Email

Mon 25 Mar 2013 - Filed under: Not a Journal.| Posted by: Gavin

We are in the process of moving webhosts so I expect there will be some email disruptions—sorry! If you need a quick response, you can always leave a comment here and if you don’t hear back by the end of the week, do drop us a line again. Thanks for understanding.

---

The State of the Book in the Digital Age

Thu 21 Mar 2013 - Filed under: Not a Journal., ebooks, Gavin J. Grant, libraries, the future| Posted by: Gavin

I’m delighted to say that on Friday April 26th I’m on a panel at the Massachusetts Library Association conference—although I’m gutted I’ll miss the library cart drill teams on Wednesday. The conference runs from 4/24 – 26 at the Hyatt Regency in Cambridge and our (Western Mass. transplants!) panel is:

9:15 – 10:30am

The State of the Book in the Digital Age

What’s up with books these days? Books are ordered online, created on demand, and distributed in digital form to individuals and libraries. Many bookstores have closed in recent years, and publishers have had to drastically downsize, retool or go out of business. How have individuals and businesses responded to this new environment? Are books giving a last gasp or being reinvented? An author, a book artist, a publisher and a bookstore owner will give their thoughts on the changing environment for books.  Co-presented by the Western Massachusetts Library Advocates

Speakers:  Susan Stinson, Author, Writer in Residence at Forbes Library, Northampton; Daniel E. Kelm, Book Artist;  Gavin J. Grant, Publisher, Small Beer Press; Nancy Felton, Co-owner, Broadside Bookshop.

---

Small Beer Podcast 17: Angélica Gorodischer’s “The González Family’s Fight for a Better World”

Tue 19 Mar 2013 - Filed under: Not a Journal., Amalia Gladhart, Angelica Gorodischer, Julie Day, Podcastery, small beer podcast, The González Family’s Fight for a Better World, Trafalgar| Posted by: Julie

I don’t always take authors very seriously, but when Angélica Gorodischer indicated in Trafalgar’s foreword that the stories should be read in order, something in her tone made me pay attention. And something in her writing. She amused me right from the beginning, and so I decided to take her at her word and allow the journey to unfold over the course of the novel. Honestly, it was no hardship. Once I started the first story, I realized nothing less than mainlining the entire book would satisfy.

Angélica Gorodischer is the recipient of the 2011 World Fantasy Lifetime Achievement Award. She has published over nineteen award-winning books in her native Spanish. Still, for me, an English-only reader, Gorodischer feels like a “new author” discovery. Trafalgar may have been written in 1979, but it’s already one of my top five books for 2013.

A fix-up novel, a mosaic novel, or as the book copy suggests “a novel-in-stories:” whatever the term you choose to describe Angélica Gorodischer’s Trafalgar, it is funny, dry, and always engaging. Trafalgar feels like some sort of Douglas Adams, Gabriel Garcia Marquez hybrid. The narrator of Trafalgar is Trafalgar Medrano’s coffee-shop companion. It is she who transcribes the various intergalactic adventures Trafalgar describes over cups of strong, black coffee. And it is she who understands Trafalgar and his foibles enough to fill in the blanks he might have left in these stories. Unlike Dr. Watson, this biographer has no misapprehensions about human nature.

And now we have one of these stories available on the podcast. When Amalia Gladhart offered to read for the podcast, I was thrilled. Amalia translated Trafalgar; she read the original novel and she shepherded that novel from Spanish to English. What better person to read the English translation?

Episode 17: In which Amalia Gladhart reads Angélica Gorodischer’s “The González Family’s Fight for a Better World” from Trafalgar.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe to the Small Beer podcast using iTunes or the service of your choice:

---

Read an excerpt from A Stranger in Olondria

Thu 14 Mar 2013 - Filed under: Not a Journal., Sofia Samatar| Posted by: Gavin

One of the real pleasures of the last year has been spreading the word on Sofia Samatar’s debut novel A Stranger in Olondria. It is an incredibly rich novel, dense, and welcoming and from the very first time I read it, I loved it and it reminded me to slow down and enjoy all parts of the novel: the story, writing, the characters, the world, the poetry, the language, and always the story. Sometimes it’s hard to step back and take that time: there are so many things that need or must be done and then there are all the shiny things out there.

Now you can read an excerpt on Tor.com and if you’d like more, you can download a pdf of the first 70 pages from Weightless.

 

---

AWP

Sun 10 Mar 2013 - Filed under: Not a Journal., AWP, conventions, keep it indie, local power, Publishing| Posted by: Gavin

I never managed to catch up with all the people I hoped to, I enjoyed the bookfair so much I didn’t see any panels, I didn’t manage to arrive on time 2 out of 3 mornings, but besides all that, AWP was, somewhat unexpectedly, a ton of fun! We have a pile of new books from a few quick trips around the fair—including a new subscription to Tin House and more poetry than I’ve gotten in ages. It was invigorating to spend three days with 13,000(!) people who care deeply in one way or another about words on pages. (Not as much chat about ebooks as expected, none about the possible horrors of the used ebook market, yay!)

We stayed with friends (to whom we are very grateful!) and Kelly’s mom looked after Ursula (and brought her in on Saturday when the fair was open to everyone) which made the whole thing much more relaxed.

Friday there was a snowstorm so I was late. On Saturday morning smoke started coming out of the ceiling of the T at Fenway. “Driver, there’s smoke in here,” someone shouted. Doors opened: we all trooped out. Looked like a long wait, walked in.

Our neighbors in the fair were the very lively H_ngm_n Books on one side and our real-life near neighbors, the excellent Perugia Press. I am very happy to say that somewhere in that 13,000 people there is a contingent who read books from H_ngm_n, Small Beer, and Perugia.

We talked to hundreds of people and I owe apologies to some people for the times when I could not stop my anti-Am*zon invective: sorry. (They really do want to put everyone else out of business and all the fun out of life. Ya boo sucks to them.)

We sold out of LCRW on the second day: awesome! Wish I had brought more but it was—again—invigorating to meet so many readers.

I can’t even begin to list the excellent people I met. Wait, I can. People from: Paris Press, One Story, Milkweed, McNally Jackson, Porter Square Books, Coffee House (got a copy of Raymond McDaniel’s new superhero-themed poetry collection(!) Special Powers and Abilities and Geronimo Johnson’s excellent sounding New Orleans novel, Hold It ‘Til It Hurts—which is one of two Coffee House titles, the other being Laird Hunt’s Kind One, up for the Pen/Faulkner Award!), Shape & Nature, Eleven Eleven, Unstuck, Biblioasis, oh, wait, no I can’t list everyone. Sore hands and: Lists = I will miss people, sorry friends! And! We just added Puerto del Sol over on Weightless so while I met tons of people from New Mexico State U., I am kicking myself for missing the Puerto del Sol table. Argh, mea culpa. Didn’t take photos. Argh x 2.

It turns out tons of our books are being taught in schools around the country, including Karen Joy Fowler’s What I Didn’t See and Other Stories, Georges-Olivier Châteaureynaud’s A Life on Paper, Ted Chiang’sStories of Your Life and Others, and others including pretty much all of Kelly’s books. For which I say to all those teachers: it was awesome and heartening to hear that you are reading and teaching and studying these books. Thank you!

And that’s it. Thanks to everyone who stopped by to say hi. Hope you got home ok and that you too went home with some books you’re looking forward to reading.

---

VIDA 2012

Tue 5 Mar 2013 - Filed under: Not a Journal., Publishing, the world, VIDA| Posted by: Gavin

For those publishers and editors who look at their part of the literary world and see no discrimination, the VIDA Count for 2012 is in. I find myself quickly scrolling down through it just looking at the red and blue shapes, rather than the numbers. It is incredibly effective use of graphics, and incredibly depressing. When I came out of university in 1991 I knew a lot of stuff and expected the world to be different and better than it is now. I knew that women and minorities in this country were paid significantly less than men for the same work. I didn’t expect that to be true 20 years later. Bah.

I was looking at the VIDA count last night with Kelly and we wondered for the first time if we should cancel our subscription to the New Yorker. I love their long articles and who doesn’t love Anthony Lane, Hilton Als (educating me about theater against my will with his great writing, damn him), Emily Nussbaum, et al. But if week after week, month after month, year after year the editors don’t see that what they are producing is a magazine that consistently doesn’t see one half of the world’s population’s experiences, then is it worth our money? Maybe not.

Time to put our money where our mouths are. I don’t expect them to notice one lost subscriber, but I’ll write and tell them why. And then instead of being sad about the imbalanced table to contents each week, I’ll wait and check the VIDA numbers and see if they improve. Oh, New Yorker, how I will miss you.

I’m not exactly up on the state of my subscription (I can check the cover, I think, when I get home) but when renewal time comes around, I think we’re going to pass.

---

That AWP thing

Mon 4 Mar 2013 - Filed under: Not a Journal., AWP, conventions, Kelly Link| Posted by: Gavin

Hey, Thursday through Saturday of this week we will be participating in the annual literary scrum commonly known as AWP. This year it’s in Boston where the weather should be a comfy 40 degrees (or 5 centigrade) with maybe rain and snow TK. Yay! Bring your boots!

Before I forget: on Saturday the book fair is OPEN TO EVERYONE! Come on by! It’s in Exhibit Halls A, B, & D,  Plaza & Level 2. Phew.

We haven’t been to AWP since 2009 and it will be awesome and overwhelming to catch up with everyone and see  all the new flashy things that people are up to. Woohoo! Kelly is teaching at UMass Amherst on Wednesday afternoon, so we drive to Boston in the evening—already missing out on the early parties! Oh well. Thursday or Friday early in the evening she is part of a UNCG alumni reading somewhere in Cambridge (details TK). Other than that, not sure how many things we’ll be doing. Would love to see Seamus Heaney and Derek Walcott in conversation . . . But there may have to be strategic withdrawals as we are old, and, of course, parents!

The best thing about the whole bedazzling thing: it’s being held at the Hynes Convention Center. Ok, that’s not soooo fab, but it is within a quick T/bus/taxi/car ride to Yoma Burmese restaurant and Pho Saigon (both in Allston), the latter of which is in the Super 88 Hong Kong Supermarket food court  and they have the best banh mi sandwichs. Otherwise, sure there are plenty of restaurants around the convention center. The worst thing: the Other Side Cafe closed last year. Oh I am so sad.

Anyway, the conference is expected to be brutal. Woohoo! We will be at table L26 in the book fair—no doubt behind a pillar, under the a/c, so far from where it’s all happening, man, that when we look around we are actually in New Hampshire. But, hey, we will have books on sale! Or, books for sale at discount prices? Something like that. Also, we like trades, so bring them on!

Kelly is on one panel at 9 am on Thursday morning with two local-to-us writers, John Crowley and Jane Yolen, one used-to-be-local writer, Kate Bernheimer, and one new-to-me writer, Anjali Sachdeva:

Room 107, Plaza Level

R108. Modern Fairy Tales and Retellings. (Anjali Sachdeva, John Crowley, Jane Yolen, Kelly Link, Kate Bernheimer) Many of us grew up reading the same stories our grandparents read when they were children. But contemporary writers are also creating their own fairy tales or crafting surprising variations on traditional stories, for both children and adults. In this panel, authors who have written modern retellings of old tales will discuss the need for fables in modern society and the literary marketplace, as well as the writing process they use to go beyond archetype and tradition to create new tales.

(Here’s the schedule. Note, that’s just Thursday. AWP is a just little huge.)

---

International shipping

Wed 27 Feb 2013 - Filed under: Not a Journal., right?, shipping, they're kidding| Posted by: Gavin

Wow. We just caught up with the recent changes in international shipping costs. Basically the price of mailing one book outside the USA is now = Ouch. The cost of mailing 2 books = 4 x Ouch. Anything more than 2 books = Wow, wait, that really hurt!

Man, does this suck. First they got rid of M-Bag shipping and now it costs $23.95 to ship a book priority mail.

We’ll continue to ship books abroad—we’re very happy that readers from all over the world find Small Beer and LCRW—but, Ouch!—we won’t be surprised if you switch to ebooks instead.

---

Mead Manifesto

Tue 26 Feb 2013 - Filed under: Not a Journal., Literary Beer| Posted by: Michael

I’ve needed to get this off my chest for awhile. A bee in my bonnet, so to speak.

Mead is at long last becoming a popular thing in the US, growing in the same way cider has been growing, particularly at brewpubs and among craft brewers in regions otherwise known for prowess in the fermenting arts. The trouble–as with cider, only worse because mead hasn’t had Strongbow and Woodchuck holding it up commercially for the last ten years–is that nobody knows a damn thing about it. Including, it seems to me, a lot of the people brewing it.

Mead is, or should be, a wonderful thing, sublime I dare say, magical even. Mead can be complex with rich mouthfeel like a port, but lighter-bodied and prettier. It can smell delicate and amazing, like all the flowers in the honey it was made from. It can send both palate and pate into flights of hyperbolic fantasy unknown since the age of bards and heroes.

Or it can be sickly-sweet, cough-syrupy, overpowered and unbalanced with ridiculous, unnecessary additives by well-intentioned brewers who as best I can understand don’t actually know what mead is supposed to taste like.

What’s it supposed to taste like?

Read more

---

Worldreader: Books for All

Tue 26 Feb 2013 - Filed under: Not a Journal., a better place, ebooks, the world| Posted by: Gavin

Just read the Worldreader Annual Report and was fascinated by the results of an external study looking into their impact:

“For girls, one year with Worldreader is like five years of regular schooling.”

This is amazing and an absolute world changer.

We’re very proud to be part of it. Publishers and authors, please donate your ebooks here, thank you!

---

Lookit

Tue 26 Feb 2013 - Filed under: Not a Journal., bookshops, keep it indie, LCRW| Posted by: Gavin

Hey, peeps, they are a-reading the new issue of LCRW.

Also, it is now in many shops. Indies bookshops who carry LCRW, listen up: We Love You! We appreciate your mad passions! You are It for us, now and forevers!

“Always happy to see a new issue of this occasional story outburst. I grope for a term to suggest the nature of the highly imaginative fiction here; “weird” will not do; “fabulist” is wrong; “odd” might fit, but I think I’ll settle on “strange”. Yes, these are strange stories, in which even experienced explorers of genre terrain may occasionally find themselves on uneven footing; there are few overworn trails here.”
—Lois Tilton, Locus Online

“The entire issue made me smile. I’m looking forward to the next issue, whenever it may come.”
—Fantasy Literature

“Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet is the kind of magazine that you want to read slowly. Read a story. Put the magazine down. Absorb what you have just read. Then, after a while, read another story. Repeat. After more than a year’s absence here is issue #28 with more of their very different stories.”
—SF Revu

 

---

Trafalgar, here, there, everywhere

Thu 21 Feb 2013 - Filed under: Not a Journal., Amalia Gladhart, Angelica Gorodischer, translations| Posted by: Gavin

Thanks to translator extraordinaire Amalia Gladhart, I’m very happy to be celebrating the first English language publication of Angélica Gorodischer’s novel Trafalgar. The credit for this book coming out also goes back to Ursula K. Le Guin whose translation of Kalpa Imperial opened our eyes to this excellent writer. I am so glad I put this rather optimistic line in our About page:

We are seriously interested in more translations — especially of Angelica Gorodischer. However, we are monolingual (sorry) which makes the editorial process difficult. If you are a grad student looking for a translation project which may be of interest to us, we recommend Gorodischer’s Trafalgar and Prodiges.

We heard from a few translators of Gorodischer’s work in the ten years(!) since we published Kalpa Imperial but nothing panned out so when I received an email in June 2011 from Amalia I didn’t know whether to get excited or not. She had published a couple of previous translations, The Potbellied Virgin and Beyond the Islands, both by Alicia Yánez Cossío of Ecuador, which seemed like a good sign. But I still wasn’t sure, of course, until I got the book.

The first story, “By the Light of the Chaste Electronic Moon,” is great and really off the wall—check it out in Fantasy & Science Fiction this spring—so I was on edge, wondering where the book was going. But the second story, “The Sense of the Circle,” blew me away and I knew we were going to publish the book.

When it was announced that Angélica was one of the two winners of the World Fantasy Life Achievement Award, I had a mad thought that we could get the book—or at least a chapbook—out in time for the convention. Ha. Did not happen. But in the meantime Kelly found Ron Guyatt‘s fabulous travel poster “Caloris Basin – Mercury” and we worked with him to use it for the cover.

And now the book is out!

Two of the stories are already online: “The Best Day of the Year” (on Tor.com) and “Trafalgar and Josefina” (on Belletrista), and just today “Of Navigators” went up on the lit journal Eleven Eleven’s new site (their print edition will be available here). And reviews are coming in from all over. The Willamette Week (“a thing of digression and casual wonderment”) liked that Trafalgar was translated by an Oregonian. Abigail Nussbaum, in the Los Angeles Review of Books, called it “A novel that is unlike anything I’ve ever read, one part pulp adventure to one part realistic depiction of the affluent, nearly-idle bourgeoisie, but always leaning more towards the former in its inventiveness and pure (if, sometimes, a little guilt-inducing) sense of fun.”

Trafalgar is hard to describe, which is part of the fun of it. Put the coffee on and join in.

---

Death stars to electric cars

Thu 14 Feb 2013 - Filed under: Not a Journal.| Posted by: Gavin

I find it hard to believe that so many people fell for the White House’s announcement that they aren’t building a Death Star. Of course that’s what they’d say.

Are you going to be in Chicago on Sat. April 6th? Check out the Caxton Symposium: OUTSIDERS: Zines, Samizdat, & Alternative Publishing. Looks like a good day.

I was sad to note the recent death of Ralph G. Martin, “The author or co-author of some 30 books, Mr. Martin was perhaps best known for Jennie: The Life of Lady Randolph Churchill, a two-volume biography of Winston Churchill’s beautiful American-born mother, the former Jennie Jerome.” Nice books, I recommend them if you haven’t read them.

Speaking of the Times, did you see Karen Russell on the cover of the Book Review this week? Can’t wait to read Vampires in the Lemon Grove, although I will probably pick it up and have to put it aside until all the excitement dies down and I can read it in peace.

Other Small Beer stuff: No, we did not post eligible books/stories or whatever for various awards. It never quite seems like the right thing for us to do. But we do like awards and reviews and so on, including this review of LCRW 28 in Locus Online from Lois Tilton, who enjoyed most of the zine. LCRW‘s out at most of the bookstores it goes to now. Thank you for giving our tiny zine space on your lovely shelves, indie bookstores!

There’s one bookstore with a 10-year-old invoice for chapbooks. On the 10th anniversary, in September, maybe I will post the invoice online and see if payment appears!

Did you see Linda Nagata has a new SF novel coming out next month. Ch-ch-ch . . . you know what to do.

AWP is in Boston this March. See you there?

Looks like an interesting show starting soon in NYC: Ann.

Who’s right, who’s wrong? NYT vs. Tesla! The writer reports he skipped regular charging stations because he wanted to use only the superchargers. Because that is a rational decision any driver would make . . . ? Er, no. Sorry. Can’t wait for the driving in circles explanation.

---

How about 9 books in a box?

Thu 14 Feb 2013 - Filed under: Not a Journal.| Posted by: Gavin

No, not a sale. We should do one of those someday, shouldn’t we? Some day when we’ve caught up with things.

Anyway! The annual Con or Bust auction is on and this is what we put up. At the moment, the bid is $25. Bid it up!

1. Poppy Z. Brite, Second Line
2. Georges-Olivier Châteaureynaud, A Life on Paper: Stories (hardcover, trans. by Edward Gauvin)
3. Kelley Eskridge, Solitaire
4. Karen Joy Fowler, What I Didn’t See and Other Stories(hardcover)
5. Angélica Gorodischer, Trafalgar (paperback, trans. by Amalia Gladhart)
6. Julia Holmes, Meeks (paperback)
7. Eduardo Jimenez Mayo & Chris N. Brown, Three Messages and a Warning: Contemporary Mexican Short Stories of the Fantastic (paperback)
8. Laurie Marks, Water Logic (paperback)
9. Benjamin Parzybok, Couch (paperback)

---

Olondria Winners

Thu 14 Feb 2013 - Filed under: Not a Journal., Freebies, Sofia Samatar| Posted by: Gavin

To the 5 lucky readers who Goodreads selected: Your copies of A Stranger in Olondria are on their way!

---

Trafalgar

Tue 12 Feb 2013 - Filed under: Books| Posted by: Gavin

February 12, 2013 · 256pp · 9781618730329  · trade paper · $16  | 9781618730336 · ebook · $9.95

Locus Recommended Reading

When you run into Trafalgar Medrano at the Burgundy or the Jockey Club and he tells you about his latest intergalactic sales trip, don’t try to rush him. He likes to stretch things out over seven double coffees. No one knows whether he actually travels to the stars, but he’s the best storyteller around, so why doubt him?

Trafalgar, a novel-in-stories, was originally published in Argentina in 1979. It starts off light and refreshing right from the very first short Who’s Who in Rosario listing for Trafalgar, although there are occasional clouds that pass through Trafalgar Medrano’s bright and happy stories.

Excerpts available in F&SF, Tor.com, Lightspeed, Belletrista, and Eleven Eleven.

Read an interview with Angélica Gorodischer on Lightspeed.

“Trafalgar and Josefina” was reprinted in The Year’s Best Science Fiction and Fantasy 2014, edited by Rich Horton.

“Elegantly constructed images and smooth narrative twists make “Trafalgar’s” enchanting oddness all-encompassing and unforgettable.”
—Seattle Times

“Perhaps the strangest thing about these tales is how easily one forgets the mechanics of their telling. Medrano’s audiences are at first reluctant to be taken in by yet another digressive, implausible monologue about sales and seductions in space. But soon enough, they are urging the teller to get on with it and reveal what happens next. The discerning reader will doubtless agree.”
—Review of Contemporary Fiction

“Gorodischer’s fecund and playful sense of invention is dazzling here, especially in the roll call of perfectly contrived larksome proper names. Her style is more jaunty and modern, less baroque than in Kalpa Imperial, giving the sense that Trafalgar is right at your elbow, hoisting a beer. The banter between Trafalgar and his interlocutors, particularly his female Boswell, is sprightly and fun. . . . At age 84, perched atop a major canon, Angélica Gorodischer deserves to loom high in the ranks of contemporary fantasists.”
—Paul Di Filippo, Locus Online

“Had I to choose five words to describe it, I would call it: quiet, contemplative, provoking, bizarre—and brilliant. Quite, quite brilliant.
“It is not the kind of thing I would normally choose to read.
“But now that I’ve read it, I am at liberty to inform you I found it delightful. Thought-provoking. Impressive. Brilliant.”
—Liz Bourke, Tor.com

“A novel that is unlike anything I’ve ever read, one part pulp adventure to one part realistic depiction of the affluent, nearly-idle bourgeoisie, but always leaning more towards the former in its inventiveness and pure (if, sometimes, a little guilt-inducing) sense of fun.”
—Abigail Nussbaum, Los Angeles Review of Books

“A thing of digression and casual wonderment.”
—Willamette Week

“The narrative of this compilation draws the reader into the story of an ordinary man traveling to alternative worlds. Gorodischer creates an atmosphere where fascinating stories take on the ordinariness of everyday life.”
—Reforma 

“This understated and impressive story cycle, written in 1979 by Argentinean author and World Fantasy Lifetime Achievement Award winner Gorodischer (Kalpa Imperial), relates the adventures of intergalactic trader and coffee addict Trafalgar Medrano. When he meets with the unnamed narrators, he tells of his attempts to raise money by selling goods and services on other planets; most of his efforts end in improbable, hilarious disaster, such as being mistaken for Mandrake the Magician or finding a world that looks exactly like Earth—in 1492. The tropes are well-worn, but Gorodischer takes them in entertaining directions that both evoke their golden age roots and transcend them with a layer of absurdism. Gladhart’s translation spotlights Trafalgar’s dryly comic statements, like “I changed the course of history; nothing more than that.” Trafalgar’s adventures build on each other nicely, creating a collection that’s a joy to read.”
—Publishers Weekly

Table of Contents

By the Light of the Chaste Electronic Moon
The Sense of the Circle
Of Navigators
The Best Day of the Year
The González Family’s Fight for a Better World [audio]

–Interval with my Aunts
Trafalgar and Josefina
–End of the Interval

Mr. Chaos
Constancia
Strelitzias, Lagerstroemias, and Gypsophila
Trafalgar and I

Read more

---

Office closed

Mon 11 Feb 2013 - Filed under: Not a Journal.| Posted by: Gavin

Perhaps not a surprise but given the rubbish weather, our office is closed today.

---

Win a copy of A Stranger in Olondria

Wed 6 Feb 2013 - Filed under: Not a Journal., Free books, Sofia Samatar| Posted by: Gavin

 

---

Reading Group Guide: Meeks

Thu 24 Jan 2013 - Filed under: Not a Journal., Julia Holmes, Reading Group Guide| Posted by: Gavin

Told from four different perspectives, Julia Holmes’ Meeks is an engaging read that presents a satirical view of marriage and society. While short, it is full of thought-provoking ideas. Here are some discussion questions by Kimberly Pavlovich to get you started. And, of course, there are no right answers:

1. The theme of grief is first introduced when Ben discovers his mother is dead. He is fitted for a black suit, during which the tailor asks, “What is grief but a sudden inability to sustain belief in the story that preceded it?” (13). Do you agree? How would you define grief? How does grief play a role in the novel?
2. Marriage is highly valued in Meeks; there are consequences for those who remain unmarried. How do you think Holmes views marriage, based on the ideas in the book? Do you think the way marriage is presented in the novel reflects some of our own society’s ideas? What are your own thoughts on marriage?
3. How are each of the characters’ perspectives (Ben, Meeks, the Brother, and the Father) connected? As you read Meeks, did you find yourself wanting to hear an additional character’s story? How would the story change if characters’ viewpoints were added or omitted?
4. When Ben discovers his room at the Bachelor House is connected to another bachelor’s room, he immediately wants to switch – until he meets him. How would you describe Ben’s and Finton’s friendship? Meeks and Bedge also have an interesting bond. How would you describe their friendship?
5. What is your take on the Brothers of Mercy’s role in society?
6. What holds Ben back from becoming a “typical” bachelor? Is it his black suit, or is it something else?
7. Ben longs for a pale suit, while Meeks longs for a gun. Eventually, they steal these items from the same prone bachelor. What compels each of them? Would you have done the same?
8. In the course of the novel, Ben wears a black suit, a pale suit, and finally a gray smock; each act as a symbol to other people. How does Ben’s behavior change with his attire, as well as the behavior of the people he interacts with? Why do you think clothing has the ability to temporarily change the wearer and how the wearer is treated – not only in Ben’s society, but in our own? Have you ever felt “changed” by your clothing?
9. What is the significance of the heavens watcher’s story about “the man marooned on an island”?
10. Who is “the man in the black jacket”? Do you think Meeks made the right decision when he refused to switch costumes with him? How would the story change if he had?
11. What is your interpretation of Ben’s last line: “Let everyone see him, let them finally get it: when something is lost, it’s lost forever” (185)?
12. Were you satisfied with the ending? Did it surprise you?

 

---

Coffee? Sure. La Morenita or La Virginia?

Thu 17 Jan 2013 - Filed under: Not a Journal., Amalia Gladhart, Angelica Gorodischer| Posted by: Gavin

Reforma gives Trafalgar a very strong recommendation (“Highly recommended for Public and Academic Libraries”), which I translate as: a book for everyone!

I suppose a good quote from the review would be “The narrative of this compilation draws the reader into the story of an ordinary man traveling to alternative worlds. Gorodischer creates an atmosphere where fascinating stories take on the ordinariness of everyday life.”

Not mentioned: Trafalgar drinks a lot of coffee. We should have partnered with an Argentinean coffee firm because this book is going to cause a lot of people to get up and put the coffee on. La Morenita! La Virginia! Coffee shops! Baristas! Call us!

How much coffee? Seven cups. Begins like this:

I was with Trafalgar Medrano yesterday. It’s not easy to find him. He’s always going here and there with that import-export business of his. But now and then he goes from there to here and he likes to sit down and drink coffee and chat with a friend. I was in the Burgundy and when I saw him come in, I almost didn’t recognize him: he had shaved off his mustache. . . .

Marcos brought him his double coffee and a glass of cold water on a little silver plate. That’s what I like about the Burgundy. . . .

Marcos brought him another double coffee before he could order it. That Marcos is a marvel: if you drink nothing but dry sherry, well chilled, like me; or orange juice—not strained—with gin, like Salustiano, the youngest of the Carreras; or seven double coffees in a row like Trafalgar Medrano, you can be sure that Marcos will be there to remember it even if it’s been ten years since you went to the Burgundy.

Marcos arrived with the third double coffee. . . .

Marcos had put down the paper—he had collected at one of the other tables—and now he was coming with the fourth double coffee. . . . 

All right, coffee, anyone?

But, wait, if you prefer it with wine, the third edition of Wine and Word Tasting at Winter’s Hill Vineyard will take place on Saturday, February 16, 11:00-5:00 in Lafayette, Oregon. Yum.

---

My fave-orite flow chart EVER

Wed 16 Jan 2013 - Filed under: Not a Journal.| Posted by: Gavin

http://hoganhere.tumblr.com/post/40586465546/2-bold

(Yes, that is really a link, because you gots to go there.)

---

Small Beer Podcast 16: Kij Johnson’s “The Empress Jingu Fishes”

Tue 15 Jan 2013 - Filed under: Kij Johnson, Not a Journal., At the Mouth of the River of Bees, Julie Day, Kij Johnson, Podcastery, small beer podcast, The Empress Jingu Fishes| Posted by: Julie

Hallelujah! Another podcast is neigh. And to everyone’s delight here at the Small Beer Studios, it’s another piece of fiction.

Kij Johnson’s debut collection, At the Mouth of the River of Bees, came out in mid-2012. And people were excited. Kij can rock climb. She can teach. She knows both Old Norse and Latin. But most of all she knows how to tell horrific and wondrous stories in the most beautiful of language.

As well as all that, Kij is a research demon. Science and ancient Japan and near-future teen culture all collide between the pages of this collection.

Kij has won the World Fantasy Award, the Sturgeon Award and the Nebula award (multiple times). Reading “The Empress Jingu Fishes” was a truly lovely experience. Kij Johnson does more than just tell a compelling story. She knows how to put her words together.

Episode 16: In which Julie Day reads Kij Johnson’s “The Empress Jingu Fishes” from At the Mouth of the River of Bees.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe to the Small Beer podcast using iTunes or the service of your choice:

---

Around Small Beer

Mon 14 Jan 2013 - Filed under: Not a Journal., Alasdair Gray, Ayize Jama-Everett, Elizabeth Hand, Karen Lord, Kathe Koja, Kij Johnson, LCRW, Under the Poppy| Posted by: Gavin

Just because the government tells you something doesn’t mean you have to believe it.

Tomorrow: Julie Day reads Kij Johnson’s “The Empress Jingu Fishes” on the Small Beer podcast on the tavern with beer and food.

And check out Wired.com’s Geek Mom interview with Kij. Kij is off to Oxford to give the JRR Tolkien lecture on fantastic fiction and to teach a workshop: lovely!

Ayize Jama-Everett’s The Liminal People was on the Identity Theory Holiday Reading List. Add it to all your comix-and-sf-reading lists!

I just interviewed Karen Lord, whose lovely new novel The Best of All Possible Worlds comes out from Del Rey next month, for BookPage. That should go up at the start of February.

In April it’s last chance to see Under the Poppy in Detroit. Do it!

The Village Voice gives Errantry a stormer of a review:
“With grand feeling and inventiveness, Hand writes of modern life edging just into the impossible. Her ragged modern characters, often lost or stoned or just unfixed in their lives, set out over moors or into hidden parks in search of realities less dispiriting than our own.”

Kelly’s “The Faery Handbag” is this week’s story on the Bookslinger app.

The first review has come in for the new ish of LCRW. Here’s Sam Tomaino at SF Revu on LCRW 28:
“Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet is the kind of magazine that you want to read slowly. Read a story. Put the magazine down. Absorb what you have just read. Then, after a while, read another story. Repeat. After more than a year’s absence here is issue #28 with more of their very different stories.”

Scottish Television loves Alasdair Gray almost as much as we do. He’s doing another piece of public art in Glasgow—can’t wait to go over next summer and see it all—this time at the Western Baths Club. (Ok, so I may not be able to go see this one). Here’s the video of the unveiling of his previous mural in the Glasgow subway. It’s based on the art from Old Men in Love.

That’s it, out of time.

---

Fountain of Age a PKD Award finalist

Thu 10 Jan 2013 - Filed under: Not a Journal., Awards, Nancy Kress| Posted by: Gavin

Lovely news from the Philip K. Dick Award peeps, Nancy Kress’s latest collection Fountain of Age is a finalist for this year’s award. Congratulations to all the nominees!

Here’s the full list of nominees and various links and so on:

---

Locus Poll: All-Time Short Fiction Results, 2012

Thu 10 Jan 2013 - Filed under: Not a Journal., Ted Chiang| Posted by: Gavin

I missed this (as with so many things) while mostly offline over the new year. Neither did I vote as I always forget things I wish I had included. But maybe if I had Maureen F. McHugh, Alice Sola Kim, and some others would appear. Also there are two Karen Joy Fowler stories and I think seven Ursula K. Le Guin’s. And we published one of the top ranked stories and reprinted two in Ted’s mighty and fabulous Story of Your Life and Others. Yay, indeed!

20th Century Novella:

Rank	Author : Title (Year)
1	Chiang, Ted : Story of Your Life (1998)

21st Century Novella:

Rank	Author : Title (Year)
1	Link, Kelly : Magic for Beginners (2005)

21st Century Novelette:

Rank	Author : Title (Year)
1	Chiang, Ted : Hell Is the Absence of God (2001)

---

Clarion & Clarion West

Wed 9 Jan 2013 - Filed under: Not a Journal., Clarion, Clarion West, workshops| Posted by: Gavin

Where will Kelly be at for 2 weeks next summer? Teaching the final two weeks of the six week Clarion Writers’ Workshop in San Diego with Karen Joy Fowler.  The 2013 writers in residence are:

Andy Duncan, Nalo Hopkinson, Cory Doctorow, Robert Crais, Karen Joy Fowler & Kelly Link

Applications are accepted until March 1st:

Applications are also due March 1st for Clarion West in Seattle where this year’s instructors are Elizabeth Hand, Neil Gaiman, Joe Hill, Justina Robson, Ellen Datlow, and Samuel R. Delany.

---

The Faery Handbag on Bookslinger

Tue 8 Jan 2013 - Filed under: Not a Journal.| Posted by: Gavin

This Friday Kelly’s story “The Faery Handbag” will be featured on the Bookslinger app. And! Some of our other fave short stories can be found there including one of the best science fiction stories of the last ten years or so, “Start the Clock” by Benjamin Rosenbaum, and Maureen F. McHugh’s amazing “Ancestor Money.”

You can download the app in the iTunes store.

And watch a video on it here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ySL1bvyuNUE

You can also order Pretty Monsters here now. Why didn’t we add this before? Don’t know.

---

New LCRW goes out, with little surprises

Mon 7 Jan 2013 - Filed under: Not a Journal., Free books, LCRW| Posted by: Gavin

We just finished mailing out LCRW 28 (takes us a while, doesn’t it?) and we had fun with this one. As a subscriber bonus (for US/Canada readers only . . .  sorry Lovely Rest of World Readers, the post office wanted to charge us $16.95 a shot!) we threw in a random free book for everyone. Enjoy!

(Want a free book? Subscribe!)

---

« Later Entries in — Earlier Entries in »