“Art — Son — Trash.”

My parents recently moved and in the process I'm pretty sure threw away all my childhood art. Well, except for--possibly--this one pretty cool picture of some kind of armored buffalo. And I'm not even sure I made it!

To express my feelings, here is a piece from George Meyer's old Army Man magazine:


GONE, ALL GONE 

Do you still have the adorable crayon drawings you made in kindergarten? I don’t. Not a one. Which means that at one point, many years ago, the following thoughts must’ve gone through my mother’s mind: “Hmm, what’s this? Oh, I see. It’s that irreplaceable drawing by my firstborn son … the one he proudly brought home from school. I’ll just put this in the garbage.” Then, as time went by: “Oh, another one of my child’s drawings. What is it that I do with these again? Oh, yes — I throw them in the trash. That’s right.” Eventually, her brain probably got it down to “Art — Son — Trash.” And on the days when my mom was sick, and didn’t get around to throwing my artwork away, my dad would do it. 

I’m not bitter. I know they had good reasons for discarding virtually everything I ever drew, wrote, collected or pasted together during my one and only childhood. I love my parents. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for them.

Moby Dick Marathon

The first ever Moby Dick reading marathon is wrapping up today. I read yesterday (the end of Chapter 50 and most of Chapter 51, The Spirit-Spout) at Housing Works. Someone told me my reading voice had "dulcet tones." I also ate some pretty great chowder. Good times!

A passage from The Spirit-Spout:

Close to our bows, strange forms in the water darted hither and thither before us; while thick in our rear flew the inscrutable sea-ravens. And every morning, perched on our stays, rows of these birds were seen; and spite of our hootings, for a long time obstinately clung to the hemp, as though they deemed our ship some drifting, uninhabited craft; a thing appointed to desolation, and therefore fit roosting-place for their homeless selves. And heaved and heaved, still unrestingly heaved the black sea, as if its vast tides were a conscience; and the great mundane soul were in anguish and remorse for the long sin and suffering it had bred. 

fleeting tweeting fame

This is silly, but in the wake of the 2012 election, I had a half-thought out tweet about Nate Silver and Biggie Smalls that went "viral" and was reposted by CNN, Washington Post, and other places. I guess that deserves to be posted here since... it is probably the most widely read thing I'll ever publish! How does one work that into a C.V.?

final elimae

elimae, one of the best journals out there, is sadly closing its doors. The final November/December 2012 issue is up. You should take it in one last time.

I was fortunate enough to be published several times in elimae over the years, both fiction (here) and poetry (here, here, here, and here).

They will be missed.

Monsters of Modern Literature

For Halloween, I decided to combine my interests in literature, bad puns, and monster drawings for Volume 1 Brooklyn.

Oh, that Nabokov

It is strange, the morbid inclination we have to derive satisfaction from the fact (generally false and always irrelevant) that a work of art is traceable to a “true story”. Is it because we begin to respect ourselves more when we learn that the writer, just like ourselves, was not clever enough to make up a story himself? Or is something added to the poor strength or our imagination when we know that a tangible fact is at the base of the “fiction” we mysteriously despise? Or taken all in all, have we here that adoration of the truth which makes little children ask the story-teller “Did it really happen?”

- Vladimir Nabokov

What We Can Surmise about the John Adams Incarnation

I'm excited to say that I have a new story about John Adams up at Melville House. The story is part of a series of forty-four stories about our forty-four presidents that will include a ton of great writers such as Matt Bell, Micheal Kimball, Amelia Gray, and many more.

My story is kind of a quasi-science-fiction-slash-Lovecratian-horror-via-Borges thing. Or not. You decide.

Although much remains unclear about John Adams (alternatively referred to in remaining analog documents as Jon Adam, John Adems, and The Adams Abomination), recent drone expeditions into the Charred Continent have unearthed new artifact fragments that led us closer to understanding this mysterious entity. Long assumed to be a prince or demon of a lesser cult, we now know that John Adams was an important figure in the dominant United Statsian mythology.

two comic things

1) I have a new comic strip in the September issue of Everyday Genius (edited by the great Michael Kimball). Sample panel above. More comics at hoarsehorse.com.

2) I reviewed one of my favorite recent comics, Forming by Jesse Moynihan, at The Rumpus. You should really check it out, especially if this description sounds good to you: science-fiction-soap-opera-comedy-cum-action adventure-mythological-origin-story.

readings past

I was lucky enough to participate in two great readings in the past two weeks. The first was InDigest's flash fiction night at La Poisson Rouge with Ann DeWitt, Shya Scanlon, Robert Lopez and John Jodzio. The second was the always packed and awesome Franklin Park reading series with Caitlin Harper, Courtney Maum, Victor LaValle, and Tayari Jones.

The latter got a great write-up by Ryan Chang in Electric Literature's Outlet blog. Very complimented by this line:

Michel reads sternly, tinged with finality, but his narrator’s child logic evokes the comic element of his fiction, locating that delicate place between comedy and tragedy.

UPDATE: Electric Literature also published a review of the InDigest reading by David Moscovich.

boring personal reading habits: 50 literary pillars

I've been enjoying the William H. Gass inspired "50 literary pillars" series at Big Other, where guests such as Christine Schutt, Matt Bell, and Samuel R. Delaney post their 50 favorite books. The list by Gass which inspired the series can be found on Goodreads.

When I logged onto Goodreads to see Gass's list, I checked my own list of favorite books, which happens to stand at 54 books. This is a very casual list that I've added a book to now and then since 2007, when I apparently first started a Goodreads account. It isn't a carefully compiled list that I agonized over to make sure I represented my various interests, had a good balance of different types of literature, and so forth.

But, as such, it may actually be more telling than a list that one I'd consciously compile for publication. Unedited list and comments after the jump.

Windeye

Brian Evenson's new collection Windeye is one of the best books I've read recently.  I reviewed it for Bookforum today and talked about the uncanny and the literary / genre divide.

cartoon news

Two updates about my comic strips:

1) I'm very excited to say that Volume 1 Brooklyn is going to be running my comics. First one is up here.

2) I've started a Tumblr to post my comics and comic collaborations at. Please follow if you want to see existential animals and crudely-drawn body horror strips.

Postmodern Demons

How many of the "doorways to demonic possession" do you qualify for? 

Quarantine

I have a new story in the most recent issue of The Fiddleback. It is about a plague quarantine and soda pop. It starts:

I was in the quarantine, but I didn’t have a quarter. I had a few dimes and some nickels but needed a quarter. There was only one soda machine in this wing of the facility. It was an old machine that hadn’t been updated, and the drinks only cost sixty-five cents. I couldn’t believe my luck!

GIGANTIC HEAT

Gigantic has a new online issue up with fiction from Robert Lopez and Marguerite W. Sullivan, poetry from Ben Fama and Leigh Stein, an interview with Gordon Lish, and more. Check it out!

Barfield

Comic attempt #6. (Previous comic attempts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.)

mostly I liked the whistlers, singers, and shriekers: the ones that screamed

I have a new story up at Tin House for their Flash Fridays series. It is called "Red-Faced Whistler, Emerald Tower, Rabid Wolfpack Motherload" and starts:

I always cared about the explosions, but mostly I liked the whistlers, singers, and shriekers: the ones that screamed. Billy Acres and I bought a backpack-full from a fold-up table beneath the overpass. The old hippie had smuggled them up from South Carolina beneath a load of tie-dyed shirts. He said we had to buy a shirt to get the rockets and that there wasn’t a holiday that wasn’t improved with fire. I picked out one with a peace sign and he handed me a free box of snappers.

Check it out if you'd like!

reading about reading

Ryan Chang has a very nice write-up of the recent Volume 1 reading I was a part of at Electric Literature's Outlet blog. The readers were Matt Bell, Melissa Broder, Julia Jackson, Jacob Silverman, and myself. Is it totally gauche to quote part of the write-up? Because I love this quote: "Michel’s marriage of the deadpan and totally absurd is a perfect iteration of the Uncanny, and it rules."

Deadpan, absurd and uncanny is pretty much what I'm going for! Anyway, thanks to Ryan, Tobias and Jason at Volume 1, and the rest of the readers.

Adorkocalypse

            There had been a subatomic explosion in the Zooey Deschanel containment unit.

            I awoke, somehow, in a charred field. Gaseous clouds in the shape of Zooey Deschanel hovered overhead.

            My assistant was covered in blood beside me. When I rolled her over, what was left of her looked exactly like Zooey Deschanel. I wept and held this Zooey Deschanel in my arms as she expired. “My God,” I tried to say, “what have we done?” but the only words left were “Zooey Deschanel.” Suddenly I could see everything—each thin blade of Zooey Deschanel blowing in the wind, each newborn Zooey Deschanel hatching into the world, every single Zooey Deschanel atom bouncing in her impossible orbit.

            Had the reaction altered the fundamental structure of the universe? Or had it merely torn the thin veil that separated the visible world from the true, hidden world of Zooey Deschanel? The horrifying sounds of infinite Zooey Deschanels overwhelmed me. I grabbed the sharpest fragment of Zooey Deschanel I could find and slid her across my wrist, a beautiful red ribbon of Zooey Deschanel spurting forth.

            But just then, at the top of the hill, beneath the painful rays of the gigantic burning Zooey Deschanel in the sky, the dark, ominous figure of Justin Bieber appeared. 

Molten Mechanistic Hull by any other name

For no reason at all, here are my ten favorite anagrams of my (full) name:

Molten Mechanistic Hull

Ill Tom: Unethical Mensch 

Nonathletic Mulch Slime

Hmm, It Echos 'Till Unclean...

Chill Unethical Moments 

Hellish Laconic Mutt Men!

Lethal Omniscient Mulch

Macho Lunchtime Lentils 

The Technician Lulls Mom

A Chill, Luminescent Moth 

 My novel title is in there somewhere...

(runners up: Cinchilla, Unsettle Mom! / Metallic Lunchtime Nosh / Neolithic Helmsman Cult / Miniscule Hellcat Month)