David Abrams's Blog, page 197
July 9, 2012
My First Time: Jennifer Spiegel
My First Time is a regular feature in which writers talk about virgin experiences in their writing and publishing careers, ranging from their first rejection to the moment of holding their first published book in their hands. Today’s guest is Jennifer Spiegel, author of The Freak Chronicles , a collection of short stories freshly-published by Dzanc Books . Lauren Groff, author of Arcadia, had this to say about the book: "The Freak Chronicles is a miracle of a story collection: passionatel...
July 8, 2012
Is your pen quivering? I'm looking for contributors to the blog
As subscribers to the Quivering Pen newsletter* already know, things will probably get a little sparse around here in a couple of months, content at the blog thinning out as I go full-frontal Fobbit. To that end, I'm putting out a call for guest book reviews. If you or someone you know would like to contribute a review to The Quivering Pen, I'll be happy to consider it for publication. Sadly, I can't pay you for your efforts--but hey, you get the everlasting glory of in...
July 7, 2012
Terrorist Whack-a-Mole: London, July 7, 2005
During my year of deployment in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom, it sometimes seemed like the most dramatic news was happening outside the borders of Iraq. A quick mental scan of headlines in 2005 reminds me that we watched Terri Schiavo's slow death, Michael Jackson's trial, and Hurricane Katrina's wrath from the distance of several continents away. Filtered through CNN, Stars and Stripes and our phone calls with family back home, it was like watching bizarre and troublin...
July 6, 2012
Friday Freebie: Nom de Plume by Carmela Ciuraru
Congratulations to Laura Kay Bolin , winner of last week's Friday Freebie: Gilded Age by Claire McMillan.
This week's book giveaway is
Nom de Plume: A (Secret) History of Pseudonyms
by Carmela Ciuraru. It's a fascinating and lively look at the lives of authors who, for whatever reason, chose to live behind an alias. Here's the jacket copy from the publisher:What's in a name? In our "look at me" era, everyone's a brand. Privacy now seems a quaint relic, and self-effacement is a thin...
July 5, 2012
Library Journal: Fobbit is "a slice of awesome"
I'm sorry Douglas Lord had to be beaten to a bloody pulp by henchmen in order to cough up his reviews for Library Journal this week (or, as he puts it, "sploop out a glob" of words), but I'm full of ever-lovin' gratitude that he liked Fobbit . In his "Books for Dudes" column, Lord writes:
[I'm] happy to report that this darkly comic novel is a slice of awesome....This ain’t Hogan’s Heroes. Like the best writing of M.A.S.H., it is true dark comedy in that it reinforces how unpleasant life...
Paperback Flashback: One For Hell by Jada M. Davis
Celebrating vintage paperbacks--both the cheesy & the profound.
But mostly the cheesy.
Let's start with the cover, shall we? A laughing pinup in a negligee stands over a salt-and-pepper-haired man who looks suspiciously like a wayward Mitt Romney clutching his chest as he's crumpled to the floor beside a bed (and is that a spot of blood coming from under his hand?). One for Hell by Jada M. Davis screams political sex scandal to me.
But, after some careful and thorough intern...
July 4, 2012
Win a copy of Fobbit (and some Fobbity swag)
Good morning, my little Fobbiteers! It's a glorious Fourth of July here in Butte, Montana. The sun is shining, the flags are waving, and the hospital's emergency room is prepping to receive those revelers who just don't know when to let go of their firecrackers.
In honor of the red-white-and-blue day, I'm giving away an advance reading copy of Fobbit , my comedy about the Iraq War. The novel doesn't officially release until September 4 (T-minus two months and countin...
July 3, 2012
Trailer Park Tuesday: Anna Karenina and Keira Knightley's Bulldog Underbite
Welcome to Trailer Park Tuesday , a showcase of new book trailers and, in a few cases, previews of book-related movies. Unless their last name is Grisham or King, authors will probably never see their trailers on the big screen at the local cineplex. And that's a shame because a lot of hard work goes into producing these short marriages between book and video. So, if you like what you see, please spread the word and help these videos go viral.
(With apologies to Mr. Leo Tolstoy:) All period-dra...
July 2, 2012
My First Time: Michael Downs
My First Time
is a regular feature in which writers talk about virgin experiences in their writing and publishing careers, ranging from their first rejection to the moment of holding their first published book in their hands. Today’s guest is Michael Downs, author of
The Greatest Show
, a book of linked short stories about the Hartford Circus Fire of 1944. You can read more about the collection and how he came to write it in
this article
from the Hartford Courant. Downs is al...
June 30, 2012
Publishers Weekly calls Fobbit "an instant classic"
Things have been a little topsy-turvy in my head since I got the email from my editor at Grove/Atlantic a few days ago giving me a heads up about Publishers Weekly's pending starred-and-boxed review of Fobbit . I'm not a man who cries easily, but I'll admit that when I finished reading those 264 words of praise I had to reach for a Kleenex. I was living every debut novelist's dream, sitting bull's-eye in the moment for which I'd been waiting nearly 30 years.
Since the review was emb...
