Welcome to another installment of If My Book, the Monkeybicycle feature in which authors shed light on their recently released books by comparing them to weird things. This week Helen McClory writes about On the Edges of Vision, her debut story collection just published by Queen’s Ferry Press.
Continue reading
She was five years old, wearing pink tights, squalling and wailing on the pavement. That scene transformed into a gif, which later turned into one of the first gif greeting cards, then gif bumper stickers and dangling gif decorations for Christmas trees, cars, closets. Her parents even started a small line of gif clothing and accessories. Watches, earrings, and of course those T-shirts that were later banned.
Continue reading
“Okay, this is what you’re going to do,” Mr. Oliver, who was Clay’s eighth grade history teacher, said. “Call your parents tonight, tell them you love ‘em, but don’t tell them who’s calling. Just hang up.”
Continue reading
Eddie Lanning, the titular character of Lot Boy, Greg Shemkovitz’s debut novel, is a slacker doing menial work at his father’s car dealership. He spends most of his time verbally brawling with the mechanics, shirking his responsibilities, and ranting against his lot in life. Another dealership reprobate, Spanky, convinces Eddie to step up his amateur stolen parts operation.
Continue reading
Welcome to another installment of If My Book, the Monkeybicycle feature in which authors shed light on their recently released books by comparing them to weird things. This week Tom Williams writes about his third book, Among the Wild Mulattos and Other Tales, just published by Texas Review Press.
Continue reading
My cat eats souls. He spends all day out of the house, and when he comes back he leaves these opalescent turds that smell like chilies in the litter box. I don’t think these are the souls themselves, just what’s left of them after they’ve passed through Clarence.
Continue reading
Welcome to another installment of If My Book, the Monkeybicycle feature in which authors shed light on their recently released books by comparing them to weird things. This week Naomi Jackson writes about The Star Side of Bird Hill, her debut novel published this summer by Penguin Press.
Continue reading
1. Close your eyes. Picture a couple of lonely, outdated gas pumps. See the vibrant primary colors of your youth. Run your fingers across the peeling and the rust of your old age. Breathe in not the fumes, but the silence of the abandoned filling station, the beautiful brown field of your existence.
Continue reading
If Dear Mister Essay Writer Guy were a brunch item, it would be an omelet with spiced zebra meat and firm avocado. Brunch would be served in a remodeled gas station, with Esso still written above the big bay doors. Our waitress, Midge, would call us “Honey,” and pour coffee until we couldn’t take it anymore. Her hair would be orange. “You’re like a skeleton,” she would say, trying to get us to order more food. “The pie was made this morning.”
Continue reading