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Other Electricities: Stories
by
Ander Monson
“Like Franklin’s discovery of the electricity we do know, Monson’s luminous, galvanized book represents a paradigm shift. The frequencies of the novel have been scrambled and redefined by this elegant experiment. Other Electricities is a new physics of prose, a lyric string theory of charged and sparkling sentences. What a kite! What a key!”—Michael Martone “Monson is tune...more
Paperback, 167 pages
Published
May 1st 2005
by Sarabande Books
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Fritz
added it
I bought this in preparation for a trip to Michigan where I thought I might look up Ander, a friend of a friend. I had just bought a new bike helmet, but I was also *wearing* a helmet, and the two-helmet deal was almost too much for the bookstore clerk. "What, you're wearing *two* helmets now?" she asked. "Is that supposed to be *safer*?"
I went to Michigan, didn't manage to look up Ander, and failed to read the book until a few months later.
All of this ...more
I went to Michigan, didn't manage to look up Ander, and failed to read the book until a few months later.
All of this ...more
Ander Monson has increased my already abiding fascination with Michigan with his collection Other Electricities: Stories. (I picked up his essay book Neck Deep: and Other Predicaments randomly at last year's book fair because it was Michigan centric. I'm an easy sell, what can I say? Great decision by me. I'm in the Ander Monson admirer ranks.)
I've never been to Michigan, but I've listened to Sufjan Steven's indescribably beautiful album Michigan countless times since its 2003 releas...more
I've never been to Michigan, but I've listened to Sufjan Steven's indescribably beautiful album Michigan countless times since its 2003 releas...more
Creative and powerful use of the written word to convey deep emotions and connections outside the typical realm of word choice and structure. Dark but meaningful relationships and means to deal with life in all it's absurdity. Sparse presentation, dense content. I loved it!
This book is like "Winesburg, Ohio," with the characters scraped clean, like the story of the map at the beginning of that book. Anderson's book, like Monson's, attempts to piece together a community through "stories," but where Anderson focuses on the "life" of the small town, its people, Monson's theme is death, or absence of life, absence of people.
Which is not to say that Monson doesn't populate his fictions with characters, only that those character...more
Which is not to say that Monson doesn't populate his fictions with characters, only that those character...more
One of the most unique books I've come across. I thoroughly enjoyed the experience of reading what reminded me of a diverse set of poems. Clearly the author is fascinated with words, structure and all things literary. I imagined him sitting with an image, a scene, a plot and transcribing in almost a free association way all the words that came to him without a filter. But that's not quite right either as he clearly put much careful construction into the book -- like chapters built entirely out o...more
Monson's stunning stories move 'from a world of hard but sparse facts to a storyscape of soft, fulfilling fictions.' He writes with distinctive whimsy and obsesssion, earning moments of inevitable, surprising beauty. At the center of everything is the ‘radio amateur,’ a meditative youth in Michigan’s upper peninsula, whose father is withdrawn into a world of ham radio, whose mother has vanished, and whose older brother is armless and aphasiac. Around him gather stories of friends and town-folk ...more
The cover declares Other Electricities "stories," but I think of it as a story cycle, or a novel in stories. What connects the stories is their location, which is not just a small town in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, but a small town in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan in midwinter: snow and ice fill the book, or empty it out, blank as empty pages, empty spaces, loss; lost girls and women, murdered or drowned by misadventure or simply gone away.
Full review at: http://coffeeandink.livejournal.com/7528...
Full review at: http://coffeeandink.livejournal.com/7528...
It's been a really long time since I've read a book that has connected with me in a way that this book has. Maybe it's because I'm from a Michigan small town (albeit Lower Peninsula) and can recall, if not somewhat relate to the many characters in these series of seperate, yet intertwined stories. Ander Monson has definitely picked up a new fan and I can't wait to read more from him.
Added note:
I was finally able to see Ander Monson at the Printer's Row Book Fair after a coupl...more
Added note:
I was finally able to see Ander Monson at the Printer's Row Book Fair after a coupl...more
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Monson has some great characters here and you've got to love the odd interconnections between characters. You get these weird kind of snapshots, collage-like, from the various characters lives. Monson does a good job connecting the reader to the characters' senses of loss. Oddly put together, but interesting nonetheless.
Ander Monson's Other Electricities won our seventeenth annual John C. Zacharis First Book Award. The award honors the best debut book by a Ploughshares writer, alternating between poetry and fiction.
You can read the full announcement here: http://www.pshares.org/issues/article-de...
You can read the full announcement here: http://www.pshares.org/issues/article-de...
I loved this strange, inventive, beautiful collection of stories, halfway between poetry and insanity.
I love the lonely, fucked-up, snowy, magical setting of the UP. I love the radio schematics and diagrams. I especially love everything having to do with Liz, Carrie, and Yr Protagonist. There were a few stories I didn't love, but that doesn't dull my appreciation for the work as a whole.
I love the lonely, fucked-up, snowy, magical setting of the UP. I love the radio schematics and diagrams. I especially love everything having to do with Liz, Carrie, and Yr Protagonist. There were a few stories I didn't love, but that doesn't dull my appreciation for the work as a whole.
this book of short stories/pieces left me verbally imprinted with loneliness and grief. don't read this if you are depressed. Monson is from the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. Funny, because I once had a long distance boyfriend who lived in this strange little town and I often took the greyhound up to visit him. Such a weird place! It is like being in some 1950's Finnish town and I love that the acronym for the university there is F U. I spent a year 2000 New Year's eve there, far away from techno...more
Elizabeth
added it
Poetry, novel, stories, investigation, meditation on the nature of place and currents... this is a wonderful book. Strange. Lyrical. Associative in vibe yet anchored by plot and relationships and place.
I know this book will be a five star in the right mood/state of mind, so I'm waiting until then to reread. Difficult to get into - I was annoyed with HOW abstract it was for the first bit - but read at least to the jumping-off-the-cliff story. It was around then that it started clicking into place.
An experimental, novelistic collection of interrelated stories set in the ice and isolation of Michigan.
Winner of the 2007 John C. Zacharis First Book Award from Ploughshares.
Winner of the 2007 John C. Zacharis First Book Award from Ploughshares.
J.J.
is currently reading it
A collection of stories linked by a small town in Michigan. Monson explores the theme of systems which leads into some complex ideas about choice and environmental influence.
My favorite part of Other Electricites was the form--short stories told from differing perspectives and centered around the deaths in a Northern Michigan town. I found Monson's writing most interesting when it was at it's most poetic and his forms were more experimental. I truly liked the index of themes at the end.
I definitely felt the characters were always real and never being looked down on. My only criticism was that there are few light spots in the dark/wintery tone that per...more
I definitely felt the characters were always real and never being looked down on. My only criticism was that there are few light spots in the dark/wintery tone that per...more
I probably missed the year when everyone was like 'holy shit this story collection from Ander Monson is on fire with goodness' but holy shit this story collection from Ander Monson is on fire with goodness. If you liked Matt Bell's How They Were Found or Ryan Call's The Weather Stations or any of James Chapman's books or any bit of anything you've ever read in Diagram or, in a different vein, if you care anything for literature that does with words what we haven't seen done as well before: read ...more
A series of interrelated, experimental short stories. The best stories in this collection (even though they are often bleak) make me excited about reading and living. There are several that are just alright and there are one or two things I thought he could have handled much better. I am probably a little more generous than others might be, but I give him a lot of credit for trying new things and because the good stories are that good.
I really wanted to like this. Ander Monson came to my writing class and showed us his website, which was awesome, and lectured, which was awesome, and this book was experimental and unique and interesting, which should be awesome.
But it ended up being so experimental that it wasn't engaging at all. I found it hard to stay focused. And I imagine it would be harder for a reader who is not a writer as well to appreciate it.
But it ended up being so experimental that it wasn't engaging at all. I found it hard to stay focused. And I imagine it would be harder for a reader who is not a writer as well to appreciate it.
Wow! What to say about this book...
Monson expertly transports the reader to the dark, icy, snowy world of upper Michigan. The several characters--and their reflection upon a girl who once fell through the ice and drowned--reveal who they are through the lens of this experience as well as a mysterious murder of another girl. It's a somewhat complex kaleidoscope of accounts, but absolutely worth every word and page.
Monson expertly transports the reader to the dark, icy, snowy world of upper Michigan. The several characters--and their reflection upon a girl who once fell through the ice and drowned--reveal who they are through the lens of this experience as well as a mysterious murder of another girl. It's a somewhat complex kaleidoscope of accounts, but absolutely worth every word and page.
Monson has some great characters here and you've got to love the odd interconnections between characters. You get these weird kind of snapshots, collage-like, from the various characters lives. Monson does a good job connecting the reader to the characters' senses of loss. Oddly put together, but interesting nonetheless.
Monson's Other Electricities is collection of delicate and moving short stories, or rather "shorts" that piece together the life of a group of friends and families who are coping with death, love loss, boredom, malaise. The best story in this book remains the title piece, that to me seems the heart of the entire book.
First story is well worth a read by anyone.
The rest of the book is a bit more peculiar. It's filled with schematics, diagrams, and other odd structure devices. None are overly distracting, but might not be to everyone's taste.
Definitely, a unique voice in short stories.
The rest of the book is a bit more peculiar. It's filled with schematics, diagrams, and other odd structure devices. None are overly distracting, but might not be to everyone's taste.
Definitely, a unique voice in short stories.
I need to re-read this one, to look at how it works too, like I'm doing with Austerlitz and did with Impossible Object. It's similar to Impossible Object, because it's seemingly made up of short stories, but they're actually part of one narrative, sort of splintered and seen from different angles.
I recently revisited this one and boy was it great. Lots of lovely imagery that makes me think of the kind of haunted world you make for yourself when you're young and alone and exploring the things and people around you. Satisfyingly midwestern in a really relatable way.
I could not put this down until I was finished, and then I wanted to start it all over again. There's something about the tension, and the space, in this book that made me happy to be receptive.
Very interesting collection of short stories that have some links, and some of which are told in very unique ways.
such a great book and no one talks about it. a lesson in brevity while still being lyrical. inventive.
So dark and cold and lonely. I don't know if I'll have time to read all of this. Maybe later.
| topics | posts | views | last activity | |
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| Desperately seeking access or leads to Other Electricities online... | 1 | 3 | Feb 15, 2011 09:36am |
Ander Monson is the author of Vanishing Point; Neck Deep and Other Predicaments, winner of the Graywolf Press Nonfiction Prize; the novel Other Electricities; and the poetry collections Vacationland and The Available World. He lives and teaches in Arizona and edits the magazine DIAGRAM.
Although Ander is a proud graduate of Knox College, he also received advanced degrees from Iowa Stat...more
More about Ander Monson...
Although Ander is a proud graduate of Knox College, he also received advanced degrees from Iowa Stat...more
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