In our afternoon reading: interviews with Kelly Link and Justin Taylor, a Sun Ra tribute album, and more.
Steak and Potato
Steak and Potato
by Marin Kosut
I was born to vegetate. As a juvenile, I’d stare at my blank bedroom wall. I’d stare out at the driveway. Not even the sky or the ceiling. I’d lay on my bed looking down at the middle of my body and stay outside myself inside the house. I wrinkled with time on top of my sheets. Sometimes, admittedly, I flipped through the Pennysaver. I didn’t know nothing, but I wasn’t totally rotten.
Morning Bites: Emily Carroll’s Comics, Peter Gordon’s Minimalism, Revisiting Juan Rulfo, and More
In our morning reading: exploring Emily Carroll’s comics, revisiting the work of Juan Rulfo, and more.
Afternoon Bites: Justin Taylor on Writing, Robin Sloan on Ursula K. Le Guin, Shabaka’s New Album, and More
In our afternoon reading: Justin Taylor on writing his new novel, thoughts on Shabaka’s new album, and more.
Morning Bites: Juan Martinez Fiction, Thomas Kendall’s Latest, Endangered Languages, and More
In our morning reading: fiction by Juan Martinez, the endangered languages of New York City, and more.
Sunday Stories: “The Traveling Mink Coat”
The Traveling Mink Coat
by CAT Wyatt
My father, a military pilot during WWII, was on a training mission a month before Valentine’s Day, 1945. Urgently needing to find a present for my mother, he went into the town close to his training facility. He noticed a beautiful mink coat in a shop window, a luxurious full-length, mahogany-colored, sheared mink coat with a caramel-colored silk lining. The lining reminded him of my mother’s silky, taffy-blonde hair. After purchasing the coat, he waited while a seamstress embroidered my mother’s and his initials deep inside the left slit pocket. My father wrote a card and tucked it in the same pocket, knowing she was left-handed and always kept a handkerchief in her left coat pocket, knowing she would find the card and their initials.
The Challenges of Art and Life: An Interview With Nicole Haroutunian
Nicole Haroutunian’s new novel, Choose This Now, wrestles with a lot of big themes in the subtlest of ways. This is a book about creative struggles, intimacy, and families both found and biological. Over the course of this book’s timeframe, its characters make decisions that are rewarding and emiently frustrating; they go to bizarre parties and embark on ill-concieved relationships. It’s an immersive work with the ebb and flow of life, and I chatted with its author about the project’s origins and her own experiences while writing it.
Morning Bites: Revisiting “The Sparrow,” Poetry Recommendations, Leanne Shapton on Tulips, and More
In our morning reading: revisiting the novel “The Sparrow,” an interview with Maris Kreizman, and more.