Books

A Cat Called Magic

2011-12-13T12:14:00.000-08:00

This is the photo my brother-in-law sent.

This is my impressionistic version.

And this is the sort of woodblock version.

And this is their other cat, the magic carpet cat.

Anxious About What?

2011-12-02T10:11:00.000-08:00

Here are last week's covers from Time magazine. What's going on? Do the editors think Americans are too self-involved to care about Egypt?

And then there are this week's covers: Europe (Putin cover), Asia and the South Pacific can think outside their boxes, but again, we're all nervous about us.

School Lunchroom Palette

2011-11-30T11:58:00.000-08:00

There was something about this utterly dead tree that I pass every day, something familiar. Today, I got it: it contains the colors of a school lunchroom. Trays, walls, tables, chairs or benches, even the food.

Aspirin for Fungal Infections

2011-11-29T07:50:00.000-08:00

I'm laughing at myself for posting a blog with such an unsavory title --- but I love discovering, and disseminating, this kind of information.

So, I was talking to my daughter on Skype the other day, and she was experiencing a little breakout due to some food allergy. To tone it down, she moistened a bit of Benadryl and rubbed it on her skin. I thought that was pretty clever --- and yes, she is my clever med-student daughter --- but that was nothing to what she said next: that aspirin, applied topically, cures and prevents fungal infections. Imagine! Not, of course, that any of us have those. But just in case, sprinkle a little aspirin in your shoes.

Casual Copping

2011-11-23T06:23:00.000-08:00

From Salon.

Keith Richards

2011-11-09T05:36:00.000-08:00

Have you read this? It's totally wonderful.

(I hope Mr Richards acknowledged co-author James Fox last night when he accepted the award. You can't help but admire the job he did, cutting and pasting all the pieces of monologue together, to create this truly marvelous narration of a life.)

Photo from last night's Norman Mailer Center Awards Gala.

Autumn Palette

2011-10-31T14:21:00.000-07:00

A mulberry tree with lichen and grape. Lovely.

Wild Grape Jelly

2011-10-24T06:10:00.001-07:00

It's time to harvest wild grapes. You can find them coast to coast. Look along country roads, the leaves can be brightly chartreuse-colored now, and where the vines have been able to climb into a tree or along a wall, you'll find fruit.

Don't worry about picking the grapes clean of their stems, just fill your bags. A heaping two-quarts will make four cups of juice, or two cups of jelly.

At home, rinse them well and pile the grapes, stems and all, into a heavy two-quart pot. Add a cup of water, cover, and turn on the heat to medium-high. Once you hear the water boil, turn the heat down to medium-low.

After about five minutes, get out your potato masher and squash the grapes. Add more water if it looks dryish. Repeat this until it looks like you've got two things in your pot: juice and pulp.

Place a colander inside a large bowl and put both of those in your sink. Strain the cooked grape juice through the colander. If you've cooked long enough, you shouldn't have to do much if any mashing at this point. Toss the pulp out behind a bush in the backyard and wash your pot.

Now, you'll need to measure. For every cup of juice, you'll need 3/4 cup sugar. Don't add the sugar yet, though. And don't cook more than 6 cups of juice at a time. Four is best, particularly in a 2-quart pot.

Place the strained juice back on the stove and turn the heat to medium-high. When it boils, turn it down to medium, keeping the boil on for 5 minutes.

After 5 minutes, add in the sugar, stirring until it dissolves and no more.

Allow to boil again. This time it's going to start bubbling up -- which is the reason you don't want more than 4 cups in a 2-quart pot. After 5 minutes, check its thickness with the old Joy Of Cooking spoon test:

Dip a stirring spoon into the pot, just to coat it. Cool a bit by blowing, then tilt the spoon so that the liquid slowly pours back into the pot. If it runs right in, it's not ready. If it forms two drips that do not meet as they leave the spoon, it's still not ready. When the two drips meet and leave together, it's done.

Pour the hot jelly into a prepared jar. Best to use a funnel -- this stuff makes real stains. No need to sterilize if you're just putting up a jar or two, but keep the jars in the fridge.

The jelly won't last long anyway. It's the most amazing stuff: sweet, musky, tart, fruity, earthy. Very, very complex. Your wine tongue will love it, and so will your kids.

It Rained All Night, and in the Morning

2011-10-17T06:17:00.000-07:00

You Make Me Sick

2011-10-14T09:31:00.000-07:00

An Expression of Our Culture

Updated October 13, 2011, 02:23 PM

Ethan Watters is the author of "Crazy Like Us: The Globalization of the American Psyche."

It is curious how easy it is to see the cultural shaping of transient mental disorders in the rear view mirror. From a historical distance we can clearly see the cultural currents that gave rise to the epidemic of hysteria in the late 1800s and early 1900s — the confluence of in-vogue theories about the nervous system combined with fanciful assumptions about the physiology and sexuality of women.

What the history of psychiatry tells us is this: Mental illnesses are not spread evenly among populations over time but come and go as unique and deeply complicated combinations of culture and biology. Which symptoms we collectively see as legitimate determines how we individually express internal feelings and unease. Psychiatric historians suggest that every generation has a “symptom pool,” behaviors by which individuals can communicate their distress.

Mental illnesses come and go as unique and deeply complicated combinations of culture and biology. But they are "real" nonetheless.

The really mind-bending fact — the one that Americans can rarely seem to grasp — is that just because these disorders are culturally shaped does not make them necessarily less real. Those Victorian-era women really did faint and experience the paralysis, tics and fainting spells found in their symptom pool. Their unconscious learned, in short, to speak the language of suffering for their time.

In certain historical moments, a given diagnosis will hit such a resonant cultural note that it catches fire. This, I believe, is the story of A.D.H.D. Parents, teachers and mental health healers are critical parts of a feedback loop by which a child unconsciously apprehends their symptom pool. This is not to lay blame at anyone’s doorstep — a similar dynamic is in play with all mental illnesses. We won’t fully understand these illnesses until we add this knowledge to the mix, but that new understanding won’t magically make the disorders disappear.

Unfortunately, the debate about the “realness” or universality of a disorder like A.D.H.D. often distracts from a discussion of what might have given rise to the need for so many children to express distress. The underlying disquiet in the children of our time is more important than the symptom cluster that we declare as legitimate.

What are the currents in our time that might be causing an upwelling of psychopathology? With a nod to the work of Sami Timimi from Lincoln University, here’s a short list: There’s a particularly Western style of anxious parenting with high expectations for achievement and assumptions that sex differences should be meaningless in terms of behavior. There is the juxtaposition of traditional school activities with the modern tsunami of flickering electronic distractions. There is the virtual demise of the extended family and connections to deeply rooted communities. There’s the rise of diets with increasing levels of sugar, fats and salts. There is the decline in exercise and the domestication — the penning — of children in ever smaller and more elaborately padded artificial environments. I could go on.

It should be no surprise that American children would have an upwelling of psychopathology and their own symptom pool to dive into.

If You Sit in Your Chair and Do as You're Told, You Never Grow Up to Imagine This

2011-10-13T11:21:00.000-07:00

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10150293374142540

The Art of Selling Books

2011-10-12T10:37:00.000-07:00

Slapping a table full of the latest so-called bestsellers ain't going to cut it anymore. People have CHOICES. Here's what Penguin Group ceo John Makinson just said at the Frankfurt Book Fair:

"Buying in a bookshop is an economically irrational thing to do, so you have to persuade people to do the irrational."

This morning a raven circled the field, then flew into one of those tress.

2011-10-06T07:59:00.000-07:00

Prohibition and Marijuana

2011-10-05T08:49:00.000-07:00

We've been watching the Ken Burns series, and my 16-year-old commented yesterday that toxic Prohibition is alive and well in the halls of TC Central High School. Marijuana is illegal, so the kids are buying something called Spice -- a spray-on synthetic high. What is it? Who knows. But anyone over 18 can purchase.

Calle 13 - Latinoamerica

2011-10-03T09:25:00.000-07:00

Cuevana.com

2011-09-30T06:04:00.000-07:00

My family in Mexico uses this site for watching American and British TV shows. It works up here too, and it streams, so no illegal downloading.

Squirrel Mind Is Not Monkey Mind

2011-09-28T10:28:00.000-07:00

Walking on the edge of the woods this morning, the sounds of heavy objects crashing through leaves and limbs caught our attention. It was unusual enough that Bella, the 5-pound poodle, barked. We paused to investigate. The noise was coming from a large black walnut. After a minute or so, I found the source. A tiny red squirrel was chewing nut stems: one nut after another plummeting 100 feet to the ground. Recently I read in Willpower that chimpanzees are incapable of planning ahead: when consistently fed only once a day, even when offered huge amounts of food, they never hoard. This dinky-brained squirrel, however, obviously had a long-term project on its mind and was implementing it on a grand scale. I wonder if he/she had a partner on the ground?

Crows Eating Apples

2011-09-27T15:38:00.000-07:00

Cleveland Township Speaks to the Undead

2011-09-26T13:16:00.000-07:00

These are stone slabs, about chest high. They're in the back of a little cemetery in Leelanau county, MI.

Old Mission Lighthouse

2011-09-25T10:07:00.000-07:00

Lake Michigan has been losing water for about 15 years now, and the temptation for tourists to make their marks is irresistible.

Some mystery flowers at the beach this morning. Like, what is this? I've looked in my books and can't figure it out.

I don't know what this is either.

I thought this was loosestrife... but not ragged enough.

I'm pretty sure this is toadflax.

And the asters are in full bloom.

As is the goldenrod -- all the different kinds.

My mother's 5-pound poodle poses as Bella the Brave.

Shop Talk #1: Only One Customer at a Time

2011-01-18T07:30:00.000-08:00

There are two different kinds of shopping venues most of us visit on a daily basis.

The first is the bricks-and-mortar store, where real people stock physical items that you can pick up, put in your cart, and check out with a real person.

The second is the virtual experience, otherwise known as shopping online.

I'm sure you know all there is to know about shopping online: you browse, compare prices, read reviews, and make a selection. You can at the same time wear pajamas, spill coffee, and watch TV. In other words, the kind of experience you have is totally up to your mood and ambition. No one's pushing things over a dressing room door, no one's glaring at your tattoo.

Big box stores blur the line between real and virtual -- but most people buy gas, a sandwich, coffee, etc. most days from a real, live, standing-in-front-of-you person, and it's this experience I want to talk about.

I want to talk about it because, let's face it, if the customer wants cheap, she'll go big box or online.

But the customer may also decide to go big box or online because the service is indifferent at her local stores.

Take bookstores for an example. I can get any book I want at Amazon and I can get it cheaper than at my local stores -- and that includes Borders. So why go to my local stores? Because I'm interested to see what bookish people have selected as interesting reads, because I'd like a recommendation, because I want to hang out with readers, because I want to browse real books that I can open and leaf through.

(The idea that one should shop locally -- an idea strident amongst independent booksellers -- may appear virtuous in their argument, but is nothing if not self-interested. Besides, how many people do anything because they “should”? I mean, if no one’s watching. People do things because they want to, and if their wants also happen to fall under “duty” or “localism” or “patriotism,” so much the better.)

So, all you storekeepers out there -- and this includes hair salons, cafes and doctor’s offices, any place where something is for sale -- accentuate the one thing that makes you different from the big box or the Web. Make your customer service personal and undivided.

And here’s that Rule #1:

Do not ever talk on the phone while a flesh and blood customer is standing in front of you. Even if you’re just checking someone out after having given them outstanding service choosing a product, do not talk on the phone. It’s a horrible insult to both the real life customer’s ego and her pocketbook.

If the phone rings, answer it and ask them to hold as you’re with a customer. This will make the real life customer feel special, and it will alert the phone customer that this store gives its undivided attention. Everyone wins.

TABLE MANNERS

2011-01-14T10:35:00.000-08:00

There’s nothing that seems less important to kids than table manners.

I remember going over to eat comida at Joan and Barry Norris’ house above Na Bolom in San Cristóbal. Joan and Barry had adopted a young Lancandon boy, and then, a bit later, brought the boy’s older brother also into their home. We all sat down at the large dining table where spaghetti was the main course. Joan was on edge, hardly able to take her eyes off the boys. At last she confessed that she’d delivered an ultimatum that day: that the boys must use silverware. Apparently, up until then they’d been eating everything with their fingers. Seemed hilarious, the idea of eating spaghetti with your hands. I would have enjoyed seeing it done.

In our house, besides the eternal reminders of “put your napkin in your lap”, the issue was the proper way to hold a fork. For some reason, my kids felt that they needed to grasp it like a hammer, not like a pencil. Come to think of it, I wonder if forced chopstick use would have solved the problem.

And why is it a problem?

My mother always used to say, “You never know when you might be invited to dinner with the queen.” Not very convincing advice, I’m afraid, as in this age you might as well have posited dinner with an ogre. Rather more helpful was her other adage, “Always wear clean underwear in case you get in an accident and have to go to the hospital.” Now that’s scary. And way more down to earth than “Say your prayers or you’ll go to hell.”

But they all have the same intent, I think, which is limiting the unpleasant sounds, sights, smells, and actions that naturally arise when people crowd together.

Unfortunately, kids are generally unconcerned with unpleasant sounds, sights, smells, etc. — in fact, they generally relish them. Fortunately, kids grow up, and in their teens and early twenties can become quite sensitive to the noxious byproducts of crowding. Ah, a teaching moment!

Take bad humor, for example. As far as I’m concerned, bad humor is bad manners. If you’re tetchy, prickly, sullen and/or complaining and there are four of you sitting in a back seat that only holds three, things can get unpleasant fast. Your bad humor quickly spreads and infects, producing symptoms of tension from obnoxious goofiness to thunderbolts of anger.

When you think of a life well lived, the tendency is to consider large actions: starting a successful company, donating a fortune, acquiring fame. The truth is that few of us will be given these grandiose opportunities for recognition, yet all of us have the means to live well every day by stinking a little less, making slightly less noise, grinding our bad humor, a bit less frequently, into the faces of our neighbors. For most of us, these little things, these common and anonymous courtesies are all we have to give to one another, and all that others have to give back to us.

But, while kids are little I don’t see any point in making dinnertimes hell in order to teach peace. Make your own peace, make a special peace with your spouse, and the kids will follow. Gentle reminders and setting a good example will manage the trick without bullying or tears. If you behave well, so will your kids … eventually.

I’ve been struggling with the term “spouse” in that last paragraph. I type in “partner,” take it out, put in “spouse,” …. When I was finishing up Write, Memory, I struggled with the same problem. One? Both? Always? It’s a mixed bag in casual social life as well. Sometimes “spouse,” sometimes “partner,” depending on the company.

Why do I care if one size doesn’t fit all or if others are informed whether I’m legally espoused? Is it that issue of courtesy again? Do I feel that some readers of Write, Memory will feel left out, discouraged, insulted, if I don’t include the proper term for their relationship? Do I feel that acknowledgment of my relationship status would be uncomfortable to some people?

Well, sure, on both counts. But, deep down, I’ve got to admit that those nice sentiments are also a cover for self-love, and as La Rochefoucauld says (La R. always comes first when I think of self-love), “Self-love is the greatest of flatterers.” Not to mention, “Self love is more cunning than the most cunning man in the world.” In both cases above, truthfully, I am attempting to forestall abandonment. “Like me, don’t leave me. See, I’m like you.” Truthfully, in the case of Write, Memory, I try to please everyone because I want to sell books. In the second, truthfully, I please because I don’t want to go to the trouble of explaining myself. In both cases, I’m pretending to be interested in the feelings/beliefs of others when the motivation is clearly other.

But is this so very different from closing your mouth when you chew? In other words, does food taste better with your mouth closed? Does it stay warmer or cooler? No, of course not. I eat with my mouth closed because I want you to eat with your mouth closed: I don’t want to see the results of that bite of spaghetti sloshing around between your cheeks. I don’t, honestly, eat with my mouth closed (or lie about my relationship status) because I care what you think about me or how I eat, I do it because it makes eating (and dealing with strangers) more comfortable for me. Courtesy is a little gift I give myself.

Let’s get back to kids and setting examples. Take, for example, the volcanic temper eruptions over clean bedrooms.

Forget about it. Hold your nose. Shut the door. It isn't your space. (That is, unless you consider children vassals. If that’s the case, congratulations for looking at another point of view, mine.)

Besides, what kind of example are you setting with all the harping, threatening, stomping, and slamming? Do your kids get on your back about how you choose to decorate the living room? Do they open your closet doors and shriek about the state of your sweaters? Of course not. They couldn't care less. You should extend the same carelessness to them.

(By the way, I am not in any sense advocating for carelessness in the attention you apportion your kids. I’m just thinking about the best way to apply that attention.)

All you need to do, the only action that you'll ever need to take to ensure that your kids grow into tidy, filth-opposed adults, is to keep your part of the house clean. Really. It has to do with nostalgia.

The sweet truth is that most kids eventually move out of their parents' homes. And then, in a year, or two — more for the bullied children — they'll miss it. They can't help it. The home they left is also the childhood they left, and there's usually something about childhood that is sorely missed in adulthood. Mix a feeling of lost security with a clean kitchen and voilá, you've got a grownup who will clean counters.

On the same but dissonant note, children who grow up with dirty kitchens, scummy sinks, and a dinner table set with tension will have a hard time overcoming the mess and stress links to their childhood. Of course, you know it can be done, it’s seen all the time, but it requires an enormous denial of nostalgia. And while some nostalgia can be paralyzing, the sweet memories of childhood are not among them. So, if you want organized adult children, then clean up your cupboards. If you want your adult children to pick up their rooms, then pick yours up. If you want sociability at the dinner table, then make it a way of life, every night, for now and forever.

Dogs and Humans

2011-01-05T07:25:00.000-08:00

What do you think? Did dogs learn this gesture for comprehension from us, or did we learn it from them?

iPad Portrait, Brushes app

2011-01-04T10:23:00.000-08:00

Tajín.

iPad and Brushes Portraits

2011-01-02T09:57:00.000-08:00

From Mexico.

iPad Portraits

2010-12-17T06:06:00.000-08:00

I'm having the best time with the Brushes app on the iPad. I thought I'd make these portraits into notebooks/journals and give as gifts. This one is of my niece, Jennifer.

Another niece, Noah.

And her sister Paulina. In about ten years.

And my daughter, looking rather Barbie.

And now for the men. Here are Taj --

and Duncan --

Don't forget the dogs, Bella and Clovis.

Chiles Rellenos

2010-10-03T13:30:00.001-07:00

We bought a bunch of poblano chiles at the farmer's market the other day, and on Friday night, I started hunting around for a recipe. Both of my Mexican cookbooks came up with nada (I don't have any Kennedy), and a search at Epicurious resulted in three awful-sounding, gooey cheese casseroles -- as in baked. Having lived for years in Mexico, I can't say I've ever met a baked chile relleno. We had a girl, Petrona, who cooked for us, and every once in awhile she'd make the dish, but it was occasional and special because it was time-consuming. I'd always meant to learn how to do it, but it never happened.

So, thwarted by English language recipes, I try Googling in Spanish. Right away, I found this one at enfemenino.com. It worked perfectly and I'm passing it on. Delicious, rich, picante. Serve the chiles with rice.

Ingredients:

6 chiles poblanos
several slices of a good, strong cheese -- manchego is what's commonly used in Mexico, I actually used a horseradish cheddar
3 eggs, separated
1 cup flour in a bowl slightly larger than your largest chile
oil for frying
one small onion
2 garlic cloves, minced
5 large ripe tomatoes, blended, or 2 cups crushed canned tomatoes
1 tablespoon broth
salt and pepper
cilantro

1/ Boil a medium pot of salted water. Place the chiles in the water and boil until softened. (This should happen in about 3 minutes. To see if the chiles are done, remove one from the water. If the fruit collapses a bit, then it's ready.) (In Mexico, Petrona always fried the chiles on a comal -- a flat pan, no oil. When the skin bubbled, then they were soft enough to use. I think the boiling method works just as well.)

2/ Make an opening in each chile just below the stem. Slice to the end and carefully pull the edges apart. Try to keep the stem section whole as it will make closing the chile back up easier. Petrona always said that it was the whitish veins inside the chile that made the flesh hot. I don't know if this is true or not, but I always take it out. Also remove any seeds.

Do this with all the chiles.

3/ Then, place three or four slices of cheese inside the chile. Wrap the sides back over and pin with toothpicks.

4/ Heat oil over medium in a large fry pan. You'll want about half an inch of oil in the pan.

5/ Beat the egg whites until medium stiff.

6/ Make sure the outsides of your chiles are nice and dry. Roll a chile in the egg white until thoroughly coated, then roll the chile in the flour. Set aside. Repeat with all the chiles.

7/ Now, add the yolks to whatever you have left of the egg whites and mix. Once again, roll each of the chiles in this mixture. Place each chile immediately in the hot oil. (If you can't fit all the chiles in one pan, then repeat steps 5-7 for each group.) Fry the chiles on each side until golden brown. Remove from the pan.

8/ Empty out all but 1 tablespoon of the oil. Return to medium heat and add the onion and garlic. When fragrant, add the tomatoes and broth. (Here, you can really add whatever you like. I threw in some mushrooms because I had them around.) When the mixture boils, season, then add the chiles back in. There shouldn't be so much sauce as to cover the chiles completely. The sauce should come about halfway up the sides. Allow the chiles to cook in the sauce until everything's nice and hot and smells good. Really, you can leave them there to simmer for as long as you like, or until the rice is ready. Don't turn the chiles over.

Just before serving, add the cilantro. And watch out for those toothpicks.

Menu Collages

2010-09-21T08:20:00.000-07:00

I was asked to put together a menu design for a restaurant in Mexico recently. Actually, it was the second time I'd designed their menu, the first time way back in 1990 or so -- back in the days when we used to hand-letter and draw with those awful refillable pens.

The restaurant's name is Madre Tierra, and its clientele mostly consists of weary tourists in search of "normal" comfort food, like brown rice, meltable cheese, and home baked bread. My idea was to make each page of the menu a graphic mix of the Mexican and the foreign — a Mother Earth collage.

The restaurant's owner decided that he only wanted Mexico to shine on Mother Earth, so these collages didn't get used. Still, I had fun doing them and thought they were interesting. You can see the finals over at Print and Publish.

Stuff We Use: FlameAwake

2010-09-05T09:11:00.000-07:00

Since the iPad came out, I don't use my phone for as many things as I used to, but FlameAwake is one app that is only useful on the iPhone. I know, we could light a real candle, but I've gotten sensitive in my old age to scent and air quality. Maybe it's a little leftover paranoia from raising typically pyromaniacal teenagers. At any rate, I just don't have many candles around anymore, but there are plenty of times when I'd like the little light. A few months ago, lying in bed, I mused, "There must be an app for that." There is. The light it casts isn't golden, but it looks just right and flickers like a real flame. Place the phone upright in a small plate stand and, voilá, instant atmosphere. A great gift app for romantics and pyros of all ages.

Don't Buy Books at Bookstores

2010-08-24T07:38:00.000-07:00

Dang! Did you see this in today's Green Lantern at Slate?

If you're not ready to plunk down $139 for a Kindle or $499 for an iPad, or you just love the feel of dead tree between your fingers, there's one thing you can do to significantly ease the environmental impact of your reading: Buy your books online. Brick-and-mortar bookstores are horribly inefficient because they stock way more books than they can sell. Between one-quarter and one-third of a bookstore's volumes will ultimately be shipped back to the publisher and on to recycling centers or landfills. The carbon footprint of the average book purchased in a bookstore tops 15 kg of CO₂ equivalents, more than twice the overall average for books.

Oh, and e-readers are better for the environment than dead tree books as well.

Restrepo

2010-08-03T07:32:00.000-07:00

All is forgiven at the TCFF by the screening of Restrepo, a documentary by Tim Hetherington and Sebastian Junger. The film covers a platoon's 15-month deployment to Nuristan, a province in northeastern Afghanistan. The action is spliced with close-up interviews done in Italy after the tour.

In a welcome retreat from the typical in-your-face documentary polemic, Hetherington and Junger let the deeds and characters speak for themselves. For example, discussing the deployment early in the film, the platoon's caption says that he didn't read anything about the area before going; he didn't want to read anything about the area because he wanted "to keep an open mind."

Go ahead and agree with Captain Empty Head if you think ignorance is good foreign policy. (He might have found intriguing the fact that Nuristan was called Kafiristan as recently as 1896. After the kafirs -- infidels -- were forcibly converted to Islam, the area's name became nur, or "light." On neither naming were the locals consulted. And 1896 might as well be yesterday in Afghan-time.) In fact, you can agree with every bad Big Army decision witnessed in this film if you like, because Junger and Hetherington aren't going to argue with you. Not even when the only unsolicited contact made with the locals is spurned over the value of a cow. C'mon Big Army -- what's $500 for a cow and a little reciprocity? Heck, these guys have spent months training their guns on a collaborator village, shooting at an enemy they never see, we never see, no one ever sees. The only casualties the soldiers ever examine are those of the women and children who get caught in the crossfire. The only men around town are old or dotty.

But, like I said, Restrepo's conclusions are yours to draw. Although, it was McCrystal's conclusion to withdraw troops from Nuristan completely, not long after this platoon left.

WTF FF

2010-07-29T06:58:00.000-07:00

Went to our first movie last night at the Traverse City Film Festival. It was the one that we'd had to reschedule because our first choice night was sold out. Meant that we were tight, with a movie at 6 and one at 9.

Anyway, we got there, and this is what we found:

When we asked why hundreds of people were standing outside, the very rude volunteers snipped that they were having projection problems -- although I don't know why that would justify not seating people. At about 6:10, we were finally let into the building, and then all the popcorn-buying had to happen. The movie finally began around 6:40.

The movie, The Infidel, was brilliantly funny, and the projection was just fine. Too bad the sound was totally hideous. Small speakers, very large room.

And, to top it off, we didn't get out until 8:40 which made the 9 o'clock movie an impossibility, between getting to the car, crossing town, the dog needing a bit of out-of-the-cage time, and neither of us having had any dinner.

Going to Borders and Buying a Book at Amazon

2010-07-15T07:44:00.000-07:00

There's a reason I haven't been posting lately. The "reason" is on the left and his name is Clovis. My last dog, Rosie, was a border collie and she was the very best of companions. She loved being smarter than every other dog and was proud to be able to anticipate my needs (i.e. I need you to walk near me on the sidewalk and stop with me at cross-streets -- without a leash). Rosie died in January and I thought I wouldn't get another dog. My children are grown and I like to travel. Funny how much I missed the welcome of a dog when coming home, though, and it didn't go away. Doggie faces in car windows made me wistful.

Welcome Clovis, the toy poodle. Smart, attentive, courageous, calm, he doesn't shed and he looks like a little toasted marshmallow.

Anyway, I'd trained Rosie to do all the usual stuff using a border collie handbook, but that was ages ago. I thought it might be nice to see what's changed in the last 15 years and went to the local Borders. (Actually, Clovis was getting groomed at the next door Petsmart, something Rosie at which would have rolled her working dog eyes). The Dog section in Borders is conveniently located next to the cafe, and I browsed and read and sipped and browsed until I found the perfect fit: The Power of Positive Dog Training by Pat Miller.

The problem was that I didn't really want it as a paperback. You see, I have WAY too many books on shelves as it is. Plus, my partner and I have gotten used to sharing a Kindle account and reading books simultaneously. So, right there in Borders, I opened my iPad and logged into their free WiFi. I opened the Kindle app and checked to see if they had the Miller book. Yes. $9.99. (Four dollars cheaper than the paperback which totally makes sense to me. I won't buy anything over $9.99 -- particularly as most Kindle books have terrible formatting and stupid amounts of typos. Where do these files come from?) (Why Kindle and not Borders for the book? Because having my ebooks scattered all over a dozen different apps makes me nervous. Wouldn't it be lovely if there was one app that read any ebook?) A few minutes later -- after returning the Miller paperback to its correct position on the shelf -- I walked out of Borders, grateful for the coffee, the WiFi, and the excellent browsing experience.

What about if if bookstores became more like libraries and began to stock one copy of everything? If you want the digital version, log in here; if you want the hard copy, send an order to the in-store printer.

If I owned Borders, I'd make a branded app for any and all digital reading devices that accepts books (and allows the transfer of books) from any and all apps. Give a discount to in-store buyers. Make the transfer of books from other apps slightly cumbersome so that folks will want to buy Borders rather than spend time messing around, managing files.

Stand-up Desk

2010-05-16T10:07:00.000-07:00

For Editorial Services, please visit the new Print & Publish blog.

I've been sitting down too much at work. Granted, I have a nice view of my garden, but the view does nothing for my circulation. I've been seeing some posts recently on the tech blogs about stand-up desks and it seemed like a great idea. However, I'm not going to go out and buy a new piece of equipment ... where would I put it?

So, I have this old dresser in my office that I use for art supplies. Look, I pulled out a drawer and put a shelf on top to hold the keyboard. iPad goes on top of the dresser. I've turned off email on my desktop and now, if I want to communicate, I have to get out of my chair. Perfecto!

Book Cover: Women and Philanthropy

2010-05-04T06:19:00.001-07:00

Book Cover Design 2

2010-04-23T08:26:00.000-07:00

So, the first set isn't very groovy. I need a more stylish model for the hipsters. The author's signature runs along the edge. Should work with any old portrait snap.

Book Cover Design

2010-04-21T07:40:00.000-07:00

The problem this morning is that I'm starting a business where I'll be receiving snapshots that clients will want to use for their book covers. I want to come up with several choices for the clients, but all of them need to be simple templates that allow me to plug in the photo -- completely untouched -- and go.

This first example works with basic vertical and horizontal snaps. I can offer a variety of fonts -- from the nice and clean....

To the serif...

To the curlicue.

Finally, for the horizontal party snap. I made it as large as I could for the space and boxed the top.

Women and Philanthropy

2010-04-05T07:34:00.000-07:00

The editing is done and most of the endorsements are in. The book will be available from Jossey-Bass / Wiley this fall.

“This book breaks essential ground in the world of philanthropy by delving into the issues specific to women. A wise and exceptional book.” —Charles W. Collier, Senior Philanthropic Adviser, Harvard University, author of Wealth in Families, Cambridge, Massachusetts

“As women and philanthropy takes center stage in the coming decade, this is a must read. It is both a look at what has been, but more importantly provides a road map for what is possible for women as donor leaders in changing the face of the philanthropy.” —Christine Grumm, President and CEO, Women’s Funding Network, San Francisco, California

“Women and Philanthropy is written for every development officer who wants to gain greater insight into charitable giving by women. The authors explore women’s motivations to donate, illuminate generational differences, and offer plenty of practical advice for fundraisers. This is a thorough, engaging book that makes a compelling case for the importance of engaging women as volunteers and as donors.” —John Lippincott, President, Council for Advancement and Support of Education, Washington, DC

“Taylor and Shaw-Hardy’s book is important to all males who care about the future of philanthropy. The world of wealth continues to evolve and women are key philanthropists everywhere. For a generation Martha and Sondra have been pointing women and men who care about fundraising in the right direction.” —Bruce W. Flessner, Founder and Principal, Bentz Whaley Flessner, Minneapolis, Minnesota

Book Cover Design

2010-04-05T07:28:00.000-07:00

Working on a re-do to bring this cover in line design-wise with the other books in the series.

Book Cover Design

2010-04-04T12:44:00.000-07:00

Smallfish Clover needed a new cover for Smashwords. Since it's an ebook, I'm shooting for maximum title visibility.

Book Design

2010-03-08T05:42:00.000-08:00

Section and chapter design for Sarah Baughman's chapbook, Growing in Seasons.

Book Design

2010-03-03T04:24:00.000-08:00

Interior spreads from Lorraine Almeida's book, Myth of the Earth.

Book Cover Design

2010-03-02T04:20:00.000-08:00

This one still missing a spine. Great image for a cover. Author/artist taking the book to an Earth Day event in CA.

Book Cover Design

2010-02-27T09:03:00.000-08:00

Book Cover Design

2010-02-25T04:14:00.000-08:00

This was the first effort. Jennifer wanted a bit more shadow on the cover.

Book Cover Design

2010-02-23T09:08:00.000-08:00

Book Design and Layout

2010-02-10T07:14:00.000-08:00

I do covers too. $300. That's it. What a bargain.

Book Layout & Design

2010-02-08T08:06:00.000-08:00

Off to teach a Down and Dirty InDesign class at Interlochen Arts Academy. At home, I'm fast and affordable: $200 design + $3 a page for poetry, $4 a page for art books.*

Book by Leigh Fairey, published by Michigan Writers Cooperative Press.

Book by Matt Sutherland, published by Spirituality and Health Books.

You get a bound copy of your book for proofing. One round of proofing included in package (not more than # changes per pages of book) and a second, corrected bound copy of book with printer-ready digital files.

* $2 a page for long works of fiction or non-fiction that do not require extensive formatting.

Book Review: Why People Get Sick

2010-02-04T06:05:00.000-08:00

by Darian Leader and David Corfield

Several interesting health items have been made public recently by the BBC:
Stressed out parents make both themselves and their kids sick.
Caring for children with developmental illnesses, like Down’s or autism, weakens parents’ immune systems.

People who own cats have a forty percent lower risk of fatal heart attack.
What do these points have in common? According to authors Leader and Corfield, the former a psychoanalyst and the latter a philosopher, it’s the mind. “[A] symptom may be a way of identifying with someone else,” they write. And even more intriguing, “certain physical symptoms may even be made from words.”

What does that mean? It means that language is central to human subjectivity. Both Leader and Corfield studied Lacanian psychoanalysis in Paris, and for Freudian and mid-20th century psychoanalyst Lacan, language is the key to the subconscious—more than that, it is the subconscious. “Since Paris, we’ve always had a dialogue about psychoanalysis,” Leader said last year in an interview in theIndependent. “We were interested in discovering this psychosomatic research of the ’30s, ’40s, and ’50s. It just seemed, compared to stuff today, so sophisticated…Now it’s all statistics and fashion-driven consensus and views.”

Not that there isn’t a certain fashion these days for finding the mind over matter. But if fashion pushes doctors to spend less time covering symptoms with pharmacopeia and more time listening to patient, it couldn’t hurt. In the introduction to their book, Leader and Corfield state that “between twenty-five and fifty percent of GP visits are for medically inexplicable complaints, and the most common diagnosis in general-practice medicine today is non-illness.” Meaning, it’s all in your head. And according to the authors, it is. Arthritis is a “symptom” of unresolved anger; Cancer, a “symptom” of unresolved grief.

What to do? Listen. Leader and Darian say that illnesses are like stories, and if doctors listened more, they’d discover that people who have trouble narrating change into the stories of their lives—whether it be birth, death, job loss, promotions—are the ones who get seriously sick. And, while drugs can mask symptoms, create a sense of elation, or burn away cancer, these illness will only return in different forms until the underlying cause is uncovered and addressed.

Why People Get Sick is highly recommended for the health shelves of libraries and bookstores. The book’s readability makes it an excellent choice for book clubs. The last chapter, on the fetishes of doctors, is enough to keep people talking for…well forever.

Other recommended titles on psychosomatic health are:

The Cure Within: A History of Mind-Body Medicine (W.W. Norton, 978-0-393-06563-3): Author Anne Harrington also believes that diseases of stories and illness is the body’s way of working through psychological trauma. In her opinion, the roots of mind–body healing go back to biblical promises of healing through faith. Professor and chair of Harvard’s Department of the History of Science, Harrington looks at how faith, or “the power of positive thinking,” or its opposite, have crept in the last hundred years from the twilight zone to mainstream bestsellerdom.

John Sarno’s Healing Back Pain: The Mind–Body Connection (Warner Books, 978-0-446-39230-3) started a furor in 1991 by positing that back pain was caused by anger issues. His newer book, The Mindbody Prescription: Healing the Body, Healing the Pain (Grand Central Publishing, 978-0-446-67515-4) is another take on how unresolved or unexpressed emotions can cause a whole gamut of illness, from fibromyalgia to migraines, allergies, acne, and ulcers. Also like Leader and Corfield, Sarno believes that trauma left undealt with is the principal source of psychosomatic problems.

Medicine, Religion, and Health (Templeton Foundation Press, 978-1-59947-141-9) is by Harold Koenig, a board certified doctor and psychologist and co-director of Duke University’s Center for Spirituality, Theology, and Health. In this accessible book he discusses the relationship between religion and well-being, summarizing major trends, controversies, and the latest research. A fine compliment to the Harrington volume. (Reviews originally published in ForeWord magazine.)

Book Review: The Secret World of Walter Anderson

2010-02-01T10:10:00.000-08:00

by Hester Bass

It takes a certain amount of bravery for an artist to attempt to illustrate the life of a fellow painter. Equally, it takes a certain amount of consideration to make the life of a painter interesting to children. Bravery and consideration are alive and well in this remarkable book about a remarkable person. “There once was a man whose love of nature was as wide as the world,” the book begins. “There once was an artist who needed to paint as much as he needed to breathe.” The detail that Walter Anderson was born in New Orleans in 1903 will fly right through the ears of kids, but not that he ate stuff that floated up on a beach, or sailed a boat with an umbrella, or that he had a room his wife and children weren’t allowed to enter. Bass’s words provide just the right amount of bizarre and secretive to illustrate the adventure of Anderson’s life. Lewis’s realistic watercolors ground the amazing in the natural. Older readers will be fascinated by the author’s note as it describes through actions a mind both tortured and illuminated by illness. We can only hope that this beautiful book will spark further investigation into the life of a fiercely independent American artist that deserves more recognition. For elementary grades. (Review appeared originally in ForeWord magazine.)

Book Cover Design: Kitchen Alchemy

2010-01-29T10:11:00.000-08:00

The latest from Spirituality & Health Books. We're proofing now; the book goes to the printer next month for a London Book Fair release.

Book design is by Sandra Salamony.
Photography by Thomas Kachadurian.

Book Review: The Printed Picture

2010-01-28T06:33:00.000-08:00

by Richard Benson

Humans have been interested in making more than one copy of an image since we dipped our hands in ochre and pressed them to the wall of a cave. "The demise of pictures in single copies," writes Richard Benson, "is one of the first great innovations of printing" Benson is a MacArthur Fellow, and was Dean of the Yale University School of Art from 1996 to 2006. The Printed Picture, a remarkably informative, accessible, and entertaining book, grew out of Bensons lectures at Yale over the last thirty years, and the examines how pictures look by describing how they were made. An original pictures meaning, says Benson, is most certainly derived from the intentions of its maker, but the meaning in a reproduction of that same picture can be extremely complicated, particularly in the modern age of photography and digital technology.

The Printed Picture begins with relief printing (printing from high parts, usually on wood) to intaglio (printing from low parts-engraving, etching, aquatint, lithography) to color printing, stencils, silk screening, the typewriter, silhouettes, photography, and ends with the digital process (which interestingly began with the old fashioned piano roll). All along the way, Benson enlightens the process, both technical and creative, with personal asides and surprising feats of nature, like, when can a tree become a camera? His discussions of the pros and cons of the different techniques as well as ways of solving problems are fascinating. For example, his notes on the calibration and measurement necessary to todays artists and its danger in reducing, or utterly destroying the unexpected and unpredictable. The Printed Picture should be on anyones shelf who believes, as Benson does, that "pictures are as important as language, and that together they form the glue that holds society together." (Review appeared originally in ForeWord.)

Beneath the Roses

2010-01-26T05:37:00.000-08:00

by Gregory Crewdson, Essay by Russell Banks

There is a woman dressed like a librarian cliché seated on a small bed. Her expression is crushed. Look at her left hand, palm up—it appears almost paralyzed, like it’s lost its grip. A laundry basket of meticulously folded pale pink sheets sets in front of her. What’s that on the bedsheet? Blood? Whose room is this? Garish satiny underwear scattered on the floor, pots of pink nail polish bunched on the nightstand, framed prints of ballet dancers above the bed—this is a daughter’s room, of course. An altar of blue light frames the window and a pile of cartoonish children’s books. The door is open. The blue light escapes to the hall and beyond.

The next picture shows a man sitting his socks in a wingback chair in his living room. He looks stunned. Something immense and heavy—or perhaps just something traveling at an enormous speed—has crashed through the roof and ceiling and is now glowing in the basement. It’s the same blue glow as that of the TV. On second thought, no, nothing has crashed. The house is a ruin. Plaster has fallen from the walls revealing the lathe like bones. There’s dirt and newspapers and cement blocks in heaps. Tile is piled by the closed entrance door. The man in his socks isn’t so much shattered by the ruin as flattened by it. There will be no reconstruction. There is no more going forward.

Born in Brooklyn in 1962, Crewdson has been taking still pictures that use complex cinematic techniques for twenty years. Working with set designers and lighting artists on sound stages and on the streets of rural towns in Vermont and Massachusetts, the prints are large (64 x 94), the colors glossy, the themes operatic.

There is dread, but there’s yearning too. A certain adolescent miraculousness. And a kind of obsessive feral nostalgia. It’s gleaming twilight in the rundown mom and pop neighborhoods, land of uneven lawns and sunken concrete sidewalks, refuse pressed down beneath a season of snow. Trailers are dwarfed by enormous deciduous trees, the rooms are spacious and the surfaces cluttered, the people wear the posture of defeat and estrangement. In an NPR interview, Crewdson said that his pictures must first be beautiful, but that beauty is not enough. He strives to convey an underlying edge of anxiety, isolation, and fear. Yes, the house is on fire, the children not at home—no, they’re walking singly and in pairs along the railroad bed, overgrown with goldenrod. Here there are terrible choices, or the tragedy of the lack of effort to make any choice at all.

There is also the quiet sadness of beginnings and ends. In a Guardian interview, Crewdson said, “My photographs are about the moment of transition between before and after. Twilight is evocative of that. There’s something magical about the condition.” All of the photos are indeed mysterious: What are the teenagers doing in the forest with their flashlights? Why have they dug the hole? Did they dig it with their bare hands? In so many of the pictures bathroom doors are open—the toilet, wastebasket, the aqua tiles, the bath rug, soap, the pharmacy bottles want to tell their story—is something about to happen or has it already taken place?

The last section of the book is made up of production stills, lighting plots, and Polaroid snaps documenting the location shoots. Smoke and fog and snow machines fill up the atmosphere and lighting reaches four stories into the air. Architectural plans and set drawings are included for the soundstage shots. Interestingly, the incidental actor on scene looks as heartbroken candid as posed.

Twilight is a place to play with what you can see, what you can almost see, and what you can’t see at all. Although movie-like in their composition and the almost liquid intensity of depth, they’re non-manipulative. Unlike a movie’s deliberate gaze upon an object that’s sure to become important later on, these pictures are open-ended and viewers are invited to bring their baggage. As poet and novelist Russell Banks says in his introduction, “Crewdson’s photographs engage the mind more like good fiction than movies.” We might make the wish, like Timothy Hutton’s character did to Natalie Portman’s character in Beautiful Girls, “When you leave here, take me with you.” (Review appeared originally in ForeWord magazine.)

Book Review: Food

2010-01-08T06:37:00.000-08:00

Food: The History of Taste
Paul Freedman, editor

What is taste? Is it that those who eat raw meat are commonly called barbarians? Or that British and American cuisine is considered bland by most of the rest of the world? That Hindus won’t eat meat, but Mohammed called it “the lordliest food of the people.” What makes rotten milk a delicacy in one part of the world and revolting in another? And why was chili an important condiment in Central America, but failed to impress the tribes of the north?

“[T]he idea that a society’s soul is revealed by its cooking has, in fact, been with us since earliest times,” Paul Freedman writes in his introduction to this fascinating and beautiful volume. But this is not a book about the history of cooking—although there is plenty of that too—it’s a study of how people in different cultures have thought about food, and how they have treated it in daily life. After all, civilization’s triumvirate of glories include painting, poetry…and gastronomy.

But life wasn’t always so rich. In prehistory, humans most likely scavenged to fill their bellies, and the concept of “rotten” is a relative one. As soon as tribes began to settle, however, a connection between social status and food arose. Fresh food was a luxury in the Middle Ages, and although wine, oil, and grain were the gods’ most cherished gifts to Greeks, cheese and salt were rare.

In Imperial China, the choice of food was both practical and symbolic. Although not quite one of the Seven Deadly Sins, excessive eating was strongly discouraged in moral literature and practice. Moderation and balance were the rule: fan, for the rice, meaning “to fill,” and cai meaning “to flavor.” Ying signified the cooling aspect of an ingredient, and yang the heating. Classical Greece had a similar philosophy of cuisine (probably imported from China), and named four humors (blood, black bile, yellow bile, phlegm) and their essences (heat, cold, dry, moist). Medieval Europe resurrected the idea and ran with it, suggesting that the universe consisted of only four elements and that digestion was a form of cooking.

New World exploration brought the miracle of the potato about the same time as Europeans settled on table manners (“It is boorish to plunge your hands into sauced dishes,” Erasmus said). But it was industrialization that really changed the world, as it hugely affected the way poor people ate. Prior to the 1800s, food for the majority was scarce, diluted, and poorly prepared. Industrialization brought life-saving advances in processing, preservation, and transportation. For the first time in history, people could fill themselves without emptying their pockets.

Color plates and captions delight and illustrate the informed and absorbing essays in Food: The History of Taste, making this an excellent book for the reference shelf, for the cook, for the gift-giver. (Review originally appeared in ForeWord magazine.)

Chapbooks

2010-01-05T05:06:00.000-08:00

The technology is in perfect alignment for creating and printing sparkling, multifaceted POD chapbooks. See what these architects have been doing here.

Book Reviews: Giving Books

2009-12-16T06:42:00.000-08:00

The attraction of the unknown is a perpetual challenge to the life traveler. Whether it’s a quest for meaning or knowledge, these books will provide both the questions and the answers, and are exciting resources for readers of all ages.

Sacred Places of a Lifetime: 500 of the World’s Most Peaceful and Powerful Destinations (National Geographic, 978-1-4262-0336-7) combines photography, lore, history, and practical information. Including nearly 300 locator maps, this beautiful 9x11 book highlights the most fascinating icons of many religions, including the White Horse Temple, China’s first Buddhist temple, as well as Mont San Michel, the Ganges, and Easter Island.

From the Discovery Channel/BBC series of the same name, Planet Earth: As You’ve Never Seen It Before (University of California Press, 978-0-520-25054-3) displays 400 vivid photographs that focus on the incredible variety of land and life around the globe. Author, naturalist, and pioneer of the nature documentary Alastair Fothergill takes us on a journey of wonder from the poles, to the rainforests, to the ocean depths, to the mountaintops, and beyond.

In the same visual league as Planet Earth, The Deep: The Extraordinary Creatures of the Abyss by Claire Nouvian (University of Chicago Press, 978-0-226-59566-5) takes us as far down as four and half miles to show the weird, remarkable, and downright astonishing in sometimes larger-than-life detail. Fifteen short, readable essays assembled by the French editor, journalist, and film director cover everything from the history of deep-sea exploration to methane seeps and hydrothermal vents.

How we got how we are is behind Evolution by Jean-Baptiste de Panafieu, with photographer Patrick Gries (Seven Stories Press, 978-1-58322-784-8). The 300-plus photos of whole and partial skeletons were made possible by the French National Museum of Natural History, not to mention a few billion years of natural selection. Linda Asher translated the book from the French.

The Colorado Plateau is a breathtakingly beautiful 130,000 square mile wilderness that crosses the borders of Utah, Arizona, New Mexico, and Colorado. In this deluxe edition from Welcome Books, Canyon Wilderness of the Southwest (978-1-59962-056-5), renowned photographer Jon Ortner captures the monumental force of nature. More than 200 photos are accompanied by quotes from authors, travelers, and naturalists. Award-winning nature writer Greer Chesher provides the introduction.

Book Reviews: Cooking the Cowboy Way

2009-12-11T05:30:00.000-08:00

Cooking the Cowboy Way: Recipes Inspired by Campfires, Chuck Wagons, and Ranch Kitchens

by Grady Spears

Andrews McMeel

This new compilation from Grady/Spears duo is as much a travel guide as a cookbook. The authors are Texans, as are most of the destinations, beginning at the Wildcatter Ranch, about ninety minutes north of Fort Worth on the Brazos River. Here, city slickers can ride with the wranglers, shoot clay pigeons, stay overnight in one of the cabins, and enjoy Bob’s Famous Baby Back Ribs. The recipe for this and other famous dishes from the selected ranches/restaurants appear along with photos of the landscape, the chefs, and the food. Sidebars offer hints for when to go, shopping, and historical points of interest.

Fortunately, Texas isn’t the only cowboy local. Arizona has its Rancho de la Osa in Sasabe (try the Lamb Tenderloin with Green Olive Jam). Florida—which also happens to be the first cattle-raising spot in the Americas—has it’s Bellamy Brothers Ranch in Darby. Here, the country western music star brothers have added a bit of Cuban spice to their cuisine.

Can’t leave out Kansas City, a.k.a. Cowtown. The recipes come from a variety of sources: Fiorella’s Jack Stack, Gates Bar-B-Q, and the Kansas City Barbeque Society. To get really exotic, travel to Calgary—yes, Canada—for some Candied Bacon with Goat Cheese or Skillet Buttermilk Corn Bread with Maple Butter. While you’re there, take in the Calgary Stampede, The Greatest Outdoor Show on Earth. You can see it by horseback, but these cowboys know better than to send a greenhorn out on a living, breathing mount. They’ll stick you one a wooden variety first, and assign a horse to fit your mettle.

Finally, there’s a chapter on what to cook if the cowboys in your life wear helmets, pads, and Lycra. The Texas Tailgate Party serves up everything you’ll need please the crowd, courtesy of Grady Spears’ Fort Worth restaurant, Dutch’s. Try Dutch’s Blue Cheese and Bacon Burger with Chipotle Mayo or Dutch’s Frito Pie for guaranteed touchdowns. —Heather Shaw

Review appeared originally in ForeWord Reviews.

Book Cover Design

2009-12-09T11:30:00.003-08:00

As a now and again cover designer, I'm always trying to get the best effect for the least amount of money — most of my design work has been done for free. As such, I'm a big fan of Dover and their copyright free images. Here, I took a few slices from a famous painting and crossed them with the title and author.

Book Reviews: Quote Poet Unquote

2009-12-08T13:42:00.000-08:00

A great gift book for the writers on your list. (Not just the poets.)

Quote Poet Unquote: Contemporary Quotations on Poets and Poetry
Edited by Dennis O'Driscoll

By day poets masquerade as mere mortals: insurance clerks, teachers, librarians. But by night they prowl like panthers, seizing words on the run and crunching raw emotion. –Unattributed, The Times, 4 September 2006.

Poetry: What is it? “ Poetry is language that sounds better and means more,” says Pulitzer Prize-winner Charles Wright. It’s “relaxation from the labours of inebriation” says that old crumb Unattributed in Acumen on the cold January of 1995. Bakeless Prize-winner Jennifer Grotz says “Poetry is philosophy’s sister, the one that wears make-up.” And Don Paterson, author of The White Lie, says, “A poem is a machine for remembering itself.”

Dennis O’Driscoll, erstwhile editor of Poetry Ireland Review, made a career out of collecting bits and pieces, “sound bites” as he calls them, of larger debates. The quotations “trapped and caged” in Quote Poet Unquote represent twenty years of collecting, and are principally derived from remarks published in newspapers and journals. But, as the editor emphatically states, he “makes not the slightest claim to comprehensiveness.” The book does, however, include sources, indices of the poets speaking and bespoken (or about), and it questions the authority of the most stubborn of classroom axioms.

“If you write about what you know,” says George Bowering, “you will keep on writing the same thing, and you will never know any more than you do now.” But worry not: “The fear of straight speaking, the constant, painstaking efforts to metaphorize everything, the ceaseless need to prove you’re a poet in every line: these are the anxieties that beset every budding bard. But they are curable, if caught in time.” This from Nobel Prize-winner Wislawa Szymborska.

O’Driscoll has organized the quotations into sections. There’s “Youth and Age:” Death is what gets poets up in the morning. –Billy Collins. “Best Words” and “Visualizing a Poem”: Poetry gets landscape and weather for its subjects; the novel gets boxing and tattooed women and sex. –Craig Raine. “ Word Count” and “Poetic Drive:” Poets are known for being non-drivers, and it seems that many also have difficulty in using their telephone-answering-machines (not to mention speaking into other people’s.) –James Campbell.

Any opinion will find its justification—which is precisely what will make this fun for classrooms and, yikes, workshops. (Babies are not brought by storks, and poets are not produced by workshops. –James Fenton.) For example, Michael Ondaatje says that “Poems get ruined by having too many ideas in them,” while Katha Pollit remarks “Nobody is truly indifferent to the ideas in a poem, and to say that you should be indifferent is really to say that poetry is a decorative art, it’s contentless, it’s like making lace or a quilt.”

There is poetry for those who have little to say: My optimum time to write is when I don’t have much to say, as opposed to when I was young and had plenty to say about everything. My poetry was liberated by that realization. I got better right away. –Billy Collins. For those who have too much there is: Foul-mouthed and pot-bellied, ravaged by self-neglect and alcohol abuse, with a huge misshapen head, matted hair and lumpy, pitted, porridge-coloured skin, he looked in his prime like something risen from the dead. –Hilary Spurling, on Charles Bukowski. Ah, “How many attempts to get poetry on the road have foundered because the poetry entrepreneurs have rolled all over the tarmac trying to gouge out each other’s eyes?” muses poet, lecturer, and actor P.J. Kavanagh.

But getting back to the basics, Michael Longley writes: “Technique is important. I think that if most people who called themselves poets were tight-rope-walkers they’d be dead.” James Fenton contributes to this drift with: “It would be very odd to go to a concert hall and discover that the pianist on offer wasn’t any good at all, in the sense that he couldn’t actually play the piano. But in poetry this is an experience we have learned to take in our stride.”

Up and down and sideways and backwards, Quote Poet Unquote is a handy and delightful ars poetica as well as a reminder that “Poetry is rarely a victimless crime.” –Robert Crawford, London Review of Books, 2007. Reviewed by Heather Shaw in ForeWord magazine

Book Reviews: The Infinity of Lists

2009-12-07T05:16:00.000-08:00

The Infinity of Lists
by Umberto Eco
Rizzoli

Umberto Eco is a world renowned medievalist, philosopher, semiotician, literary critic, and currently the president of the Scuola Superiore di Studi Umanistici, University of Bologna. A frequent contributor to the popular press, Eco has written two children’s books, and is a successful novelist and essayist. His best-known novels are The Name of the Rose and Foucault’s Pendulum. Eco, however, confessed in an interview in 1996 that The Name of the Rose may be a book more unread that read. “It happens,” he said. “When The Name of the Rose came out, so difficult and full of Latin quotations…” Still, he is “content.” The book has sold more than fifty million copies.

This latest venture is a byproduct of a series of conferences and exhibitions he was asked to organize at the Louvre. The topic was open to his discretion, and without hesitation, he chose the list.
Now, readers of Eco’s novels can hardly help noticing that the man has a predilection for listing. But the list form seems, from a casual glance, outside Eco’s preference toward literary texts that are open and encourage a connection between the reader and society at large. According to Eco, literature is at its best when it resonates with context, rather than closing itself down to a single, unalterable meaning. How can a list—the naming of objects or qualities—engage outside its frame? How can a list be infinite and still be something that fits on a page or a canvas?

The notion that infinity can continue beyond the frame, says Eco, first appeared in Western literature in Homer’s catalogue of ships, and the way to achieve infinity is to suggest that the list does not end.

So from the polish’d arms, and brazen shields,
A gleamy splendour flash’d along the fields.
Not less their number than the embodied cranes,
Or milk-white swans in Asius’ watery plains…
To count them all, demands a thousand tongues,
A throat of brass, and adamantine lungs.
Daughters of Jove, assist! inspired by you
The mighty labour dauntless I pursue;
What crowded armies, from what climes they bring,
Their names, their numbers, and their chiefs I sing.

And so Homer will, for another 350 verses.

The list, says Eco, “turns up again in the Middle Ages…and especially in the modern and post-modern world; a sign that we are subject to the infinity of lists for many diverse reasons.”
Using examples of art from the Louvre and other collections around the world, plus lengthy (in a good way) excerpts from texts, Eco catalogues the catalogue. There is the Visual List with its intention to create the effect of abundance, over-abundance, overflowing the frame, as in Bosch’s The Garden of Earthly Delights, Dutch still lifes, or Ravel’s Bolero.

In another chapter, the Ineffable is suggested by giving examples, then leaving the rest to the imagination, like Assumption of the Virgin by Correggio or this list of Christian demons.

Aamon, Abigor, Abracace, Adramelech, Agares, Aguare, Aivion, Alastorr, Alloces, Amduscias, Amon, Amy, Aarazel, Andras, Andras, Arioch, Andrealphus, Andromalius, Asmoday, Astaroth, Aubras, Azazel, Baalzefon, Bael, Baelbalan, Balam, Barbato, Bathym, Beleth, Belfagor, Belial, Belzebú, Beret, Berith, Biemot, Bifrons, Bitru, Botis, Buer, Bune, Byleth, Caacrinolaas, Caassimolar, Calì, Carabia, Caym, Cerberos, Chax, Cimeries, Dantalion, Decarabia, Eyrevr, Flauros, Focalor, Foraii, Forcas, Forneus, Furfur, Furinomius, Gaap, Gamygyn, Gemory, Glasya, Gusoyn, Haagenti, Haborym, Halphas, Ipes, Ipos, Labolas, Leonardo, Leraye, Lucifer, Malaphar, Malèhas, Malfa, Malphas, Marbas, Marchocias, Marcocia, Melchom, Micales, Moloch, Morax, Murmur, Naberius, Nibba, Nicliar, Orias, Orobas, Ose, Otis, Paimon, Phoenix, Picollus, Procel, Prufla, Purson, Rahouart, Raum, Ronove, Ronwe, Sabnach, Saleos, Satanas, Scox, Seere, Separ, Shax, Sitri, Stola, Svcax, Tap, Ukobach, Valac, Vapula, Vassago, Vepar, Vine, Volac, Vual, Wall, Xafan, Zagam, Zaleos, Zebos, Zepar.

There continues Lists of Things; Lists of Places; Exchanges Between List and Form; Exchanges Between Practical and Poetic Lists; Lists of Mirabilia; Excess, from Rabelais Onwards; Chaotic Enumeration; Collections and Treasures… The latter title which simply describes—not effusively, dizzyingly, oppressively, or immoderately, but essentially—the nature of this book. No matter his complaint of inadequacy, Eco’s short and often pithy chapter introductions, the gorgeous displays of exemplary art, and the generous experts from original texts are a tour de force of curation. (November) Heather Shaw

Reviewed in ForeWord Reviews November/December 2009

Best Books

2009-12-05T05:19:00.000-08:00

Cooks' House chosen by The Detroit News as one of this year's 5 best cookbooks for cooks. "This book is also a delight to just sit down and read."

Editorial Services

2009-12-04T06:01:00.000-08:00

For Cooks' House, by Eric Patterson and Jennifer Blakeslee, I was given a sheaf of recipes, often with detailed explanations of ingredients or alternative cooking procedures or notes on chefs. To maintain an orderly and clear recipe, I pulled out these sections and made them into "sidebars." Designer Sandra Salamony then organized them on the page as you can see here. So beautiful, and clearly readable.

Book Design

2009-12-02T06:48:00.000-08:00

Cover design and interior promotional page of Holly Wren Spaulding's book, 2008.

Book Cover Art

2009-12-01T06:18:00.000-08:00

A cover design I did for Michigan Writers Cooperative Press. I saw the title, and knew I needed a horse.

Kitchen Alchemy

2009-11-30T05:59:00.000-08:00

Photographer Thomas Kachadurian and I went to northern UK a couple of weeks ago to work on a forthcoming cookbook from Spirituality & Health Books, Kitchen Alchemy.

Tom (photographer) and Phillippa Lee (co-author and chef) in the kitchen.

(Bottom) Leftovers from the last day of shooting.

Going Out Green

2009-11-24T06:08:00.001-08:00

Here's a book idea I pitched to an author. He describes the moment in the first chapter, rather fancifully I might add. I swear I never ever married that CIA guy. See a slice of the book at Scribd.

I also did the interior design of this book.

Cooks' House

2009-11-23T05:51:00.001-08:00

Yesterday's launch party.

Cooks' House: The Art and Soul of Local Sustainable Cuisine

2009-11-22T15:29:00.000-08:00

This is my first cookbook. It was picked up by Barnes & Noble for their regional holiday tables and has won a Gourmand Award for 2009.

Sternly Departing by Mark Halliday

2009-04-29T07:32:00.000-07:00

Sternly Departing by Mark Halliday

Nobody seemed to notice me for three days in San Diego
as if I were less significant than a spindly palm tree
yet when my plane took off from the airport
at that moment all over San Diego people paused
and glanced into some crystal of absence;
the plane's wheels lifted unequivocally from the runway
and San Diego was left with a diminished portion of the possible

and in particular several thousand quite healthy women
in their twenties and thirties (okay and early forties)
felt a sudden shiver and fearfully touched their hair
as my plane rose sternly into the blue
of the tremendous Unavailable, so gone and so debonair.

from Keep This Forever (Tupelo Press)

The joy of exclamation marks! by Stuart Jeffries

2009-04-29T07:26:00.000-07:00

Stuart Jeffries at the Guardian writes hilariously about punctuation!

In and out of style: Punctuation past and present
The full stop
It stops, and it will never stop being useful. Often used for rhetorical effect to break up sentences into. Significant. Words. Or phrases. Ed McBain wrote: "Oh, boy. What a week." The 1906 edition of the King's English lamented "spot-plague", meaning the full stop has to do all the work. In the intervening period, the full stop. Has. Done more work. Than Edwardian lexicographers. Would have thought possible.
Ellipsis
I love ellipses, which are also experiencing a revival online (so easy not to finish a thought but instead to lean on your full-stop key .... ), and I use them to seem cleverer. Ellipses confer gravitas on banal thoughts ...
The comma
Use wrongly and hilarity ensues. Thus: "Mr Douglas Hogg said that he had shot, himself, as a young boy." Take out the commas, and Hogg mutates into someone who takes himself out.
The semi-colon
Yay or nay? Literary types divide over this. In France, they have been arguing about it histrionically. Lynne Truss argues that "they are the thermals that benignly waft our sentences to new altitudes". George Orwell once purged A Clergyman's Daughter of the semi-colons, arguing they were unnecessary.
The colon
Functional, utilitarian. Fowler said that, "the colon ... has acquired a special function, that of delivering the goods that have been invoiced in the preceding words". Dull, isn't it?
The question mark
Thanks to Australian uptalking, this, like the exclamation mark, is undergoing a renaissance? Now, it can be used at the end of any sentence? It makes everything you write read like Russell Crowe whining about the media? This, to be sure, is no advance? Or is it?

Resistance by Fady Joudah

2009-04-27T05:50:00.000-07:00

Resistance by Fady Joudah

When the thick skinned,
Thin juiced, red
Grapes of summer
Ripen, love and war also ripen.

Their taste and texture
Don't remind the old man
Who prunes them or his wife

Of home. For his part,
He's aware bird and insect
Won't let these strange grapes

Live out their old age
On the vines in peace:
He brings them to the kitchen table

Where they're also beautiful.
And the wife
Smiles in protest.

Because this shortens
Her listening beneath the trellis
On quiet afternoons
To the bumblebees as they sip.

from The Earth in the Attic

Pitcher of Lemonade by Sam Cornish

2009-04-23T06:06:00.000-07:00

Pitcher of Lemonade by Sam Cornish

for Cora Keyes

St. Louis child black
Face shining like sunflowers

And daffodils
Laughing on the fence

White woman's child you are
A pitcher of lemonade golden child

Your eyes were blue
Still a nigger the lord will provide

Little high brown boy
Grandmother's favorite child

from An Apron Full of Beans (Cavankerry Press)

Little Gothic by Emily Wilson

2009-04-22T05:46:00.000-07:00

Little Gothic by Emily Wilson

We rode on a road through a wood
The wood itself rode a river
Slow beige wade of mid-passage
Between regions of our union
In the form of a forest of tulip trees

We rode on a road of seepages
Bridged with viridians
Sun took pause, low down
What was almost gold

We rode crossed with roads
Closing in and paths that were more
Like pressures
Wild harts. Soldiers.
A far little stage stung with figures
A box with a breakdown at the bottom

Just that the road moved off sequence
The forest bore out its own office
Its own kind of craft
We rode through the wood along the river
Beyond the mineral
Over-richness that leads off
An inwardness

from Micrographia (University of Iowa Press)

April is National Poetry Month. Each weekday during April, ForeWord-online will feature a different poem.

Letter to the Unconverted by Jason Gray

2009-04-20T13:10:00.000-07:00

Letter to the Unconverted by Jason Gray

And what would you say if I told you the deer had spoken?
Two animals, we were face to face in the wood
And stopped each other dead in the last light
Of day, the cold coming down the hillside.

Descending as ash that would preserve us like this,
Clay jars that could crumble at the lightest push,
Here in this moment, or the next (that haven
Of the already dead), crumbling in a flash

Of powder, still too late to catch the spirit
Escaped, wild and full of unknown sound,
Virgin language to the eager ear,
Beautiful unearthly distance unwound.

What would you say if I told you this? The light
Detached like a ghost, expanded before it broke
With bark and dirt, and watched the two of us
Solidify. What would you say? The deer spoke.

from Photographing Eden (Ohio University Press) 2009

What You Read When There’s Nothing to Read

2009-04-20T10:11:00.000-07:00

Dusting my bookshelves this weekend, I came across a couple of Georges Simenon titles, Dirty Snow and Three Rooms in Manhattan. I love those books, I think to myself. Maybe I should put them on my iPhone as calculated additions to the permanent ambulatory library in my pocket.

But the thought of a library always at my beck and call got me thinking about all the books I’ve read because there was nothing else to read. The Thorn Birds, for example. Or, out of the same isolated bookshelf, Jane Goodall’s My Life with the Chimpanzees and William Burroughs’ Factotum. (How those three books ended up in the same small library in a house with a bed, a garden, and two enormous doors is provoking, wouldn’t you say?)

There was the year spent teaching English to fifth and sixth graders. I was not in India, but the only English books happened to be Kipling’s collected works in pocket-sized hardcover. And there was my mother’s house one summer, broke, and Dickens. Or an ornamental Jane Eyre from a leather-bound collection of classics bought on subscription by my great-grandmother. No one had ever read any of them and I had to dig up a letter opener to slice the pages apart. It was terribly romantic.

So, here’s the question: Would I have read Jane Eyre at some point later in life if hadn’t been in the glass-fronted bookcases of my home? Maybe. Although, it’s has never been required in any course I’ve taken. No one has ever recommended it or handed me a copy. (So sad.) And it’s not a book I recall seeing on jungle bookshelves (I do, however, remember a copy of Nabokov’s Lolita in a Maryknoll mission in Guatemala) or foreign language school bookshelves. If, at the age of twelve, I’d been offered the choice between Jane Eyre and, say, a contemporary equivalent to Twilight would I have chosen the former? Would my son be reading the Economist Book of Obituaries if it weren’t the only thing in print the bathroom?

Interesting to ponder, the pros and cons of having everything you ever wanted. It’s hard to be critical of choice when the other option is totalitarian; on the other hand, necessity can make for strange and wonderful book choices.

L'Chaim by Patricia Goedicke

2009-04-17T06:17:00.000-07:00

April is National Poetry Month. Each weekday during April, ForeWord-online will feature a different poem.

L’Chaim
by Patricia Goedicke

But if you’d been pinched by it for years,
if inside that brittle package, your one
and only parches skin and bones there were scabs
scaling the inside of your nostrils, under your scrotum
if inflamed wrinkles scratched you at every step,

and if, after so long staring at it, trying
to prepare your family and yourself to just jackknife
into outer space and drown smoothly, barely stirring the waters,

it still wouldn’t behave;
if deeper inside and always,
bending over the belt cutting your gut
only to tie your shoes you felt the grinding

imperial Worm nudge upwards
hard against you as excrement and then, all at once
even as you straightened up, trying to ignore the distant
approach of vomit, cells gathering their undercover teams
for the daily seizure of No Air, No Air;

if the spavined wings of your lungs battered against your ribs
like trapped hail, if you thought
you’d never get your breath, goggle-eyed
beneath stretched eyebrows even as you rested,

if finally you raked your chest
frantic, no dignity left
like a chicken
nailed to the bedroom floor, why wouldn’t you go ahead and push

everyone aside, grab for the oxygen mask, in its plastic
rush of instant release, why wouldn’t you just
take the powder you’d been waiting for all these years
and disappear, light as a rocket
after lift-off when the cellophane nose cone’s sudden
quiet stopped up the one hole left in your life suit,
why wouldn’t you leave behind

the faint parenthesis of your
mysterious smile, your domed scalp
wreathed by white hair as you finally turned away,

why would you even bother to look back
with a last flicker of tenderness for earth
and your wife and all your friends gathered at table
hushed, with everyone waiting for you
one more time to raise your glass, who would you?

from The Baseball Field at Night: Last Poems (Lost Horse Press)

Ice Junco by Doug Ramspeck

2009-04-16T05:36:00.001-07:00

Ice Junco by Doug Ramspeck

The bird is frozen in the ice. Black and frozen
in ice that will not scrape—not even when he claws
it with a stick. Later he will imagine its eyes
as red, or thunderhead gray, or sooty white.
He will be doing his homework after school,
or eating dinner at the kitchen table, and every
sound he hears is junco, junco. As though
his bird is singing from the ice. And some nights
in his dreams when the snow comes drifting
upward from the stream, rising like an apparition
past his window, he imagines it's not snow at all
but juncos, white juncos, small as horseflies, fluttering.
And sometimes when the train cries from the ridge
beyond the barn—he imagines juncos swooping
down like bats, or he pictures fish thawing and wiggling
inside ice. And mornings when he hurries down to the creek
beyond the barn—where the shagbark leaves crunch
beneath his boots—he is eager to discover if the stream
is trickling once more into the drainage ditch,
if the ice is scattered and broken in the mud.
In which case he will bend to poke his junco
with a stick. And either it will quiver or it won't.

from Black Tupelo Country (BkMk Press)

Home by Mark Irwin

2009-04-15T05:52:00.001-07:00

Home by Mark Irwin

After your death I stopped on the hill and looked down at our house,
but as I approached it did not grow larger. Finally I bent down,
picked it up, and put it in my pocket. Now I can never
return, but sometimes I'll place that house by my window
and watch the tiny, shadowy figures move. If only I could make myself
small again, but the years. Sometimes I see clothes, bodiless, spill
through that house, a kind of light, then I wake gripping the sheets.
In one dream I live in a vast country atop a pebble When people
in this country die, they become larger, robbing more and more
space from the living, yet they continue to evolve, building smaller
houses, raising fewer children, writing smaller and smaller books,
Until finally everyone thinks for a long time before uttering a word.

from Tall If (New Issues)

Diagnosis by Joel Brouwer

2009-04-13T04:29:00.000-07:00

April is National Poetry Month. Each weekday during April, ForeWord-online will feature a different poem.

Diagnosis
by Joel Brouwer

The doctor says think of it this way: Your insides are like
the jungle at night: warm noisy, rank with mango, and but for
some holes drilled through the sky by stars, wholly dark. A
river floats through you on its back, shivering with piranha.
Banyan roots claw its face with thirsty fingers and draw black
water up to the leafy canopy, where the last honeysuckle vireo
on earth has sunk her beak into the single living pygmy
anaconda, which in turn has the bird half wrapped in its flexing
grip. Only one will live. It's too soon to say.

from Satellite Convulsions: Poems from Tin House (Tin House)

Chipilly Ridge — Regimental Dressing Station

2009-04-10T05:50:00.000-07:00

April is National Poetry Month. Each weekday during April, ForeWord-online will feature a different poem.

Chipilly Ridge — Regimental Dressing Station

by John Allen Wyeth

Squat wall of sandbags-and above, a sky
all thin and cool with dawn and very far.
Black empty stretchers. On the parapet,
light out before the clangor of the gun.
The bliss of strong fatigue-and where I lie
the canvas breathes between me and that star
a bitter stream of blood. The air feels wet,
and the stars go, forgotten one by one.
Time to start back—and watch those towns go by!
"You ready to go?—we got a lift in a car."
"Already?—"
"Yeah, let's start. we got a long way
to go."
O God the ruins of Sailly-Laurette!
-like dying men that wake and find the sun
and shut their eyes against another day.

from This Man's Army: A War in Fifty-odd Sonnets (University of South Carolina Press)

Azalea by C.S. Carrier

2009-04-07T06:00:00.000-07:00

April is National Poetry Month. Each weekday during April, ForeWord online will feature a different poem.

Azalea by C.S. Carrier

An azalea brushes chimneys, hovers above the common.
I don't listen to the azalea or its baubles.
White, footshaped, the azalea, denominated,
easily choreographed. Some of my azaleas are good, some not.
The azalea should be ripped
by magnets. I sweat in the body of an azalea.
The azalea's in the backyard praying for paint, pregnancy.
I'm the sexiest azalea in here, yo.
To make rent, I borrow azaleas and sell VCRs
in a blue smock under a blue siren.
My azalea, my good luck, get me nowhere
in the supermarket. Bloated with sunflowerseeds,
the azalea will not be televised.
I set fire to silk pajamas, azaleas with maps.
All around are the azaleas of Learjets,
the azaleas of hairspray, cigar azaleas.
The most basic azalea's to dissent.
I stick a neck in my azalea
for light. I azalea to witness the peacock, its feathers.
In the Victorian nextdoor, kneedeep
in emptyjars, a Madonna waits for the magpies to descend.

from After Dayton (Four Way Books)

A Poem a Day

2009-04-06T12:00:00.000-07:00

The research doesn’t stop coming that apples and aspirins every day do the body good. A poem a day combines qualities of both the above—freshness and pain relief—and both work on the same root cause: distress from the everyday.

In honor of National Poetry Month (and because I’ve been saving these up all year long), we’re launching A Poem a Day on ForeWord magazine's homepage. To reap the full mind/body health benefit, read twice a day for thirty days.

Here’s one for bucking up and taking your medicine:

Raised Not By Wolves
by Lucia Perillo

The family sank into its sorrows—
we softened like noodles in a pot.
Whereas the bicycle’s bones were painted gold
and stood firm against the house
no matter how hard it rained.

Beneath the handlebar mount, it said ROYAL in red letters
unscathed despite the elements;
this was the bicycle’s first lesson,
to be royal and unscathed—

I pressed my ear-cup to the welds.

Pedal furiously, then coast in silence.
You will need teeth to grab the chain.
Exhortations with the stringent priggishness of Zen,
delivered by a guru who hauls you off and wallops you

in answer to your simple questions.

Though its demise is foggy,
I can conjure with precision its rebukes, the dull sting
when the boy-bar bashed my private place.

Then no talking was permitted
beyond one stifled yelp.

You could, however, rub the wound
with the meat of your thumb—so long
as you did this stealthily, pretending you had an itch.

From the book, Inseminating the Elephant (Copper Canyon Press)

Cats

2009-03-13T03:40:00.000-07:00

This is the time of year when I hate my cats. The birds are back and the cats want to go outside, but there’s still several feet of snow out there and I can’t say, in all my cat years, that I’ve ever seen a cat prowl around on top of a snow bank.

So I should be pitying the poor dears, but I can’t. I’m sick to death of them. They’re underfoot. They’re sitting in a row when I open my bedroom door in the morning, waiting to herd me to the food bags. At night, they’re all over me before I can even get my coat off, shoving and yowling me to those food bags. They just don’t have enough to do and I’m feeling bullied.

To make matters worse, my mom goes away every winter and leaves her cat with me. (That makes a total of three—in my opinion, one more than the single female’s limit.) My mom’s cat is petite and delicate. She growls when the icy cold sidewalk touches her tiny paws. She refuses to do her business outside.

My cats are big brawny fellows who always do their business outside, except, of course, when a lady’s present. Then they want to do it right there with her. So, at the time of year when everything’s snug against the cold, I’m having to change litter every day to combat kitty fug.

That’s not the only problem: Miss Dainty also has special diet food to keep her slim. It comes in cans. It smells like tuna. Seriously—we’ve got two twenty-five pound cats and one ten pound cat and a can of faux tuna. Who do you think’s going to get that special stuff?

So not only am I getting bullied, but I’m having to break up fights. I hate my cats.

Which is why it’s so nice that Seller Publishing sent me this wonderful cat book, Best Seat in the House: Cats in their Windows. Each page has a photo and a caption, and all together, there’s a delightful story. Marcie Jan Bronstein, the author and photographer, hand-colored the photos, giving them the look of old Kodachrome snapshots from the sixties and seventies.

Best Seat in the House is a wonderful book for people who hate—oops, I mean love their cats. It’s also a lovely book for reading aloud to children.

Best Seat in the House: Cats in their Windows
Text and photos by Marcie Jan Bronstein
Sellers Publishing
Softcover with flaps $12.95 (112pp)
978-1-4162-0531-9

Kindle on the iPhone

2009-03-04T07:50:00.001-08:00

I am totally predictable in the mornings. I make coffee, turn on CNN, drink juice, scan the night’s email. When the coffee’s ready, I go to the New York Times online. There’s a whole litany of sites that follow: Slate’s news wrap, The Daily Beast for fun, The Guardian for books. . . but this morning I got no further than the news item that Amazon was offering a free Kindle app for iPhones. Way before 7 AM I downloaded it. Zip, zip.

There’s a button on the top of the app that says “Get Books.” Press it and you’re told to go to the Amazon/Kindle website. I did this, on my iPhone. Now, what book do I want?

My first choice was a novel called Adiós, Hemingway because a friend recommended it. Nope, they didn’t have it. Although that wasn’t terribly unexpected, it threw me for a loop. You don’t know me, but you must realize that I work for a book review magazine. On any given day, there are hundreds of books all over the floor of my office. At home, there’s a Post Office box next to the door full of books I’ve taken the time to read a chapter or two of, and discarded. On the shelves there are four generations of books read and saved and reread. I don’t have enough room to keep books that won’t be reread. How many books are up there? I don’t know the number but I know what I’ve got.

And I also know what I don’t need, what I’m not interested in spending $9.99 on, the going-price of most books in the Kindle store. I mean, I like to read mysteries as much as anyone, but $9.99 seems a wasteful, selfish amount to spend on a non-tangible, one-time-only book. At least if I buy the hardcopy, I can give it away to someone, and they can give it away to someone.

So what would I spend $9.99 on? Something I’d like to keep with me. A reference. For example, a few weeks ago I splurged on the Oxford American Dictionary app for my iPhone. I love it. I use it every day. Surely there must be something else, maybe something I’ve got in my library.

I get up with my coffee and stand in front of my bookshelves for a bit – what would be something more useful than Google to keep on my phone?

How about John Emsley’s Nature’s Building Blocks? That’d be fun. I key in the name. Nope. Sorry. There’s a book by John Emsley (same guy?) called The Elements of Murder: A History of Poison, and there’s also one (same guy) called Vanity, Vitality, & Virility: The Science Behind the Products You Love to Buy, but I’m not buying.

Okay, how about The Oxford Book of Military History. That could be useful for when I’m in waiting rooms filled with Good Housekeeping magazines. I key in the name. Nope. There’s U.S. Military History for Dummies (never understood why anyone would buy those books), and there are really odd (and suspicious) titles like The Art of Insurgency: American Military Policy & the Failure of Strategy in Southeast Asia. Who’s reading that, and where? Or even stranger, Marching Under Darkening Skies: The American Military & the Impending Urban Ops Threat. Wow. Are Special Forces guys with Kindles killing time reading this stuff in the field?

It’s getting pretty late by now. I need to get dressed and go to work. What am I going to do? All right, let’s just key in “Oxford” and see what comes up.

Lots. All sorts of weird “handbooks” on oncology, international relations, ethical theory. . . Wait! Here’s something. How about The Dictionary of Modern Quotations? That’d work. That’d be useful and fun. $9.99.

I hit the “one click” button and since I’ve already signed up for the app, Amazon recognizes my device. Apparently, if you have both a Kindle and an iPhone, your purchases will upload to both and will keep track of where you are in your readings no matter which device you use.

The WiFi at my house wasn’t working this morning, and there’s no 3G network in northern Michigan. Even so, it only took a couple of minutes for the book to show up in the Kindle app. I was immediately amused that the familiar Oxford font shows up on my phone. And the table of contents is a series of links – that’s good. Let’s try “Last Words.”

1 Bugger Bogner.

King George V. (1865 – 1936) on his deathbed in 1936, when someone remarked ‘Cheer up, your Majesty, you will soon be at Bognor again’; alternatively, a comment made in 1929, when it was proposed that the town be named Bognor Regis on account of the king’s convalescence there after a serious illness
K. Rose King George V (1983); see Last Words 190:5

I’d call this a success, wouldn’t you?

Handmade Books

2009-02-25T13:17:00.000-08:00

Extrapolating from my experience growing up, my children’s experience growing up, I’m going to go out on a limb and say everyone’s first book is handmade. Who here did not fold a piece of paper and make a book? How can you complete six years of elementary school and not make a book?

So everyone’s talking about ebooks and phone books and Twitter and FaceBook and even print-on-demand and how no one really reads anymore. I say bah. People read the backs of shampoo bottles, they read cereal boxes. People read all day on computers (whatever the size). They read advertisements and newspapers and junk mail and the scrolling text at the bottom of CNN. No one’s going to stop reading. An illiterate in the modern world is a severely handicapped. What is going to change, what’s already changing, is publishing.

Used to be you got your different mediums of communication: phone, fax, letters, books, papers, records, photos, movies, tv. Some came on paper, some on tape, some on vinyl, some through the “air.” Now, everything comes the same way: all 111s and 000s. I’ve got one device that fits in my pocket and all that stuff up above comes to me with the flick of my thumb. What do I need a tv for? And a book?

I need a book, a physical book, when I’m building a library on a certain subject. It’s still easier to scan physical books, and I like to write in mine. I also want a physical book if its concern is art – I want the big picture. Finally, I want a book if it’s special, either to me or because it’s one-of-a-kind.

A few days ago, David Buchan sent me an invitation through ForeWord’s generic write-the-editor email to view his handmade and limited edition books. What the heck? I did. They’re wonderful. Look at this:

I asked David about himself and he said he’d moved from Chicago to Puerto Rico in 1999 and he prints the books himself on an old press. “In Chicago, I worked in theater but found that when I got here that my Spanish was just not up to the task of doing theater. So, I made children's books. My first book about a mouse who can only speak in the language of the cats was an expression of that language change for me. My Spanish is still pretty so-so, especially compared to my three year old daughter, who is bilingual by nature, or nurture.”

The Bilingual ABC Book will charm the pants off any youngster who’s starting school and realizing, perhaps, that there are two different ways of saying the same thing. The adult version is wicked funny. See the whole collection at http://davebuchen.com. He makes beautiful calendars as well.

It was Dave who got me thinking about first books and handmade books. Once I made a flipbook for my daughter by drawing on the corners of Molly Katzen’s MooseWood Cookbook! And I have this friend in Mexico, Ambar Past, who made a business out of making books. Here are a couple of examples of her work, the first one being a book of spells, remembered by Mayan women of Ambar’s acquaintance. Appropriate cover, eh.

Up from History

2009-02-11T08:51:00.000-08:00

Up from History: The Life of Book T. Washington alludes in its title to the neglected nature of black activist's place on the biography shelves. (Washington, the last generation of African-Americans born to slavery, wrote an autobiography, published in 1901, called Up from Slavery.) Author Robert J. Norrell offers a comprehensive and thoughtful reassessment of the life of one of America's most famous in title-recognition, and at the same time, one of its most misunderstood. (978-0-674-03211-8, Harvard University Press, January)

For my last year of high school, I moved to a private school, Interlochen Arts Academy, and glutted myself on nonessentials like Aesthetics, British Lit, and Poetry. I also took an American history class, but only because I had to. Like my fourteen-year-old says now, I've been studying American history over and over since second grade… Isn't there anything else?

Well, yes actually, there is. It was in that class, for example, that I first saw the contradictory speeches given by Lincoln during his run for the presidency. I was shocked. Not only by the language and duplicity of the revered Abraham Lincoln, but that no one had bothered to mention this complication in all of my school years. (After close questioning of my son, they are still neglecting to publicly delve deep.)

Henry Louis Gates, Jr. and Donald Yacovane have collected speeches, letters, eulogies, and interviews to illustrate the not only the complexities of the times, but of the man himself. As Gates concludes in his brilliant and readable introduction,

"In 1922, [W.E.B.] Du Bois wrote that 'As sinners, we like to imagine righteousness in our heroes. As a result, when a great man dies, we begin to whitewash him…. We slur over and explain away his inconsistencies until there appears before us, not the real man but the myth - immense, perfect, cold, and dead.' Du Bios loved Lincoln but refused to deify him. 'I love him not because he was perfect but because he was not and yet triumphed…. The world is full of people born hating and despising their fellows. To these I say: See this man. He was one of you and yet he became Abraham Lincoln.'"

The book, Lincoln on Race and Slavery (978-0-691-14234-0) is available this month from Princeton.

Finally, Legacy Publications has published this month a book for children called Shackles. It's great material for use in schools as an early introduction to slavery in America because the narrative works much in the same way as good history: there's adventure, then a mystery, then discovery, disbelief, explanation, and at the end, the need to run out and tell someone. The story is set near Charleston, SC, and it's summertime. Three little boys are amusing themselves in the backyard, digging for treasure. They have a map from the Pirate Museum, nice black tri-corners, and wooden swords. They dig a hole, but what the oldest boy finds is "an armful of mud and metal. It is all as heavy as bricks, and I almost drop it." Shackles (978-0-933101-06-7), written by Marjory Heath Wentworth and illustrated by Leslie Darwin Pratt-Thomas, is highly recommended for school libraries.

By Heart: Reflections of a Rust Belt Bard by Philip Brady

2009-01-31T13:18:00.000-08:00

Author Philip Brady introduces "Teaching Tu Fu on the Night Shift," an essay in this week's Book Club book:

"Your da may be a cop," a parish priest once told me, "but you're headed for a life of crime." Though my snowball didn't break the rectory window, I did nearly fulfill his prophecy—I became a poet. This essay, from my recent book By Heart: Reflections of a Rust Belt Bard, takes place in a classroom in an urban mid-west university, where many students come — or I should say 'return' — with ambitions of advancement. But the poetry they meet in this particular class stumps them—and in turn, they wind up stumping me, bringing about a realization that poetry, if it is to transform us, must also transgress.

Philip Brady teaches at Youngstown State University, where he directs the Poetry Center and Etruscan Press. He is the author of three books of poems, a memoir, an edition on James Joyce, and a collection of essays. He has won the Ohioana Poetry Prize, five Ohio Arts Council Fellowships, residencies at Yaddo and Hawthornden Castle, and a Thayer and Newhouse Fellowships from New York State. He plays in the Celtic band, Brady's Leap.

The story, "Teaching Tu Fu on the Night Shift," is available for free download at ForeWord Book Club.

The Letter of the Law - yer

2009-01-22T11:05:00.000-08:00

The Oaf of Office by Steven Pinker (NYT)

Barack Obama: A Pocket Biography of Our 44th President

2009-01-21T06:24:00.000-08:00

Henry Louis Gates, Jr., the Alphonse Fletcher University Professor at Harvard University and Director of the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for African and African American Research opens this short biography with an introduction. Written the day after Barak Obama’s election as the 44th President of the United States, he talks about the “few magical transformative moments in African American history”:

The first time was New Year’s Day in 1863, when tens of thousands of black people huddled together all over the North waiting to see if Abraham Lincoln would sign the Emancipation Proclamation. The second was the night of 22 June 1938, the storied rematch between Joe Louis and Max Schmeling, when black families and friends crowded around radios to listen and cheer as the Brown Bomber knocked out Schmeling in the first round. The third, of course, was 28 August 1963, when the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. proclaimed to the world that he had a dream, in the shadow of a brooding Lincoln, peering down on the assembled throng, while those of us who couldn’t be with him in Washington sat around our black-and- white television sets, bound together by King’s melodious voice through our tears and with quickened flesh.

For Gates, and on this Inauguration Day, clearly thousands and thousands of others, Obama’s election constitutes, as Gates also writes, a “symbolic culmination of the black freedom struggle, the grand achievement of a great, collective dream.”

Steven J. Niven works with Gates on the ongoing African American National Biography (Oxford), where he has authored 125 biographies, and is also part of the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute. In 41 action-packed pages, he takes the reader from Obama’s birth in Honolulu on 4 August, 1961, to Jakarta, Los Angeles, and New York. A new chapter opens when a disillusioned Obama accepts a $12,000 job organizing steel workers facing factory closures, and moves to Chicago. That was 1985, in 1996, he was on his way to the Illinois Senate, and eight years later, in 2004, he gave his Democratic National Convention speech, which launched the possibility and then the reality of his 2007 announcement of candidacy for President of the United States.

The biography concludes with a bibliogrpahy and transcript of “A More Perfect Union,” the March 2008 speech delivered in Philadelphia where Obama addressed his relationship with Reverend Wright and the anger of the black community.

With is snappy content, small size, and affordable price, this is a great book for corporate gifting. Don’t you wish you had it on your phone right now?

Barack Obama: A Pocket Biography of Our 44th President
by Steven J. Niven
Introduction by Henry Louis Gates, Jr.
Oxford University Press
978-0-19-539078-0
Softcover $3.95
February

How It's Done

2009-01-16T06:52:00.000-08:00

"Posterity" by David Crouse

2008-12-22T12:01:00.000-08:00

Author David Crouse introduces the short story "Posterity" from his collection The Man Back There. A free download is available until Wednesday at ForeWord's Book Club.

"Posterity" might be as close as I’ve ever come to historical fiction, in that the protagonist here is a culmination of a certain amount of research and so forth, but the story has to stand or fall on its own, not as a comment on a particular person or political period. The research I did is hopefully so unobtrusive as to be invisible.

The story began, I remember, as I sat in my office one day waiting for a blizzard to subside so I could head home. I had been reading about several different political figures that day, Strom Thurmond among them, and as I began to work on a revision of another story, the water fountain scene spilled out accidentally onto the page. Once that scene was finished then I certainly had to do something with it. I remember writing almost a complete rough draft of the story during that snowstorm—I remember it distinctly because usually I have to labor a lot more on first drafts. I wouldn’t say this one was easy, but it was quick.

"Posterity" one of the stranger pieces in the The Man Back There, but I also think it fits perfectly. The book is full of bad men, and the senator is definitely one of these, but in a way that feels distinct from the other men in the book. He certainly occupies a different economic strata than the others, although deep down, in the furthest, darkest closets of his psychology, he has the same problems and failings as the rest of them. Hopefully he’s still strangely sympathetic for all of that. Because that’s a big part of what I wanted to do in these stories and in this story in particular—render ordinarily unsympathetic characters in such a way that the reader feels empathy for them, and possibly feels slightly troubled by that empathy. Not just by the fact that it exists, but by its limits too.

Networking: The Contrarian Approach

2008-12-17T12:06:00.000-08:00

At ForeWord Magazine, Peter Gutiérrez, a principal partner at Skyline Publishing Solutions, LLC, a New Jersey-based consulting firm, offers a workable definition of the dread networking.

For years I believed I was a decent networker, maybe even a good one. I could secure work in a variety of publishing roles across a range of platforms. Along the way I’d meet interesting, accomplished and sometimes even famous people. When it came time to do what I considered “schmoozing,” I’d put on my game face and make sure my business cards were in a place that I could get to with one hand.

The truth is, I was terrible at networking.

Okay, so I didn’t spray crackers on my cocktail party hosts. However, I was deeply oblivious to networking’s “big picture” in just about every way one can imagine that phrase having any meaning.

To clarify, I hope you’ll allow a question at this point: what are your current networking efforts really getting you? If they help you to achieve your publishing goals, or to promote your work once it’s published, great. After all, there’s nothing wrong with that…

But here’s another question for your consideration. Is your networking really opening up any unexpected opportunities of a creative or financial nature? That is, is it sparking possibilities that you couldn’t have imagined? Examples might include your work/titles entering markets that you never could have foreseen them entering, or the spontaneous birthing of exciting new projects or partnerships.

Networking that produces results like these might appear, at best, to require a tremendous amount of time and sweat and, at worst, to represent wishful thinking writ large. Yet from my own experience I can say that when the process of networking is truly working (and this idea likely applies beyond the narrow confines of publishing), it becomes a low-maintenance system that continually generates new and unpredictable “inputs” into your professional life. It’s the difference between going to your mailbox and finding that something you ordered from Amazon has arrived on time and in one piece and is just what you wanted… versus finding a completely new mailbox.

I used to think networking was a form of self-promotion, or maybe a way to set up a safety net for lean times. Through it, one earned a living and built up a résumé. But now I’m of the opinion that that’s not really networking—it’s self-aggrandizement via Rolodex. Think about it. Is a network that’s disproportionately about benefiting one little individual node even worthy of the name?

So these days I’m thinking that in print and media publishing in particular, everything is about networking. After all, isn’t our business about connecting to readers? Or, when we’re inspired, doesn’t it feel like we’re connecting our very ideas (i.e., our “content”) to a larger discourse? In other words, to a conversation that’s already in progress and that will continue long after our “utterance.”

The trick is to take these somewhat lofty-sounding and abstract principles and wed them to what we commonly think of as networking. With that in mind, it should be clear that I’m not talking about moving away from developing your career or growing your company. Rather, think about those things as you might think about nurturing a sapling in your backyard or on your roof deck. Sure, you’d want to water it, but it wouldn’t make sense to be so focused on that single tree or that single act that you don’t notice when it’s in fact raining. This doesn’t mean just being open to serendipity when it comes knocking (we’re all pretty good at that), but being always mindful of the larger mission, if I may be permitted a pretty overused word these days.

I think we’ve all experienced not being sure what to say when meeting someone in our industry for the first time. Do you launch into what you do, hoping it sounds interesting? Or maybe you have the other guy go first—and listen for points where you can jump in and turn the spotlight on yourself? Again, there’s nothing wrong with those approaches and sometimes they may even be unavoidable. But how about talking about something that’s neither I- nor you-oriented—a conversation in which a deeper alignment is discovered?

I fully realize that some of these notions may sound a bit out there, so next week I’ll follow up with specific practices that have been hugely helpful to me. In today’s challenging publishing environment I can’t help but feel this is actually the best time to effect a paradigm-shift in terms of how one approaches networking.

Yes, that’s contrarian even to my ears—after all, self-preservation is the name of the game when sales are plummeting, new titles aren’t being acquired, and work forces are being laid off. It’s only natural to start scoping out the lifeboats and identifying the ones that may have room for you. If you don’t, the other swimmers certainly will.

Still, a neat alternative might be to stop panicking, take a deep breath, and simply stand up—then you might see that the water comes up only to your knees. A clichéd image, I guess, but it’s worth noting that such self-possession is much easier to muster when you strengthen your network by, paradoxically, realizing that in the end that network isn’t about you.

Posted by: Peter Gutiérrez

The Theory of Light and Matter by Andrew Porter

2008-12-11T09:41:00.000-08:00

The Theory of Light and Matter is a collection of short stories by Andrew Porter. It was published by the University of Georgia Press after receiving its Flannery O’Connor Prize for Short Fiction.

Here, Mr Porter talks about "Departure," one of the stories in the book.

Almost all of my stories begin with an image, or a memory from my past, that has stayed with me over the years. In the case of “Departure,” the image was that of a small arcade inside a strip mall that my friends and I used to frequent in the late afternoons after school. There was nothing unusual about this arcade, except for the fact that every once in a while a group of Amish teenagers would show up in street clothes to play video games there. I had grown up among the Amish—there was a large population in the small town where I lived—but I’d never seem them out in public like this and I had certainly never seen them wearing street clothes. At the time, I didn’t understand that this was part of an experiment designed by their parents to reinforce their children’s commitment to the Amish way of life. I simply thought that there was something strange going on, something I didn’t understand. And though the arcade itself never made its way into the final draft of my story, and though I myself did little more than stare at these kids, I think that the questions that puzzled me back then were the same questions that compelled me to write the story: Who were these kids? What did they want? And, perhaps most importantly, what would happen if I actually walked across the arcade and tried to talk to them?

A download of the story is available all week at ForeWord Book Club.

Dead or Disfunctional

2008-12-11T06:16:00.000-08:00

I love this article from the NYT about what New Yorkers need to know.

What the Search Engines Have Found Out About All of Us by Jim Dwyer.

Stop Writing

2008-12-10T12:30:00.000-08:00

Have you noticed how many writers there are today? And technology has made every writer a publisher as well. Paul Greenburg's ingenious plan calls for cutting back by paying out. And who would you rather support, he says, a writer or an insurance agent? See the article in the NYT.

Urban Walls

2008-12-05T06:46:00.000-08:00

Burhan Dogançay’s father, a painter, sent him to Paris from Istanbul to study economics. He had to promise not to study art or play soccer. Dogançay kept his promise, more or less, until he graduated and visited New York. There, on the Upper East Side, he saw a wall that would change his life. “It struck me as a perfect composition," he said. "In spite of its decaying and aging appearance, it looked like a beautiful painting.”

Urban Walls: A Generation of Collage in Europe & America (Hudson Hills Press, 978-1-55595-288-4) displays Dogançay’s 40-plus-year chronicle and interpretation of public walls, windows, doors, what he calls a “reconstruction of the arbitrary” and a “mirror of the neighborhood.” Accompanying and complementing the 75 beautiful and disturbing plates is an essay by art historian Brandon Taylor. Taylor documents the beginning of collage by Braque and Picasso, and its transformation after the massive urban destruction of World War II. Walls, buildings, lives, expectations were fragmented and jumbled—collage, and its opposite, decollage, or “the tearing of parts asunder,” were artists' attempts to make unspeakable public spaces articulate. Taylor describes how the Beats, the size of American studios, and the GI Bill all contributed to the self-discovery of Rauschenberg, Villeglé, and Hains, among others.

(ForeWord Magazine)

The Vampire of Ropraz

2008-12-04T07:13:00.000-08:00

The Vampire of Ropraz
Jacques Chessex
Bitter Lemon Press
978-1-904738-33-6

Where I live, winter is not just the name of a season, it’s a state of being. Today I look out the windows – sure, there’s a line of geese heading to where the Boardman pours out into West Bay making a little unfrozen spot, but there’s also snow like grit, like clouds of icy gnats, and the view beyond a block fades away into clammy gray. From below, all day long, comes the sound of chopping and metal on concrete. The few people on the streets walk with their shoulders hunched into collars and faces obscured by scarves. I can see my car from here, growing a toupee of white, the interior vinyl collecting its special frostiness.

But, when all’s said and done, I live in a city. A small city, but nonetheless convivial. You won’t find boys hacking their grandparents to death for a couple hundred bucks, or bar fights that end in the spring when the body catches in the dam. Superstition drifts harmlessly in the garden dream-catchers and cement angels of liberal townies.

The regional paper tells another story — one of generational alcoholism, incest, fundamentalism, the desire for the destruction of culture and the longing to survive by tooth and folklore. A drive to the nearest major ski resort (30 minutes) takes you past homes sided with black plastic, ancient peeling doublewides, windowless cinderblock bars, and tiny isolated stores that sell gas and the smoked flesh of the local wildlife. In the summer there are campers and cabin-owners in these hundreds of acres forests of northern Michigan; in the winter, there’s the ticking of your own brain, or your wife’s brain, or your kid’s.

The people who live in the deep forests are not the entrepreneurial spirits found in cities — for a city attracts idea-makers whether they’re thieves or manufacturers. They’re not of the farmer-type either, who must clear the path to plant and watch the weather, who must plan for good times and bad. Backwoods people live day-to-day, scrap to scrap. Most of them were born in the place; some have been pushed there, like to the end of a rope; a few have invented the place for themselves.

Which is all a long introduction to the kind of chill of the suspected-unknown The Vampire or Ropraz, short novel by Prix Goncourt winner Jacques Chessex, produced. High in the Jurat mountains, the twenty-year old daughter of a local dignitary dies of meningitis and is buried in the frozen February earth. Two days later her grave is discovered open, the coffin unscrewed. Intestines are hanging out in the snow, the girl’s left hand has been severed, and her flesh bitten everywhere and spit out in the bushes. Although the story takes place in Switzerland, it is not so far geographically from the land of Vlad, and this rapist of dead women is quickly entitled “Vampire” by the press.

All right, so the press has always loved catchy titles for their criminals, and although the violation takes place in the isolated, squalid areas, where “[i]deas have no currency, tradition is a dead weight,” where poverty and lack of education leave people “barred inside their skulls,” where ailments are nourished with potions, and spells are concocted with menstrual blood and toad spittle, they don’t lynch the suspect when they finally get their hands on him.

They hand him over to a psychologist who takes him to his ward on Christmas Day to “sing of Christ’s birth, drink mulled wine and eat little cakes baked by volunteers in the kitchen.”

The young man ages twelve years in the ward before the War arrives, opening the gates. Immediately, he joins the Foreign Legion (he was rejected by the army in his youth, in his own country) and is killed seven months later on the Souain road. A broken body in a muddy battlefield would seem to be the end of it, but no: in 1920, France’s Unknown Soldier is chosen by lot from among eight anonymous coffins. Recent DNA research suggests that the body of the soldier who lies beneath the Arc de Triumph is none other than Charles-Augustin Favez, convicted in Switzerland of vampirism and desecration of graves. And the question is, how could this man be a monster in one place and a hero in another?

The Vampire of Ropraz is a superb choice for fiesty book clubs.

Aftershocks: Seven Stories by Grete Weil

2008-12-01T06:22:00.000-08:00

Aftershocks: Seven Stories by Grete Weil translated by John Barrett

This week, the ForeWord Book club features a story from Greta Weil’s Aftershocks (Verba Mundi/David R. Godine, 978-1-56792-282-0). In “Little Sonja Rosenkranz,” Marthe is reminded of her time as part of the French Resistance when she sees the name of a long forgotten acquaintance on the television screen. After several decades, she renews her efforts to find the woman who may have murdered a young Jewish girl who was entrusted to her care. This a haunting story of what it's like to participate in something larger than yourself, and to have that end. Or not.

ForeWord Magazine Book Club

Bombay: The City I Love, by Amit Chaudhuri

2008-11-28T08:06:00.000-08:00

In today's Guardian, "The novelist Amit Chaudhuri finds it impossible to think about his childhood home without a quickening of excitement and pleasure. But this week's terror attacks have highlighted the other side of Mumbai - a society riven by poverty and despair."

A couple of days ago, after a performance in London, an old schoolfriend who had come to my concert offered to drop me at the station. He had come to listen to me sing - and to show me how to operate my first ever MP3 player, whose stock of songs he had provided. Music, which had brought us together in conspiratorial and competitive ways when we were growing up in Bombay, had continued to be a common interest even now; and this exchange of songs and information went back to when we were privileged, tie-wearing, precocious schoolboys. The one thing, naturally, we never did then, and we always do now when we see each other, is talk about the city we still refer to as Bombay; it has taken on a retrospective, definitive meaning for us, but it has also burgeoned and changed unimaginably in our absence.

As usual, our conversation on the subject registered gentle disagreements: we both admitted to still loving the city, but I said I was increasingly disturbed by its present incarnation. A few years ago, a taxi driver had told me that someone dining at the exclusive Indigo restaurant could spend in a night what he earned in half a year. On a subsequent visit, I had noticed, not far from Indigo, a woman and her children sitting on the brightly lit road, vacantly absorbed in their own universe. The disparities in Bombay had always been crude, but liberalisation and the free market had legitimised consumerism and spending, and made it seem, in the metropolis, more effective than social work. It was essential to splurge at the Indigo for the lot of the woman on the road to change: the thread connecting one to the other may not be obvious to the passerby, but it was apparently undeniable. In the process, Bombay's middle and especially its upper classes - always large-hearted and relatively free of introspection, always upbeat - had slowly but irrevocably been infantilised. It was an infantilisation that even my friend and I, after all these years, consciously re-enacted, as he showed me the buttons to press on the MP3 player, a way of connecting to the world and the past: it was, in part, why we still loved Bombay.

The Indigo is only a five minutes' walk from the Taj Mahal hotel. In the past 12 hours, I have been watching pictures of the Taj taken from different angles: trapped guests leaning out of windows; the top storey burning; swathes of smoke covering the majestic dome. I have also seen pictures of two very young men with AK 47 rifles, one of them in a T-shirt with Versace printed on it in large letters. People, including my wife calling from India, have mentioned 9/11 and New York, and I suppose there is a comparable degree of strangeness - combined with the inevitable sense of having been betrayed and outwitted - in these attacks. The comparison also possibly arises from the joy-loving nature of both cities, capitalism and the new world order after the collapse of the Soviet Union having transformed them both decisively - New York into the world's first city, Bombay into India's great metropolis.

My parents moved to Bombay from Calcutta in 1965, when I was an infant - they stayed at the Taj for two weeks while the company found them a flat. This was the beginning of Calcutta's decline, companies and professionals fleeing labour trouble, and relocating at this optimistic seaside metropolis in western India. It was a charmed life - from at least two of the flats we lived in when my father was finance director and then chief executive of Britannia Biscuits, flats in Malabar Hill and Cuffe Parade, the city's two richest localities, you could see a skyline that, with its lissom, tall buildings (Bombay is the only Indian city to have had an obsessive romance with the vertical, the skyscraper), approximated Manhattan in some ways; in its sunniness, its palm trees, its disguised but obvious carnality, it echoed what we knew of California from films; and the gothic buildings were remnants of the old history that had first brought together these seven fishing islands.

From different windows and balconies in those two flats, at different points of my life until 1982, when my father retired, the dome of the Taj (the "old" Taj, as it came to be known after the arrival of its neighbour, the Taj Intercontinental) was visible, grey, as seemingly and deceptively stationary as a low cloud. Like Calcutta, and unlike Delhi, with its Moghul and Sultanate lineage, Bombay had no really great historical or religious monuments; its landmarks, in keeping with the fact that it was the progeny of an almost innocent-seeming colonial modernity, were secular ones - hotels; cinema halls, such as the Eros, the Regal, the Metro; grand, untidy railway stations such as the Victoria Terminus. To call the Taj the "old" Taj was to deliberately indulge in a flagrant misnomer, and a reminder of Bombay's willingness to rewrite history in terms of the urban, the kitschy, the comic: it was as if the "real" Taj Mahal in Agra had never existed except in those most incredible of objects - school textbooks.

A great deal changed in the early 90s, along with the name: Bombay obliterated, and turned into Mumbai, at the behest of the rightwing Shiv Sena. The old place names then become a currency of a middle-class oral culture, and recur in slips of tongue that reveal as much as they hide.

The politics of Bombay itself became intolerant in the past 25 years, but the city, discovering its true metier with liberalisation, became more heterogeneous and variegated than I can remember, partly because its old centres of wealth had to disperse and scatter from within, as property prices rose unthinkably and offices moved to the less salubrious suburbs. Similarly, the uncontainable, swelling traffic enforced the creation of new routes, flyovers through previously unvisited (for the middle class) areas, and random, swift, and intriguingly uneven, gentrification.

As Bombay expands and shrinks, and you take the new routes and visit the relocated offices, you are struck by the architectural marvel it is: the thrilling juxtaposition of churches, mosques and small Hindu shrines, the genteel, suburban residential houses, with flower pots and swings, that you had never before noticed.

No city I know, certainly not New York, has this variety of life, except perhaps London. Its principal difference from these two cities, which, in many ways, it surpasses, is its relative intolerance of the learned, academic classes: it has ceased to have a great university. When, in a traffic jam, you look at the faces in a car near you, you do not see anyone - whether it's a trader or a corporate executive - who is lost or unfocused, who is not engaged, in some sense, in the final, unifying, daytime activity of money-making. Yet, for all its opacities and daily injustices, it is impossible to think of Bombay without a quickening of excitement and pleasure, and not to recall that quickening with awe and confusion at moments such as this one.

Books

A Cat Called Magic

Anxious About What?

School Lunchroom Palette

Aspirin for Fungal Infections

Casual Copping

Keith Richards

Autumn Palette

Wild Grape Jelly

It Rained All Night, and in the Morning

You Make Me Sick

An Expression of Our Culture

If You Sit in Your Chair and Do as You're Told, You Never Grow Up to Imagine This

The Art of Selling Books

This morning a raven circled the field, then flew into one of those tress.

Prohibition and Marijuana

Calle 13 - Latinoamerica

Cuevana.com

Squirrel Mind Is Not Monkey Mind

Crows Eating Apples

Cleveland Township Speaks to the Undead

Old Mission Lighthouse

Shop Talk #1: Only One Customer at a Time

TABLE MANNERS

Dogs and Humans

iPad Portrait, Brushes app

iPad and Brushes Portraits

iPad Portraits

Chiles Rellenos

Menu Collages

Stuff We Use: FlameAwake

More Reading, Less Books

Don't Buy Books at Bookstores

Restrepo

WTF FF

Going to Borders and Buying a Book at Amazon

Stand-up Desk

Book Cover: Women and Philanthropy

Book Cover Design 2

Book Cover Design

Women and Philanthropy

Book Cover Design

Book Cover Design

Book Design

Book Design

Book Cover Design

Book Cover Design

Book Cover Design

Book Cover Design

Book Design and Layout

Book Layout & Design

Book Review: Why People Get Sick

Book Review: The Secret World of Walter Anderson

by Hester Bass

Book Cover Design: Kitchen Alchemy

Book Review: The Printed Picture

Beneath the Roses

by Gregory Crewdson, Essay by Russell Banks

Book Review: Food

Chapbooks

Book Reviews: Giving Books

Book Reviews: Cooking the Cowboy Way

Book Cover Design

Book Reviews: Quote Poet Unquote

Book Reviews: The Infinity of Lists

Best Books

Editorial Services

Book Design

Book Cover Art

Kitchen Alchemy

Going Out Green

Cooks' House

Cooks' House: The Art and Soul of Local Sustainable Cuisine

Sternly Departing by Mark Halliday

The joy of exclamation marks! by Stuart Jeffries

Stuart Jeffries at the Guardian writes hilariously about punctuation!

In and out of style: Punctuation past and present

Resistance by Fady Joudah

Pitcher of Lemonade by Sam Cornish

Little Gothic by Emily Wilson