<![CDATA[(Not That You Asked): Rants, Exploits, and Obsessions]]>

false <![CDATA[(Not That You Asked): Rants, Exploits, and Obsessions]]> http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1184531755m/208616.jpg 208616 3 An Exclusive Essay from Author Steve Almond Steve Almond is obsessed. He first offered the world a peek into his fixations in My Life in Heavy Metal, a collection of short stories throbbing with hookups, drunken kisses, failed passes, souring relationships, and, naturally, heavy metal. But Almond forever chewed the hard chocolate shell from his creamy inner obsessive with 2004's Candyfreak: A Journey through the Chocolate Underbelly of America--a sort of On the Road for the sugar set, documenting an epic journey through America's confectionary highways and backroads. Almond is back with (Not that You Asked): Rants, Exploits, and Obsessions, a collection of autobiographical pieces covering topics as diverse as Oprah Winfrey, Kurt Vonnegut, sexual failure, and the many varieties of shame. We asked Almond just what it is about obsession that drives his work, as well is its intrinsic value in all art--low and high. <hr class="bucketDivider" noshade="noshade" size="1"> The Obsession Engine Why House of Rock with Bret Michaels could be your next novel. Or not. By Steve Almond A close friend of mine - who may or may not be my wife - recently fell in love with the VH-1 reality series House of Rock. For those of you who are not hip to its charms, HoR stars Bret Michaels, the former lead singer of Poison, and a gaggle of women vying to become his soul mate. I hope you will not be shocked to learn that several of these potential soul mates are strippers. Nor do all of them appear to be virgins. My friend insists that her interest in the program is purely anthropological. But I happen to know that she spent a good portion of her adolescence listening to Eighties hair metal bands and dreaming about bedding dudes like Bret Michaels and even working, briefly, as a waitress in a topless bar. She comes by her obsession naturally, is my point. The longer I read and write, the more I come to view obsession as the essential engine of literature. I am not suggesting that my wife, er, friend should write a novel about House of Rock. (The series is, by her own description, a kind of pulp novel already--histrionic, predictable, crushingly squalid.) What I'm suggesting is that her allegiance to the program identifies essential fears and desires within her, ones which embarrass her quite robustly and therefore belong in the novel she hopes to write. To take this a step further: I'm not interested in writing that isn't obsessive. Who is? We're all drama queens in the end. We all come to stories with two basic questions: Who do I care about? And What do they care about? As long as our hero, or heroine, cares deeply about something (i.e. is obsessed), and as long as they're willing to tell us their own twisted version of the truth, we'll come along for the ride. Don't believe me? Let me call to the stand my star witness, Humbert Humbert. Read more... 201928 11 9 2007 (Not That You Asked): Rants, Exploits, and Obsessions total:383|5:66|4:138|3:129|2:41|1:9| 383 1360 607 128 2 2 false false Sat Dec 01 00:00:00 -0800 2007 Mon Oct 29 17:28:50 -0700 2007 Mon Dec 03 06:58:56 -0800 2007
I hear ...more...]]> 1 2 false false Wed Aug 01 06:21:29 -0700 2007 Sun Sep 16 12:55:34 -0700 2007 Cand...more...]]> 4 1 false false Sat Sep 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Thu Nov 29 13:01:24 -0800 2007 Thu Nov 29 13:45:58 -0800 2007
Almond opens with a "pre-emptive" letter to Winfrey, rejecting her "offer" to make this volume one of her book club selections....more...]]> 3 1 false false Thu Nov 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Sun Nov 11 21:38:40 -0800 2007 Sun Nov 18 21:20:56 -0800 2007 love (baseball or politically-centered), I laughed often and much throughout. Well, I acutally did...more...]]> 5 1 false false Mon Oct 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Mon Oct 15 15:24:42 -0700 2007 Mon Oct 15 15:26:06 -0700 2007 Candyfreak that he used to roll around in piles of candy when he was a kid. Now that he’s (chronologically, anyway) an adult, I think he’d like to roll around in piles of words. Almond is the kind of writer who sees and feels and loves and hates with abandon, and it’s c...more...]]> 4 1 false false Mon Jul 09 14:30:44 -0700 2007 Mon Jul 09 14:35:16 -0700 2007 more...]]> 3 0 false false Fri Sep 04 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Tue Sep 08 14:16:05 -0700 2009 Tue Sep 08 14:27:17 -0700 2009 1 more...]]> 5 0 false false Mon Aug 31 06:30:58 -0700 2009 Mon Aug 31 06:33:22 -0700 2009 10 Ways I Killed My Daughter Within Her First 72 Hour Of Life

I rarely even chuckle aloud while reading, and almost never cry at the written word, but while lying in bed, 11:30 Saturday night, alone (which my husband—who was away—will be happy to know,) I smiled, lau...more...]]> 2 0 false false Sat Dec 06 15:57:09 -0800 2008 Sat Dec 06 16:00:24 -0800 2008 more...]]> 4 0 false false Sat Jul 18 21:09:13 -0700 2009 Sat Jul 18 21:09:38 -0700 2009 more...]]> 3 0 false false Sat Jul 11 16:22:00 -0700 2009 Sat Jul 11 16:22:26 -0700 2009 more...]]> 3 0 false false Sun Aug 17 11:24:01 -0700 2008 Sun Aug 17 11:24:10 -0700 2008 more...]]> 4 0 false false Fri Jul 18 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Sun Jul 13 13:42:09 -0700 2008 Sun Aug 24 01:43:44 -0700 2008
They are funny. They are eloquent. They are insightful. They know a little bit a...more...]]> 4 1 false false Wed Jul 09 11:59:50 -0700 2008 Sat Jul 12 21:04:23 -0700 2008 more...]]> 2 0 false false Sat Dec 01 00:00:00 -0800 2007 Wed Oct 10 08:26:37 -0700 2007 Tue Dec 11 08:29:41 -0800 2007
There are great moments in this book, though, and it's overall wonderfully readable, so there. ...more...]]> 4 0 false false Sat Sep 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Tue Sep 18 18:56:56 -0700 2007 Fri Sep 21 17:27:42 -0700 2007 Not That You Asked was both hilarious and insightful. The essay on Vonnegut was stellar, as was the essay about the author quitting his adjunct position at Boston College--an act of protest (but not heroism, as Al...more...]]> 5 0 false false Tue Jul 01 06:25:43 -0700 2008 Tue Jul 01 06:29:35 -0700 2008 more...]]> 5 0 true false Mon Oct 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Tue Oct 02 16:48:58 -0700 2007 Sat Oct 20 15:09:10 -0700 2007
He writes about his extreme dislike for the Red Sox even though he re...more...]]> 2 0 false false Wed Oct 29 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Fri Oct 24 11:40:57 -0700 2008 Wed Nov 05 13:37:16 -0800 2008 more...]]> 3 0 false false Thu Nov 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Mon Nov 19 13:11:08 -0800 2007 Mon Nov 19 13:25:41 -0800 2007 I had moments of laughter and I was swept away by a sentence here or there but all in all I felt like most of the conclusions were either too tidy or too abrupt in t...more...]]> http://www.goodreads.com/book_link/follow/8?book_id=208616