Books on Deck / Up Next

I've been slow on posting new stuff, but I've been reading through a fantastic "trilogy" by Carlos Ruiz Zafon recently. Beginning with "The Shadow of the Wind," then "The Angel's Game," and ending on "The Prisoner of Heaven." All pretty good books, but the last of the series was half the size of the first two and felt rushed (probably more by Zafon's publishers than the man himself). Regardless, all three were fantastic reads.

I've also been trying to pump out more stories for this collection I've been working on for the last year and a half now, so I've been trying to find new (to me) short story collections in a darker, more experimental vein. I've got a few coming to me in the mail that I'm super excited about. The first one to arrive, Matt Bell's "How They Were Found" has been an incredibly nice surprise thus far. Right up my damn alley and I couldn't be happier with his style, his imagination, or with his prose.

Matt Bell - "How They Were Found"

"In his debut collection “How They Were Found,” Matt Bell draws from a wide range of genres to create stories that are both formally innovative and imaginatively rich. In one, a 19th-century minister follows ghostly instructions to build a mechanical messiah. In another, a tyrannical army commander watches his apocalyptic command slip away as the memories of his men begin to fade and fail. Elsewhere, murders are indexed, new worlds are mapped, fairy tales are fractured and retold and then fractured again. Throughout these thirteen stories, Bell’s careful prose burrows at the foundations of his characters’ lives until they topple over, then painstakingly pores over the wreckage for what rubbled humanity might yet remain to be found."

Amber Sparks - "May We Shed These Human Bodies"

“May We Shed These Human Bodies” peers through vast spaces and skies with the world's most powerful telescope to find humanity: wild and bright and hard as diamonds. Here is humanity building: families reconstruct themselves, mothers fashion babies from two-by-fours and nails, boys make a mother out of leaves and twigs and wishing. Here is humanity tearing down: a wife sets her house on fire in revenge, a young girl plots to kill the ghosts that stalk her, a dying man takes the whole human race with him. Here is humanity transforming: feral children, cannibalistic seniors, animal wives - a whole sideshow's worth of oddballs and freaks."

Donald Barthelme - "Paradise"

"Simon, a middle-aged architect separated from his wife, is given the chance to live out a stereotypical male fantasy: freed from the travails of married life, he ends up living with three nubile lingerie models who use him as a sexual object. 

Set in the 1980s, there's a further tension between Simon's desire to exploit this stereotypical fantasy and his (as well as the author's) desire to treat the women as human beings, despite the women's claims that Simon can't distinguish between their personalities. 

Employing a variety of forms, Barthelme gracefully plays with this setup, creating a story that's not just funny—although it's definitely that—but actually quite melancholy, as Simon knows that the women's departure is inevitable, that this "paradise" will come to an end, and that he'll be left with only an empty house, booze, and regrets about chances not taken."

David Markson - "Vanishing Point"

"In the literary world, there is little that can match the excitement of opening a new book by David Markson. From "Wittgenstein’s Mistress" to "Reader’s Block" to "Springer’s Progress" to "This Is Not a Novel," he has delighted and amazed readers for decades. And now comes his latest masterwork, "Vanishing Point," wherein an elderly writer (identified only as "Author") sets out to transform shoeboxes crammed with notecards into a novel — and in so doing will dazzle us with an astonishing parade of revelations about the trials and calamities and absurdities and often even tragedies of the creative life — all the while trying his best (he says) to keep himself out of the tale. Naturally he will fail to do the latter, frequently managing to stand aside and yet remaining undeniably central throughout — until he is swept inevitably into the narrative’s startling and shattering climax. A novel of death and laughter both — and of extraordinary intellectual richness."

Ann & Jeff Vandermeer - "The Thackery T. Lambshead Cabinet of Curiosities"

"You’ll be astonished by what you’ll find in “The Thackery T. Lambshead Cabinet of Curiosities.” Editors Ann and Jeff Vandermeer have gathered together a spectacular array of exhibits, oddities, images, and stories by some of the most renowned and bestselling writers and artists in speculative and graphic fiction, including Ted Chiang, Mike Mignola (creator of “Hellboy”), China Miéville, and Michael Moorcock. A spectacularly illustrated anthology of Victorian steampunk devices and the stories behind them, The “Thackery T. Lambshead Cabinet of Curiosities” is a boldly original, enthrallingly imaginative, and endlessly entertaining entry into a hidden world of weird science and unnatural nature that will appeal equally to fantasy lovers and graphic novel aficionados."

Dante Alighieri - "The Divine Comedy" (John Ciardi Translation)

"The historical and cultural significance of Dante Alighieri’s masterpiece “The Divine Comedy” cannot be overstated. Dante’s poetry takes the reader on a multi-layered journey, one through which he or she experiences this literary master s unique aesthetic and spiritual sensibilities. “The Divine Comedy” also presents the opportunity to gain a deeper understanding of medieval Italian thought and its bearing on Western theology and culture. This lyrical allegory of a journey from the depths of Hell to Paradise is a moving read in its own right and its influence upon world literature unchallenged."

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