Ben Tanzer's Blog, page 186

This Podcast (and Chapbook) Will Change Your Life, Episode Thirty-Nine - The Beauties.

There is podcast and the killer Lauryn Allison Lewis. And There is "The Beauties," Lewis' self-bound, all unique and Kingfisher lovely chapbook, soon to be a novel playing in a bookstore near you, that finds a way to mash together both the story of woman, violence, marriage, mothering, all of it, all-powerful and diffuse, and the stories of three generations of women as well, in ways both old-fashioned, call it the vibe, and contemporary, with its commentary on machines and technology and transmutations, somehow speculative and looking back at once, signaling we think yet one more direction literature is going, coming, repeating, fiercely and wonderfully as we try to make sense of the world today.

"His best fiction yet." You Can Make Him Like You gets Pete Lit'd. And likes it. A lot.

Big hugs to incredibly biased and most possibly subjective TBWCYL, Inc. favorite, great friend and terrific writer Pete Anderson of Pete Lit blog fame for his generous and yes, maybe not so objective, words about You Can Make Him Like You. Drinks and falafel on us for sure when next we meet.

"I won't even try to be objective, but will simply mention that it's another funny, thoughtful, pop culture-saturated winner from Ben's restless imagination."

We are Father's Day Barrelhouse blog.

After a brief respite we are Father's Day Barrelhouse blog. Enjoy. And Happy Father's Day.

This Book Will Change Your Life - the bee-loud glade: a novel by Steve Himmer.

We suppose that we are supposed to read the rhythmic and beautifully crafted the bee-loud glade: a novel by Steve Himmer and find ourselves captivated by the ruminations on nature, which we were, and in turn ruminate ourselves on the work of Thoreau and maybe even the Garden of Eden, which we did, but as we read the book over the last couple of months we found ourselves primarily returning to another theme entirely, the world of work. The conceit here is that the mysteriously rich and eccentric Crane wants the oddly asocial Finch to live as a hermit on his estate for pay, another employee subject to Crane's every whim, from playing the flute to engaging in Tai Chai, which Finch does, willingly, and rarely grudgingly, never with a complaint certainly, and always coming back to the fact that he has signed a contract and made an agreement, which got us thinking about the state of work today, versus say the world of Bartleby the Scrivener, who famously said, "I prefer not to," and forced us to ask ourselves if that was okay. Is it okay to tell your employer you prefer not to do something, even work? What are our obligations when someone is paying us to do something? We think it has to be okay on some level, must be, right, regardless though, Finch never raises this issue or anything to that affect. But does that mean something? Is it a commentary on the fact that workers don't feel they can prefer not to do anything these days, that work is so fraught with tension, it feels impossible to do so? Because we also suppose that there is an argument here that says a return to nature is our one true escape from a world run by corporations, and yet in Finch's case he "escapes" in the employ of someone else, he is a worker with no say, who yes, ultimately becomes free of said employer, we think, but does that make him, or us free, can we ever truly be free, and can we still prefer not to?

"All parts kinetic-cool." You Can Make Him Like You gets The Quivering Pen'd. And likes it. A lot.

Big thanks to newest BFF and author David Abrams for his most kind review of You Can Make Him Like You at the similarly kind The Quivering Pen. David is also giving away a copy of the book as part of the ongoing Friday Freebies series, so please do check it out, and drinks for us, for sure, whenever, and wherever we get to meet.

"Welcome to Keith's head, a manic swirl of neuroses, song lyrics, sexual fantasies, and the Obama-McCain presidential race. Told in short, can't-read-just-one chapters, You Can Make Him Like You (which takes its title from a Hold Steady song) is one part Nick Hornby, one part McSweeney's off-kilter lit, and all parts kinetic-cool."

"The writing is incredible," though, "I kept searching for some lightness." My Father's House gets Small Press Reviews'd. And likes it. A lot.

ARCs of My Father's House have started trickling out and with that there is the first review from the always sublime and incredibly thoughtful Lavinia Ludlow at Small Press Reviews. There is much positivity and that is appreciated, there is also the search for more lightness though, something we think is there, could be there, but is now a concern, and has us wondering how else the book will be experienced. We look forward to what is to come, however, and we are very thankful to Lavinia for jumping in first, drinks on us for sure, whenever, and wherever we finally meet."The writing is incredible, no surprise for a writer like Tanzer, and his storytelling ability has always been incomparable, but the incessant mention of grief, dying, wasting away, and the sheer hopelessness of his protagonist's tortured soul overtook me like Mavericks' surf."

"The writing is incredible." Though "I kept searching for some lightness." My Father's House gets Small Press Reviews'd. And likes it. A lot.

ARCs of My Father's House have started trickling out and with that there is the first review from the always sublime and incredibly thoughtful Lavinia Ludlow at Small Press Reviews. There is much positivity and that is appreciated, there is also the search for more lightness though, something we think is there, could be there, but is now a concern, and has us wondering how else the book will be experienced. We look forward to what is to come, however, and we are very thankful to Lavinia for jumping in first, drinks on us for sure, whenever, and wherever we finally meet.

"The writing is incredible, no surprise for a writer like Tanzer, and his storytelling ability has always been incomparable, but the incessant mention of grief, dying, wasting away, and the sheer hopelessness of his protagonist's tortured soul overtook me like Mavericks' surf."

Some You Can Make Him Like You interview action courtesy of the Spilker, Codex and Impose.

Big appreciations to TBWCYL, Inc. favorite and long-time supporter Josh Spilker of Deckfight fame and the Codex blog at Impose magazine for interviewing TBWCYL, Inc. spokesperson Ben Tanzer about You Can Make Him Like You, podcasting, Chicago and trying not to be a dick.

Do you read your stuff out a lot? have you ever heard a reading from somebody that you didn't really like as a writer but they blew you away at a reading?

Over the last couple of years I have both pursued and been asked to read on an increased basis and I find it really fun, especially since I began to look at it as entertainment or performance, something less scripted and less focused on capturing exactly what's on the page. And to answer the second part of that question, I think I an more likely to see writers I like on the page who don't do much with their readings, versus what you have suggested, but as I am not going any farther with that, the answer that came to me as I read this, is how often I see a writer I don't know much about at the time, and then I see them read, and I think oh fuck, get that book, or read that book of theirs that's already sitting on the shelf, try to meet them, don't be a freak, and in that category I would cite Elizabeth Crane, Spencer Dew, Don DeGrazia, Barry Graham and Scott Haim among others, some of them I planned to see, others were just somewhere I was, all five of whom floored me in different ways and made me want to read their stuff in a much bigger and more immediate way.

Ostdick. THE2NDHAND. Word.

There is new Ostdick in THE2NDHAND. There is boy. A father. Ghosts. And pain. Check it out. It just might change your life. For reals.

"Begin with a ghost. Dim the bulbs in your small rented cabin until the moonlight beams bluish shadows down over everything. Sit on the arm of the foldout sofa where your five-year-old son sleeps — weekend visitations only, as your ex-wife stipulated, and once in a while on Wednesdays when she has date-night with her new beau, a lounge singer named Tony. Then, lean close and whisper that his mother's house, the one he lives in now, is haunted, terribly so."

This Book Will Change Your Life - Old Ghosts by Nik Korpon.

We are thinking about dread. Wallowing in it really. We recently riffed on dread during Short Story Month 2011 as we talked about some of the short stories that crushed us during the last year. We were struck that when read short stories especially, we want to be punched in the gut, be it with humor or pain, and in that riff we focused on the pain. Which got us thinking dread, which is where we find ourselves today having finished Old Ghosts by Nik Korpon, a book which we might have loved for being set in Baltimore alone, yet is so much more, neo-noir, or something post-apocalyptic possibly, but is most definitely full of dread from start to finish. And we clearly dig the dread, need the dread, and there isn't pain here necessarily, and to that we say fine, it isn't needed here. Because here's the thing, you can't run with the wrong people, do the wrong things, and then just disappear and start again, all full of love and happiness and possibility. It doesn't work like that, it can't work like that, and thank God for that. And for the Korpon, who writes, sparsely, and effortlessly, doesn't get lost in fantastical flourishes, and is always telling story, always moving forward, and always pushing us to the end, where he finally offers a glimmer of hope and allows us a moment, though only a moment, to believe the dread has passed and we can catch our breath again.