What I Read in March

 I know there is still one more day left in March but I am pretty confident I won't be finishing any new books between now and then so here's what I've read for the month! I'm pretty happy with the results from a quantity perspective because I'm still knee deep in publicity for a couple of books I'm working with and that usually whittles away at the free time I have...  and those that I did read were mostly advanced review copies. 

So let's see what I spent my time with this month....

The Antidote by Karen Russell

Give me more epic wild west fiction with a dash of magical realism please! This is becoming my new favorite genre, you guys.

The Antidote takes place during the 1935 dust storm known as Black Sunday and in it, we meet a prairie witch named Antonina who makes a living absorbing people's memories. A local outcast, our witch is suddenly fearful of her life. The dust storm seems to have emptied her of the memories she's taken and the residents of Uz, Nebraska will be murderously upset when they come to make a withdrawal and find she's lost the things they are desperate to collect. But Dell, a thick skinned orphan girl who has an ear for the local town gossip, has decided to become Antonina's apprentice and devises a way for her create new memories for those who come knocking.

Meanwhile, there's a dirty sheriff doing dirty sheriff things; a visiting photographer whose pawn shop camera can only take photos of what once was or may come to be; and Dell's uncle, the one farmer whose land strangely seems to be thriving after the dust storm while everyone else's is suffering for it. Not to mention the odd scarecrow that's staked out in his field that seems to be untouched by the weird weather and a pregnant tabby cat with revenge on its mind.

It also addresses topics such as the unjust treatment of Native Americans, white privilege, and how, even back then, mother earth takes her revenge when we abuse her lands.

This book! It's a chunkster, and it takes a while for all of the storylines to fully pull together so you have to be patient with some of the back story stuff but oh my gosh it's so worth it and that ending. Ugh! My heart!

It's magical, and powerful, and really uniquely done!

The Lamb by Lucy Rose

The Lamb is the newest internet darling and I'm 100% behind it. It's an extremely impressive debut and very deserving of all of the love #bookstagram has been showering it with. Lucy Rose wastes no time jumping right into it - with an opening line like "On my fourth birthday, I plucked six severed fingers from the shower drain" you know you are going to be in for one heck of a tasty, bloody ride.

One thing is for sure. The Lamb has taught me that I don't have the right goodreads bookshelves created for the kinds of books I've been reading lately. I'm going to create some now post-haste because this needs to be shelved under messed-up-mothers, and people-as-monsters, and mmm-tasty, and get-on-my-plate, and tastes-like-human.

I adored the short chapters, which helped give the impression that the story was moving along faster than it actually was because c'mon let's be honest, it was a really slow burn knowing what we know up front and waiting for it to finally all come to a head. And dang, did it serve up a messed up ending or what?

Seriously, I love the moment that cannibalism is having in literary fiction and horror right now!

Rose of Jericho by Alex Grecian

his is the sequel to Red Rabbit and it's every bit as fun and fantastic.

In Rose of Jericho, we are reunited with a few of our favorite characters: Rose, Sadie, and Rabbit, who take up residence in a haunted mansion when they travel to the town of Ascension to visit Rose's ill cousin; and Moses, who is a man on a mission after his wife is taken from him. In a moment of anger and grief, Moses does something he cannot undo and suddenly, the dead won't stay dead.

And no, not in a zombie sort of way. Just in a 'you get your brains bashed in and you lie there a minute and then you stand up and go about living your life as if it was just a little owie' sort of way.

But now Moses is dead set on righting his wrong and he knows he's going to need Sadie's help to do it. So he heads out to find his friends, and they are going to soon discover the roles they will need to play in order to restore order to the world.

The Red Rabbit witchiness we've grown to love is still in full effect, with some cool cosmic intervention stuff thrown into the mix, and even more gore and violence!

Can we make historical cosmic fantasy a thing now?!?!

The Haunting of Room 904 by Erika T Wurth

I love the way Erika's writing shifts and changes with each new book, especially these last two from her, weaving in new levels of creepy supernatural horror while also pushing the Native American voice and experience forward.

Her female characters are flawed badass toughies that I can't help but wish I knew in rl. Well, ok maybe not in the case of this particular book. You can keep Olivia and her paranormal investigative self far far away from me because ain't no way I want to get caught in the crosshairs of the vengeful spirits she's tangled up with in The Haunting of Room 904. Spirits trapped in wooden boxes and hotel mirrors, dark evil entities literally breathing down your neck, and an occult group called the Sacred 36 who attempted a ceremony that backfired... yeah, no thanks, I'll be waaaay over here in my book room flipping pages, living safely on the periphery!

It's also another great example of grief fiction. The death of Olivia's sister, and the guilt she feels over not taking her call for help seriously 5 years ago, weighs heavily on her, and this new case she's picked up might just be the one chance she has to right the wrong she's been living with.

Cover those mirrors y'all!

White Line Fever by KC Jones

I need to be up front with you guys. I accepted this review copy with some hesitation. I wasn't crazy for the cover and the description sounded a little lackluster. But... it's Tor Nightfire and I usually really dig their stuff so I figured I'd give it a shot. And omg... I'm so glad I did!

It's a bit of a slow burn to start, with Livia discovering her husband has cheated her, which is the catalyst that propels her and her childhood girlfriends towards the Devil's Driveway, a 15 mile long seasonal shortcut between highways that's known for its extremely high death toll. In an attempt to escape an aggressive tow truck driver, the girls turn down the sketchy backroad and begin to experience periods of lost time and odd dizzy spells. It's not long before they start noticing the signs of previous car crashes and then begin seeing things that aren't there, creepy ass hallucinations that start out as bugs and bats, but then quickly escalate to darker and scarier things.

KC Jones periodically disrupts the tension with some flashbacks into Livia's past, her relationship with her father, and the bonds between her and her friends, which helps shine a light on what Livia and her gal pals are suffering through as the powerful visions pull them deeper and deeper into paranoia and panic. I found myself wanting to push through the flashbacks quickly so I could get back to the main story. For those of you who grew up on cable tv, those scenes started to feel like annoying commercial breaks, popping up at the most inopportune times, right as the shit started getting really good.

All they wanted was a relaxing weekend getaway and instead, what they got was a full fledged terror filled ride down a road that wasn't going to let them go now that it had them in its sights.

Horror filled road trip anyone?

Blood on Her Tongue by Johanna Van Veen

I just finished Blood on Her Tongue yesterday and get ready, you guys. You think you know what you're getting yourselves into but it's not what you're expecting. I mean, ok, it is... in one sense. It's dark. It's atmospheric. It's bloody. But the dog knows. Ooooh man, does the dog know!

Set in the Netherlands in the late 1800's, the book opens with Sarah accompanying her husband to view a body that's been discovered in the bog on their property. She immediately becomes infatuated with it and writes to her twin sister Lucy about the strange thoughts and dreams she's been having ever since coming in contact with it. Not long after, Sarah becomes gravely ill, speaking gibberish and running a high fever. Her husband and their childhood friend Arthur fear she's going mad. Lucy rushes to her side in an attempt to save her from the asylum, but ends up coming face to face with a horror nothing could have prepared her for.

The set up and storyline will have you thinking vampires (sorry for the slight spoiler) but oh dearies, it is something much much darker and sinister... and ancient... and it is soooo fucking hungry!

Some of you may know that I typically do not do well with gothic horror, and if I'm being honest this one tried my patience a few times, especially with the whole 'men know better than women', and the marital affair (why do so many of the books I've read lately involve cheating, it's so cringe) and oh yes, I should have predicted, all the fainting or near fainting spells and female hysteria stuff that the ladies were afflicted with back then. But all those pet peeves aside, the story really kept my interest piqued.

Dripping with dread, the book delves into codependency, mental health, and the allure of the unknown all while challenging familial bonds. How far is too far when a loved one's survival is at stake?

I Cheerfully Refuse by Leif Enger

Oh gosh you guys, this book. I forget who I first saw reading it but I took one look at the description and knew I wanted to read it, too.

It's a slow burning dystopian novel that's less focused on how fucked up the world has become and turns instead towards the aching emptiness we would do anything to fill when we lose the one we love the most. Yes, sure, the richest of the rich bitches have taken over, an elite sixteen referred to as the astronauts, and yes, there are giant medical freighters out on Lake Superior conducting test trials on volunteers and cranking out a suicide drug called Willow, and yes, food and books can be hard to come by at times, but our narrator Rainy, a gentle giant of a man, is doing his best to live life as close to normal as possible and that's mainly because he has the love of his life Lark at his side. Until one day, he doesn't.

After allowing a sketchy but kind stranger to rent out a room in their attic, Rainy suddenly finds himself haunted by grief and shock and caught up in a situation he can only control by escaping, and escape he does, towards the safest and warmest memory of his wife he has, heading out towards a remote set of islands called the Slates.

Driven by the desperate hope of his wife's ghost meeting him out there, Rainy comes face to face with nasty storms at sea, horrid toll bridge workers, a group of air rifle packing punks, and befriends a young girl attempting to escape a bad home situation, all while trying to keep the people who took his wife from him from catching up to him first.

I didn't expect to like this book as much as I did. It's very reminiscent of Per Peterson's books, who is an author I absolutely adore. Rainy is one of the most likeable, most laid back characters I've read in a while. He has so much heart and an incredible knack of making the best of the worst situations. I just wanted to reach into the pages and give him a big ole bear hug most of the book, and I'm not a hugger so that should tell you something.

Bones and All by Camille DeAngelis

Ok, I'm on a bit of a literary cannibalism kick these last few months, so I gave this one a shot and all it did was confirm that I really don't like YA. Nothing against those of you who do. It's just not for me.

I have to admit those first few pages were very attention-getting, flipping through it at the store when I was making the decision on whether or not I wanted to buy it. But DeAngelis just couldn't sustain that wow-factor all the way through. The characters, their motivations, and their nom-nom, lick the plate clean, eat all the people and their bones behaviors all lived too far above the surface when I would have loved for everything to go just a little bit deeper.

It's like the Disney version of cannibalism. meh.

If you're feeling tempted like I was, you're really not missing much. It's ok. Put the book down. Spend your money on something else.

And can we please for the love of god stop with the movie cover posters?! I should knock a star off just for that!

Annihilation by Jeff Vandermeer (audiobook, reread)

In anticipation of picking up the 4th book in the series, I decided to do a re-listen (or is it now a thrice-listen of the audiobook.

Still just as a good as the first time. Mostly because my memory is shit and I forget a lot of the details and it's just so darn amazing.

The Cut by CJ Dotson

Oh Sadie, how you really worked my last nerve, you stinker.

In The Cut, a pregnant woman escapes an abusive relationship with her three year old daughter in tow, and ends up taking a housekeeping job in an old hotel, with free room and board.

Within Sadie's first day at the hotel, there are strange wet noises in the hallway, random damp spots on the walls and hallway rugs, and she's witness to an incident from her window, where a guest appears to be drowning in the pool, though when she rushes out there to help, no one is around, the pool is calm and serene, the only evidence of anything untoward is the quickly drying wet drag mark on the concrete.

The hotel manager seems wholly unconcerned when Sadie reports it. She tries to put the weird experience behind her until the next day when she learns a guest has failed to check out and take their stuff, and notices dried blood in a tub during one of her routine cleaning jobs. And let's not mention the slimy little tentacled things that appear on the floor of her own tub while she's taking a shower... although, when she grabs the manager again, all of the evidence is gone when he takes a look.

Is she losing her shit or is something horrible hiding just beneath the surface of the L'Arpin Hotel? And is manager and the rest of the staff behind it? And what of old lady Gertie, who offered to babysit her daughter on her work days, who always happens to show up right after the weird stuff takes place?

Dotson immediately sucks us in with all the strange shenanigans. I had so many questions, you guys. But then it just got meh and kept on meh-ing. There was so much to look forward to, yet so many annoyances kept popping up. The repetitive rehashing of the abuse she took, the constant fits and tantrums and coddling of her daughter, the whole not feeling safe but then running off to check things out and leaving her little girl alone, asleep in the hotel room, and even then when she was out there spying around, talking herself out of everything she saw, it got old quick.

So when the real shit starting hitting the fan, I was more perturbed and less hanging on every word, because I had kind of figured out what was going on before we got there and just wanted to get it over with.

A solid three star. Less if I focus on the all the ways Sadie annoyed me and the overall execution of the book, but for the creepy, cosmic weird plot it certainly deserves more.

What I Read in February

It feels like January just ended, and here we are at the of February already. I read a total of 9 books and I liked the books that I read this month a bit better than the ones I kicked the year off with. So at least that's a positive!!

Here's what words my eyes absorbed this month: 

Cuckoo by Gretchen Felker-Martin

A 1990's conversion camp with a sinister secret? Sure, sign me up. A group of queer teens battling a horrific evil? Uhm, of course I'm all for it.

Cuckoo is simultaneously tender and cheeky but also quite dark and twisted. Imagine an 80's summer camp horror movie and Invasion of the Body Snatchers mashup and you'll get the gist. It's not write-home-to-mother good, but it's definitely worth a read.

The Devil's Grip by Lina Wolff

Lina Wolff is one F'd up writer. Her stories go places no one else's does and I am sooo here for it!

The Devil's Grip follows a woman who goes by the nickname "Minnie" and chronicles her slooow mental unravelling as a result of the destructive, hellish relationship she finds herself stuck in. The more time passes, the more she falls victim to incredibly unhealthy behaviors - her own obsessive love, bouts of intense jealousy, infidelity, verbal and physical violence - and becomes convinced that both her and her boyfriend's bodies have been inhabited by demons intent on destroying themselves.

It's an intense and twisted look at gender dynamics as it relates to romantic relationships. It digs deep into the muddiness of love and asks the tough questions of us. When we're knee-deep in it, are we thinking rationally enough to know when we should stay or go? Can we clearly determine what's worthy of forgiveness or assess when enough's enough? And then there's the horrors of what happens if we misjudge and stick it out just a little too long...

Ahhhh... This book infuriated me!! I wanted to kick Minnie for every decision she made but I just could. not. stop. reading. I ate this up in practically one sitting.

Moon of the Crusted Snow by Waubgeshig Rice

Moon of the Crusted Snow is an incredibly slow burn of a novel. It's quiet and heavy, much like the wintery blanket of snow that covers the isolated reservation our characters have built a home on.

When the cell phones and internet cut out, they don't think much of it. Those were novelities recently introduced to the community, and were not yet completely stable. But when the power goes out, and shows no sign of coming back on, they start to worry that something much bigger is going on.

This is a survival story. A story of community and working together for the greater good. Of protecting those you know and fearing those you don't. While the pages don't contain a lot of action, they are full of human compassion.

I liked the book well enough as a stand alone, but I'll probably not be picking up the sequel. Carry on survivors... wherever the road takes you.

I Who Have Never Known Men by Jacqueline Harpman

I saw this book popping up from time to time in my bookstagram feed. I was honestly shocked it had flown under my radar for so long because it sounded amazing and oh my god it did not let me down.

I Who Have Never Known Men is the story of a young woman who was locked in a cage below ground in a bunker with thirty nine other women. They do not know how they got there, where they are, or how long they have been there. Their memories are muddled - they recall screaming and chaos, and then this. They know they are being guarded and are being kept alive but they have no idea why.

One day, as the guards are unlocking their cage to feed them, a siren goes off and the guards immediately evacuate. Our narrator wastes no time in retrieving the key, opening the cage door, and heading up the stairs with the other women, out into the strange new world that awaits them.

Where did the guards go? Will they come back? All they can see, everywhere they turn, is a vast dry landscape, empty and barren, with the exception of the cabin they just escaped from. Is this Earth or are they someplace else? Are there others out there, locked away like them?

There are so many questions and not one single answer. We know only what our narrator knows, which is absolutely nothing and that's ok because we're here for it.

Is it post-apocalyptic? Is it science fiction? Is it psychological horror? Is it futuristic or is it set in a distant past? Yes, maybe, all of it and none of it.

If you've read Brian Evenson's The Warren, or Armageddon House by Michael Griffin, or The Divine Farce by Michael SA Graziano, then you'll understand how sometimes, when the writing is this good, and the setting is this strange, and the narrator is this pure, it's all about the journey and who cares what we learn or whether our questions get answers or how it ends... we're just sad that it had to end at all.

The Hearing Test by Eliza Barry Callahan

Some of you may know that I've struggled with severe hearing loss and permanent high pitch ringing in my ears (like ever present static), an issue I spent the better part of 15 years compensating for, and ignoring, until finally seeing a specialist three years ago. The dr's believe mine came about as a result of Lyme disease, and though it doesn't appear to be worsening, there's always that worry that one day I'll wake up to complete and utter silence.

So when I saw The Hearing Test, I requested a review copy from Catapult. It sounded intriguing and I was hoping to find bits of myself in the protagonist, who awakens one morning with hearing loss in one of her ears. Unlike me, though, this prompts her to seek out immediate medical attention, and sets her off on a year long journey of self discovery, and clinical trials, and more and more tests, always carrying around the fear of deafness, which hovers over everything she does, like a dark cloud she cannot shake.

Hearing issues aside, there wasn't much else I connected with. This is going to fold perfectly into the sad girl genre - that passive aggressive okayness to just play out the cards that have been dealt, not quite miserable but not really happy either, aimlessness of most present day twenty something female characters. Days turn into months, there are texts and phone calls and meals at restaurants and virtual hypnotherapist visits, but it's 159 pages of a whole lot of nothing really happening.

There's a line in the book that I'm going to manipulate for the purposes of this review because it's just so damn perfect: It's between her and her ex-boyfriend and it says "Your paintings are like my films. About nothing. But with precision."

Yes, Callahan, yes. This book was like all of the other sad girl books. About nothing. But with precision.

State of Paradise by Laura van den Berg

Another stellar novel from Laura van den Berg and one in which the jacket copy fails to do it justice.

It's a post covid Florida, in which the goverment took advantage of everyone while they were isolating and got them hooked on a new meditative, immersive technology called MIND'S EYE, and where people are suffering strange side effects that are believed to have been caused by the crazy high fevers they survived. Our narrator herself discovers that her outie is becoming a cavernous innie and her sister's eyes have completely changed color.

As she deals with these subtle physical changes, and ignores her mom's strange antics, and puts off urgent requests from the assistants of the author she ghosts for, MIND'S EYE users all around town begin mysteriously disappearing, as though into thin air... her sister being one of them. Some of the missing begin reappearing days later, a little dazed, not much worse for the wear, but with strange stories of where they've been. And our narrator's sister is one of the ones who've returned. She swears she entered another reality at their dead father's bidding and she's determined to return, with or without our narrator.

This book was just so deliciously weird. It's a fabulous mashup of grief fiction, sci-fi post-pandy fiction. Much like Florida and the pandemic itself, State of Paradise is a humid and feverish thing and oh gosh I was sooo there for it!

In the Sight by Tobias Carroll

Read in one sitting.

A strange little story about a guy who travels from gas station to gas station hooking his clients up with a homemade drug that messes with their brains and turns them into someone completely different.

A gig that was working out pretty a-ok for him until, at one particular drop off, he's informed that someone is coming for him. And suddenly we're on a road trip from hell, hotel hopping across country as our dude reconnects with old friends and tries to stay one step ahead of whatever nightmare is following him.

Though with one last pill in his pocket, there's the hope that he can continue to run... until he can't, and then... well...

Hum by Helen Phillips

When Helen Phillips puts a new book out, I'm first in line to request it!

Her lastest, Hum, is a creepy peek into a futuristic world in which natural forests and wild animals are things of the past and robots called hums intermingle with humanity.

May is a wife and mother and she's just lost her job to AI. Unsure when she'll land her next one, she decides to undergo experimental facial surgery that will alter her appearance just enough to confuse the ever present cameras throughout the city, but will beef up their bank account with nearly a year's worth of cash.

Only, she can't seem to stop purchasing friviolous things. No sooner does the money clear her account, with her skin still raw and painful from the surgery, she finds herself in line purchasing a weekend getaway for her and the family to The Botanical Gardens - a HUGE financial splurge, but one she's excited to share with the kids and her husband. The perfect retreat from the anxieties of the real world, a relaxing few days spent in an artifical woods complete with waterfalls, flora and fauna, and a much needed break from their cell phones and electronic addictions. But the trip quickly devolves into a mother's worst nightmare as she's forced to put her trust into one of the hums when her children go missing.

Phillips is a master at threading unsettling, atmospheric undertones throughout her stories. It's a bit foreboding, and feels a lot like stepping through the looking glass: where the horrors of consumerism, climate change, our obsession with technology, and the unrelenting guilt and pressures of motherhood all come to a dark and cryptic head.

Ripe by Sarah Rose Etter

Listened on audio and enjoyed the company of it while driving to and from work. Didn't love with it as much as I did Book of X... but...

Sad-girl fiction is having a moment and Ripe definitely claims its seat at that table.

Much more mainstream than its predecessor, we meet Cassie, a young up and coming marketing drone, working long hours, putting up with shitty bosses, who also spends some quality time with her anxiety and depression and an actual, physical black hole that hovers above and around her.

As if that's not enough to stress us out, she gets involved with a super sweet guy, but just as she finds herself falling head over heels for him and realizes her period is running late, she learns that he's in an open relationship, and he's really just exploring things because his wife wants to explore other women too...

Just when you think things for our poor girl Cassie can't possibly get any worse, they do. They really, really do.

Set right at the very beginning of the virus outbreak that would soon bring the world to its knees, Ripe is jam packed with toxic work environments, mental health crises, unhealthy family dynamics... all the things that make us keep turning the pages even though we know full well where the book's going to lead us...

Indie Spotlight: Jack Houghteling

 Welcome to our Indie Spotlight series, in which TNBBC gives small press authors the floor to shed some light on their writing process, publishing experiences, or whatever else they'd like to share with you, the readers!

Today, Jack Houghteling, author of the forthcoming cover Sunnyside, which releases later this month, discusses the book's cover and how the main character Montague came to be. 

I was at my Mom’s apartment last October - looking out on a northward view of the Hudson up toward the chasmic Tappan Zee - when I came across a picture of my great aunt and late grandma on a brumal Sunday in Sunnyside, Queens.

They smile on the concrete as a boy - a mature twelve or a prepubertal sixteen - peers on the aluminum. Or perhaps, like them, he poses.

I just liked the picture. I shared it to my social. I asked my Mom: What year? What street? What development (which RE company followed which Subway line)?

At the time I was two-and-a-half years into a project about a boy-become-man from the area - I’d first conceptualized a name, Montague Yazzo, in my early twenties. He’d once been a touted and celebrated local football player; a Jesus Shuttlesworth of Westchester County. But this was not a few-worded, many-strided athlete that ultimately succeeded. Why the fuck would I want to tell that story? The streamers and credit card are for that.

No. This was a former player that spoke in arias, spoke too much. He mined past movements. He mourned his lost uncle. He chirped his younger brother.

But above all, he thought about his Mom. He thought about Joanie-Hutch. How she’s left me with all this soul-toting and - contrary to the sportsperson’s climb - nonconclusion. With all these words.

This was it: a story about the conurbation’s cement, asphalt, brick, metal (Why does it get so cold and so hot? Why can I feel it on my breath and body?); about the ball in the sky; about lying in bed, post-breakdown, dreaming back upon nerved movements; about younger men and their older women guardians. Still they stood as we veered and tired.

 

``````````````````````````````````````````````````````

Jack Houghteling grew up in Hastings on Hudson, NY and published his debut novel Goodman in 2022, which was longlisted for the Dzanc Books Prize for Fiction. Sunnyside is his second novel.

The 40 But 10 Interview Series: DEAN DE LA MOTTE

 

I had retired the literary Would You Rather interview series, but didn't want to stop interviews on the site all together. Instead, I've pulled together 40ish questions - some bookish, some silly - and have asked authors to limit themselves to answering only 10 of them. That way, it keeps the interviews fresh and connectable for all of us!

Today we are joined by DEAN DE LA MOTTE. Dean was born and raised in California’s San Joaquin Valley, and studied English, French, and comparative literature at UC Santa Barbara, UNC Chapel Hill, and the University of Poitiers, France.  He has published articles and books on nineteenth-century French literature and culture, as well numerous essays on the teaching of literature, including Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights. 

 The father of two grown children, de la Motte lives in Newport, Rhode Island, and spends most summers in France.  Oblivion: The Lost Diaries of Branwell Brontë (Valley Press, 2022) is his first novel.

 

What do you do when you’re not writing?

I teach, I read, I cook.

 

Describe your book in three words.

Ambitious. Astonishing. Unputdownable.

 

Would you and your main character(s) get along?

After a couple of drinks, yes.

 

What are you currently reading?

Éric-Emmanuel Schmitt’s La Part de l’autre (2001); just finished James Robertson’s News of the Dead (2021).

 

What genres won’t you read?

Theatre. Fantasy. Works seemingly written only for women, or only for men for that matter. Self-improvement texts. Books about money. Religious, pious, or inspirational works. Most poetry.

 

What’s the one book someone else wrote that you wish you had written?

Flaubert’s Madame Bovary.

 

What’s the single best line you’ve ever read?

The final line of Wuthering Heights: "I lingered round them, under that benign sky; watched the moths fluttering among the heath, and hare-bells; listened to the soft wind breathing through the grass; and wondered how anyone could ever imagine unquiet slumbers for the sleepers in that quiet earth."

 

Do you think you’d live long in a zombie apocalypse?

I’d be dead in about two minutes.

 

If you were on death row, what would your last meal be?

Pasta fra diavolo and a bottle of red wine.

 

If you could time travel, would you go back to the past or forward into the future?

Into the past, preferably mid-nineteenth-century Paris with tons of cash on hand.

 

 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Oblivion: The Lost Diaries of Branwell Brontë is both a compelling reconstruction of the life of the famous literary sisters' often-misunderstood brother and a dramatic, sweeping portrayal of a century in rapid transition to modernity. It is a meticulous, loving tribute to the language, structure and themes of the Brontës' own works, as de la Motte at times weaves the very words of their correspondence, novels and poems seamlessly into his lively narrative.

Oblivion traces Branwell's meandering journey across the north of England, from the Fells of the Lake District to the ocean cliffs of Scarborough, from the smoky streets of industrial Halifax to the windswept moors above Haworth, encountering such notables as Hartley Coleridge and Franz Liszt. Through him we meet poets, sculptors, booksellers, prostitutes, publicans, railway workers, farmers, manufacturers and clergymen; through his experiences we contemplate the ineffable but fleeting ecstasy of sex, the existence of God, the effects of drugs and alcohol and the nature of addiction itself, the desire for fame, and the bitter resentment of artists and intellectuals who feel unappreciated by an increasingly materialistic, mechanised society.

This sprawling story is a moving, thought-provoking page-turner that seeks not only to understand the roots of Branwell Brontë's tragic end but also to unearth the striking similarities of character between him and his now-famous sisters.

 

Buy a copy here: 

https://www.valleypressuk.com/shop/p/oblivion

The 40 but 10 Interview Series - rob mclennan

 

New year, new interview series! Looking forward into 2023, I have decided to retire the literary Would You Rather series, but didn't want to stop interviews on the site all together. Instead, I've pulled together 40ish questions - some bookish, some silly - and have asked authors to limit themselves to answering only 10 of them. That way, it keeps the interviews fresh and connectable for all of us!

Today, rob mclennan joins us! Born in Ottawa, Canada’s glorious capital city, rob mclennan currently lives in Ottawa, where he is home full-time with the two wee girls he shares with Christine McNair. The author of more than thirty trade books of poetry, fiction and non-fiction, he won the John Newlove Poetry Award in 2010, the Council for the Arts in Ottawa Mid-Career Award in 2014, and was longlisted for the CBC Poetry Prize in 2012 and 2017. In March, 2016, he was inducted into the VERSe Ottawa Hall of Honour. His most recent titles include the poetry collection the book of smaller (University of Calgary Press, 2022), and a suite of pandemic essays, essays in the face of uncertainties (Mansfield Press, 2022). An editor and publisher, he runs above/ground press, periodicities: a journal of poetry and poetics (periodicityjournal.blogspot.com) and Touch the Donkey (touchthedonkey.blogspot.com). He is editor of my (small press) writing day, and an editor/managing editor of many gendered mothers. In spring 2020, he won ‘best pandemic beard’ from Coach House Books via Twitter, of which he is extremely proud (and mentions constantly). He spent the 2007-8 academic year in Edmonton as writer-in-residence at the University of Alberta, and regularly posts reviews, essays, interviews and other notices at robmclennan.blogspot.com

 

 

Why do you write?

Writing has become my best thinking form. I work to document, articulate and comprehend. I am trying to figure everything out. I suppose, even to keep missing a moving target allows me to capture some sense of that patterning of motion.

 

What made you start writing?

Compared to paper and pen, art supplies were expensive.

 

What do you do when you’re not writing?

Live, mostly. Sleep, watch television, read, errand. Review. Attend children, house, laundry, dishes. Edit/publish journals, chapbooks. Fold and staple. Organize readings and a small press fair. Attend others’ readings. Hang out with friends. Spend time with dear wife.

 

Do you have any hidden talents?

Yes.

 

What’s the best money you’ve ever spent as a writer?

Rent.

 

How do you celebrate when you finish writing a new book?

Consider what might come next.

 

Describe your book in three words.

We stayed home.

 

What are you currently reading?

I’m in the midst of a mound of titles (as per usual), including Manahil Bandukwala’s Monument (Brick Books), Emmalea Russo’s Confetti (Hyperidean Press), David Dowker’s Dissonance Engine (Book*hug), Sarah Heady’s Comfort (Spuyten Duyvil), Ewa Chrusciel’s Yours, Purple Gallinule (Omnidawn) and Brian Teare’s The Empty Form Goes All the Way to Heaven (Nightboat), etcetera. I’ve been working through some Bernadette Mayer titles lately as well, including Works & Days (New Directions) and MEMORY (Siglio), and rereading Rosmarie Waldrop’s Gap Gardening: selected poems (New Directions). I’m simultaneously reading a variety of trade editions of X-Men, Doctor Strange, Green Arrow, Doom Patrol (Silver Age). I’ve the new issue of The Capilano Review beside my desk, but I haven’t had a moment to open that yet.

 

What would you do if you could live forever?

Investing money might be a requirement, for the sake of future expenditures.

 

Are you a book hoarder or a book unhauler?

I feel the world “hoard” in regards to book collecting is incorrect. I have constructed and curated a personal library some ten thousand titles deep (not including the eight to ten thousand comic books assembled downstairs), most of which sits on our living room poetry shelves. I delve into this library regularly. Hoarding suggests one has absorbed thoughtlessly, and for no purpose beyond gathering for its own sake. Every library has purpose.

 I know some writers who curate their collections with a greater precision than mine, such as Cameron Anstee, Gregory Betts or Derek Beaulieu, but I’ve always leaned far more into the excesses of writer/reader-collectors such as jwcurry or Dennis Cooley. The stacks are endless.

 That being said, I regularly gift doubles of books already set on our shelves. We don’t need more than one.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

essays in the face of uncertainties

Mansfield Press, 2022

http://mansfieldpress.net/2022/11/essays-in-the-face-of-uncertainties/

 

This suite of pandemic essays exist within those first one hundred days of original lockdown, marking time through moments, anxieties and the elasticity of time itself. What are days, weeks, months? In this stunning collection of deeply personal essays, Ottawa writer rob mclennan wanders through literature, parenting, family, the constant barrage of cable news and the slow loss of his widower father across the swirling, simultaneous anxieties and uncertainties of an increasing sense of isolation.

 

“mclennan’s writing is clear and haunting. This is a book that will stay with you for years to come.”

—Anne Thériault

 

“The short lyric essays that comprise this book in one long meditative stream are indeed written in the face of uncertainties: not knowing where the pandemic of 2020 and on will lead us or how it will change us. The narrator/author stays home with his wife and two daughters while the map of the fallen to Covid expands and the numbers mount. In the face of the terrifying reality of death and political neglect, we are ensconced in the peaceful home of a small family that continues to work and play in isolation. mclennan writes with great elegance and compassion, and his expansive reading of books and authors from all over the world is brought into his narrative with great skill and ease. As a result, we find ourselves at the centre of a very large world of writers talking to each other across the globe and we see clearly that in this lockdown we are not alone. We never were alone. This book is a beautiful companion for our time and a very absorbing narrative that is hard to put down once you begin.”

        —Kristjana Gunnars