FOREST OF FORTUNE in the middle of a Katherine Faw Morris-Haruki Murakami sandwich in Michael Seidlinger’s SUMMER READS at HTML Giant.
There’s something otherworldly about the book that has me intrigued and I’m a sucker for a well-written book about strife, especially gambling.
Antonia Crane’a sex-worker memoir, Spent, from Barnacle Books:
Recruited as a sensual-massage therapist by her friend Kara, Crane finds herself in a compromising situation. The allure of easy money has brought her to the Four Seasons in Beverly Hills on Christmas Day for a four-hand massage. The client, a widower with a skin condition who is “covered in tiny scabs,” predictably wants sex and is willing to double the fee. Are they interested?
With a quick glance from Kara, Crane bolts to the bathroom for condoms, and then they go to work: “I looked into Kara’s blank blue eyes and our tongues met in circles around the latex condom. I tasted the sour plastic of new tires, party balloons, and hospital gloves.”
I contributed an essay for Hobart’s annual baseball extravaganza about the Los Angeles Dodgers, Yasiel Puig, and a friend’s illness. It’s called Ode to Joy.
Carl Crawford lifted a high fly ball way up in the azure sky for a no-doubt-about-it home run, and hung there in the air for long enough to change everything. It was the strangest thing. The volume got so loud that it transcended the audible realm and enlisted other senses. Our bodies shook, but we were absolutely still. Speech wasn’t possible yet we were all in communication with each other. It was grand, it was glorious, and we were all witnesses to something extraordinary.
The fabulous Porochista Khakpour reading from The Last Illusion. (at Vroman’s Bookstore)
Forest of Fortune book trailer shoot day 2 (at Chimayo, NM)
Forest of Fortune book trailer shoot day 1. (at Stanley, New Mexico)
Julia Escoria reading at the launch of Black Cloud (at Nunzi’s)
The true story behind this is that at the after party for Rosie’s book launch we all went to Walker’s and John Bowman took the crayons they provide at every table and started noodling around on the paper tablecloth and over the course of the hour – all the while talking and joking and saying brilliant things – made this drawing. Then right before I left he ripped it apart from the rest of the tablecloth and gave it to me and I felt extremely special. And then one morning, not too long after that, when I was feeling really stuck with my book I remember rolling over in my loft and looking up at the wall and remembering how he had made the city of Aleppo appear from his memory with just crayons so maybe I should stop being such a baby and just get back to work and write my new book. And then I did.
And we all get mired in the bullshit, the personality quirks, the personality disorders (ours and everyone else’s), the jealousy, the disappointment, the blocks, the financial struggle, our egos, I do it too, I do it too, but if you can’t remember it is all about the work and nothing else then I can’t help you and you can’t help yourself and you will lose. I promise you. You will lose.
Jami Attenberg dropping wise words.
The true story behind this is that at the after party for Rosie’s book launch we all went to Walker’s and John Bowman took the crayons they provide at every table and started noodling around on the paper tablecloth and over the course of the hour – all the while talking and joking and saying brilliant things – made this drawing. Then right before I left he ripped it apart from the rest of the tablecloth and gave it to me and I felt extremely special. And then one morning, not too long after that, when I was feeling really stuck with my book I remember rolling over in my loft and looking up at the wall and remembering how he had made the city of Aleppo appear from his memory with just crayons so maybe I should stop being such a baby and just get back to work and write my new book. And then I did.
And we all get mired in the bullshit, the personality quirks, the personality disorders (ours and everyone else’s), the jealousy, the disappointment, the blocks, the financial struggle, our egos, I do it too, I do it too, but if you can’t remember it is all about the work and nothing else then I can’t help you and you can’t help yourself and you will lose. I promise you. You will lose.
Jami Attenberg dropping wise words.
