02-19-10: John Callahan and Adam Bradley and 'Three Days before the Shooting'
"I've moved through the phases of my own life, and I find those phases mirrored in the characters of this novel." —John F. Callahan
"...capable of brilliance, eloquence and power; that's how I understand the second novel, as we see it in Three Days Before the Shooting, and that's certainly how I understand, and I think how Ellison understood, America." —Adam Bradley
You never know how close you may come to history.
John F. Callahan is Ralph Ellison's literary executor. Adam Bradley was in high school when he first met Callahan; now he's an associate professor of English at the University of Colorado at Boulder. Callahan was Ellison's friend; he met and spent time with the man. Both men have spent time with his papers, putting together 'Three Days before the Shooting.' These men spent time with history.
For me, at least, I guess I got as close as Free conference call dot worth what you pay for. That'll work for now, but I'd like to meet the men in person.
John Callahan and Adam Bradley and I juggled and bobbed and finally found the time and the number where we could get on the phone to talk about their rather incredible journey. These are the men who were entrusted with Ralph Ellison's second novel ... an American triumph and tragedy. Ralph Waldo Ellison was a brilliant and complicated man. In retrospect, Ralph Ellison created his only complete novel, 'Invisible Man' in a heartbeat. His truggle to finish his second novel is clearly an epic American experience, and I was privileged to talk to the two men who went through all of his papers and put together 'Three Days Before the Shooting.'
It was a fascinating glimpse into a literary mystery, and the men who, though they could not solve the mystery – the novel was indeed never finished – were tasked with finding the core of what was there and determining how to present it.
"When I think about what I'm saying, it's so depressing..."
Thomas Frank
The more things change, the more they stay the same. That seems to be the lesson of Thomas Frank's latest columns for the Wall Street Journal. It seems that no matter how thoroughly the Aegean stables of Washington are shoveled clean, the same smell creeps back in with a new name, a new brand ... but the same folks pulling the levers, and the same goals in mind. Some folks, it seems, won't feel free while there are still laws left on the books to obey, and regulations to regulate the transfer of wealth.
It was just the names, really, that alerted Thomas Frank to the never-ending irony that is Our Government InAction. Looking at the top dogs of the new "Tea Party" movement, that ultra-conservative, ultra-free group of roving protestors, Frank noticed some very familiar names. He'd written about them in 'The Wrecking Crew' because they were the ultimate insiders, the wheeler-dealer lobbyists who made the Marianas Islands safe for Sweatshop manufacturing. Now, the same names are calling themselves the leaders of the supposedly grassroots Tea Party movement. It is the sort of irony you could drive a golf ball with — providing that Jack Abramoff had flown you and your aides to Scotland to play the game.
We also talked about the surprisingly pervasive anti-government feeling that manages to keep stepping up to the podium and turning it into the bully's pulpit. It's not surprising that people would be disgusted with government. I would guess that I am not alone in being almost unable to watch TV news these days. But the problems with government, as Frank points out in 'The Wrecking Crew,' stem from the fact that those who were put in charge in the previous administration were against the principles they were supposed to uphold; the regulators didn't regulate.
02-17-10: Laurie R. King Reads at SF in SF on February 13, 2010
"...as real as Sherlock Holmes..." Laurie R. King
You are well-advised to remember that in a sense, by definition, all fiction is both fantasy and mystery. It's fantasy, because it's made up. It's mystery because the reader starts at the beginning, with one set of thoughts and winds up after the end having a different set of thoughts. In theory, you start wanting to know the end; the mystery is what happens in-between, and the only solution is to read. One is best served by keeping an open mind and immersing one's self in the author's voice. Laurie R. King has a variety of voices, and perhaps that helps make her such an excellent reader.
Laurie R. King is the kind of reader who can summon visions of a walled, Chinese San Francisco, or wainscoted waiting room of Mycroft Holmes — both in the same reading. It was interesting to note that both readings at this month's SF in SF were rather short. I know that Ms. King prefers to keep her readings short, the better to ensure the audience is entertained.
She really managed this with a dual reading; she started out with a gorgeous travelogue of Meijing, which in the world of 'Califia's Daughters' is San Francisco. Nowadays we'd describe it as rather steampunkish, but she wrote the book well before steampunk became a sort of brand name.
Her second reading was from 'The Game,' her Russell-Holmes novel set mostly in India. The "game" of the title is of course, the Great Game, the cat-and-mouse conflict between Great Britain and Russia for dominance in Central Asia. Of course in the Russell-Holmes universe, and it is a universe, Sherlock Holmes has a rather large part to play, as does a certain Kimball, a boy now grown, but who was once known by a shorter name as the subject of a novel by an author of great repute ... and thus does our world come into delicious contact with that of what we thought to be fiction.
02-16-10: Jedediah Berry Reads at SF in SF on February 13, 2010
The Manual of Detection
Be prepared; not just prepared, but over-prepared, so that when you screw up, and you will screw up, things might just have ahope in hell of turning out okey-dokey.
Readers may or may now know that I was the Cubmaster for Pack 609 of the Cub Scouts, back in the day. I'd get up in front of all the parents, make announcements, and introduce goofy surf music to otherwise staid proceedings to entertain myself, if no-one else. But that whole, "Be prepared" mantra did sink in and in the end, has often produced helpful results.
The upshot of all this reminiscing is that I got some fine audio of Jedediah Berry and Laurie R. King in their readings at SF in SF on Saturday, February 13. I ued first class microphones and amplifcation. The mic amp I use is the same model that was once employed for presidential addresses. Not cheap, but worth the money. Certainly true when you're amplifying voices like those of Jedediah Berry and Laurie R. King.This is important because they totally rocked. You listen, you'll hear why I'm so enthusiastic about their work.
Jedediah Berry
We'll start the podcasts with Jedediah Berry, reading from his first novel, 'The Manual for Detection.' I loved this book a lot. It's definitely a re-reader, because hearing him read it aloud made me want to go back and immerse myself in all the wonderful details he puts into his dream-walking wonder. Moreover, he's funny, and he brings out the humor in the book.
Or perhaps it's the audience that does this, and here's an important clue why you want to try to get to live readings like this.
And here's where I sidetrack slightly, to one of my favorite and most memorable movie-going experiences. The very first time I saw Re-Animator, I sat in a matinee with an audience that really, really got the movie. The humor and laughter was infectious, in a way it would not have been had I been in the theater alone, or just watching the movie on video. There's something about the laughter of the crowd that makes a movie comedy funnier.
But this is also true for books, which to be frank, I'd never thought of before. However, the reaction of the crowd to Berry's very effective reading was indeed contagious. The more we all enjoyed the reading, the better it got. Berry had a great stage presence and first-class material, which certainly helped. Here’s why books are every bit as entertaining to a crowd as any other form of entertainment. We often think of reading as a solitary activity, and that is indeed the case, but it is not solely the case. Book readings can be great crowd pleasers as well. You can hear just how crowd pleasing by following this link to the MP3 audio file of Jedediah Berry's reading.
Chitra Bannerjee Divakaruni
02-15-10: A 2009 Interview with Chitra Bannerjee Divakaruni
"I have to work through the novel and then it comes to me, how it's going to end." Chitra Bannerjee Divakaruni
I do a lot of interviews in a lot of places, and generally, I'm well organized. I have a kit for home that pretty much stays home. I have a to-go kit that pretty much stays in a variety of luggables.
Listeners to my radio show might have noticed that of late, my readings for the grant announcements seem a little bit ... slicker. This would be because I've been pre-recording the whole show and laying them in at home, and hat gives me the option to do it right. But it also presents one little challenge. I record the announcements in my "studio," a book-lined room that presently has fifteen three-foot stacks of books on the floor. My show is on Sundays and that is often when I record the announcements. So when I have an interview on a Monday, as I did with Chitra Bannerjee Divakaruni, I have to have everything packed.
I'm guessing that readers can see where this is going. I show up early at Capitola Book Café on Monday, and just as I'm unpacking and setting up my to-go "studio" in their wonderful little office that serves as a recording home base here in Santa Cruz, I note that I've managed to leave the mic cables behind. Two seconds later, I turn around to greet Chitra Bannerjee Divakaruni, and tell her ... "Nice to meet you; I'll be back in twenty minutes with the mic cables to do our interview."
Fortunately, the California Highway Patrol was elsewhere occupied, and I was able to make it back in a minimal amount of time; not that I broke any laws. And when I did sit down with Chitra, we had a wonderful conversation about her new book, 'One Amazing Thing,' which she says is quite a departure for her in a number of ways. To my mind, for a book that is really rich and filled with characters, it is wonderfully terse. It's an all-meat extravaganza. Moreover, I have to admit that I totally forgot about the "pilgrims telling stories" aspect of the novel as I read it, because the arc narrative about the nine people trapped after an earthquake was really compelling, involving and strongly written. Once you're embedded, you get the gift of stories, and they are indeed gifts; quite surprising.
07-30-10: Commentary : Subterranean Press and Robert R. McCammon Wake at 'The Wolf's Hour' : The Time Before Cheese
Agony Column Podcast News Report : Three Books with Alan Cheus : Allegra Goodman, 'The Cookbook Collector,' Noam Shpancer's 'The Good Psychologist' and Elie Wiesel 'The Sonderberg Case'
07-28-10: Commentary : Rule Britannia, In Space 2 : En Route, RJ Frith and Peter F. Hamilton
Agony Column Podcast News Report : Brian and Wendy Froud at SF in SF on Monday, July 19, 2010: Q & A : "The people you deal with at the publishers ... if they last the end of the week, you're lucky."
07-27-10: Commentary : Rule Britannia, In Space : UK Space Opera Demonstrates Excess is Not Enough (Part one, the Arrived)
Agony Column Podcast News Report : Brian and Wendy Froud at SF in SF on Monday, July 19, 2010 : "Well, I thought if I do faeries then nobody's going to say that I've got it wrong."
07-26-10: Commentary : Brian and Wendy Froud Seek 'The Heart of Faerie Oracle' : Cards, Books and a New Perspective
07-20-10: Commentary : Adam Elenbaas is Caught by 'Fishers of Men' : The Gospel of an Ayahuasca Vision Quest
Agony Column Podcast News Report : The Agony Column Live, July 10, 2010 : Alan Cheuse and Peter S. Beagle : "There are certain phrases I'm leery of using; one's "the creative process" and the other is "inspiration." ” Peter S. Beagle "Habit is the best thing for you if you're trying to write prose." ” Alan Cheuse
07-19-10: Commentary : Phil Cousineau is the 'Wordcatcher' : A Selectionary for Curious Mind
07-09-10: Commentary : Harlan Ellison's 'Deathbird Stories' : Back from the Dead and Ready to Party
Agony Column Podcast News Report : Three Books With Alan Cheuse : Everything by Kevin Canty, The Best of Kim Stanley Robinson by Kim Stanley Robinson, and Glorious by Bernice McFadden
07-07-10: Commentary : Kitchen Testing 'The New Vegetarian Epicure' and 'Get Cooking' : Lentil Power
Agony Column Podcast News Report : The Agony Column Live, June 26, 2010 : Mollie Katzen and Anna Thomas, Part Two : "'You should really write a cookbook,' and I thought, 'Yeah, that's a good idea...'"
07-06-10: Commentary : Anna Thomas Cooks Up 'Love Soup' : Recipes, Menus and Meals
Agony Column Podcast News Report : The Agony Column Live, June 26, 2010 : Mollie Katzen and Anna Thomas, Part One : Time to Get Cooking Because You Love Soup : "It makes a huge difference really, really, it does, to completely clean up when you're done."
07-05-10: Commentary : Abraham Verghese Will Not Be 'Cutting for Stone' : Stories of Spirit and Words of Comfort
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2010 Interview with Abraham Verghese : "Literature has a wonderful ability to restore your imagination for the suffering of others."
07-02-10: Commentary : Sloane Crosley Asks 'How Did Get This Number' : Excellent Essays for the Short of Temper
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2010 Live Interview With Sloane Crosley : We Did Not Mention the Title of Her Essay 'Fuck You, Columbus'
06-30-10: Commentary : Mark Charan Newton Enters 'City of Ruin' : Inspector Jeryd Rides Again
Agony Column Podcast News Report : Panel Discussion at SF in SF on June 12, 2010, with Seanan McGuire, Deborah Grabien and Terry Bisson : "Coke Black was just a horrible thing unleashed on an unsuspecting world."
06-29-10: Commentary : 'Twelve,' 'Thirteen,' Tongues of Serpents,' and 'The Strange Affair of Spring-Heeled Jack' : Historical SF & Horror Makes Rousing Summer Reading
Agony Column Podcast News Report : Seanan McGuire Interviewed at SF in SF, June 12, 2010 : "If I have my unbreakables, I can set my conditionals."
06-28-10: Commentary : Jennifer Egan Gets 'A Visit from the Goon Squad' : Revisiting the Novel Genre
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2010 Conversation with Jennifer Egan : "The characters and the action led the way... I was led into the future not so much because I was thinking, 'I want to write about the future,' but more because I wanted to re-visit this particular person."
06-23-10: Commentary : Adam Langer Corrals 'The Thieves of Manhattan' : Lies, Balderdash and the Absolute, Unvarnished Truth
06-21-10: Commentary : Linda Greenlaw is 'Seaworthy' : Back to the Grand Banks in Not-So-Grand Style
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2010 Interview with Linda Greenlaw : "Well, I call him up and tell him I'm going to the Grand Banks and he pretty much signs himself right up."
06-17-10: Commentary : Georges-Olivier Châteaureynaud Lives 'A Life on Paper' : Translating the Ineffable
06-15-10: Commentary : Donald R. Burleson Whispers 'Wait for the Thunder' : Stories for a Stormy Night
Agony Column Podcast News Report : Three Books With Alan Cheuse : Lucyby Laurence Gonzalez, Spies of the Balkansby Alan Furst, A Visit From the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan
06-14-10: Commentary : James P. Othmer Drinks the 'Holy Water' : Backing Into the Future
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2009 Interview with Juliet Schor : "...We need to move to much more open, collaborative, sharing knowledge systems."
06-10-10: Commentary : Brett Easton Ellis Peers Inside 'Imperial Bedrooms' : Panic After the Year Zero
06-09-10: Commentary : Dan Dion and Paul Provenza Free the '!Satiristas!' : Bleeding the Comedians
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2010 Conversation with Paul Provenza and Dan Dion : "I was raised to respect the printed word so much, when I was in school, I couldn't highlight books..."
06-08-10: Commentary : China Miéville Unleashes 'Kraken' : Comedy of Tentacles
06-03-10: Commentary : Justin Cronin Enters 'The Passage' : A girl who saves the world
Agony Column Podcast News Report : Three Books With Alan Cheuse : The Millennium Trilogy by Stieg Larsson, The Nearest Exit by Olen Steinhauer, The Passage by Justin Cronin
06-02-10: Commentary : 'Animythical Tales' by Sarah Totton and 'Metrophilias' by Brendan Connell : Better Seeds
06-01-10: Commentary : The Return of The Agony Column : Logic, License and Habit
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2010 Interview with Karl Marlantes : "..these are common human foibles and failings, it's just that they get magnified in a combat, war situation..."
