Clifford Garstang's Blog, page 34

March 1, 2020

Book Tour: North Carolina

[image error]

A few months ago I realized I would have a window of opportunity in February to do a swing through North Carolina to promote my novel, The Shaman of Turtle Valley. I had made some connections with a few bookstores, so I sent out some queries to those stores and managed to line up three appearances, three days in a row. It seemed like an ideal schedule. Then I hoped the weather wouldn’t interfere.

My first stop was Scuppernong Books in Greensboro. I’ve done events at Scuppernong before and I know one of the owners, so they were most welcoming. It’s a great little store in the re-emergent downtown and includes a coffee/wine bar. It also hosts lots of events and groups, making it a wonderful community resource. I invited another writer friend to join me for the reading and between us we managed to draw a fair number of people. Cameron MacKenzie, author of the very imaginative novel The Beginning of His Excellent and Eventful Career, about Pancho Villa, went first and was very entertaining in talking about his book. Then I talked about my novel and read a few passages. It was fun for me because when I talked about Korea I knew there was someone in the audience–my old friend Kathleen, who was a Peace Corps Volunteer in Korea with me back in the day–who would understand.

The next day I was off to Chapel Hill. I’ve done readings in the past at another bookstore in the area of the Research Triangle, but this time I wanted to try something different. And, as it turned out, some good friends live very near Flyleaf Books, making it very convenient. Flyleaf is a great store. It doesn’t depend on a cafe–they just sell books. And what a great selection they have, too! This event was billed as a conversation and my friend Marjorie Hudson, another fine writer, had read my novel very closely in order to prepare questions and launching points for my reading of select passages. This was a lot of fun for me and it led me to read from parts of the book I don’t usually present to audiences. If you weren’t able to come out to the event, the store has signed copies in stock.

For my last stop I drove south to Southern Pines for my reading at The Country Bookshop. I was looking forward to this event because my friend Katrina lives there and also because I had enjoyed meeting the bookshop manager at a SIBA event last fall and knew she was enthusiastic about hosting me. On arrival in the town, I checked into a historic hotel, The Jefferson Inn, and walked around to check out the shops. The event was scheduled for 5:00 pm, relatively early for a reading, and the audience was small. But I had spent some time that afternoon preparing a different group of selections to read–getting most of the voices from the book into the time allotted–so I felt it went pretty well.

After each event, there was a Q&A period, something I always enjoy. At the last stop, though, a gentleman asked me if it was really cost-effective for an author to come to a small town like Southern Pines. In purely economic terms, I don’t suppose it is (although I did sign a fair amount of stock, so who knows). But the actual number of books sold at a reading is only a small part of what an author is doing. For me, I’m there to connect with readers. If I can make my book sound appealing, maybe a listener will buy the book or one of my other books and maybe they’ll tell their friends. In the short-run, no it’s not cost-effective, but the connections make it worthwhile.

In fact, as I was leaving the store, one of the women who had heard my reading said to me that if my publisher makes an audiobook of the novel that I should do the narration myself because I was a good reader. That was such a nice compliment. I’m not sure I would actually do that, but it was certainly nice to hear.

The next day I drove home, but I would love to schedule mini-tours like this one again.

View more on Clifford Garstang's website »

Like • 0 comments • flag

Published on March 01, 2020 06:38

2020 Reading–February

Only five books finished this month, but, hey, it’s a short month, even with Leap Day!

[image error]Friend by Paek Nam-nyong

Friend by Paek
Nam-nyung is a curiosity, at least. Paek is a North Korean and his novel is one
of the few published in the West. It was originally published in North Korea in
1988, then published in South Korea a few years later, and more recently in
France in 2011. It will be published in April in the U.S. by Columbia
University Press, and look for my review of the book then in the New York Journal of Books. The novel’s
focus is a judge, Jeong Jin Wu, who must adjudicate divorce cases in his
district, a small city some distance from Pyongyang. A divorce petition is
filed by a woman who is a singer. She wants to divorce her husband, a lathe
operator. The judge investigates the case, finds that there is a child
involved, and both parents are being selfish and obstinate. He also discovers
the damage caused by an earlier case he handled in which he did grant the
divorce and separated the two children of that couple by awarding custody to
the parents of one child each. Given the author’s official status as a member
of the Writers’ Union in North Korea, one might expect politics to find their
way into the novel, but the book is interesting because it isn’t political. It deals with the everyday lives of
these people, although it seems that they are all being exhorted to do their
best for the betterment of their country.

[image error]Disappearing Earth by Julia Phillips

Disappearing
Earth by Julia Philips is beautifully written. Such fluid prose,
capturing the look and feel of a setting—the Kamchatka Peninsula in Russia—that
is unfamiliar to most of us. It’s called a novel, although as I read it I felt
that it was more of a novel in stories, in which the many chapters that focus
on the large cast of characters all orbit around the central mystery: what
happened to the two girls who were kidnapped? Although I liked the book a lot,
I was reading it just after the controversy over another novel, American Dirt, came to my attention.
That book involves a migrant from Mexico and the author has been lambasted by
some critics (starting with a Latina reviewer) for a number of misdeeds, first
among them being cultural appropriation. I reject the cultural appropriation
label; artists should be free to depict anything their imagination desires. If
they don’t do it with sensitivity, then the work may be said to be poorly
executed, but that doesn’t make it evil. Disappearing
Earth is a book about Russian and native peoples on the Kamchatka
Peninsula. The author is neither Russian nor a native of that region, although
she did spend time there doing research. Why isn’t she also charged with
cultural appropriation? Because the native people of Kamchatka have no voice in
America? Because we don’t care if another “white” (i.e. Russian, in this case)
culture is appropriated? I’m genuinely curious about this. In any event, the
book has received much praise that I think is richly deserved.

[image error]Only As The Day Is Long by Dorianne Laux

Only As
the Day is Long by Dorianne Laux is a collection of new and selected poems that I
picked up when I heard the poet read in Portland, Oregon at Powells Books last
year, having visited that city for the annual conference of the Association of
Writers and Writing Programs. The book includes a large number of selected
poems from five earlier collections, as well as a number of new poems in the
title section, “Only as the Day is Long.” There is a lot to love here and I’ve
been reading it gradually over a month or more. I think I am most moved by the
new poems, though, many of which deal with the death of the poet’s mother (who
also appears in many of the earlier poems).

[image error]The Feather Thief by Kirk Wallace Johnson

The
Feather Thief by Kirk Wallace Johnson begins with a description of a theft in
2009 of a huge number of preserved birds from the British Museum of Natural
History. The author then describes how the bulk of the collection came to be in
the museum, having been assembled by the British naturalist, Alfred Russel
Wallace, who independently of Charles Darwin came up with a theory of the
origin of species. Johnson becomes obsessed with the crime and tries to learn
as much as he can about the thief, Edwin Rist, a gifted flautist and fly tier
who himself was obsessed with the exotic feathers he craved for his most
elaborate creations. While it’s an engaging story, I’m puzzled by Johnson’s
insertion of himself into the narrative. He finds it necessary to explain that
he heard about the theft while fly fishing during a difficult time in his life
and that his research was somehow a relief from his work with refugees (also
not relevant to the theft). Other than that, however, it was fascinating. It
might also have been interesting if Johnson had explored the psychology of
tying flies that will never be used to actually fish, which seems to me a
bizarre pursuit.

[image error]Pigs by Johanna Stoberock

Pigs by Johanna Stoberock will be part of a panel discussion I’m moderating in March at the Virginia Festival of the Book called “Writing the Anthropocene.” The term Anthropocene refers to the human era and specifically the extreme impact humans have on the environment. In this case the subject is garbage, especially garbage that ends up in the oceans. On an island—somewhere, not specified—all the garbage washes up on the shore (including discarded humans), where a crew of children feed it all (with occasional but rare exceptions) to a bunch of pigs. Meanwhile, some adults live in a villa on the hills and party and drink martinis all day and force the children to work. The children are finely distinguished from each other—one is a toddler who doesn’t speak, until the day when she begins speaking in the language of an adult obsessed with acquisition and consumption. Very allegorical, and part of the fun of reading it is deciphering what the message actually is. I can’t say I’m entirely clear about that, but I’m still pondering it.

View more on Clifford Garstang's website »

Like • 0 comments • flag

Published on March 01, 2020 06:16

January 31, 2020

2020 Reading–January

Starting the year off slowly, with just six books finished this month. (My goal for the year is 66 books, so I’m just a little ahead of schedule.)

[image error]Olive, Again by Elizabeth Strout

Olive, Again by Elizabeth Strout is a sequel to Strout’s Pulitzer Prize-winning book Olive Kitteridge. I’ve heard from many people that they like this book even more than the original, and I think I do too. When I read the first book, although I admired the writing, I really didn’t like the character of Olive. Maybe she’s grown on me by this time, but now I like her bluntness. She definitely doesn’t pull punches. It’s also interesting to watch Olive advance into old age over the course of the book, absorbing the punches that time delivers. In the first book time also passed, but the endpoint didn’t seem quite so near, even though Olive’s husband does die in that book. While I’m not quite as old as Olive yet, it is sobering to read about her difficulties, and it was a bit depressing. On the other hand, it was great to see Olive react so negatively to a woman who had a Trump sticker on her car (although Strout doesn’t use Trump’s name).

[image error]The Testaments by Margaret Atwood

The
Testaments by Margaret Atwood was my book club’s pick for January, although
I had been determined not to read it. I read The Handmaid’s Tale some time ago and enjoyed it well enough, but I
didn’t feel the need to spend time on the sequel. (Also, I didn’t see any of
the TV series.) What more was there to say on the subject? And I was right that
I don’t think this book takes us much further than the original did. For one
thing, the writing isn’t particularly strong—lots of clichés—and the
organization is peculiar. I also never get a clear picture of Aunt Lydia’s
motivation. She puts herself at great risk to undermine Gilead, and yet she was
complicit in its creation and the oppression of a generation of women,
apparently to save herself. I’m not saying I didn’t like it, but it didn’t
exceed my low expectations.

[image error]The Bonfire of the Vanities by Tom Wolfe

The Bonfire of the
Vanities by Tom Wolfe was first published in 1987 and apparently I bought a
hardcover copy shortly thereafter (full price, $19.95, at Rizzoli, whose
Chicago store I visited when in town once or twice a year). It’s been on my
bookshelf, unread, ever since (moving several times, including back and forth
across the Pacific Ocean), probably because of its daunting length. Since then,
though, I had the pleasure of meeting Wolfe a few times and got a couple of
books signed by him (but not this one). Anyway, I was inspired to finally read
this one because while reading Stephen Greenblatt’s The Swerve recently I learned about the original Bonfire of the
Vanities perpetrated by Savanarola in Florence in 1497 in which various sinful
objects were burned. So, now that I’ve read the book, I realize that it is
satire, or at least it reads as satire when viewed from the perspective of 2020.
The Master of the Universe, Sherman McCoy, a bond trader on Wall Street, is a
cartoon character, and surely seemed that way even in the ‘80s when the book
was written. The question is whether he learns anything from his ordeal. He
says he does, but one wonders. The whole thing feels like a cartoon, come to
think of it, with no one—the press, the lawyers, the bankers, the gold-diggers,
the activists—coming away unscathed in their portrayals. It’s one of the
densest books I’ve read, in the sense of getting deeply—very deeply—into the
thoughts of many characters. If Wolfe had focused only on the plot, which is excellent,
it would have been half the length.

[image error]Crazy Rich Asians by Kevin Kwan

Crazy Rich Asians by Kevin Kwan isn’t a novel for everyone. It is set in Singapore, and I think it helps to have some familiarity with that country to really grasp what’s happening in the book (although maybe the movie would work better). The book deals with an American woman who is in a relationship with a Singaporean in New York, where they are both academics. He invites her to join him in Singapore for summer vacation, but he doesn’t tell her that he’s from a very wealthy and powerful family. Even when she arrives and starts experiencing the absurd extravagance of the lifestyle of his family and friends, she doesn’t fully understand that she’s basically now on another planet and there’s no way the natives will ever accept her. Having lived in Singapore for almost ten years, I’m very familiar with the landscape Kwan is describing here, although I had no dealings with the people he’s describing. I lived and worked on planet earth, I’m happy to say. In the end, I found the book to be kind of silly—a farcical soap opera of the rich and powerful—but I actually did enjoy it in the end. Kwan is a very good storyteller. I gather there are several sequels, and right now I don’t feel compelled to read on, but that may change.

[image error]Death in Spring by Merce Rodorero

Death in Spring by
Mercé Rodorero is beautiful, but nearly impenetrable. Rodorero was a Catalan
writer and I picked this book up in Barcelona last month in order to get a
taste of the literary culture. Given that the cover included a blurb from
Gabriel Garcia Marquez, I knew to expect some magical realism, but the story
goes far beyond that into a world that is difficult to comprehend. I take it
that on some level the novel is anti-authoritarian allegory, but in that case
some of its elements are difficult for me to comprehend. The stepmother with
the deformed arm who marries her step-son? Their child born with the same
deformity? The burial of villagers in trees in the forest? And what’s with all
the butterflies? And the river that flows under the village? Perhaps someone
has spent time parsing it all in a PhD dissertation, but I’m not sure I want to
make the effort to discover all the book’s meaning. I’m glad I read it, though,
and it adds something to my Barcelona trip.

[image error]Private by James Patterson and Maxine Paetro

Private by James
Patterson and Maxine Paetro is the first in a series, part of the Patterson
franchise, but I’m reasonably confident I won’t read beyond this first book and
I doubt that another Patterson will darken my door. I guess some people like
these action-filled books filled with stock characters, clichés, and trite
plots, but not me. Here, the hero is Jack Morgan (Seriously? Did they work
really hard to choose such a bland name?), impossibly handsome, ex-military who
has some kind of suppressed memory from action he saw in Afghanistan, and he
runs a fancy private investigation firm called Private. Oh, and he’s extremely
wealthy, partly because of dirty money he inherited from his father (who died
in prison), and partly because he’s good at the investigations game. Like other
books of the genre, there are several plot lines that have little to do with
each other, except that Jack Morgan is chasing down several different sets of
bad guys. There are several women in the story too, and Jack has slept with
most of them, of course, except for the unattractive ones.

View more on Clifford Garstang's website »

Like • 0 comments • flag

Published on January 31, 2020 12:58

January 8, 2020

New Book Now Available for Pre-Order

[image error]House of the Ancients and Other Stories
by Clifford Garstang

My new short story collection, House of the Ancients and Other Stories is now available for pre-order from the publisher, Press 53. The official release date is May 12, 2020, but the book will begin shipping in late April. For more information, and to place your order, go here.

Unlike my first collection, In an Uncharted Country, which included twelve linked stories set in a small town in Virginia, and my second book, What the Zhang Boys Know, a novel in stories set in a condominium building in Washington DC, this book has a wide variety of stories and settings ranging from Mexico to Hawaii to Southeast and Central Asia to Virginia to the Midwestern United States. (Both of those first two collections are also available from Press 53, by the way, along with the anthologies I edited for the press. Go here for more information about ordering those books.)

Endorsements for the book are still coming in, but here are a couple:

In his story collection House of the Ancients, Clifford Garstang sets before the reader a tiered Crayola box full of modern American males. A variety of different shades await inside—troubled, thoughtful, arrogant, and broken men, each trying to find his place in a changing society. Be prepared to hate some of them. Be prepared to weep for some of them. Be prepared to weep for the ones you hate. Fascinating, insightful, equal parts poignant and disturbing, House of the Ancients will keep you reading deep into the lonely night.

—Kim Wright, author of Last Ride to Graceland, winner of the Willie Morris Award for Southern Fiction

Clifford Garstang’s impressive collection arrives like a rush of postcards from around the world, streaming in through the morning mail slot. Mexico City, Bangkok, Hanoi, Copenhagen, Central Asia and the hinterlands of Virginia are only a few of the locales he transports us to in these memorable stories. And at each stop along the way, we’re greeted by another cast of characters, eager to enchant, charm and delight.

—Tim Wendel, award-winning author of Castro’s Curveball and Cancer Crossings

View more on Clifford Garstang's website »

1 like · Like • 0 comments • flag

Published on January 08, 2020 08:24

January 1, 2020

Writing Goals for 2020

[image error]

Happy New Year! What will you accomplish in 2020?

I believe that writers, maybe more than any other artists
and certainly more than other professionals, need to set goals for themselves. Creativity
doesn’t have to be undisciplined, and I can’t imagine calling yourself a writer
if you aren’t producing work. That doesn’t necessarily mean forcing yourself to
write 1,000 words a day, but aiming toward finishing a project by a certain
date might make it more likely that you will actually finish that project. And
if you do, then you can move on to the next one. Or so my thinking goes, at any
rate.

My goals aren’t resolutions. I’ve got those, too, but that’s
a whole other subject, one that I’ll keep to myself. Goals are what I want to
get done in 2020, and they’re meant to be far more specific than resolutions.
But before I can articulate what my 2020 goals are, I need to look back at the
goals I set for myself a year ago to see how I did. You can see my post about
2019 Writing Goals here.

My first goal for 2019 was to finish the novel that was my work-in-progress. Didn’t happen. Didn’t
come close. I struggled with it all year long. I think I now see a way forward,
but the picture only improved recently. Since I didn’t finish the novel, I also
didn’t query agents for the novel.
Two strikes! But then: I did launch my
debut novel and I did prepare my new
story collection for publication. The novel came out in May and the story
collection is currently out gathering blurbs for its expected publication in
May of 2020. Not only did I submit a
story for publication, the story in question found a very good home and was
published in a print journal in the fall of 2019. I actually wrote and
published several book reviews
during the year, and I also updated the
literary magazine rankings, which people seem to find useful. So I missed
on the first goal in a big way, but I managed to do almost everything else, so
I feel pretty good about the year. (I was also going to write at least one essay, and I didn’t finish it, but
I did start it, at least.)

Which brings us to 2020 and my writing goals for this year:

Launch my new story collection. Publication
of House of the Ancients and Other
Stories (Press 53) is scheduled for May 12, 2020 and we’re currently
finalizing the galleys and gathering blurbs for the cover. Between now and then
I have a lot to do to arrange some appearances and signings, but the work of
publication is now mostly out of my hands.Finalize
edits for my new novel. My novel Oliver’s
Travels will be published by Regal House Publishing in the spring of 2021.
Regal House takes a different approach than my previous publishers, and has a
rigid schedule of how and when edits will be done so that galleys can go out to
reviewers well in advance of publication. So this work will begin very soon and
should be done by the fall. Write and
submit a personal essay. I’ve been giving nonfiction a lot of thought
lately, and I think I want to try my and at the personal essay form. I started
work on an essay in 2019 and I’d very much like to finish that and submit it to
magazines in 2020.Write and
publish one or more book reviews. I was happy with the reviews I wrote in
2019 and I already have one commissioned review for 2020 with at least one more
in process. I’m also sitting on a couple of advance copies of 2020 books that
might turn into reviews. We’ll see.Update
the Literary Magazine Rankings. The 2021 Pushcart Prize anthology will be
out in the fall and I will update the rankings as soon as I get my hands on the
volume. People do seem to appreciate the work I do on this. If you’re not
familiar with the rankings, check out the 2020
Literary Magazine Rankings. Finish my
Work-in-Progress. This is the same goal I had in 2019 that I failed to
meet, but I do think it’s possible to do this year. Or, at least, I can finish
a complete draft. I won’t necessarily say that I’m going to query agents with
it, however, because it will need to be polished to do that, so that’s
something that might have to wait for 2021.Apply to
Writing Residencies, etc. I didn’t include this goal last year, but it’s
definitely part of the business, so I need to take a look at conferences,
residencies, and book festivals to see which ones make sense for me.

View more on Clifford Garstang's website »

Like • 0 comments • flag

Published on January 01, 2020 04:50

December 31, 2019

2019: My Year In Review

At my age, time really flies. I can’t believe this year is over already. But I have to say, as years go (not counting the national political scene), it was a good one, and I’ve got a lot to be pleased with.

[image error]

My First Novel. Without question, the biggest thing that happened for me in 2019 was the publication of my novel, The Shaman of Turtle Valley, which came out in May from Braddock Avenue Books. In truth, the book has overshadowed everything else, with pre-publication work, launch events (we had a great party at Ox-Eye Vineyards Tasting Room in May), readings and appearances throughout the year (and even stretching into 2020). I’m happy with the book and people have had very nice things to say about it. I hope it will continue to find new readers. There are several ways to buy the book, which I list here: How you can buy The Shaman of Turtle Valley (scroll down to Ordering Information). I’m also happy to visit book clubs (in person or by Skype) or give readings.

Travel. I was away from home a lot in 2019. I spent January in Chicago (during the most recent Polar Vortex) at Ragdale, working on my new novel. It wasn’t the most successful residency I’ve ever had, mostly because I was struggling with several aspects of the book (some of which still haven’t fully been resolved) and also because I was anticipating the publication of The Shaman of Turtle Valley. But being at Ragdale with a bunch of other artists was great. In March I was all over the place—Hot Springs, Virginia for an Electoral Board Conference; Portland, Oregon for the annual AWP Conference; New York City for some theater and museums; Charlottesville, Virginia for the Virginia Festival of the Book; and Winston-Salem, North Carolina for the new High Road Festival of Poetry and Short Fiction, where I taught a workshop on editing. Some of my other trips were for book events—Winchester, Virginia for a reading at the Handley Library and then later for the Summer LitFest sponsored by 1455 Literary Arts; a visit to Gettysburg College where I spoke with students and gave a public reading; readings and talks in Richmond, Fredericksburg, and Charlottesville, Virginia; and to Spartanburg, South Carolina for the Southern Independent Booksellers Association for their Discover trade show. I also returned to New York to see some more theater and to give a reading in the Yeah You Write reading series, which was a blast. And I made two trips to Europe: I spent 10 days in Prague in early September and two weeks in Barcelona in late November and early December. I wrapped up the year of travel with a two-week stay at the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts just before they closed for the year-end holidays. Altogether that’s close to three months away from home.

Theater. As I
mentioned above, I went to New York twice this year and saw some shows. First
up, in March, was The Ferryman, a
terrific play, winner of several awards including a Tony for Best Play, by Jez
Butterworth that I saw because my old friend Fred Applegate was in it. (Bonus:
backstage tour and drinks after with some members of the cast.) I also saw Boesman and Lena by Athol Fugard in a
wonderful off-Broadway revival that was meaningful to me because one of my
favorite Indiana University graduate school professors wrote a book about
Fugard, who was for a time in residence at the university. (The Dramatic Art of Athol Fugard by
Albert Wertheim.) In June I saw The Phantom
of the Opera, a show I’d somehow managed never to see anywhere, even though
it’s been on Broadway for more than thirty years and has been produced
everywhere else, too. I was familiar with the music, but the show seems dated.
It’s still making money—the theater was packed—but maybe it’s time to retire
that one? My final New York show for the year was Hamilton. Because of the hype over this show, I expected to be
disappointed. How could anything live up to the praise that’s been heaped on
it? But it did. The show is fantastic. There’s a touring production that I’d
love to see, but it was a thrill to see it on Broadway. These New York shows
weren’t the extent of my theater-going, however, as we have the amazing and
wonderful American Shakespeare
Center right here in Staunton, Virginia, and we (I’m on the Board of
Trustees) do great work. I saw every show we produced this year, most more than
once, and loved them all: Winter Season (The
Merry Wives of Windsor, Henry IV,
Part 1, The Belle’s Stratagem, Arden of Faversham, and Anne Page Hates Fun), Spring Season (The Comedy of Errors, The Winter’s Tale, Antigone, 16 Winters or The
Bear’s Tale), Summer/Fall Season (Julius
Caesar, Antony and Cleopatra, Caesar and Cleopatra, The Willard Suitcases), and Holiday
Season (A Christmas Carol, Every Christmas Story Ever Told and Then
Some). Rehearsals start momentarily for the 2020 Winter Season, with
opening performances near the end of January.

Reading. For the
past several years I have set a reading goal for myself on Goodreads. Thinking it would be a busy
year for me (it was), I set a modest goal for 2019 of 60 books—just 5 books a
month. But I’ve smashed through that goal and somehow have managed to read 80
books this year. Not a record for me, but not too shabby, either. Also, I
managed to do blog posts every month about the books I’d read. Rather than
recreate that list, I invite you to check the posts out, one for each month: 2019 Reading. I
read some really excellent books and only a few that I didn’t like. I’m not
going to make a list of my favorites, but there is no question that the best
book I read in 2019 was The Great
Believers by Rebecca Makkai. One of the best books of the decade.

[image error]Books read in 2019

Looking Forward.
I intend to do a separate post about writing goals, but here I’ll just say that
I’d really like to finish a draft of my current work-in-progress, a novel, in
2020. But there are plenty of distractions that may prevent me from achieving
that goal.

New Book. My new story collection, House of the Ancients and Other Stories will be published in May 2020 by Press 53. We’re beginning to think about events associated with the launch, and I hope to do several appearances throughout the year to support the book.Old Book. The Shaman of Turtle Valley, published in May of 2019, is still alive and kicking, and I’m lining up readings and book signings for the first half of the year, including an appearance in March at the Virginia Festival of the Book.Next Book. Yes, I’m currently working on a novel, but I have a finished novel that will be published in 2021 by Regal House Publishing, and because they like to produce Advance Reading Copies more than six months ahead of publication, we’ll be diving into edits for the novel very soon. I’m looking forward to working with the editor on the book, but I know it’s going to be time-consuming.Elections. There are likely to be three elections here in 2020. The Democratic Presidential Preference Primary will be March 3; there will almost certainly be a primary in June for the Republicans to pick their nominee to run for Senate and for the Democrats to pick their nominee to run for the House from this district; and the big one, the 2020 Presidential Election, will be on November 3. For most people, voting involves a few minutes on election day, but as Chair of the County Electoral Board, my obligations stretch out for months in advance of each election.Travel. I’m determined to go abroad again, but I have no idea where. I’m studying Spanish, so maybe South America? But I haven’t been to Asia for a few years, so maybe Japan?

View more on Clifford Garstang's website »

Like • 0 comments • flag

Published on December 31, 2019 17:04

2019 Reading–December

With travel and a writing residency, it was a busy month, so I finished just six books, but that brought me to 80 for the year, which feels like a respectable number. Here are the books I read in December.

[image error]Fascism: A Warning by Madeline Albright

Fascism: A Warning
by Madeline Albright is a smart book that does raise an alarm about the current
state of the world and the rise of authoritarian regimes, including the Trump
mess here in the United States. But it begins earlier in the 20th
Century with Mussolini and Hitler, taking the reader on a world tour of other
fascist regimes. It’s interesting that she includes some dictators who are
communists, whom we don’t generally think of as fascists, but people like the
Kims of North Korea aren’t just Marxists—they’re personality cultists. The book
is well written and engaging, as well as being a concise history of fascism.
And a warning.

[image error]Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 by Cho Nam-Joo

Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982
by Cho Nam-Joo is not a book that I can recommend. Its sole purpose seems to be
to establish that Korea is a sexist society, which can’t be news to anyone who
is at all familiar with that country. Kim Jiyoung is a woman born in 1982 who
learns her place in the family—the younger brother is favored, as in most
Korean families of the time—and in school and in the workplace. Everything is
stacked against women in Korea and ultimately it drives her insane. In fact,
the novel can be read as the file of Kim’s psychiatrist who is treating her for
her mental illness, a kind of schizophrenia in which she has begun to speak as
if she were other people. I wish, though, that we’d see even more of that
illness, as that’s way more interesting than the bulk of the book. To make
matters worse, the writing is dull and lifeless, although it’s hard to know how
fair an assessment that is given that the book is translated from Korean.

[image error]Dad’s Maybe Book by Tim O’Brien

Dad’s Maybe Book
by Tim O’Brien is a wonderful book with an odd name, explained in the
introduction. It helps, probably, to be a fan of O’Brien’s work, but if
approached with an open mind, there’s a lot to be gained from reading it.
Ostensibly, the book is a love letter to Timmy and Tad, O’Brien’s sons. O’Brien
married late in life, so the kids came when he was in his fifties, and the book
provides messages to them he might not be around to give them as they grow into
adulthood. But the book is also a collection of observations about writing,
some of which I remember from my time with O’Brien at the Sewanee Writers’
Conference, where I also met Timmy and Tad and Tim’s wife Meredith. Read this
way, the book will be valuable for any writer. And it is also a collection of
Tim’s general philosophy of life, especially his anti-war beliefs. These will
be useful for anyone, particularly the warmongers among us, who probably won’t
pay attention.

[image error]Nothing to See Here by Kevin Wilson

Nothing to See Here by Kevin Wilson came out earlier this year and received a lot of attention. It’s not my favorite of Wilson’s books (he’s a friend from the Sewanee Writers’ Conference and, like O’Brien, blurbed one of my books) but I did enjoy it. The novel is about a Tennessee woman who is asked to look after the step-children of an ambitious friend (anticipating that her Senator husband is destined for bigger things) because the kids are rather unusual: they spontaneously combust. (This quirk is the mark of a Wilson story.) But Lillian loves her friend, realizes that her life pretty much sucks (for which the friend is partly to blame), and she doesn’t have anything to lose. So she accepts the challenge and moves into her friend’s fancy guesthouse to take care of twins Bessie and Randall. The combustion thing is a problem, of course, but there are other complications as well that I won’t reveal here. It’s something of romp, and, most importantly for me, beautifully written. (I didn’t even notice the flaming child on the cover until I posted the image here.)

[image error]The Quitters by Carlo Matos

The Quitters
by Carlo Matos is a book I
acquired almost 2 years ago when I visited the publisher’s table at the annual
AWP Conference. (They were at the time considering a manuscript of mine that
they ultimately passed on, but no worries, it found another home.) The author
of this book was at the table during my visit and he was engaging, the book had
an attractive cover (call me shallow), and it never hurts to buy a book from a
publisher you might work with later, so I bought it. I buy more books than I
can read, so it went into a pile in my study until last week, when I moved some
stacks of books around and revealed this one. I decided to finally read it. It’s
terrific. It is described as creative essays, but I gather they are more or
less true. They deal with the author’s time as an MMA fighter, move into
attempts to learn archery, watching roller derby, and finally being an adjunct
composition teacher. The language throughout is fresh, which is what makes the
book a winner for me, but also most of the situations (adjuncting aside) are
fresh as well.

[image error]The Best American Travel Writing 2019, Edited by Alexandra Fuller

The Best American Travel Writing 2019 edited by Alexandra Fuller has altered my understanding of what travel writing is. It’s not enough, apparently, to visit Sagrada Familia in Barcelona and write about the beauty of the place, or even the warnings about pick-pockets in the crowded tourist spots in that city. The essay, like other essays, must have a broader point than just the personal experience being described. And while travel must be involved, it’s not tourism we’re talking about, exactly, but travel for the purpose of writing the essay: returning to your home on St. John to view the damage caused by Hurricane Irma; visiting the Russian tundra to talk to the native herders about the reindeer anthrax breakout; visiting various countries around the world to investigate their relationship to and use of hot peppers. Then there are the political essays that aren’t really about travel but do address circumstances in far-flung places, such as China and Egypt. My favorite pieces here, though, are the ones that do seem to be really about travel: going back to Cuba to visit the ancestral village, trying to find the same in China, and even the piece about bachelorette parties in Nashville.

View more on Clifford Garstang's website »

Like • 0 comments • flag

Published on December 31, 2019 09:33

December 21, 2019

Barcelona

Although I was waiting to hear about a short-notice writing residency, I saw a window of opportunity for travel and decided to jump through it. (And another reason: I was recently approved for Global Entry, a status that makes getting through the long immigration lines at airports much easier, and I wanted to try it out. That’s probably among the lamest excuses for international travel I’ve heard.) I booked a trip to Barcelona because I’ve heard great things about it and because I’ve never been to Spain. Of course, shortly before I left I was offered that residency—four weeks at VCCA—but the travel plans were all set. (I settled on a two-week residency to begin a couple of days after my return from Spain, so I did okay.)

I left for Spain on Monday, November 18, from Washington’s
Dulles International Airport. I don’t love IAD, and hate the traffic on the
highways getting to and from there, it’s a reasonably efficient place. I
parked, took a shuttle bus to the terminal, checked in, went through security,
and got to the United lounge in hardly any time at all. The flight to Frankfurt
was slightly delayed so there was virtually no layover before the flight to
Barcelona on Lufthansa. My ride into the city was waiting for me upon arrival,
and I got to my AirBnB apartment earlier than expected. Which was a problem,
because my host was not there to meet me.

I had been planning to either get a new sim card for my
unlocked phone or get new service weeks for the sim card I bought in France
last year, but I had not done that yet. So I stood in front of the building
wondering what to do. After a few minutes, I flagged down a student and asked
if he spoke English. “Of course,” he replied, somewhat offended. I showed him
my host’s phone number and asked him to call, which he did. The host assured me
that he would be there shortly. He came, got me settled into the apartment—which
was beautiful—and then I was on my own.

The two weeks in Barcelona were great. Although I had intended to get some work done—making progress on my novel, reading submissions for Prime Number (I’m the current guest editor for fiction)—the weather was too delightful and the city too interesting, so I ended up being more tourist than writer. Mostly I walked around the old parts of the city, visited museums and churches, and also took some day trips to sites in the countryside, including a monastery, a winery, and the Salvador Dali museum which is near the French border.

Here’s a selection of photographs from the trip:

[image error]flea market[image error]view from Montjuic[image error]view from Montserrat[image error]Gaudi [image error]jamon[image error]market[image error]Monastery[image error]Montserrat[image error]Park Guell[image error]Entrance to Park Guell[image error]Gaudi gate[image error]tourists love the lizard[image error]viaduct at Park Guell[image error]Picaso Museum[image error]Pontons winery[image error]Arch[image error]Costa Brava[image error]Dali Museum[image error]Dali museum[image error]view from chapel[image error]vineyard

View more on Clifford Garstang's website »

Like • 0 comments • flag

Published on December 21, 2019 09:45

December 16, 2019

2020 Literary Magazine Rankings

[image error]2020 Pushcart Prize Anthology

Below are links to the 2020 Perpetual Folly Literary Magazine Rankings for Fiction, Poetry, and Non-Fiction. Scroll down for a discussion of the rationale and methodology behind the lists.

If you find the lists useful, please consider making a donation to support this site.

Literary Magazine Ranking — Fiction

Literary Magazine Ranking — Poetry

Literary Magazine Ranking — Non-Fiction

Rationale for the rankings. Years ago, when I was first submitting short stories to literary magazines, I wanted a way to tier my submissions. I believe in simultaneous submissions, but I didn’t want to submit a story to a great magazine and a not-so-great magazine at the same time because of the risk of multiple acceptances. (If the not-so-great magazine accepted first, it would pain me to withdraw the story from the great magazine.) Developing a ranking of literary magazines allowed me to submit only to those magazines in roughly the same tier. I began sharing the list on my blog because I knew other writers used the same tiered approach to submissions. Eventually, I added poetry and non-fiction rankings and also links to magazine websites.

Basis for the rankings. I base the rankings on the annual Pushcart Prize anthology that comes out in November or early December. That anthology includes fiction, poetry, and non-fiction and excludes the magazines of general circulation like The New Yorker, Atlantic, Harper’s, and so on. Other anthologies, like the Best American series and the O.Henry Prize Stories are excellent books, but their approach to assembling their winners is different. As these things go, the Pushcart Prize anthology draws from a wide range of nominating magazines and contributing editors, which makes it the best choice for these rankings. One criticism of the Pushcart Prizes is that they have a print-publication bias. Although there are an increasing number of online publications earning recognition in the anthology, that bias is probably real. There are some fine online magazines that won’t appear on these lists, unfortunately.

Methodology. After several years of making these lists, I made a change a few years ago that I have retained. Originally, I based the rankings on a ten-year rolling score that assigned a constant value for Pushcart Prizes earned over that period and a lower value for Special Mentions. Some readers suggested that a five-year rolling score would be better because it would result in newer publications rising in the rankings sooner. But reputations take years to develop, and I didn’t like the shorter period, while acknowledging the validity of the point. So I compromised. Now the formula assigns one value for Prizes and Special Mentions received in the most recent five years and half that value for Prizes received in the preceding five years. Not all of the publications on the lists are magazines. The Pushcart Press considers nominations of works included in books published by small presses, and a handful of those presses are recognized each year for inclusion in the anthology.

Symbols. You’ll notice a few symbols next to the names of some magazines on the lists. (c) indicates a closed magazine; (w) indicates a broken link for a live magazine; and (?) indicates some question about the magazine or an unknown link.

Feedback and Support. I welcome your feedback. Let me know if you find a broken or incorrect link, either by leaving a comment or contacting me through this website. I don’t mind hearing criticism of my approach, either, if that’s what you want to share. (Praise is also welcome.) And if you find the lists at all useful, please consider making a donation to support the site. You’ll find a Donation button above and on each of the ranking pages.

View more on Clifford Garstang's website »

Like • 0 comments • flag

Published on December 16, 2019 04:00