WiPP’s 2nd Annual Summer Book Drive

Please donate and encourage your friends, family, and colleagues to do so as well! Used and new books accepted.

When: June 27–August 3
Where: Drop-off points are located at Annie Bloom’s, In Other Words, A Children’s Place, Twenty-Third Avenue Books, Looking Glass Bookstore, and Ink & Paper Group.

Books will be donated to the Regence Boys & Girls Club, Books to Oregon Prisoners, and Portland Books to Prisoners. Please click here to see the full press release.

Local Events

Wednesday, June 27, 2007
Appreciating Comics: Douglas Wolk Moderates a Panel of Oregon Cartoonists, Including Colleen Coover, Dylan Meconis, Gail Simone and Jenn Manley Lee.
Where: Central Library, 801 SW 10th Ave.
When: 6:00 p.m.
Cost: Free

Wednesday, June 27, 2007
Poet Clemens Stark Reads from Studying Russian on Company Time, China Basin, and Traveling Incognito
Where: The Press Club, 2621 SE Clinton St.
When: 7:30 p.m.
Cost: Free

Wednesday, June 27, 2007
Robert J. Wiersema reads from Debut Novel Before I Wake
Where: Annie Bloom’s Books, 7834 SW Capitol Hwy.
When: 7:30 p.m.
Cost: Free

Thursday, June 28, 2007
Erich Schweikher: Cycling’s Greatest Misadventures
Where: Powell’s City of Books, 1005 W Burnside
When: 7:30 p.m.
Cost: Free

Thursday, June 28, 2007
Willamette Week Finder Party: Willamette Week’s Guide to Portland and an Adidas-Sponsored Art Show Featuring 12 Portland Artists
Where: WW Office, 2204 NE Albert St.
When: 7:00 p.m.
Cost: Free

Friday, June 29, 2007
Fiction/Poetry Double Feature: Pete Fromm and Dorianne Laux
Where: Taylor Meade Performing Arts Center, Pacific University, 2043 College Way, Forest Grove
When: 7:30 p.m.
Cost: Free

Saturday, June 30, 2007
Haiku Inferno
Where: Tour De Crepe, 2921 NE Alberta St.
When: 8:00 p.m.
Cost: Free

Tuesday, July 3, 2007
Aaron Raz Link: What Becomes You
Where: Powell’s City of Books, 1005 W Burnside St.
When: 7:30 p.m.
Cost: Free

New Release Spotlight: An Arsonist's Guide to Writers' Homes in New England

An Arsonist's Guide to Writers' Homes in New England, By Brock Clarke

Come September, keep an eye out for Clarke's clever new novel, An Arsonist's Guide to Writers' Homes in New England. Sam Pulsiver is an average suburbanite, husband, father, and ex-convict. Well, everyone has his secrets. Sam's is that he accidentally burned down Emily Dickenson's house with (unknown by Sam at the time) two people inside. Years after his release from prison, Sam narrates the story of how his past came back to haunt him as other New England writers' homes go up in smoke (this time not at his hand). Well, that's one of the main storylines (all of which center around Sam at this time in his life). Part mystery, part love story, part exploration of the meaning of loneliness, part tragic tale of decaying families, this story has a bit of everything.

Clarke's voice is approachable, realistic, and at times quite witty. The book as a whole has an extremely oral quality, and the narrative voice is very believable as an ordinary storyteller. Sam truly sounds as though he's telling his story—not writing it—with all the digressions, lack of clear organization, and backtracking that goes with any story told impromptu. While this is not necessarily a bad thing—in fact, it's quite impressive for an author to really commit and not sink into the common trait of trying to create a 'normal person' with amazing eloquence and an outstanding vocabulary—it does create some complications. I feel compelled to offer this one warning: this novel is a great way to spend a weekend (flight, vacation, long evening) marathon reading, if you have the time to really escape reality and fully enjoy the wonderful world Clarke has created. However, it does not work quite as well with more constricted time limits. As entertaining and fluid as the digressions and back stories are within the greater story, they make episodic (e.g. bus ride or short lunch break) reading more difficult, as it takes some time to remember where you are among the many, many plotlines of the novel, especially if you stop in the middle of a digression or history. Very confusing. That does not mean that this book isn't one-hundred-percent worth a read; it just means you should schedule your time accordingly to get the most out of it.

Review by Julie Franks, Indigo Editing, LLC

Local Events

Wednesday, June 20
Loggernaut Reading Series: Katie Ford, Jim Lynch, and Kevin Sampsell
Where: Mississippi Studios, 3939 N Mississippi Ave.
When: 7:30 pm.
Cost: $5 suggested donation.

Thursday, June 21
Austin Grossman: Soon I Will Be Invincible
Where: Powell's on Hawthorne, 3723 SE Hawthorne Blvd.
When: 7:00 p.m.
Cost: Free

Thursday, June 21
Unnatural Landscapes: Tracking Invasive Species
Where: Twenty-Third Avenue Books, 1015 NW 23rd Ave.
When: 7:30 p.m.
Cost: Free

Friday, June 22
Joseph Millar (Fortune) and Claire Davis (Labors of the Heart)
Where: Pacific University, Taylor-Meade Performing Arts Center,
2043 College Way, Forest Grove
When: 7:30 p.m.
Cost: Free

Saturday, June 23
St. Johns Booksellers' Anniversary Party
Where: St. Johns Booksellers, 8622 N Lombard St.
When: 10:00 a.m.-6:00 p.m.
Cost: Free

Sunday, June 24
Soapstone Open House Featuring: Molly Gloss, Penelope Schambly Schott, Noel Hanlon, Angie Chuang, Luciana Lopez, Kathleen Worley, Judith Arcana and Katy Riker
Where: 6347 SE Yamhill St.
When: 2:00 p.m.
Cost: Free

Monday, June 25
Mike Daily Reads Selections from ALARM
Where: Powell's City of Books, 1005 W Burnside St.
When: 7:30 p.m.
Cost: Free

Tuesday, June 26
Shannon Hale: Austenland
Where: Powell's Book at Cedar Hills Crossing, 3415 SW Cedar Hills Blvd.
When: 7:00 p.m.
Cost: Free

Los Porteños Reading June 24

Los Porteños is a Latino writers group. It is a sister group of Los Norteños, a Seattle based group. Group members will give a reading on Sunday, June 24, at 7:00 p.m. at the Miracle Theatre on SE Stark between Grand and 6th Avenues. Kathleen Alcala, award-winning novelist, will read from her newest book during the event.

Where to Submit?

Your poem, short story, essay, or even novel excerpt is ready to see the light of day, but there are so many journals out there. How do you even begin to start a list? Check out NewPages, which Utne Magazine called "the best overall Internet portal to the alternative press." The site "independently (and noncommercially) organizes pages of links to hundreds of magazines, independent publishers and bookstores, literary magazines, newsweeklies, and review sources. NewPages.com also publishes unique book and zine reviews, and an interesting weblog broadly covering the world of arts, publishing, and libraries."

New Release Spotlight: Leonard Michael's Collected Stories

The Collected Stories, by Leonard Michaels

It's tempting to say that Michaels's stories move breathlessly, as in the anthology's startling opening, "Manikin," which begins with a rape and ends with a suicide, consensual sex, platonic admiration, and obsession melted in between and oozing out the seams. But a simple sprint would be too boring for Michaels. Instead, his words run and fall back, introducing the suicide victim with the unexpected image of "naked feet like bell clappers" or, in a later story, "Mildred," amid talk of illegal abortions and just before reality tailspins and the male characters eat the female's womb, cutting dialog and leaving only sentences like, "Max was saying and Sleek added." Though his 1981 novel, The Men's Club, earned Michaels both praise (a National Book Critics Circle nomination for best novel) and criticism (some saw the content as misogynistic), he was considered an exceptional writer throughout his career. This anthology includes the Nachman stories, Michaels's only pieces not collected elsewhere. In a perfect world, these stories, less frantic but just as complex as his earlier ones, should be enough to sell the book.

Excerpt of review by Kristin Thiel, Indigo Editing, LLC
Previously published in The Library Journal

June BookSense Picks

I love seeing the monthly BookSense picks. These titles are hand selected by independent booksellers who are working hard every day to ensure consumers get great books. If you haven't checked out the BookSense site already, do so at www.booksense.com. Find bestseller lists and award winners, and locate an independent bookstore near you. You can also order books from indie bookstores elsewhere that carry that one out-of-print book you've been searching for.

This month's BookSense picks are:

Landsman: A Novel by Peter Charles Melman (Counterpoint, 9781582433677)

Land of Lincon: Adventures in Abe's America by Andrew

Ferguson (Atlantic, 9780871139672)

From the Palmer Raids to the Patriot Act: A History of the Fight

for Free Speech in America by Christoper M. Finan (Beacon, 9780807044285)

Austenland: A Novel by Shannon Hale (Bloomsbury, 9781596912854)

This Week in Portland

Thursday, June 14
Penelope Scambly Schott presents A Is for Anne: Mistress Hutchinson Disturbs the Commonwealth, a biography told through verse
Where: Looking Glass Books, 7983 SE 13th Ave.
When: 7:00 pm.
Cost: Free

Thursday, June 14
National Book Critics Circle Award Winner Anne Fadiman
Where: Powell's City of Books, 1005 W Burnside St.
When: 7:30 pm
Cost: Free

Thursday, June 14
Bitch Release Party
Where: In Other Words, 8b NE Killingsworth St.
When: 7:00 pm
Cost: Free

Saturday, June 16
Portlander M. Allen Cunningham Presents a Fictional Retelling of Rainer Maria Rilke's Life in Lost Son
Where: Twenty-Third Avenue Books, 1015 NW 23rd Ave.
When: 7:30 pm
Cost: Free

Saturday, June 16
BLUMEsday: A Tribute to the One and Only Judy Blume
Where: Bagdad Theater, 3702 SE Hawthorne Blvd.
When: 7:30 pm.
Cost: $3

Monday, June 18
In Other Words 7th Annual Literary Feast
Where: Mississippi Ballroom, 833 N Shaver St., 232-6003.
When: 5:00 pm
Cost: $25-$75

Monday, June 18
Tony Wheeler's Bad Lands: A Tourist on the Axis of Evil
Where: Powell's City of Books, 1005 W Burnside St.
When: 7:30 pm
Cost: Free

Hate Mail

Wednesday, June 13th, 7:30 pm
Someday Lounge, 125 NW 5th Ave.

You are invited to an oh-so-adult, book-launch release extravaganza, celebrating the debut of Hate Mail, by m. m. garcia. Just back from Book Expo America in New York, the staff of Dame Rocket Press was stunned at the attention and excitment generated by the advance copies of Hate Mail. Distributors, sales reps, book sellers, and looky-loos alike were drawn into the Ink & Paper booth by this visually compelling little book. Some went so far as to say it was hands down the strongest title of the show! To honor the dark humor, touching pathos, and flat out gifted writing of our friend and author, m. m. garcia, the launch will be held in the incandescently cool Someday Lounge. This is a 21+ shindig, so leave the kids at home and join us for a drink, a reading, and the pop-style tunes of local bands, Yoyodyne and Pocket Parade.

New Release Spotlight: Human Resources

Human Resources , by Josh Goldfaden

Human Resources is the first collection of short stories by Josh Goldfaden. Goldfaden used alternating satire and sincerity to examine various attempts at meaning and connection among the people of his stories, from a spoiled circle of pompous writers to discontent girlfriends of sell-out artists, and a modern-day clan of pirates to a well-meaning pair of mutually stalking neighbors. In the first story alone, Goldfaden pokes fun at self-congratulating writers—and their search to capture the meaning of life in a rhyming couplet about the moon or the moral struggles of flapjacks—through the eyes of a confused, recently-graduated au pair who finds more answers than any of these 'poets.' Goldfaden's prose manages to be profound without the pretense, heart-felt without being saccharine or melodramatic, and humorous without resorting to slap-stick or one-liners. His knack for subtlety is impressive, and his stories (although whimsical and very readable) do not wrap up in overly neat packages claiming to have the key to happiness. Instead, each of his main characters stumbles through his or her life, gaining small clues which point toward a greater understanding of life while leaving room for more growth and folly.

I particularly appreciate the satirical nature of this highly entertaining book; pretense is ripped to shreds with vibrant, humorous strokes, pointing out how lost most of his characters are. While many of the main characters look to answer a great question in their lives, their moments of revelation do not answer these questions, but show that these are not the right questions to be asking. His characters do not find the resolution they were seeking, but rather they learn a better way of searching for it. This recurring theme could have become formulaic or ridiculous in the hands of a lesser writer, but Goldfaden manages to keep his stories unique and surprising without sacrificing sincerity or the connectivity of the collected work. Human Resources makes a great read in one marathon sitting or broken in convenient, single-story doses.

Review by Julie Franks, Indigo Editing, LLC

Writer's Block

Get Fuzzy is one of my favorite comic strips. When I saw this, I couldn't help but want to share. Enjoy!

Local Events

Thursday, June 7
Cathi Hanauer presents Sweet Ruin
Where: Annie Bloom's
7834 SW Capitol Hwy
When: 7:30 pm
Cost: Free

Thursday, June 7
Jillian Robinson Presents Change Your Life Through Travel
Where: Twenty-Third Avenue Books
1015 NW 23rd Ave.
When: 7:30 PM
Cost: Free

Monday, June 11
Single State of the Union
Where: Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
When: 7:00 pm
Cost: Free

Thursday, June 7
Chris Salewicz on Joe Strummer
Where: Powell's Books on Hawthorne
When: 7:30 pm
Cost: Free

Tuesday, June 5
Joyce Carol Oates
Where: Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
When: 7:00 pm
Cost: Free

Tuesday, June 12
Local Authors Dan Raphael and Jim Shugrue
Where: Broadway Books
1714 NE Broadway St.
When: 7:00 pm
Cost: Free

Good Read Spotlight: Tokyo Cancelled

Tokyo Cancelled, by Rana Dasgupta

The next time you fly, remember to look around the cabin and locate the best storyteller. Should your flight be delayed somewhere between Here and There, you're going to want to know whom to sidle up to for company. Rana Dasgupta would be a fine prospect. In his first novel, Tokyo Cancelled, he tells not one but 13 stories (14, if you count the thin thread tying them together into a "novel"), most of which are fantastical diversions. The kind of distraction that would be especially welcome during an unexpected layover.

Tokyo Cancelled opens with 13 strangers stranded for a night in an airport in the middle of nowhere, a blizzard having interrupted their itinerary. One of them suggests that the only cure for such a situation is stories. By dawn each has told one. The yarns echo traditional fables and fairy tales, with lessons learned and magic exploited. The language is lush, as in one story about a man dying of an odd disease:

There were also white flowers growing out of the hole in Fareed's forehead: flowers like tiny hyacinths growing tightly packed on wiry green shoots that pushed upwards through the sticky layer of blood...

As the details in that passage suggest, a dreamy and somewhat surreal air pervades the airport. A large, unrecognizable arthropod scuttles across the hall; a cat leaps into the airport through an open window and drinks at a bowl of milk set on the floor. These interludes help us suspend disbelief at the idea of strangers actually agreeing to tell each other bedtime stories. Nothing about this airport is normal.

The storytellers sprinkle their tales with elements of their modern lives: mentions of take-out food and biodegradable detergents, commentary on commercialism and wonder cures and the loss of history. Intrigued by these minor clues, the reader is liable to think more about the characters behind the characters--the 13 nameless storytellers. What kind of person would create a velocity map, which plots the movement of bacteria, love, and the sale of prosthetic limbs? Who would imagine the transubstantiation powers of Robert DeNiro's love child and the secret daughter of Isabella Rossellini and Martin Scorsese?

Billed as a novel, Tokyo Cancelled is really a collection of short stories, and Dasgupta ultimately leaves the identities of the 13 speakers a mystery. Traveling is all about short stories: It's impossible to weave a novel out of encounters as brief as those you have in airports, and it's naive to believe people will keep in touch once the story is through.

by Kristin Thiel, Indigo Editing, LLC
Previously published at www.citypages.com.

ForeWord Magazine Announces Book of the Year Award Winners

In a Friday ceremony at the BookExpo America in New York City, ForeWord Magazine announced the winners of the Book of the Year Award, including two Editor's Choice Award winners. To read their full press release or view the winners and finalists, please click here.