Nath Jones's Blog - Posts Tagged "salinger"
Title Change for How to Cherish the Grief-Stricken
The fourth collection of stories in the On Impulse series has been renamed Acquainted with Squalor. It will still be a while before it's released. Most of the stories have been submitted to literary journals. Several months are required for those publications to make their determinations.
But we'll have a book soon enough.
The title debate became quite raucous, really. I had loads of fun and three days of laughs with several friends. How to Cherish the Grief-Stricken is just a little off-putting, a little depressing. One friend who's read the collection and who is a writer also said that the original title literally repelled him. (Not good.)
More importantly he said the stories in this fourth collection don't quite inspire grief. He found more anger than sadness in the book.
So. Several of us tossed lots of options around: Home Wreck Makers, Blossoms in One Short Hour, Trust the Sweetest Frame, and the popular favorite Blessed Rat Bastards.
Now granted Blessed Rat Bastards would probably sell very well. (Even very, very well.) If it suited the collection a little better, I'd probably run with it. But it doesn't. It's too bombastic and this book really is supposed to be about craft, be my best stab at Litracher.
Home Wreck Makers was a real contender. I like it. The literary editor liked it. But ultimately most of the characters don't end their stories in wreckage.
There was a similar issue with Trust the Sweetest Frame. I love that title. It nods to the great old hymns and to home-building, which occupies many of the individuals in the book. Still, it's a little too religious and a few people quibbled over the fact that, really, you're not supposed to trust the sweetest frame, only God.
So what to do? If we're not going for raucous provocation, for word play, or for a time-honored religious allusion, what are we going for?
We're going for a good collection of literary short stories.
Salinger's Nine Stories is one of the best. This fourth collection of mine has nine stories in it as a sort of nod to his example. So. I went back, picked up his lovely wonder, re-read much of it, and in so doing found, "Are you at all acquainted with squalor?"
Oh, yes. There it was: the new title.
The line is in "For Esme -- With Love and Squalor".
Personally, I am a bit acquainted with squalor. I think that's why the phrase caught me, called to me, asked me to stop reading right there.
I conferred with the characters in my collection to the extent possible, and it seems they're each acquainted with squalor, too. It is a truth, quiet and undeniable.
But we'll have a book soon enough.
The title debate became quite raucous, really. I had loads of fun and three days of laughs with several friends. How to Cherish the Grief-Stricken is just a little off-putting, a little depressing. One friend who's read the collection and who is a writer also said that the original title literally repelled him. (Not good.)
More importantly he said the stories in this fourth collection don't quite inspire grief. He found more anger than sadness in the book.
So. Several of us tossed lots of options around: Home Wreck Makers, Blossoms in One Short Hour, Trust the Sweetest Frame, and the popular favorite Blessed Rat Bastards.
Now granted Blessed Rat Bastards would probably sell very well. (Even very, very well.) If it suited the collection a little better, I'd probably run with it. But it doesn't. It's too bombastic and this book really is supposed to be about craft, be my best stab at Litracher.
Home Wreck Makers was a real contender. I like it. The literary editor liked it. But ultimately most of the characters don't end their stories in wreckage.
There was a similar issue with Trust the Sweetest Frame. I love that title. It nods to the great old hymns and to home-building, which occupies many of the individuals in the book. Still, it's a little too religious and a few people quibbled over the fact that, really, you're not supposed to trust the sweetest frame, only God.
So what to do? If we're not going for raucous provocation, for word play, or for a time-honored religious allusion, what are we going for?
We're going for a good collection of literary short stories.
Salinger's Nine Stories is one of the best. This fourth collection of mine has nine stories in it as a sort of nod to his example. So. I went back, picked up his lovely wonder, re-read much of it, and in so doing found, "Are you at all acquainted with squalor?"
Oh, yes. There it was: the new title.
The line is in "For Esme -- With Love and Squalor".
Personally, I am a bit acquainted with squalor. I think that's why the phrase caught me, called to me, asked me to stop reading right there.
I conferred with the characters in my collection to the extent possible, and it seems they're each acquainted with squalor, too. It is a truth, quiet and undeniable.
Nope. No title.
Well. Mom came for Easter and said, "Absolutely not!" to the title Acquainted with Squalor.
She then laughed uproariously adding, "That will send 'em running to the shelves!" Meaning, actually, no, no one will buy the book.
I said, "It's Salinger."
She said, "You're you. Pick a line from your own book."
Mother's always had quite a bit of sway, as most Freudians and dutiful daughters can appreciate. So. Mom's rather strong opinion coupled to the fact that the literary editor now suggests going back to How to Cherish the Grief-Stricken has left the collection a bit without form.
With all the eureka phenomenon for which anyone could ever hope, I woke up on the twenty-second thinking Shoot the Diamond would definitely be the answer.
I'd been reading about Annie Oakley, how she could (according to Wikipedia), "repeatedly split a playing card, edge-on, and put several more holes in it before it could touch the ground, while using a .22 caliber rifle, at 90 feet (27 m)."
I'm enough of a piss-poor marksman to know that's amazing.
Isn't it?
So I woke up with that title seared across the landscape of my mind wondering what exactly would happen if you shoot a diamond.
There are no YouTube videos showing what does. What do you think? Would the diamond shatter and scatter, become pulverized glitter reflecting light? Or do you think the bullet glances off, gets deflected, and ricochets?
I have no idea what happens. I certainly don't have the sharpshooter skills to find out. I still love the image and think it's a much better course of action to shoot the diamond than to be at all aggressive with the man who may have offered such an item. Frankly, I thought Shoot the Diamond was a rather anti-materialist, peace-keeping concept.
However. My friend Chris Foresman says absolutely not. No way. No. No. He hates it. Says both How to Cherish the Grief-Stricken AND Acquainted with Squalor are better, though he likes neither.
She then laughed uproariously adding, "That will send 'em running to the shelves!" Meaning, actually, no, no one will buy the book.
I said, "It's Salinger."
She said, "You're you. Pick a line from your own book."
Mother's always had quite a bit of sway, as most Freudians and dutiful daughters can appreciate. So. Mom's rather strong opinion coupled to the fact that the literary editor now suggests going back to How to Cherish the Grief-Stricken has left the collection a bit without form.
With all the eureka phenomenon for which anyone could ever hope, I woke up on the twenty-second thinking Shoot the Diamond would definitely be the answer.
I'd been reading about Annie Oakley, how she could (according to Wikipedia), "repeatedly split a playing card, edge-on, and put several more holes in it before it could touch the ground, while using a .22 caliber rifle, at 90 feet (27 m)."
I'm enough of a piss-poor marksman to know that's amazing.
Isn't it?
So I woke up with that title seared across the landscape of my mind wondering what exactly would happen if you shoot a diamond.
There are no YouTube videos showing what does. What do you think? Would the diamond shatter and scatter, become pulverized glitter reflecting light? Or do you think the bullet glances off, gets deflected, and ricochets?
I have no idea what happens. I certainly don't have the sharpshooter skills to find out. I still love the image and think it's a much better course of action to shoot the diamond than to be at all aggressive with the man who may have offered such an item. Frankly, I thought Shoot the Diamond was a rather anti-materialist, peace-keeping concept.
However. My friend Chris Foresman says absolutely not. No way. No. No. He hates it. Says both How to Cherish the Grief-Stricken AND Acquainted with Squalor are better, though he likes neither.
