Punch-Outs & Love: History-on-Strings by Red Shuttleworth

Is there anything better than getting a surprise chapbook in the mail? Red Shuttleworth sent me an inscribed copy of this beautiful book last week, and I devoured it. Red Shuttleworth is the read deal; his poems have grit and grime and all the heart in the world. No one writes the American West like Red.

After Alluvium by Thom Dawkins 

I had the good fortune to read this book while it was in its developmental stages, and as lovely as it was then, After Alluvium is even more striking in this slimmed-down version. I love Thom Dawkins’s ear for the poetic line, and his surprising musicality that reminds me, in its way, of Anne Sexton’s.

The Bible By Gregory Sherl by Gregory Sherl

I wish this book were in print now so that it could make you happy, too. Gregory Sherl is one of my favorite LAR poets (in fact, we’re quite proud that we were his first publication way back in our sixth issue), and I’ve been something of a proud poetic auntie watching his career grow. This new manuscript, which I highly encourage a publisher out there to accept right away, is a heartbreaker. For a sneak peek, you’ll just have to order a copy of LAR Issue 12, which will feature a poem from this collection.

Then there are the things I expect in the mailbox soon-ish, which are making me happy before the fact:

Sex With Buildings by Stephanie Barbé Hammer 

Stephanie Hammer is one of the smartest women I know, and I cannot wait to see what she’s done with her first poetry chapbook. With Stephanie’s exuberant imagination and the brains to back it up, I fully expect this chapbook to be killer.

Surrounded by Water by Stefanie Freele 

Stefanie Freele, our Fiction Editor at the Los Angeles Review, is already an important voice in the flash fiction world, and her second short story collection, just released form Press 53, will only solidify that position.

A Real Emotional Girl by Tanya Chernov

My writing partner and best poetic bud Tanya is expecting her first book this September. I’ve had the pleasure of reading is book throughout its development over the past few years, and I cannot wait to the rest of the world to read it, too.

I still don’t know how to write about this. In fact, I feel rather sick trying to tell the story at all. But the scene that followed was what you might expect–I raced around from room to room to discover what had been stolen. Computer, check. Jewelry, check. Family heirlooms, check. Everything of any monetary value had been taken. Quite a few things of irreplaceable sentimental value, too. Then there were the odd things: a stick of deodorant. A can of pepper spray I’d taken off my keychain before air travel. A battered suitcase that I’d dragged all over at least five countries. The more I looked through my home, the more details of my personal life I discovered had been rifled through. I turned on every light in the house, and I let them burn all night.

We called the police. I went to the neighbors to tell them what had happened. I shook. I tried to make a list of what was missing, and tried to draw pictures of my antique jewelry for the sherif, my hand wobbling. I remembered that my laptop had a tracking device that could be enabled remotely. I set an alert, and hoped it might work. I didn’t sleep that night, and sat bolt upright in bed every time the house creaked or a car drove by outside. (A car just drove by outside as I wrote this sentence, and I still jumped.) I thought about the two somewhat sketchy people I’d seen taking a walk in my neighborhood as I left for work, then felt terribly judgmental for suspecting them.

The next day, I was flummoxed as to what to do with myself; I couldn’t work on The Los Angeles Review. I couldn’t work on my manuscript. I couldn’t grade the papers my students had turned in online, or pull up my lesson plans for class; everything I needed–the entire rhythm of my everyday life–was on that laptop. Instead of accomplishing anything that I needed to do, I stayed in sweatpants and scrubbed every inch of my house. I washed all of our clothing that had been rifled through with the thieves’ I-don’t-know-where-those-have-been hands, scrubbed down the light switches and doorknobs and cabinet handles that the intruders must have touched. I went through a quantity of Lysol that can only be described in terms usually reserved for Howard Hughes. Just in case, I left one big, clear handprint the intruder had greased against the door.

When I eventually did get an alert that my computer had been located, I got in the car right away, and drove to the intersection that had popped up on the notification. When I got to the intersection and saw a rare coin shop, I tried my luck. I went inside and talked to the very kind people who worked there, and asked them to keep a lookout for my belongings, and for those two people I’d seen in my neighborhood. I don’t know what I thought I’d find when I went to that intersection–some criminal holding my suitcase full of my stuff?–or what I thought I would do about it. I felt rather stupid as I drove home.

I was back to my regular program of Lysoling my now thoroughly Lysoled house when the administrative assistant of the coin shop called me to come down to the store right away–the thief, the one I’d described to her, was on the ground in handcuffs after having been tackled by the police. His girlfriend, the second person I’d described, had fled, but not before dropping her (my) purse full of stolen property. One of the workers in the store actually chased her down the street in an attempt to catch her–a rather heroic move, I thought. The shop’s staff had done as they promised, and more, alerting the police when the couple came in to sell some of my things. The cops showed up quickly, and the couple ran–the police caught the man and his giant backpack full of my possessions, and one of the workers in the shop chased after the woman, though she eventually slipped away. The rest of that day is a blur of talking to police lieutenants, giving witness statements, identifying property (and answering questions I never thought I’d be asked, such as “I assume this isn’t your crack pipe, ma’am?” when a gross, crusty item was pulled out of the stolen purse), and being interviewed by newscasters. That massive handprint on my door was later dusted for prints, which matched those of the man tackled outside the shop. I then Lysoled the heck out of that door.

It was quite some time later when the police were able to give me back my laptop–the well Lysoled one from which I am now, happily, writing this blog post, and which has my still unfinished novel inside (thank goodness). In the interim, when all I could do was Lysol and re-Lysol the house, I realized that the thing I missed most was being able to work on my book. Yes, I am still missing lots of my stuff, including heirlooms passed down to me from my great-grandmother, and it makes me blazingly angry that these people took some irreplaceable things from our home without any compunction about it. Yet the only time I actually lost it–sat down on the floor and wept–was when I couldn’t work on the book that I’ve been writing. I didn’t just want to write it; I needed to. I still need to. And this laptop is never leaving my sight again.

I suppose I’d always known that such a thing as the small press existed, but I imagined people in dark basements stapling together spooky and unnecessary tracts full of misspelled words and randomized capitalization. At the time, I’d just finished reading through every Salman Rushdie book available, though, and I was eager to try something new. It’s been such a long time now that I couldn’t tell you who wrote the article, or even what it was called. But it made three recommendations that I read immediately: Clown Girl by Monica Drake, Set This House in Order by Matt Ruff (never mind the fact that this wasn’t exactly a small press title), and The Exquisite by Laird Hunt.

I was so impressed by those three titles that I started to change my reading habits, and became quite the small press enthusiast. By late 2007, I’d be enrolled in the MFA program where I met the good people of the Red Hen Press, for whom I work today as managing editor for The Los Angeles Review. I don’t think I’d be editing at all, and certainly not reading and writing in the same way, if I’d not stumbled across that little article in Slate.

Since I came across that list of books, I’ve been looking for similar lists. I want to be absolutely knocked over by books I’ve never heard of before, and might not hear of otherwise. Slate never ran another article of its kind, and over the years, I’ve been sorry to see that many “must-read” lists might be better titled “a bunch of so-so books by friends of the list-maker.”

But this January, when The Millions came out with its list of Most Anticipated books of 2012, I felt as though I’d found that treasure trove of books I’d been looking for. No, they’re not all small press, but they’re not all mega-hyped titles either. Many of them I’d likely not come across in my own bookstore wanderings. I’ve been dutifully making my way through as many of these month-by-month groups of new titles as I can, and haven’t been disappointed yet. Maybe I’m late to the game (it appears that The Millions has been doing such lists for some time), but I’d love to recommend this 2012 list to your attention. I hope you’ll find a book you love, a book that knocks you out. Then come back here and tell me all about it.

I’ve been delightedly working my way through that tower of books and literary journals in the days since returning home. Because I’ve been thinking so much about fiction lately (which is, I suppose, appropriate: I’ve been working through revisions to my novel-in-progress this week), I dove into the novels first.

And then I was very confused.

The novels I’ve read from my pile ‘o AWP books had something in common: a completely buried lead. I was entering the books looking for stories: some narratives that had beginnings, middles, and ends, as well as characters who encountered some kind of conflict and then underwent change. But in the books, the dramatic situations weren’t ever made clear–a character or characters seemed to float from one interaction to another without will, intent, or understandable responses to stimuli. Surreal things happened to characters (for example, aliens showed up, then aliens went away. Naked people descended and ate everyone’s snacks, then disappeared sans comment from the characters) without apparent purpose, the characters then made unrelated remarks, and the author rinsed and repeated the above until the book was simply…over.  Where was the story?

I’m not against experimental approaches to fiction. I’m a fan of many writers–Mark Z. Danielewski and Kazuo Ishiguro on the more commercial front and Laird Hunt and Matt Bell in the small press world, to name just a few–who don’t take the most straightforward approaches to narrative. But all of those writers still tell stories. Satisfying stories that have a shape, a trajectory, a humanity about their characters, and a resonance with the traditional gestures of fiction.

It could be coincidental that I picked up a handful of books that all focused on surreal situations without character arcs or much plot at all, but perhaps there’s a deeper current running through literary fiction today. Is story dead?

Tell me, readers. What’s going on here?

1. The people at the conference this year were, with very few exceptions, very friendly and kind.

1a. I don’t know if the snow storms last year were to blame for the stand-offish attitude at the DC conference, but I will take Chicago any day. I love that Midwestern niceness.

1b. LAR contributors are the best people in the world.

2. I saw fewer beards this year. Are we over the beards at this point?

3. Chicago is not goofing around with that wind. I lost one earring and a hat to the elements.

4. Panels on how to promote your book/zine/site/etc. are played out, friends. Unless you’re completely new to the world of publicity and promotion, you can ignore these panels completely. You’ll do better to walk around the book fair and meet people.

4a. A guy on one publicity panel I attended–and I am not making this up–suggested that the more degrading the publicity approach, the better. Dude told a very detailed story about plaster-casting his own nether regions as a publicity move. I (and quite a few others) stood up and left.

4b. If you plaster-cast your naughty bits, I don’t think we can be friends any longer.

5. I was given more hugs than business cards this year. I think that means I’m doing something right.

5a. Spend time meeting people and making real connections at conferences like these. Knowing people beats networking every time.

6. I was mistaken for Eloise Klein Healy. I felt inexplicably proud.

7. Mark Cull, publisher of Red Hen Press, is the hardest-working man in publishing.

8. I have learned not to have the audacity to be female in the presence of a strange guys with infants, as guys with infants will first hand you their offspring, then walk away while the offspring vomits on your sleeve. True story, friends. I’m still not quite over it.

8a. If you are a stranger, please don’t hand me your baby. Both the baby and I will thank you.

9. I am too old to stay out late.

10. I must be getting very old indeed, because when one guy on a panel was feigning disaffection for the writing world, I wanted to pat him on the head and say “cheer up, little one.”

11. I am incredibly happy to be a writer and a journal editor, and I feel galvanized by the energy of the 9,999 other writers at the conference.

12. We sold out of all the LAR Issue 11s that we brought to Chicago, and went through the bulk of Issues 10, 9, 8, 7, and 6.

12a. Thank you to everyone who became a subscriber! You, our readers, keep us in print and keep indie publishing going strong.

See you next year in Boston!

I and the other editors of The Los Angeles Review will be holding court at Red Hen Press‘s booth in the book fair, and I’m already excited about meeting everyone who comes into Red Hen vortex. But I’m also looking forward to walking the book fair by myself. It’s a good chance to get my head out of our work at LAR and to see all the amazing stuff that’s going on in the small press world.

There’s one big problem with the book fair, though: the fact that you can walk up to a table you’re genuinely interested in, start looking at books, and be stared at so bleakly by a seated, wordless intern–one who’s either hung over or bound by a vow of silence–that you drop the book you had in hand and run for more promising territory. Maybe I watch too many horror films, but anybody sitting on a folding metal chair with a lowered head looks a little too much like the creepy girl from the movie The Ring.

But there are some very bright spots in the book fair–safe havens with friendly people, good books, and plenty of opportunities to have conversations with literary folk:

PANK. I have much love for PANK, who gave me my first publication. Even if I didn’t have eternal gratitude, I’d still recommend that you go by and visit the great group of editors. They’re lively, welcoming, and a general pleasure to meet and great. The new issue of the magazine looks amazing, as well.

Tin House. I’ll be honest: I usually don’t bother going by “big” booths. You know, Mc Sweeney’s, Milkweed, Tin House. You can’t always manage to squeeze in sideways between the writers teeming around their tables, and I’m not much of one for teeming. But last year, when the crowds had thinned near the end of the book fair, I was extremely impressed with the niceness of the Tin House crew (okay, the one guy at the booth when I came by) and walked away with a subscription.

Press 53. A great press, great people, and genuine enthusiasm for innovative, high-quality writing.

Dzanc Books. These people are amazing. With five imprints, two print journals and one online journal, and some truly innovative outreach programs, Dzanc is a press to watch (and, more importantly, to read).

Copper Nickel. Do yourself a favor and buy a copy of this journal. The folks at Copper Nickel put out a consistently impressive journal, and they’re a delightful crew of people.

The Rumpus. A word of caution: don’t go by this table unless you are prepared to buy and lug home a mug, okay? Because you will buy a mug. Oh yes you will.

Fifth Wednesday Journal. FIfth Wednesday doesn’t often travel to AWP, but this Illinois journal is a true labor of love. Vern Miller, the man behind the publication, is one of the nicest, most invested editors I’ve ever had the pleasure to meet. Don’t miss the chance to meet him and pick up a copy of the journal.

Weave Magazine. An independent journal with a lot of heart, Weave is where it’s at for eclectic, diverse, quality writing. Independent publishing is a labor of love, and is evident on every page of this small, smart, energetic journal.

]]> http://kellydavio.com/2012/02/23/kellys-guide-to-the-2012-awp-book-fair/feed/ 5 Kelly Davio http://kellydavio.com/2012/01/25/everything-youve-wanted-to-know-about-using-submishmash-from-this-editors-perspective-that-is/ http://kellydavio.com/2012/01/25/everything-youve-wanted-to-know-about-using-submishmash-from-this-editors-perspective-that-is/#comments Wed, 25 Jan 2012 03:03:26 +0000 Kelly Davio http://kellydavio.com/?p=622 ]]> I’ve always enjoyed reading the Google search terms that direct people to my blog. One of my favorite Google referrals of all time was “trying to contact the version of me who lives on another planet.” I was sorry that my blog would have been of little help for that Google user, but not a little amused that someone out there was researching such an important topic. But at least once per day, I see some permutation of the question “how do I withdraw a piece from Submishmash?” or “what does it mean when my submission’s status is marked In Progress?” in this blog’s search results. If there are that many of you with questions about navigating submission managers, I think it’s time for a little public service announcement about all things Submishmash (a.k.a. Submittable).

First, a disclaimer: this is one lowly editor’s advice about how to understand and approach Submishmash/Submittable. Not all editors are the same in the ways they run their publications; while I am trying to give the most broad advice possible, I can’t speak for everyone in publishing. I also do not have complete and unending knowledge about the intricacies of Submishmash, as I do not work for them.

Okay. Are we good? Let’s talk about those little status indicators you see to the right of your submissions list. When you first send your work, you’ll see the stats marked at “received.” A submission marked received is simply one that has made its way through the submission process unscathed. Depending upon the editor’s Submishmash preferences, she may have received an email alerting her that you’ve submitted work. This status is the equivalent of an envelope’s having arrived in an editor’s mailbox; nobody’s opened the envelope yet, but your work has arrived safely.

“In Progress” is the next stage of a submission’s life cycle. As soon as an editor does something–anything–with your submission, your work is marked “in progress.” The editor may not have even opened your work yet–she may have only assigned it to a first reader. Or, perhaps she’s read your work thoroughly. She may have voted (yes, there’s a voting feature in Submishmash; editors can give your work a “yes,” a “no,” or a “maybe” vote as they read) or made notes to other readers about her thoughts on your work. The reading process can take quite a while, and there is no way for you to divine just how much progress your “in progress” submission has made, or how readers have voted on your work. Try not to read too much into this stage of the process. Patience, friends.

Once the editor has made a firm decision about your work, she will use Submishmash’s internal tool to generate either a letter of acceptance or a letter of rejection that Submishmash emails to you immediately. If you see your work marked with the bright green label “accepted” or the red label “declined,” a letter should be awaiting you in your email inbox.

There’s one more status you might see in Submishmash, and that’s “Withdrawn.” Let’s talk about withdrawing work.

There are two good reasons to withdraw work. One is that your material has been accepted elsewhere. If you get an acceptance from a venue, you should immediately withdraw your work from every other editor who’s considering it. The other is that you have realized this piece is horrific, that you have sent it out undercooked, and that you would rather die than have it viewed by the reading public. Hey, it happens. If these events transpire, you should click on the submission’s title in Submishmash to open the view of your file, then click the “Withdraw” link and type in your reason for having withdrawn work. If your writing was accepted elsewhere, it’s nice to tell the editor which publication will be printing it. It’s interesting for us to know, and we’ll be happy for you. If you’ve realized your work is undercooked, you don’t need to say anything at all.

Poetry presents a tricky problem when it comes to withdrawing work. Most journals ask writers to submit multiple poems in one submission file. If one poem among five is picked up for publication elsewhere, then what? When it comes to The Los Angeles Review, I prefer that writers send an email to me to say that work has been accepted elsewhere. I can then put a note in the submission that the reader should disregard the poem that’s no longer under consideration. If you withdraw the entire file, it’s possible that the editor could simply archive your entire submission (archiving submissions removes them from the editor’s view pretty much for good–the archive is a deep and spooky territory much like Limbo) as she would a rejected piece, and you may never see a response notice. Check individual publications’ guidelines before deciding how to withdraw a single poem from among many, but in general, email is your best bet.

It’s worth noting that when you use the withdraw link in Submishmash, the editor of the publication gets an email alerting her of your action. Bear in mind that if you’re a chronic withdawer of submissions, those emails are going to get a little old. The reality of the withdrawal email should also tell you that, once a piece is under consideration, it is not, I repeat, not the time to tinker with and revise your work. In the last submission cycle for LAR, I had a gentleman submit work, withdraw it immediately (I later learned he was revising it each time), then submit it again. He did this up to three times every day for over one week. At first, I thought he was attempting to be rude or to make some sort of bizarre statement with this behavior. Eventually, I emailed him and asked what on earth he was trying to do, and telling him that I’d had enough. He was chagrined to learn that we were alerted to every withdrawal and resubmission, and I was chagrined to learn that he wasn’t trying to be a jerk, as I’d thought, but just had the worst publication strategy of all time. Learn from this comedy of errors, friends.

I hope this public service announcement has been of help, writers. Go forth and submit well, often, and with, I hope, much success.

Let’s get the elephant in the room taken care of first: The Marriage Plot may just as well have been called Jonathan Franzen’s Plot. Eugenides essentially reconstructed Franzen’s Freedom–college-aged kid are all sleeping with one another, but they want to be sleeping with different people. None of the sleeping with turns out to be very satisfactory, and everyone is having crises about this sleeping-with situation. That’s all. Eugenides does toss in a little lightweight literary theory and cuts out the saggy middle-aged bits that Franzen includes, but we’re looking as the same, fundamental book.

But whereas there are authors–like Franzen–who put their characters through grave trouble and suffering of all kinds, then allow the characters to escape, grow, and triumph in some small way, there are also authors–like Eugenides–who put their characters through troubles, and then proceed to mock them; not only is The Marriage Plot a low-calorie version of Freedom, it’s also pretty snide.

In a plot about college kids outgrowing school life and moving toward adulthood, we can, and perhaps should, expect that hindsight will make both author and reader cringe a bit at the characters’ (and, by proxy, our own) childish antics. But for many who were lucky enough to attend college, the experience still holds a bit of sweetness. An honest rendering of the collegiate experience should, I believe, tread the line between recognizing silliness without wagging a withered finger at it. Julien Barnes’s The Sense of an Ending treats this same subject matter with remarkable maturity and grace, but Eugenides seems to sneer and leer and guffaw at young people’s lives in a way that seems tantamount to mocking an infant because it doesn’t yet know how to eat spaghetti. That kind of writing doesn’t enlighten us much about the subject scorned, nor does it say much for the humanity of the one doing the scorning.

However unwise the choice, Eugenides seems to openly loathe his characters. It’s not just that he puts difficulty in their way, as any good writers should, but that he seems to truly dislike them on a fundamental level. Of the three main characters, female lead Madeline gets the worst of Eugenides’s down-the-nose look. Her life path seems about as robust as that of Bella Swan of Twilight; Eugenides gives us a character who doesn’t think herself very bright or capable, relies heavily on a male characters to give her a sense of worth, and throws away her future to spend time with a boyfriend who’s a drain on her in every sense. Eugenides tells us that she smells bad. He tells us that she’s unintelligent. He tells us that she only has professional opportunities because of her father’s connections. And Eugenides seems to suggest a pathetic life of tying herself to unworthy boys is the best that Madeline deserves as a rich child of privilege who goes around calling her mother “mummy.”

Then there’s Leonard, a bipolar scientist. Leonard fares a bit better than Madeline on the scorn quotient, but Eugenides appears to take a great deal of pleasure in detailing Leonard’s dysfunctional childhood, manic break, and subsequent battle with lithium (rather than with his bipolar disorder). Poor Leonard is doomed to fail, apparently, because of his mental illness. It would probably come as a surprise to a lot of folks who suffer from bipolar disorder that they will never have healthy human relationships or be able to hold down jobs, but that’s the picture Eugenides paints for our man Leonard.

The only character Eugenides seems to hold any kindness for is the one who’s a thinly veiled version of himself–the Greek-American kid from Detroit who briefly considers a career in religious studies. This poor knucklehead, Mitchell, goes about the business of loving the unworthy Madeline from a distance, even from India where he serves in Mother Theresa’s home for the dying and destitute, where he is apparently so deep and complicated that he’s unable to help with any tasks more involved than the pushing of the medicine cart (and then going off to drink a weed smoothie). Eugenides is nicer to Mitchell than he is to anyone else; even though he may not get the girl in the end, he at least, unlike the other characters in the book, is allowed some personal agency and some freedom from cliched tropes of the rich girl or the handsome madman.

Add quite a few pointless, sweeping loops of backstory and some fairly inelegant expression throughout, and this book begins to seem more like an unfortunate draft than the great American novel. With so many chattering enthusiastically about this book, I’d really like someone to explain this to me: is this really the direction we’re going in literary fiction? If so, I think I want off this bus.

I was chatting with one such guy–who I’m fairly sure ended up a local Republican politician somewhere in Kansas or Iowa–one morning before a lecture we were about to hear on medieval monasticism. He told me that he had entertained the idea of becoming a monk, but sighed and said that “the monastery just isn’t what it used to be. It’s so service-oriented these days.” I had to chuckle. Of course, my KansIowan classmate wouldn’t be any Abelard, able to keep a lovely lady on hand in the back room while he philosophized the day away. He would have to work with the poor, with the indigent, with the sick. Not what it used to be indeed.

But if I’m honest, I’d have to admit that I too had had a fascination with cloistered life. In fact, I think many of the young women with whom I grew up in a highly religious community felt, at one time or another, that if there were some sort of Protestant version of nuns, we’d sign ourselves up. While I no longer align myself with any religious group, I still understand the draw of that sense of purpose, of contemplation, of service, and of love. Of a radical commitment to an ideal rather than to the proscriptive path of marriage and family.

It was with that sense of fascination with the cloistered life that I found Mary Johnson’s new memoir, An Unquenchable Thirst. While I’m not generally a great reader of memoir, I practically gorged myself on this book. Johnson tells a fascinating story of growing from a young college student into a novice, a postulant, an avowed sister in the Missionaries of Charity–the order of nuns founded by Mother Theresa.

Johnson manages a nearly impossible feat in her book: balancing the incredible amount of detail and background information a reader will need to understand the nuances of the Catholic church and the lives of “the religious” (as avowed members of Catholic orders are called) with her own poignant life story of struggle, commitment, and growth. The particulars of life as a Missionary of Charity and as a Catholic nun would have made my classmate squirm–the MCs are committed to living under the same conditions as the poorest of the poor. For Johnson, this means bathing in buckets, foregoing necessary medical care, wearing the same sari until it is so full of holes that it cannot be mended. It’s a study in squalor that aims to bring the nuns closer to God and to the poor as they distance themselves from physical concerns.

Added to the nuns’ poverty are are the disciplines of self-flagellation (I, for one, thought the practice had largely died out in the dark ages, and was stunned to learn that there are still quite a number of young nuns whipping themselves across the legs as a method of penance for their own and others’ sins), total and unquestioning obedience to the dubious demands of superiors, and a complete lack of interpersonal physical contact and affection (at least in theory–the several romantic and sexual subplots in this memoir made me rethink my notion of what goes on behind the cloister’s walls).

But aside from the stark, frightening, and even scandalous details of religious life, Johnson tells a tale that is universal in its appeal and message. As she struggles to reconcile her belief in God’s love with the dominating personalities, pedantic attitudes, and seemingly needless austerities in her order, Johnson begins to question at what point a commitment to an ideal becomes a lost cause, at what point obedience becomes enabling of unhealthy power structures, and at what point selflessness becomes self-destructive.

These questions hit home for me as a reader–as I suspect they have for many others–though I have very few points of commonality with Johnson in terms of my life’s path. If we’re lucky people, we have what we feel are callings in our lives. We feel we’re supposed to climb the unending mountain toward being successful in our chosen pursuits, toward being good spouses or good parents. Good friends or good role models. But there are, this book seems to suggest, inevitable points at which we must look at our paths, make a brutally honest assessment about why we’re doing what we’re doing, and then find the resolve to change if we cannot live with what we find.

Find Mary Johnson’s An Unquenchable Thirst here. 

]]> http://kellydavio.com/2012/01/09/what-im-reading-mary-johnsons-an-unquenchable-thirst/feed/ 2 Kelly Davio 9780385527477 http://kellydavio.com/2012/01/02/lets-talk-about-books/ http://kellydavio.com/2012/01/02/lets-talk-about-books/#comments Mon, 02 Jan 2012 19:24:18 +0000 Kelly Davio http://kellydavio.com/?p=613 ]]> I’ve been thinking lately about how much time I and other writer-types spend yakking away about our writing and about our industry. Of course, we spend a huge amount of time working on our books and trying to bring them to market, so it makes sense that we would want to talk shop now and then. The problem, though, is that it sometimes seems that writers and readers exist as different species: one creates the work with a great deal of fanfare and bloggery, and then the nameless, faceless other devours it in some dark corner of the universe. But when we writers are doing our jobs properly, we’re also readers. Big readers. I’m a firm believer that a writer who doesn’t spend at least as much time reading as scribbling isn’t serious about the work. If you want to make good books, you have to experience books.

In 2012, then, I’m planning to talk more about what I’m reading–to look at the publishing world from the other side of the fence. That’s not to say I’m going to quit documenting the thrilling–okay, maybe only thrilling to me–world of managing a literary magazine, or giving some helpful writing world hints (according to my search statistics on this blog, a lot of you have questions about Submishmash! I’m planning some future blog pieces to help you out). But I think it’d be nice to strike a balance between looking at the world as a producer and as a receiver of books.

If you’d like to join me in the endeavor of talking about and engaging others in the books you read, here are some great resources for getting started with cataloguing and reviewing your reads:

Library Thing (www.librarything.com)–this is a simple, easy to use tool that helps readers catalogue their books online, find other readers with common interests, and receive recommendations based on readerly interests.

Goodreads (www.goodreads.com)–a social media website for book lovers, Goodreads allows users to rate and review books, to track their reading progress, and event to interact with their favorite authors (a recent live streaming interview with Jennifer Egan really sold me on the Goodreads experience!).

Shelfari (www.shelfari.com)–this site describes itself as a community-powered encyclopedia for book lovers. While readers can create virtual bookshelves here as they would on Library Thing or Goodreads, Shelfari also allows users to create “book extras,” from character descriptions to lists of book factoids. (Fair warning: Shelfari is an Amazon.com creation, so those who prefer less corporate options for virtual bookshelves will likely be better served by Goodreads or Library Thing.)