Category Archives: Tiny Book Plugs

THE LIAR'S DIARY Blog Day

THE LIAR’S DIARY – Blog Day LitPark

Today is the day! Literary bloggers all over the place are pointing their sites to LitPark and Patry Francis’s book The Liar’s Diary.

Patry’s story struck home for me because my 4 year-old was diagnosed with cancer just last month (a week before Christmas). He had a little fibrous mass removed from his leg in early December. It was supposed to be nothing, but pathology had different ideas…

A whirlwind of tests followed, wedged in around Christmas. Then, another surgery on New Years Eve Day (of all things) to get clear margins around the site. Now, we’re a month out and it seems like years have passed. The second pathology came back clear and so we are not supposed to be worried. Just MRIs once a quarter for some time to come, just to be sure.

I cannot yet describe what this whole experience has been like. I’m not sure how long it will take to settle in and find its voice. Some day it will though and I will have more to say about it.

So, my heart goes out to Patry. Please show your support! Pick up a copy of Liar’s Diary today!

[Note: I accidentally set the original future post date for this entry to 2/1 not 1/29. Sigh…]

Orhan Pamuk's Messy Closet: Thoughts on Other Colors

Note: this review was written in a huff. Pamuk’s book is actually quite wonderful when taken in the right frame of mind. I’m leaving up this post though (as I do all the garbage here) because it serves as a good reminder not to take myself so seriously.

To read more about what causes this condition, check out the next day’s post: Putting it out there. I’m especially embarrassed by my comments about the need for play in the mind of a novelist. Play is absolutely essential. [2008-02-15]

Novelists who publish their personal archives (the shit no one is supposed to see) should be beaten. Invariably, they are revealed to be nervous lumps of self-doubt and self-pity. This blog is frankly a ray of fucking sunshine compared to the flogging I give myself in private. It’s just awful really to think of all the dark and depressing crap that goes on in a novelist’s journals.

Orhan Pamuk, undaunted by the promise of ropes and razors and solipsism, has gone to the trouble of translating his own self-hatred from Turkish to English so that we may all enjoy his self-abuse. The book is called Other Colors, which aside from being a lame-ass title is actually a misnomer. There are no other colors in this book, just shades of gray. Lots and lots of particularly depressing shades of gray.

In the introduction, Pamuk refers to these bits as pieces of stories that have yet to make their way into his novels. I rather like that idea, but then why publish them at all? It’s a bit like Gabriel Garcia Marquez putting out his notebook of story ideas he never intends to get to or someone finding Hemingway’s stolen suitcase of crap stories and publishing an anthology. Is there really a point to this?

Anyway, here is a sample that I had the presence of mind to copy down while feeling sorry for myself:

Continue reading Orhan Pamuk's Messy Closet: Thoughts on Other Colors

My Book Brahmins Questions

Mark Terry isn’t starting a meme, but it feels like one anyway… 🙂

The Book Brahmins Questions:

Shelf Awareness, a newsletter I get, generally has a section on Fridays where they interview “Book Brahmins” (and no, I find the reference a bit vague) and ask the same questions. Today, for instance, they interview Douglas Preston (whose book is in the mail, any day now…). Since no one seems to be requesting I become the next Book Brahmin, I thought I’d appoint myself and answer them anyway.

[Via: This Writing Life]

Ok, so here are the questions with my answers. (italics indicate my own level of self-importance today)

On your nightstand now:

Hotel de Dream by Edmund White but I have no idea why (although it seems interesting).

Favorite books when you were a child:

The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien. I preferred this book (and still do) to LOTR because it is a walkabout with little purpose other than pure fun.

Your top five authors:

Henry Miller, Julian Barnes, P.G. Wodehouse, W. Somerset Maugham, Paul Theroux. How is that for a screwed up list?

(Funny, Mark listed Ross Thomas. I just finished reading Briarpatch. Good plot though Thomas let his characters get sort of fuzzy in the last quarter of the book.)

Book you’ve faked reading:

The Bible (seriously)

Book you are an evangelist for:

The Courage to Write by Ralph Keyes (if you are struggling with your writing, get it today)

Book you’ve bought for the cover:

Atomised by Michel Houellebecq (UK edition) and I still have it.

Book that changed your life:

It’s cheap to say this, but every book does in some way or another. I’m far to malleable about these things. However, my initial reaction was Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman. I carried a dog-eared copy around with me for a long time. However, I also had a very powerful reaction to Zen and the Art of Archery by Eugen Herrigel and The Piano Shop on the Left Bank by Thad Carhart. Basically, those sort of seeking life out and finding it quite different from what you expected.

Favorite line from a book:

“I hate computers for any number of reasons, but I despise them most for what they’ve done to my friend the typewriter.” – David Sedaris Me Talk Pretty One Day

This is one you can pin up on your wall and it always gets a laugh.

Book you most want to read again for the first time:

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone by J.K. Rowling. I’m not going to justify it. I just loved that book.

The Uncommon Reader by Alan Bennett

There are a lot of folks talking about AB’s new book. I read the somewhat short version in the LRB (or was it the TLS). Very funny.

The Uncommon Reader:

I picked up Alan Bennett’s The Uncommon Reader at the library last Saturday. I opened it up when I got home intending to just dip in. Yeah, right. A couple hours later I finished the book with a happy sigh. It’s a slim, quick read, a novella, and utterly delightful.

[via: So Many Books]