Renowned microfiction author Joseph Young put out his new flash fiction collection The Thing I Was Trying to Tell You in June, and the collaborative children’s book Rocks: What Are They Doing also came out in June by artists Christine Sajecki and Michael Mäke. They got together for an amusing and enlightening conversation about their books, their process, and what art means to them.
Chapter 33
Streaming is genius because you get paid to share something the customer never owns.
Joselyn does market research and chooses who we promote on the front page. Morgen assists. It’s very clear Joselyn now has the Arto empire more than Morgen ever did. I’ll go with the last woman standing. Just don’t make me come out of retirement.
I don’t respond to cold calls much and I’m trying to get out of the book-review racket, but when Maggie Umber wrote me about her nearly wordless book Chrysanthemum Under the Waves, something told me to answer.
The jumping-off point was a piece Umber made for an anthology of graphic work inspired by the writing of Shirley Jackson. Her story, “The Tooth” features a malevolent stranger named James Harris. Soon Umber was seeing Harris not only in Jackson’s stories but also in her own life.
In our morning reading: interviews with Alisa Alering and Helen Phillips, Jo Walton’s book recommendations, and more.
I’ve been an admirer of Matt Kindt’s comics work ever since I read the 2001 graphic novel Pistolwhip, his collaboration with Jason Hall. Since then, his career has seen him take on a host of genres, including working with some other high-profile collaborators. (Notably, Keanu Reeves on BRZRKR.) Kindt’s latest collaboration finds him working in the mystery genre, collaborating with his mother Margie Kraft Kindt on the series Gilt Frame. The first issue is due out this Wednesday, and I spoke with the two collaborators on the making of their new series.
In our weekend reading: James Baldwin’s connection to New Jersey, an interview with Tara Isabella Burton, and more.
Chapter 32
Morgen hands a copy to everybody.
We get letters from mothers and grandmothers and spouses from all over threatening to sue us over their sons and daughters losing their sense of reality after watching videos which they describe as “circus art” and “demonic athletic performances”.
Behold, it’s August and — for the moment, at least — the weather is almost….nice? The heat and humidity aren’t conspiring to make our lives miserable; instead, there’s something almost cozy in the air. “Cozy” and “August” aren’t two words often used together, so it’s a moment worth savoring. Also? Books. We have some we’d like to recommend. Unnerving takes of the uncanny, thoughtful works of nonfiction, and sharp explorations of familial dynamics are all on the menu; read on for what we’re reading this month.