Averil Dean's Blog, page 30

Point and Shoot

I don’t know what I’m doing. This book, this bass-ackwards book, is slowly frying what’s left of my circuitry. A few days ago, I dissected the fucker, cut some scenes apart and spliced them together and deleted a couple of hangers-on, and though it’s certainly a structural improvement, I still feel I’m missing the point.

With my last book, there came a moment when I realized what the story was about, specifically. It was something (to me) unexpected, personal, something deeper than the surface...

Wynton

If you get HBO, don’t miss this. All the YoungArts shows are terrific but this has been my favorite yet.

Strong

Trees

If a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound? Does pain still count if you don’t express it? If it exists only in the hidden places, in the fetid muddle at the bottom of your mind or the pinkening pressure of your eyelids, carved into nonessential bits of you that rub at the raw side of your clothes, does it exist at all? Does it matter? What matters is that hungry child on the other side of the globe. What matters is the mob, the milk, the rain cloud, t...

Goons

I just finished Jennifer Egan’s A Visit From the Goon Squad, a novel in stories about an aging record executive and the young woman who works as his assistant. I hesitate to read books that have collected as many awards as this one has, because I always feel I’ve failed somehow if I don’t like them. But no fear this time. I loved the wry-edged ennui, the leaping structure, the warmth and complexity of the characters—and the language. Gorgeous language.

After I’d finished, I rated it on Goodrea...

Galley

Two things happened last week: my galleys arrived, and I was invited to sign them at MPIBA next month in Denver.

First of all, holy shit, the book looks great. All laid out with pretty shards of broken glass at the chapter headings, the pages wrapped in their slick little galley cover with the marketing deets on the back. Amazing, all of this. I can’t get over it. Now I see why people have pages of thank yous at the end of their books: it’s what you feel like doing when you see it all come tog...

Debt

Tuesday morning at the cafe. My manuscript is marked throughout with notes saying {more here} in all the places where the shovel hit caliche. The {more here}s represent gaps in the dialogue, failed attempts at description or character reaction—places where I couldn’t think of a single damn thing to say. I’m always aware when I add a {more here} that I’ll owe myself the words at some point. Those little flags aren’t going to delete themselves.

So here we are. Seventy-five {more here}s, and me w...

Wolf

It’s 2:24 a.m. Are you asleep? Did you flip the pillow, settle your cheek, bliss out to the sound of your heartbeat in the down? Does your back hurt? Is your temple damp with tears? Are you fighting, fucking, necking, coming, sleep-jamming to Mr. Manning’s radio while the street lights wash your PJs white and red? Will anybody love you? Will you die before the dawn? Is it Mardi Gras in dreamland, all foil beads and thongs? Is a black hole forming in the space behind the morning, sucking your...

Couch

It’s football season and my Broncos are stomping. (We got your rematch, Baltimore.) My son isn’t into football, so he’s curled up on the couch with his e-reader. It’s hard to keep up with what he’s reading. The kid is voracious, and is one of those people who will carry on with a book until the bitter end, whether it has zombies in it or not. He reads as much as I do, and has taken to creeping up with his e-reader and a sheepish look on his face like he knows he’s getting carried away. Hey, a...

Blue Balls

I saw a movie today in which nothing happened. No build-up, no payoff, no shootout or car chase or first kiss or courtroom drama. No mystery, solved or lingering, no childhood romance or complicated family life, no dilemmas relating to career or parenting or religion or old-school morality. No glorious technicolor dreamcoat. No unintended leaks of laughter. No CGI. Or soulful interactions, or nuanced flicks of an eyelash. No blow jobs in the alley. No torch singer on a piano. No afterlife, or...