrained myself. It isn’t proper for a lady to speak first, even if she is the designated killer.”
This is the way of good prose. This story, like much of Hoang’s other work, is a modern fairy tale, but she isn’t interested in being didactic. We don’t get a feel that there will be some moral lesson gained by the end; how could we with such a charming yet brutally honest narrator whose deepest desire is to commit murder? “I have never killed a woman,” the narrator admits, “but I have often wondered how I would do it. Now, I wonder if her neck, which is not slender or thick, would be easy to grasp or if my large hands would simply slip from smooth skin.”
Hoang’s imaginative leaps are mysterious and inevitable. She changes points of view, tells the story of the man and the dying bird and the old woman as a youthful princess whose beauty brought people to death simply from looking at her. She’s able to tie things together in such a small place. In fact, The Woman Down the Hall offers a whole lot in a small space, with surreal images to accompany the text. It’s like being at a great all-night party in a strange city. Really. This is a haunting and delightful story, and I highly recommend you go over to Lamination Colony and read it.
confession
When I find myself talking to a person who stutters, I try so hard not to stutter that conversations become awkward and near impossible, and I end up sounding like a shithead.
Dear Clusterflock,
How many times do you Google yourself each day? (I am personally, disturbingly way too obsessive about this and do it too many times to mention here).
Say Anything
My short piece of fiction, “Say Anything,” is up at Titular Journal.
No Colony — first issue
Blake Butler and Ken Bauman’s No Colony is about to release its first issue, including work from Kim Chinquee, Tao Lin, Brian Evenson, Robert Lopez, our fellow flocker Derek White, and more. Go buy a copy. They’re also reading for issue two, which will include a short piece by yours truly.
Dear Clusterflock
Is fiction’s job to disturb the comfortable, comfort the disturbed, or both?
dear clusterflock,
I was looking at my t-shirts today, and I realized I no longer have any good t-shirts. Well, I have a Morrissey t-shirt that I bought from his concert a few years ago, and that’s a cool one. I think I would like to have some very good, very cool t-shirts. So if anyone wants to send me one, email me, I wear a size large, and I will be forever grateful and will in return send you something really nice!
Godard’s Band of Outsiders
One of my favorites.
Lish’s The Quarterly
We talked about this a few months ago, but can someone scan the table of contents of some of the issues? Or, rather, which are the best issues to purchase? I’d love to read the issues with Cooper and Daryl. And of course Diane Williams, etc. Thanks.
a short review of The Levitationist
Today Blake Butler wrote a short review of my book The Levitationist over at hotbooks.today.com.
Laid - James cover
Anyone else like this cover as much as I do?
Dear Clusterflock…
Best Bill Murray movie?
Playing the Gretsch
recent fortune from a fortune cookie
“Hope for the best but expect the worst.”
Figures.
Overheard at the 8th Grade Graduation Dance Sat. Night
“No shit. I’m pretty sure I know who farted!”
My newest toy
A Gretsch g5129 hollow body.
subterranean homesick blues
I know, I know, I’m no Dylan. Be nice to me, please.
do it live!
The Collins Kids
Anyone else like this as much as I do?