Conversations – Page 6 – Vol. 1 Brooklyn

Books, Conversations, Featured, Interviews

Literary Seattle, Bar Crawls, and Defining Independent Literature: An Interview With APRIL Festival Co-Founder Willie Fitzgerald

February 20, 2013 1 Comment

I first heard of Seattle’s APRIL Festival — the name is an acronym for Authors, Publishers, and Readers of Independent Literature — via the coverage of ace The Stranger book critic Paul Constant. His account of last year’s lit crawl piqued my interest, and when he reported that the festival was returning this year, I figured it wouldn’t be a bad thing to learn more. And thus, this interview with co-founder Willie Fitzgerald, conducted via email.

Between Books, Books, Conversations, Featured

No Gothic Excess: A Between Books Conversation with Jac Jemc

January 31, 2013 1 Comment

Jac Jemc‘s first novel My Only Wife ended up on more than a few of our best-of lists for 2012. Those who have read it will understand why: the Chicago-based author’s fiction is perfectly pitched, atmospheric and yet containing abundant mysteries. It’s unsettling without ever crossing a line into Gothic excess; it’s ambiguous without ever feeling the need to show off. Over the course of a few weeks, Jemc and I exchanged a series of emails to discuss her work as […]

Books, Conversations

From Competitive Running to Stephen Malkmus: An Interview with Michael Heald

January 23, 2013 No Comments

The first time I’d heard anything about Perfect Day Publishing was due to a write-up of Lisa Wells’s essay collection Yeah. No. Totally. in the Portland Mercury. Intrigued, I ordered a copy of the book, which turned out to be one of my favorite books of 2011. Sometime after that, I made contact with Michael Heald, the man behind Perfect Day; we’ve remained in contact ever since. As it turns out, Heald is a fine writer in his own right, and his collection Goodbye […]

Books, Conversations, Featured

Amphetamine Reptile Lit: A Discussion of Brian Evenson

January 15, 2013 No Comments

Over the course of several months, Tobias Carroll and R. Stephen Shodin discussed the work of Brian Evenson. It’s not really a surprise why; Evenson occupies a particular sweet spot between the visceral and the intellectual. He seems equally at home discussing literary theory as he is writing a novel about mutilation-based cults; he’s a writer, editor, translator, and educator whose work is often brutally compelling. His work has the ability to spring to life after laying dormant in a […]

Books, Conversations, Featured

Conversations on “Confessions”: Talking Dante, Ducks, and Infocom With Eric Raymond

January 9, 2013 No Comments

Nick Bray, the protagonist of Eric Raymond’s novel Confessions From a Dark Wood, is in over his head. Following the death of his father and the loss of his job, he finds himself employed by an enigmatic management consulting firm, LaBar Partners Limited. His friendship with a poet whose day job is at the TSA seems healthy; his romantic relationship with a woman planning a spectacular suicide is less so. Did I mention that one of the offices at LaBar is […]

Conversations, Featured

Labors of Love and Drinking Urine: Getting Uncomfortable with Tim Heidecker

November 12, 2012 No Comments

Fans of comedic renaissance man Tim Heidecker are likely to find his dramatic turn in Rick Alverson’s “The Comedy” profoundly disturbing, in no small part because his approach to drama is eerily similar to his approach to comedy. Heidecker and perpetual collaborator Eric Wareheim (who also features in “The Comedy”) have built a unique comedy brand in the past decade. Their TV shows (“Tom Goes to the Mayor,” “Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job!” “Check It Out! with Dr. […]

Books, Conversations

Private Schools, Medication, and Gossip Magazines: A Conversation with “Accelerated” Author Bronwen Hruska

November 12, 2012 1 Comment

If you’ve ever been told that your C in 3rd grade Social Studies isn’t going to look good on a college application, you probably have some sense of how accelerated the private school world can be. Yet, in New York City, where everything is inherently accelerated, the private school system can be even worse. Bronwen Hruska’s novel Accelerated (Pegasus) follows a newly single father, Sean Benning as he juggles his kid’s private school, his job at a gossip rag, and his aspirations as an artist. Sean must […]

Books, Conversations, Featured

Talking Philip Roth, Class, and Artists with Kids with Paula Bomer

October 25, 2012 No Comments

After learning she’s pregnant with her third child, Sonia — the protagonist of Paula Bomer’s new novel Nine Months — embarks on a frantic road trip, revisiting old friends and past homes. Taken together with her earlier collection Baby, they showcase Bomer as a smart observer of class, economic anxieties, shifting familial bonds, and the frustrations that can come with lives spent engaged in creative disciplines. (It doesn’t hurt that Bomer’s fiction is often impressively — and sometimes bleakly — comic.) After […]