Kyle Minor's Blog, page 2
November 18, 2014
Italian Translation for Praying Drunk and In the Devil’s Territory in 2016/17
Some good news: Milan-based publisher Baldini & Castoldi has acquired translation rights to Praying Drunk and In the Devil’s Territory. The books will be available to Italian readers in 2016 and 2017.
November 9, 2014
Amazon Best Books of 2014
I’m happy that Praying Drunk made the Amazon Best Books of 2014 list for short stories, alongside such heroes as Lorrie Moore, Margaret Atwood, and Donald Antrim.
October 1, 2014
Trying to Remember
I’m trying to remember what my grandfather looked like when he was alive and I knew him, but all I have to work from is a photograph taken before my mother was born. Is he on his way to hellraise or to declare whatever sounded enough like undying love to get the yes and the ring? I’m imagining hard and writing hard and drawing hard but I can’t bring him back.
September 19, 2014
July 27, 2014
Powell’s Best Story Collections of the 21st Century (So Far)
Praying Drunk was selected as one of Powell’s “Best Short Story Collections of the 21st Century (So Far),” keeping some good company: Junot Diaz, Roberto Bolano, Lorrie Moore, Wells Tower, Jhumpa Lahiri, Alice Munro, Karen Russell, George Saunders, Jess Walter, Lydia Davis, Ben Marcus, David Foster Wallace, and Donald Ray Pollock.
June 27, 2014
Powell’s Best Story Collections of the 21st Century (So Far)
Praying Drunk was selected as one of Powell’s “Best Short Story Collections of the 21st Century (So Far),” keeping some good company: Junot Diaz, Roberto Bolano, Lorrie Moore, Wells Tower, Jhumpa Lahiri, Alice Munro, Karen Russell, George Saunders, Jess Walter, Lydia Davis, Ben Marcus, David Foster Wallace, and Donald Ray Pollock.
Some Unsolicited Advice for Young Writers
Some unsolicited advice for young writers: There is probably something weird about you, about what you want to do, about how you want to do it. You’re probably not pulling it off yet. But the one piece of advice you should immediately ignore is the suggestion that you shear off the rough edges, regularize, de-complicate, become like whatever the advisor thinks everybody ought to be. Don’t do that. Be yourself. Be weird. Be singular. When the time comes, the thing that will lodge your work in the mind and heart of the readers for whom it will mean so much is the thing that right now is causing people to say the crippling words: No. Don’t. Can’t. Stop.
- Kyle Minor
May 29, 2014
Powell’s Best Story Collections of the 21st Century (So Far)
Praying Drunk was selected as one of Powell’s “Best Short Story Collections of the 21st Century (So Far),” keeping some good company: Junot Diaz, Roberto Bolano, Lorrie Moore, Wells Tower, Jhumpa Lahiri, Alice Munro, Karen Russell, George Saunders, Jess Walter, Lydia Davis, David Foster Wallace, and Donald Ray Pollock.
May 9, 2014
New York Times Book Review, IPPY Bronze Medal, Reader’s Digest
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Three good things:
1. Praying Drunk was reviewed in the April 27 edition of the New York Times Book Review.
2. The book will be awarded the Bronze Medal for Short Fiction at the 2014 Independent Publishing (IPPY) Awards at BookExpo America on May 28 in New York City.
3. Dawn Raffel at Reader’s Digest pointed readers toward Praying Drunk in a feature titled “23 Contemporary Writers You Should Have Read by Now.”
April 22, 2014
Book Suggestions for NYTBR Readers
If you’re here for the first time because you read about Praying Drunk in the April 27 edition of the New York Times Book Review, I hope to use the good fortune of your brief attention to point you in the direction of eleven new (and newish) books I think you might enjoy as much as I did:
1. The Virgins, by Pamela Erens (a novel) (author’s website)
2. The Transcriptionist, by Amy Rowland (author’s Twitter)
3. The Big Smoke, by Adrian Matejka (author’s website)
4. Wynne’s War, by Aaron Gwyn (author’s Twitter)
5. Loteria, by Mario Alberto Zambrano (author’s website)
6. Dept. of Speculation, by Jenny Offill (author’s website)
7. The Empathy Exams, by Leslie Jamison (author’s website)
8. Americanah, by Chimimanda Ngozi Adichie (author’s website)
9. East of the West, by Miroslav Penkov (author’s website)
10. Demon Camp, by Jennifer Percy (author’s Twitter)
11. Lay It on My Heart, by Angela Pneuman (author’s Twitter)
12. Thrown, by Kerry Howley (author’s website)
13. Saint Monkey, by Jacinda Townsend (author’s website)
