1 sentence review: It's less than the sum of its parts.
On a page by page or sentence by sentence scale, the book is brilliant. The opening scene at the baseball game: fantastic. Each individual character and scene were well fleshed-out, and he came up with an interesting way to structure the book (essentially, the book moves backwards, but it still feels like you're moving forward). I like the concept here: where the reader, and the characters really, keep looking back into the past to find out where it all went wrong, so to speak. And it was an interesting study of America from the 50s up to the 90s -- the Cold War basically.
But it was like there was some glue missing that was needed to hold these 800 something pages together. I think maybe only a few people capture the sort of jaded, seen-it-all-before-so-now-what, emptiness of the 80s and 90s better than DeLillo, and indeed these are the most compelling and parts of the book, but I also think that he did a much better job with that material in White Noise. Around the 300 page mark the cohesiveness started to unravel and the pace plateaued. By the time you get to part 5 (around page 600 or so), which is made up of "Public Fragments from the 50s and 60s", I was exhausted and tired reading and felt annoyed, like my time was being wasted by my being forced to read several pages of Lenny Bruce material when all I really wanted to know was the missing link between the characters presented in the previous 600 pages. Maybe it was a case of trying to do too much, or of stubbornly sticking to a plan to write a massive 800 page novel when 300 or 400 would have sufficed. (aside: I kind of hate when people use this critique of books on, say, an Amazon review "It needed to be about 300 pages shorter" but, honestly, Underworld would have been better, I think, about 300 pages shorter).
I will say this, though: it may need to be a book that is read in large chunks, maybe 100+ pages at a time, in order to work as a cohesive novel. My reading was spread out over a month plus with not a lot of time and energy to dedicate to reading, but I still think there was something missing here.
Tuesday, November 13, 2012
Wednesday, October 31, 2012
Letter from the Editor Issue 6
Yes, we're still alive, although we recognize that some of you out there might not be. We know. It's been months and since the last issue, many of you have been sitting in corners with a glazed look in your collective eye, slapping at veins on your arm chanting, more, more, more, while your family members and friends are sitting in a living room somewhere, sipping their tea and wondering what they can do to help you, because, really, you're just not yourselves. An intervention perhaps, like on TV. Or maybe they're planning to just lock you in a dark room, with a few cans of cold Campbells Cream of Mushroom Soup, a la Trainspotting.
Kindling can be addictive, is what we're saying.
Some of you may have moved on, certainly. Rehab, maybe. Maybe you did go the locked room route. Maybe you're reading stuff from our friends at Trnsfr, or Fiddleback. Maybe not.
But here's the point. We just stretched that metaphor too far. Kindling is not a drug. It's paper, with words. Sometimes the words are funny, sometimes the words are sad. What we're saying is, Hey, we're your pal. Come on back. Read us again and remember what it was like before this past summer where we just suddenly disappeared and then popped up again. In Charlotte. Yes, Charlotte, the one in the Carolinas (we're not sure which one). We know.
Anyway. Enjoy.
The Editors.
Kindling can be addictive, is what we're saying.
Some of you may have moved on, certainly. Rehab, maybe. Maybe you did go the locked room route. Maybe you're reading stuff from our friends at Trnsfr, or Fiddleback. Maybe not.
But here's the point. We just stretched that metaphor too far. Kindling is not a drug. It's paper, with words. Sometimes the words are funny, sometimes the words are sad. What we're saying is, Hey, we're your pal. Come on back. Read us again and remember what it was like before this past summer where we just suddenly disappeared and then popped up again. In Charlotte. Yes, Charlotte, the one in the Carolinas (we're not sure which one). We know.
Anyway. Enjoy.
The Editors.
Wednesday, April 18, 2012
Portland Obeservations, 1 week +/-
As many of you know, Kindling is now based in Portland. If you didn't know, now you do. Those of you in DC who feel, I don't know, jilted, enraged, sad and incurably depressed about our departure from the nation's capital, know this: we're sorry, but it had to happen, and if you're ever in Portland, look us up. Come hang out.
Anyway. Portland. There's an image of Portland, enhanced by certain television shows like, say, Portlandia, of eco-conscious, slightly passively aggressive, intellectual types who care about things like eating only locally sourced food and drinking only pour-over coffee, or else grungy hipsters with weird piercings and tattoos that possibly play guitar or bass for a band that sounds like, is inspired by, but is in no way derivative of Pearl Jam or Nirvana, or else general freaks. And then there's the rain. We were asked several times before we moved if the rain would bother us, if it would make us so miserable and depressed that we start memorizing the bus schedule for the purposes of jumping in front of a good one when the depression finally got to be too much.
Here are some observations based on our first week here -- note: we've only been here a week and have explored a very, very small slice of the city. One, there are plenty of normal people here, too. In fact, everybody is pretty normal. I mean, yeah, there's a certain element of people that try to be weird. The mural that says Keep Portland Weird. And yeah, we haven't seen the whole city yet, so maybe our sample size is a bit off. Whatever. The people here are great. And friendly.
(One thing I've noticed, is that people smoke cigarettes here about the same rate as people in DC. People in DC smoke a lot, but it's always -- with the exception of service workers and the homeless -- in a happy, self-conscious, look-at-me-I'm-in-a-cigarette-ad kind of way. People here smoke with a cloud of tragedy around them. A sort of I'm-smoking-because-life-sucks-and-the-slow-willing-pollution-of-my-lungs-is-a-reflection-of-this. I don't know the reason for this, like I said, it's just an observation).
Two: the rain. I'll hold off judgement on the rain. I mean, it has rained since we've been here. It has been grey a majority of the days we've been here, and doesn't seem so bad. I'm imagining it to be akin to Phoenix's heat. i.e. it isn't the fact that it's 110 degrees, it's the fact that it's 110 degrees for six months straight. It aggregates. So, it may well suck a ton after months and months of wet, grey skies. But for now, it's cool. It makes everything lush and green.
Three: there's Thai food everywhere. There may be more Thai restaurants per capita than Thailand, keeping in mind that I'm counting all restaurants in Thailand as technically Thai because they're in Thailand. One in Portland will not want for Pad Thai, like ever. However, I cannot vouch for the quality of all this Thai food, even though the ones I've tried have been pretty good. Which reminds me, also, there's food trucks everywhere, which is really cool.
Four: Powells. Any lover of books should make a pilgrimage.
That's it for the observations for now, really, unless I wanted to get redundant, which I don't. This, these observations and generalizations, will probably all be turned on their heads after a month, or two months. But we really like it.
Now a bit of business. May 1. The first issue of Kindling in Kindling's new home. Yes, Kindling still exists. Mark your calendars.
Anyway. Portland. There's an image of Portland, enhanced by certain television shows like, say, Portlandia, of eco-conscious, slightly passively aggressive, intellectual types who care about things like eating only locally sourced food and drinking only pour-over coffee, or else grungy hipsters with weird piercings and tattoos that possibly play guitar or bass for a band that sounds like, is inspired by, but is in no way derivative of Pearl Jam or Nirvana, or else general freaks. And then there's the rain. We were asked several times before we moved if the rain would bother us, if it would make us so miserable and depressed that we start memorizing the bus schedule for the purposes of jumping in front of a good one when the depression finally got to be too much.
Here are some observations based on our first week here -- note: we've only been here a week and have explored a very, very small slice of the city. One, there are plenty of normal people here, too. In fact, everybody is pretty normal. I mean, yeah, there's a certain element of people that try to be weird. The mural that says Keep Portland Weird. And yeah, we haven't seen the whole city yet, so maybe our sample size is a bit off. Whatever. The people here are great. And friendly.
(One thing I've noticed, is that people smoke cigarettes here about the same rate as people in DC. People in DC smoke a lot, but it's always -- with the exception of service workers and the homeless -- in a happy, self-conscious, look-at-me-I'm-in-a-cigarette-ad kind of way. People here smoke with a cloud of tragedy around them. A sort of I'm-smoking-because-life-sucks-and-the-slow-willing-pollution-of-my-lungs-is-a-reflection-of-this. I don't know the reason for this, like I said, it's just an observation).
Two: the rain. I'll hold off judgement on the rain. I mean, it has rained since we've been here. It has been grey a majority of the days we've been here, and doesn't seem so bad. I'm imagining it to be akin to Phoenix's heat. i.e. it isn't the fact that it's 110 degrees, it's the fact that it's 110 degrees for six months straight. It aggregates. So, it may well suck a ton after months and months of wet, grey skies. But for now, it's cool. It makes everything lush and green.
Three: there's Thai food everywhere. There may be more Thai restaurants per capita than Thailand, keeping in mind that I'm counting all restaurants in Thailand as technically Thai because they're in Thailand. One in Portland will not want for Pad Thai, like ever. However, I cannot vouch for the quality of all this Thai food, even though the ones I've tried have been pretty good. Which reminds me, also, there's food trucks everywhere, which is really cool.
Four: Powells. Any lover of books should make a pilgrimage.
That's it for the observations for now, really, unless I wanted to get redundant, which I don't. This, these observations and generalizations, will probably all be turned on their heads after a month, or two months. But we really like it.
Now a bit of business. May 1. The first issue of Kindling in Kindling's new home. Yes, Kindling still exists. Mark your calendars.
Monday, January 23, 2012
THE WOODPILE -- Negative #6 by Anthony David Jacques
This is a hybrid type of piece from Anthony David Jacques (see bio). It was featured in issue 1.
Why we liked this piece -- It takes advantage of the space well, creating an extra dimension to the story. The story is strong enough to function on its own, which is very important to us. Doing something like this always runs the risk of crossing into gimmick territory. We were impressed that Anthony tried this, and of course, extremely pleased that it actually worked.
Here's some insight from the Author --
This story went through a few iterations before the final version solidified. This was iteration number 6, hence the title.
I love writing with constraints--not that it always pays off, mind you--but constraints give me a challenge whereas simply sitting down to write (to just ... write?) can seem daunting. Even if I have a plot idea, my mind is immediately flooded with questions of length, perspective, style, literary devices, etc... I tend to do a lot of flash fiction to give myself at least one constraint, word count, since I tend to have a real problem with getting longwinded.
At first my approach was, "What am I going to do with 1200 characters?" But that was the wrong question. I had a canvas to work with, so that must be part of the equation. I decided to treat it like a canvas, and while I was at it, why not make the canvas device work on more than one level?
If I'm honest, this story is a (very) subtle nod to MZ Danielewski's House of Leaves. (Very subtle). Admittedly, my story is nowhere near the genius-level of anything he's ever done, and I'm sure MZD could blow all of our minds with a 4x6" story should he put his mind to it. But the way he plays with text and formatting is brilliant, and it's something I always find myself wanting to do, but this is the first time I ever ran with it. I'm pleased with how it turned out.
-- Anthony David Jacques
Monday, January 9, 2012
What We're Reading Now -- Brian -- The Light of Falling Stars
It starts with a plane crash and is as compelling of a fifty-page beginning to a novel as I've read in a while. Emotionally rich. Human and complicated. The plane crash serves as a catalyst for a handful of characters to start dealing with their own repressed problems.
But then it sort of unravels. Long, kind of dry stretches of internal monologue and thoughts and feelings with the occasional compelling node. A few scenes near the middle that sort of pop up out of nowhere and make very little sense. And then, eventually, these repressed problems the characters are dealing with get resolved....because they, meaning the characters, say so. The characters do something or say something that triggers them to believe that they've resolved their problems.
This may very well be J. Robert Lennon's point. A statement on the human condition...or whatever. Saying, basically, humans are shitty at dealing with things. Once a problem is brought to the surface, there's some grappling, and eventually, it's rationalized away. Shoved under the carpet. A haircut, or a new apartment, and the belief that everything is going to be all better. But no real progress is made.
As an aside: lately I've realized that I don't much care for internal monologue in a book. There are a few writers who do it well, but I think a lot more can be found out about a person by observing what they do, rather than listening to what they think -- and this, to a certain extent, is the case with real people. For example, when people talk to each other, they present themselves how they want to be seen, which isn't exactly how they really are -- this is something everybody has noticed at one point or another. If you really want to get to know someone, observe them when they don't know they're being watched (you know, in a non-creepy, legal way).
Another aside, this time about the book. Lennon makes Montana feel surprisingly urban. With bustling down towns and basement apartments, corner delis. There's no mention of strips of fast-food joints and big box retail that populate every town in the West. It was an interesting choice, to portray the town this way.
Anyway. Back to the point. Everything considered, it was a good book. An enjoyable read. Not as tight as it could be, but still pretty good. Worth a read
But then it sort of unravels. Long, kind of dry stretches of internal monologue and thoughts and feelings with the occasional compelling node. A few scenes near the middle that sort of pop up out of nowhere and make very little sense. And then, eventually, these repressed problems the characters are dealing with get resolved....because they, meaning the characters, say so. The characters do something or say something that triggers them to believe that they've resolved their problems.
This may very well be J. Robert Lennon's point. A statement on the human condition...or whatever. Saying, basically, humans are shitty at dealing with things. Once a problem is brought to the surface, there's some grappling, and eventually, it's rationalized away. Shoved under the carpet. A haircut, or a new apartment, and the belief that everything is going to be all better. But no real progress is made.
As an aside: lately I've realized that I don't much care for internal monologue in a book. There are a few writers who do it well, but I think a lot more can be found out about a person by observing what they do, rather than listening to what they think -- and this, to a certain extent, is the case with real people. For example, when people talk to each other, they present themselves how they want to be seen, which isn't exactly how they really are -- this is something everybody has noticed at one point or another. If you really want to get to know someone, observe them when they don't know they're being watched (you know, in a non-creepy, legal way).
Another aside, this time about the book. Lennon makes Montana feel surprisingly urban. With bustling down towns and basement apartments, corner delis. There's no mention of strips of fast-food joints and big box retail that populate every town in the West. It was an interesting choice, to portray the town this way.
Anyway. Back to the point. Everything considered, it was a good book. An enjoyable read. Not as tight as it could be, but still pretty good. Worth a read
Friday, January 6, 2012
What We're Reading Now - The Zero by Jess Walter
by Carolyn, editor
I used to be anti-genre fiction, which is to say that I used to be a Serious English Student.
Then it turned out that my favorite movies were thrillers. As in I noticed a pattern of "What kind of movie do you want to watch?" preceding "Thriller!" and I guess that's how I started gravitating to the book jackets with blurbs like "keep you guessing in this race against time" and "a roller-coaster ride" and "a psycho-sexual thriller".
Okay, that last one was the tagline that drew me to see Black Swan (but regardless of how traumatized you were by seeing Natalie Portman get nasty on herself, you've got to admit that was a must-see movie for making conversation with people you don't really feel like talking to)
The point is that in my staid old age of responsibility and sobriety, a really compelling thriller is peak excitement - right up there with ordering uni and spotting the neighborhood Newfoundland. And, in case you thought I had totally lost the thread: The Zero is a fantastic thriller with enough substance for even the most Serious of English Students to have a good chaw.
[Enter comment here about how refreshing it is for an author with literary talent to wade unapologetically into genre fiction, to write something that can confound bookstore clerks by being genre-proof. Of course Jess Walter performed the same trick in his previous novel Citizen Vince, which I read, sadly, before the birth of this blog, but also recommend.]
I'm assuming that - if you cared - Amazon would tell you that The Zero is a fictional story of a cop after the September 11th attacks, who wakes up in the first scene after trying to shoot himself in the head (the bullet grazes his head - just stitches. This isn't a post-suicide in the hospital sort of deal.)
Beyond the 9/11 premise, The Zero is too dark and unforgiving to feel like propaganda. Instead, it's told in sharp flashes as the cop becomes part of the confusing aftermath of clean-up, intelligence rivalries, and coping. It works partly because of a complete lack of name-dropping - the words "September 11th" never appear, nor do "World Trade Center" or even "NYPD" - and partly because Walter's writing is so fluid and his characters so flawed that they feel real enough to touch.
The line that keeps you guessing (and reading) is that our protagonist cop is having "gaps" in his memory, so that the story is told not in chapters, but in fragments of consciousness. I think there is an obligatory reference to Fight Club that needs to be made here, but rather than feeling tricked at the end, the reader sees the careful orchestration of story lines that read as a whole, over and above the fragments.
That wasn't a spoiler, so sit back down. I always find my eyes trying to skip down a page when I want to know what happens - it takes discipline to read a good thriller line-by-line. (Sidenote: did you see that article about how you enjoy a book more when you know the ending? Such bullshit.)
So here is my attempt to tie this back neatly to the reason we're all here:
If it's possible to write a genre-proof novel with the intrigue of a thriller, the grit of noir, and the human frailty of literary fiction, can you create a genre-less fragment of it on a 4x6" card? Better yet: can you write a story in 250 words that builds so much tension that the reader must train his or her eyes to read line-by-line, and not skip to the bottom?
Note: Brian has informed me that the tie-back-to-kindling is not necessary. What a waste.
I used to be anti-genre fiction, which is to say that I used to be a Serious English Student.
Then it turned out that my favorite movies were thrillers. As in I noticed a pattern of "What kind of movie do you want to watch?" preceding "Thriller!" and I guess that's how I started gravitating to the book jackets with blurbs like "keep you guessing in this race against time" and "a roller-coaster ride" and "a psycho-sexual thriller".
Okay, that last one was the tagline that drew me to see Black Swan (but regardless of how traumatized you were by seeing Natalie Portman get nasty on herself, you've got to admit that was a must-see movie for making conversation with people you don't really feel like talking to)
The point is that in my staid old age of responsibility and sobriety, a really compelling thriller is peak excitement - right up there with ordering uni and spotting the neighborhood Newfoundland. And, in case you thought I had totally lost the thread: The Zero is a fantastic thriller with enough substance for even the most Serious of English Students to have a good chaw.
[Enter comment here about how refreshing it is for an author with literary talent to wade unapologetically into genre fiction, to write something that can confound bookstore clerks by being genre-proof. Of course Jess Walter performed the same trick in his previous novel Citizen Vince, which I read, sadly, before the birth of this blog, but also recommend.]
I'm assuming that - if you cared - Amazon would tell you that The Zero is a fictional story of a cop after the September 11th attacks, who wakes up in the first scene after trying to shoot himself in the head (the bullet grazes his head - just stitches. This isn't a post-suicide in the hospital sort of deal.)
Beyond the 9/11 premise, The Zero is too dark and unforgiving to feel like propaganda. Instead, it's told in sharp flashes as the cop becomes part of the confusing aftermath of clean-up, intelligence rivalries, and coping. It works partly because of a complete lack of name-dropping - the words "September 11th" never appear, nor do "World Trade Center" or even "NYPD" - and partly because Walter's writing is so fluid and his characters so flawed that they feel real enough to touch.
The line that keeps you guessing (and reading) is that our protagonist cop is having "gaps" in his memory, so that the story is told not in chapters, but in fragments of consciousness. I think there is an obligatory reference to Fight Club that needs to be made here, but rather than feeling tricked at the end, the reader sees the careful orchestration of story lines that read as a whole, over and above the fragments.
That wasn't a spoiler, so sit back down. I always find my eyes trying to skip down a page when I want to know what happens - it takes discipline to read a good thriller line-by-line. (Sidenote: did you see that article about how you enjoy a book more when you know the ending? Such bullshit.)
So here is my attempt to tie this back neatly to the reason we're all here:
If it's possible to write a genre-proof novel with the intrigue of a thriller, the grit of noir, and the human frailty of literary fiction, can you create a genre-less fragment of it on a 4x6" card? Better yet: can you write a story in 250 words that builds so much tension that the reader must train his or her eyes to read line-by-line, and not skip to the bottom?
Note: Brian has informed me that the tie-back-to-kindling is not necessary. What a waste.
Sunday, January 1, 2012
THE WOODPILE: Centaur Love
We figure you're probably getting a bit tired of all of this kindling talk in the online world, when you can't see any of it here. That's part of the whole kindling shtick though - "real words on real paper" - and we've already had a few purists ridicule us for offering an electronic subscription.
But as readers ourselves, we also thought it'd be helpful to show samples of published kindling pieces online, along with a bit of commentary from the editors and the writer. We want to know what you think too, so leave a comment at the bottom if you have something interesting to say.
The point: we're going to start posting a single piece of published kindling here - in "THE WOODPILE" - every few weeks.
It was the first piece written for kindling, so it seemed like a fitting inaugural feature for THE WOODPILE. Of course Brian is also one of the editors (the other one is writing this) so it was an easy choice. She's a little biased.
Let me clear up one rumor right now: penis references are NOT a prerequisite to publication in kindling. Do they help? Sometimes. We do like funny, and penises are some of the funniest organs out there. (NOTE: we do not advocate bestiality)
So, what do we like about an off-beat freakshow like Centaur Love? For me, it's all about the voice: it's honest, it's conversational, and it has personality.
I asked Brian for some insight into the piece, but he was being all opaque and artistic about it - that is to say, he gave me nothing. Scratch that, he said it was autobiographical.
So, what do we like about an off-beat freakshow like Centaur Love? For me, it's all about the voice: it's honest, it's conversational, and it has personality.
I asked Brian for some insight into the piece, but he was being all opaque and artistic about it - that is to say, he gave me nothing. Scratch that, he said it was autobiographical.
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