Benjamin Percy’s The Wilding
Posted on December 23, 2010 Leave a Comment
So my review is now up at TNB. Go check it out, peeps.
If you haven’t read Ben’s work, well, you need to go do that. I can’t remember the last time I found a new voice that captivated me as much as Ben Percy. It started with the story, “Refresh, Refresh” in an issue of The Paris Review that my friend Drew McCoy showed me. From there, I got the collection, Refresh, Refresh. It’s like the first time I read Chuck Palahniuk, or Brian Evenson, or Will Christopher Baer. It hooked me for life.
His work it typically focused on the outdoors, such as Oregon, but not always. He taps into the universal truths that I’m trying to find in my own work. And he does it with authority and emotion.
I’ve been lucky enough to meet Ben at various AWPs, talk a bit, listen to him read (good lord the man is a baritone, a bass, makes Barry White sound like a soprano) at various panels, and talk via email. He’s good people – talented, generous with his time, and all kinds of cool. The Wilding is his first novel, and I can’t wait to read more of his work.
Stay God, the debut neo-noir thriller by Nik Korpon IS OUT RIGHT NOW!
Posted on December 17, 2010 Leave a Comment
“Someone stabbed the sun. It’s dripping onto Baltimore, seeping through gauze clouds onto the cobblestone street, reflecting off wet tire tracks in pinpoint sparks like the ones that follow a two-by-four across the nose. It’s dimming, dying, falling in slow motion, but the city is oblivious. Couples in matching jackets and complementary scarves walk arm-in-arm down Thames and through Fell’s Point. They push strollers with babies double-wrapped in winter coats. Share hot chocolate and kiss the dot of whipped cream off their noses. Window-shop the poster place next-door, looking for the perfect thing for the TV room. Happy lives, happily self-contained in their happy little oblivious universes.”
I’ve known of this book for years, been reading it in our Write Club workshop, and was thrilled when it landed with me at Otherworld Publications. Nik is one of my neo-noir brothers, a guy that doesn’t mind laying on the mood, the setting, injecting the emotions, slapping you in the face with the harsh Baltimore weather, every grimy cobblestone on top of every chipped brick until you are immersed, a part of it all, trying to keep up, trying to find a way out, holding your breath as you turn the page.
Stay God is a neo-noir thriller, one that isn’t afraid to go dark. But it’s not one note. He puts your through the wringer, making you laugh, become friends with this cast of miscreants, understand their love, and then shatter it all in the blink of an eye.
Chuck Palahniuk said something like “Teach me something, make laugh, and then break my heart.” Nik Korpon does this and more. It is a book I really enjoyed reading, from start to finish.
Pick it up at Amazon or Otherworld Publications, and spread the word. This is Nik’s debut, not long after my debut, and part of the pantheon of excellent work that OWP is putting out. Keep an eye out for Caleb Ross, Brandon Tietz, and Michael Sonbert in 2011 on our label as well. More compelling fiction that isn’t afraid to punch you in the gut and walk away.
Redesign The Velvet – A good cause is up at IndieGoGo – GO NOW!
Posted on December 11, 2010 Leave a Comment
The Velvet is home to three talented authors that have greatly shaped my work.
Will Christopher Baer is one of the best neo-noir authors around, and has been the great influence on my work. His trilogy (Kiss Me, Judas; Penny Dreadful; Hell’s Half Acre) is a perfect example of the voice, the mood, the tone of what neo-noir is and can be. Dark, strange, grounded in reality, but floating in the surreal, it’s hypnotic. I’d give a kidney to meet the man. Inside joke.
Craig Clevenger is another author that has dabbled in the neo-noir, but is moving on to other genres. The Contortionist’s Handbook is a classic, and Dermaphoria is equally as rich and layered, hallucinatory and yet vivid and visceral. He’s taught me in two classes at The Cult, and pushed me to submit my story “Stillness” until it got accepted in Shivers VI (Cemetery Dance) alongside Stephen King and Peter Straub. He’s generous and brilliant.
Stephen Graham Jones is the only one of the trio I’ve met, at two AWPs, and he’s one of the most intelligent, giving, well-read authors I know. All the Beautiful Sinners haunts me to this day, and the rest of his work is equally stunning. Pick up any of his books. And he’s one of the most published and accomplished short story writers I know. 100+ I’d say. Whenever I’m researching places to submit, I say “If it’s good enough for Stephen, it’s good enough for me.
Go to IndieGoGo and support the cause, the website, the plethora or emerging authors that hang there, and the talented, giving people that make up the community. Even $5 helps. Lots of great things are being given/auctioned away, so go check it out. A portion of the donations goes to charity too.
It Came From Del Rio by Stephen Graham Jones
Posted on November 17, 2010 Leave a Comment
It Came From Del Rio (Trapdoor Books) by Stephen Graham Jones
My review of It Came From Del Rio (Trapdoor Books) is up at The Nervous Breakdown. What can I say except I love this book, and Stephen’s work in general. I think the review will speak louder than anything I can add here, but this was a real pleasure to read. I’ve never been disappointed in anything that SGJ has written, so check out his work if you haven’t. I’m particularly a big fan of All The Beautiful Sinners. But it’s all good. Also, keep an eye out for The Ones That Got Away (Prime Books) out soon.
Here’s an excerpt from the review:
Once Jones has your heart, he has to take your mind as well, and he does that with the authority of his voice. He grew up in Texas, so every weathered post, every bit of rusted barbed wire, every detail about burying photos in the dirt, chewing on cactus pulp, eluding coyotes, hanging out at the bottomless Jacob’s Well, it has the sincerity of a personal history behind it, the truth in every action.
The Paris Review – discount for HTMLGiant (and other fans of literary fiction)
Posted on November 11, 2010 Leave a Comment
I’ve really grown to love The Paris Review. There was a discussion over at HTMLGiant about it, and Roxane Gay was talking about how individual copies are expensive, and got this response from the people at TPR:
Roxane,
Peter from The Paris Review here. Thanks for such a thoughtful review–very much appreciated.
Unfortunately, there’s nothing we can do about the shipping on a single issue (the post office charges us what they charge us). But to make up for this and make the magazine a little more affordable, we’re offering the good people of HTMLGIANT and your readers a one-year subscription for $28 ($7/issue) through our website with the code GIANT12.
http://store.theparisreview.org/products/one-year-subscription
This will be active for the next two weeks (and feel free to share). Due to the vagaries of our site, there may be an 81 cents shipping charge, but nothing hefty. Hopefully this makes the makes keeping in touch with TPR a bit easier.
Most of all, do keep reading. The winter issue is shaping up to be something pretty special.
So, hop to it, folks. It’s mostly because of people like Benjamin Percy that I started reading TPR, but there is always something amazing in each issue – a story or interview, always something worthwhile.
Daddy’s by Lindsay Hunter
Posted on November 8, 2010 Leave a Comment
Daddy's by Lindsay Hunter (Featherproof)
I’ve met Lindsay a couple times, starting with an event at Quickies! Chicago where I was thrilled to read with a ton of talented people. I was blown away by Amelia Gray, Blake Butler, Jac Jemc, and of course, Lindsay herself. It’s not surprising that I’ve become a big fan of her work. I’ve come to expect the unexpected from her. She has no fear when it comes to short stories that deal with sex, violence, loss, love, hope, and the drama and tension that exist in dysfunctional families and relationships. My full review of Daddy’s (Featherproof) is now up at The Nervous Breakdown, so go check it out. This is one of my favorite collections of the year, and Lindsay Hunter is a voice to watch. Now hop to it, people.
The Avain Gospels by Adam Novy
Posted on November 1, 2010 Leave a Comment
My book review for The Avian Gospels by Adam Novy is now LIVE at The Nervous Breakdown. This was a wild ride, a surreal, dystopian book, issued in two beautiful volumes by Short Flight / Long Drive Books. I don’t know if you’d call this a division or an arm of Hobart, but whatever you call it, the people over there (Aaron Burch and Elizabeth Ellen) are doing great things. Big World, by Mary Miller, another of their releases (2009) was just fantastic.
Richard Thomas is interviewed by Simon West-Bulford.
Posted on October 29, 2010 Leave a Comment
Simon‘s a fantastic author himself, with his first book due out soon with Medallion Press, entitled The Soul Consortium. So check out our conversation here as we chat about my novel, Transubstantiate, multiple POVs, plot vs. no plot, staying motivated, and many other things.
Kevin Lucia writes Hiram Grange and the Chosen One, supernatural detective
Posted on October 27, 2010 Leave a Comment
Check out my review at OWC
I thought I posted up about this last June, but guess I didn’t! WHOOPS, my apologies, Kevin. Hiram Grange and the Chosen One by Kevin Lucia is the sixth book in the Hiram Grange series, and it was a real hoot. My review gets into all of the details over at Outsider Writer’s Colletive, but suffice it to say it was a wild ride. So go check it out. Imagine F. Paul Wilson with a little James Bond, Sherlock Holmes and Phineas Poe sprinkled in.
Interview with Amelia Gray at The Nervous Breakdown
Posted on October 16, 2010 Leave a Comment
In addition to doing book reviews at The Nervous Breakdown, I’ll also be doing interviews. My first is with one of my favorite authors, Amelia Gray. I hate to even limit her by calling her a small press darling (in the vein of Parker Posey, indie film darling) as she is a voice to be reckoned with, and I’m sure the small presses will only hold on to her for as long as they can, until the bigger presses come calling. Harper Perennial, are you paying attention?
Instead of doing the standard interview, asking about her latest projects and what her process is, I went over her first two books, AM/PM (Featherproof) and Museum of the Weird (FC2), reminisced about the times I’ve seen her read live at various AWPs and other outings, and generally prompted her with whatever authors, presses, and eccentricities I could think of.
Visit her at her site, or Five Things (her reading series in Austin), or hell, just Google her. She’s everywhere. Be sure to catch her live, it’s always worth it.
So, go check out the review up at The Nervous Breakdown, pick up copies of AM/PM and Museum of the Weird, and track her at Twitter and her blog. She’s one of the most compelling voices out there right now – hilarious, disturbing, emotional, surreal, heartbreaking, grounded, alluring and smart.
- Richard Thomas - 