In our morning reading: interviews with Silvia Moreno-Garcia and Laird Barron, thoughts on Jeffrey Ford’s fiction, and more.
Sunday Stories: “Disappear Me”
Disappear Me
by Steve Himmer
In hindsight we saw the invisible coming. A meme in which photos of teenagers caught in conversation with adults bore the words “Disappear Me” became ubiquitous enough that even I noticed. Then it spread to include photos of anything that looked unhappy listening to anything else, whether a cat or a dog or a small tree overshadowed by a large one. Videos of kids pulling hoods and shirt collars over their faces while talked at by parents and teachers and scolding strangers earned millions of views, and at school assemblies whole student bodies were swallowed by their clothing before baffled speakers trying to teach them how to fend off a mass shooter. Whatever the unwelcome subject, kids disappeared.
Morning Bites: Ottessa Moshfegh Interviewed, Harry Mathews Remembered, Min Jin Lee, Steve Himmer’s Playlist, and More
In our morning reading: interviews with Ottessa Moshfegh, Chris Gethard, and Min Jin Lee; talking books about the 1980s; and more.
Afternoon Bites: Sarah Gerard Nonfiction, Sublevel Debuts, A Scott McClanahan Excerpt, Steve Himmer, and More
In our afternoon reading: new nonfiction from Sarah Gerard, an excerpt from Scott McClanahan’s next book, and much more.
The Woods, The Unknown, and the Monstrous: An Interview With Steve Himmer
It’s a story as old as civilization: a man ventures into the woods to seek his fortune, and finds something menacing and uncanny there. In the case of Steve Himmer‘s new novel Scratch, that man is Martin Blaskett, a man in the process of building several houses near a forest, and the uncanny is in the form of the title character, an ageless, amorphous creature that can enter dreams and alter bodies. There’s plenty of danger to be found in […]
Afternoon Bites: Steve Himmer’s Latest, Laurie Penny, Margaret Atwood Interviewed, Brian Evenson, and More
In our afternoon reading: thoughts on Steve Himmer’s new novel, interviews with Margaret Atwood and Brian Evenson, and more.
Afternoon Bites: Sarah Manguso Interviewed, Amanda Petrusich on Courtney Barnett, New Steve Himmer Writing, Nick Cave, and More
In our afternoon reading: Chelsea Hodson interviewed Sarah Manguso, new writing is on the way from Nick Cave, Lindsey Zoladz on the new album from Kendrick Lamar, and much more.
Arctic Histories and Secrets: Talking “Fram” With Steve Himmer
Right about now, there’s no shortage of snow and ice falling outside my window. And so I’m thinking about Fram, the new novel from Steve Himmer, about a man named Oscar and his own obsessions with the snow. Fram follows Oscar, an employee at a secretive government agency, as he embarks on a mysterious mission north, encountering characters with mysterious loyalties and taking in progressively more surreal landscapes. I checked in with Himmer via email to learn more about the book, the history […]