Cardinals bullpen. Youth’s flowing fountain runs deep, Like hot, fresh cheese fries. Sports bar bathroom reeks, Yet within: community. Bros pee, united. Love thy neighbor, dawg. Boston: The Pixies. Sam Adams. St. Lou: Jon Hamm. Busch.
Usually, this is the kind of thing I do when the Tournament of Books is announced: a frantic flailing to try to read as many acclaimed books from a given year as humanly possible. This year,I decided to get things underway a little early. Maybe James McBride is the reason: his The Good Lord Bird seems to be racking up award nominations right and left; given that Jason also had kind things to say about it over at Flavorwire, I figured […]
Over dinner after drinks, my friend and I eavesdrop and happen to hear two women talking about books. One of them summarizes The Love Affairs of Nathaniel P. as “all set in Brooklyn.” My friend and I make faces at each other and keep listening. Other books are brought up, but none of their selling points seem to us as crushing as the first. “All set in Brooklyn.” “I have to read that” was the response, in case you didn’t […]
A month or so ago, I went to an event for the Sarah Weinman-edited anthology of domestic suspense, Troubled Daughters, Twisted Wives. (Which, by the way, is fantastic.) The event featured Weinman in conversation with Hilary Davidson, and among the topics that came up were the definition of domestic suspense, and the way that it, as a genre, has passed in and out of popularity. I found myself thinking about domestic suspense a lot when I read Fiona McFarlane’s The Night Guest. […]
I went over to Academy Annex’s new location the other day. They’ve moved to a space not far from where I live — or, more precisely, even closer to where I live than they did before. And their location relative to WORD and Permanent Records means that, in theory, I can drop a lot of money on books and music in the span of less than ten blocks. Besides picking up Siltbreeze’s reissue of The Victor Dimisich Band’s discography — […]
The first thing that I’m reminded of when watching the Congress in crisis is my lifelong love of professional wrestling’s broad theatrics. Telling someone that you love wrestling is akin to what I expect it’s like to announce a foot fetish. Most recoil and wince, the rest ask if you prefer the big toe or the pinkie.
I may have lost track of the number of book groups I’m in at this point. Four? Five? I run one, and am now in the semi-regular position of putting together the reading list for early 2014. (One prediction: the expanded edition of Carl Wilson’s Let’s Talk About Love will make an appearance.) It’s something I value a lot — getting to talk about books with smart people is never not time well spent, and in a lot of cases, I’ve […]
The interiors of the apartment building where Rosemary Woodhouse would become Satan’s unknowing paramour were filmed elsewhere, but anyone knows that the exterior shots were of the Dakota, on Central Park West and 72nd Street, a corner most famous for being where John Lennon was shot. (Mia Farrow’s sister was the Prudence to inspire John to write “Dear Prudence,” but that is a campfire tale digression.) I lived a few blocks from the Dakota for a couple of years. I […]