Reviews of the Ephemeral

Posts Tagged ‘Ian Chung’

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‘To the Lost’ by Jack Foster

In Pamphlets on May 24, 2013 at 7:37 am

-Reviewed by Ian Chung-

257Foster_Jack_Cov

Memory and loss are inextricably bound in most of the poems from To the Lost, Jack Foster’s chapbook from Finishing Line Press. From a literary perspective, this thematic pairing is hardly unexpected, and To the Lost might be thought of as an elegiac sequence. What is interesting about Foster’s poems, however, is the manner in which their recognition of loss is consistently inscribed within an act of remembering, which itself is situated within a wider awareness of the cyclical nature of life, the echoes that may be observed across lifetimes or generations. While the overall effect of these poems remains consolatory, they also display a tendency to resist conventional elegiac closure.

For instance, ‘Belated’ begins with a graveyard visit that becomes an auditory revivification:

‘I finally visit your grave on a Wednesday
and press my ear to the ground,
thinking the crinkling of the grass
is you telling me a story.’

The word ‘finally’ suggests this is the first step towards attaining a long-delayed closure, while ‘thinking’ conveys the self-consciously fanciful nature of imagining the voice of the dead person. Foster further envisions the person ‘knitting’ and ‘fashioning baby booties / for my children you’ll never meet’. Yet these flights of imagination are curtailed by the fourth stanza’s sobering bluntness: ‘You’ve been atomized and scattered – / reduced down to a slab of marble, / letting only strangers know you in death’. Nonetheless, the final stanza fervently insists, ‘I swear I hear you though’. Thus the earlier ‘crinkling of the grass’ is brought up again, except now there is the certainty of ‘know[ing] the crinkling / is only the insects that separate us’, as opposed to merely ‘thinking’. The final line’s ‘I start to remember your voice’ then reveals the emotional crux of the poem, i.e. the dead person’s voice has in fact already been forgotten until this graveside moment.

This technique of ending a poem with a line that gestures towards new beginnings or at least non-resolution also occurs in ‘Blackout in Nan Ning’ and ‘How Fast We Grow’. The latter literally breaks off in midsentence: ‘She stands by the window and cries, / Not for death, but, finally –’. As for ‘Blackout in Nan Ning’, given its title, it unsurprisingly ends with the image of a blackout, ‘a place beyond my own comprehension, // where the past and the present / reveals itself’. The cloaking of darkness is juxtaposed with the moment of clarifying epiphany: ‘I see as if for the first time’. The poem has rendered absence into a form of potentiality.

The last poem in To the Lost might well serve as an extended metaphor for the act of artistic creation. ‘On Letting Go’ is ostensibly about precisely that, how ‘Like from the hand of a carefree child, / we are let go’, and thus ‘When I am let go, do not cry’. This is not resignation so much as it is an acknowledgement that life and death form an inevitable cycle. (A similar sentiment regarding ageing is expressed in opening poem ‘Orioles on the Windowsill’, where the image of ‘my great-grandfather’ and his ‘boney finger’ becomes ‘the great-grandsons / Of the long-gone birds / … / Seek[ing] a boney perch’.) At the same time, the red balloon of ‘On Letting Go’ could be seen as representing the poet’s work, which attains a life of its own once it has been written, ‘hoping not to burst under the pressure / of an unfamiliar sense of freedom’. So just as there is comfort in ‘knowing that I won’t pop until I’m far from sight’, the poet may rest easy in relinquishing his poems to the reader. Foster’s chapbook indicates he is off to a good start in this regard.

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‘The Flood’ by Superbard (George Lewkowicz)

In Interactive Literature, Saboteur Awards, Short Stories on April 21, 2013 at 1:57 pm

-Reviewed by Ian Chung-

What is particularly interesting about The Flood is how it translates the live storytelling experience into a digitally portable medium. For instance, the first story ‘Dr Who and the Water’ was performed by Superbard (aka George Lewkowicz) at the Birkbeck Writer’s Hub October Hubbub last year, and he plans to continue performing stories from The Flood around the UK. At the moment, the ebook features three stories by Superbard and illustrations by Maria Forrester, accompanied by music and narration from the former. The latest update in iBooks added music and narration for the third story, ‘The Ark’, plus a burst of social commentary in the form of new song, ‘Two by Two’.
The Flood - Superbard
A complaint that is sometimes levelled at digital storytelling is that it resorts to gimmickry, privileging the manipulation of form at the expense of good stories. Thankfully, there is no danger of that in The Flood. Opening story ‘Dr Who and the Water’ nicely sets up the arrival of the titular flood. Rather than spend time trying to explain why the flood has happened, the story self-assuredly brings the reader into a remoulded reality where London is ‘Venice with no buildings’, and everyone is still unconcernedly going about their business, including watching the Doctor’s onscreen triumph. (I would quibble with the story’s referencing a particular Doctor Who episode though, since that so precisely dates the story’s time setting.)

‘Brixton’s Afloat’ is my favourite story of the three, due in no small part to its catchy refrain (vocals by Nikki Blemings):

Now that Brixton’s afloat will you lay your body next to mine,
And we’ll sink to the bottom of the sea.
For now my darling we should smother ourselves in brine,
Now that Brixton’s afloat upon the sea.

The story itself is told in a familiar form, making use of diary entries, but even the tiniest detail like how the narrator begins each entry by describing what kind of tie he wore that day (the tie is later dropped in favour of jeans, then waterproof trousers, and finally a wetsuit, as the flood progresses) lends a twist, especially when one is experiencing the story aurally.

As for final story (for now) ‘The Ark’, it manages to evoke a blend of pathos and disgust simply from the device of having the characters sit down to play a game of bridge. The addition of song ‘Two by Two’ just before the story emphasises the class aspect of the card game choice, but there is also something pitiful about a group of people (illustrated as animals though, which is apt on multiple symbolic levels), the ‘worst of humanity’, carrying on as if they were not stuck in a sinking ark. Superbard also displays his gift for live storytelling in the story’s closing line: ‘and then for the first time, they started to breathe’.

Frankly, if The Flood were to just finish on that note, I would consider it a satisfying book. Fortunately, The Flood is an ongoing project, and readers are invited to contact Superbard on Facebook or Twitter to suggest storylines or characters. With any luck, you might even be made a character in the stories, with your choices determining Superbard’s handling of your character, turning The Flood into a form of collaborative storytelling. (The credits for the current three stories connect the various characters to their real-world inspirations.) On the whole, this is a project that makes for great reading-cum-listening, and my only regret is that I cannot be in the UK to catch Superbard performing one of these stories live.

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‘This Jealous Earth’ by Scott Dominic Carpenter

In Short Stories on February 8, 2013 at 1:05 pm

-Reviewed by Ian Chung-

This Jealous Earth is Scott Dominic Carpenter’s first collection of short stories, and it is also the first title to launch for MG Press, the publishing arm of Midwestern Gothic. Both literary journal and micro-press share the same core values of ‘shining a spotlight on Midwest authors by focusing on works that showcase all aspects of life—good, bad, or ugly’. Carpenter’s collection also stays true to this in the variety of characters that it showcases, all of whom are united by what he refers to as ‘the question of choice: in each story characters arrive at a fork in the road, and they need to choose a path that will alter their future in important ways’.

This Jealous Earth by Scott Dominic Carpenter

The book opens with ‘The Tender Knife’, a story underpinned by the tension between youth and age, pragmatism and sentimentality. At his young wife’s insistence, Walter is steeling himself to cull the population of his koi pond. What should be an ordinary affair becomes complicated by his guilt at having to kill a bunch of fish ‘built to outlive him’: ‘What bothered him more than the killing was the parting, the leave-taking. Harder to sever than flesh were all those other filaments, the invisible ties that bound him like live nerves to those he loved.’ When Walter’s decision at the end of the story is to once again avoid the problem, having gone through one traumatic almost-botched koi beheading, it is hard not to sympathise with his wish to just be with his grandchildren, ‘escaping, however briefly, from this warm land with its bubbling ponds and its lies of eternal summer’.

As for title story ‘This Jealous Earth’, it serves up an interesting variation on the usual ‘end times’ narrative by presenting events from the perspective of Catherine, a young girl who refuses to let her blaspheming, unbelieving older brother be left behind, even at the cost of her place among the supposed elect. Midway through the story, there is a moment where Catherine keeps stuffing more and more items into her dress pocket, thinking to herself, ‘Her pocket felt heavy now. It weighed her down. This jealous earth didn’t want to let her go.’ Rather than taking the easy option of turning his story into a straightforward critique of the Driscoll family’s cultic beliefs, Carpenter instead uses the ending to demonstrate that in extremis, the bond of family may prove to be the strongest force of all, and it is really we who do not want to let each other go.

Alongside these short stories, Carpenter’s collection also mixes in a couple of flash fictions. Pieces like ‘Foundering’ and ‘The Phrasebook’ succinctly portray relationships in various states of crisis. The former contains this heartbreaking evocation of empty nest syndrome: ‘Even the children, it turned out, were only on long-term loan, and the departure of each cardboard box felt like another melon ball scooped ever closer to the rind.’ The latter matter-of-factly relates: ‘Something went wrong. The turns were too sharp. We were going too fast. We thought it was all under control. By the time we understood, it was too late. The collision was too violent. The damage had been done. Only the formalities remained, the paperwork.’ After this paragraph of relatively short sentences, the final ‘Please, I need to report an accident’ forms a sobering coda to the whole flash fiction.

It is a testament to the consistency of Carpenter’s narrative skill that I could have picked any story in This Jealous Earth and found something about it to recommend in this review. As it is, there is not enough space to say much about the surreally funny ‘Sincerely Yours’, beyond that as a one-time student dealing with utility bills, I completely empathise with the protagonist’s predicament. Or ‘The Death Button’, which despite its title, turns out to be a rather morbidly sweet love story. Or ‘General Relativity’, a story made all the more effective by its refusal to explain its fantastical element, in which the narrator experiences whatever he reads. So This Jealous Earth is packed full of surprising tales, and best of all, if like me, you read it and really enjoy Carpenter’s writing, you can look forward to his debut novel, Theory of Remainders, coming out later this year from Winter Goose Publishing.

[You can read Ian's full interview with Scott Dominic Carpenter here]

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Interview with Scott Dominic Carpenter (This Jealous Earth)

In Interview, Short Stories on February 7, 2013 at 1:26 pm

-Scott Dominic-Carpenter spoke to Ian Chung-

Scott Dominic Carpenter teaches literature and critical theory at Carleton College (MN), where he has written extensively on the representation of madness in the novel, political allegory, and literary hoaxes. His fiction has appeared in such journals as Chamber Four, Ducts, Midwestern Gothic, The MacGuffin, Prime Number and Spilling Ink. A Pushcart Prize nominee and a semi-finalist for the MVP competition at New Rivers Press, he has just released his first collection of short stories, This Jealous Earth (MG Press). His debut novel, Theory of Remainders is due to appear in May (Winter Goose Publishing). His website is at http://www.sdcarpenter.com.

1) How did your collaboration with MG Press come about? How does it feel for This Jealous Earth to be their first title?

It was a happy coincidence. MG Press is the brainchild of a literary journal called Midwestern Gothic. They’d been putting out excellent issues for the past few years, and one of my stories had appeared in their pages. Just as I was ironing out the last wrinkles in my collection, they put out their initial call for book submissions. I think they expected to be publishing a novel, but I managed to win them over with the stories—and I couldn’t be happier about it. MG Press is a class operation, and they provided more support (both in editing and promotion) than you’d get from presses many times larger.

Midwestern Gothic Press

2) What holds the stories in This Jealous Earth together as a collection? Are there any writers that have influenced either particular stories or you as a writer in general?

It’s quite a varied collection, featuring main characters of all backgrounds—men and women, old and young. No setting appears twice, and readers will find the gamut of emotions. However, the stories are bound together by the question of choice: in each story characters arrive at a fork in the road, and they need to choose a path that will alter their future in important ways. I try to show these choices in real time, and then illustrate the consequences.

Stylistically I find myself drawing on many authors, and much depends on who I’m currently reading. But special favourites are Paul Auster, David Mitchell, Arthur Phillips. I also love the short story greats of the nineteenth-century: Poe, Hoffmann, Gogol, Balzac.

3) In 2011, The Millions published an essay by Cathy Day, in which she argued that talk of the renaissance of the short story is reflective of the rise of creative writing classes/workshops and their preference for the standalone story or poem, rather than any actual shift in what people want to read. As someone with both a published collection of short stories and a forthcoming novel, what are your thoughts on this?

It’s an interesting theory, and there may be a grain of truth to it. The fact is that public taste shapes what people write at the same time that what we write shapes public taste. There’s give and take. The short story used to be a tremendously popular genre, then it subsided, and now it seems to be coming back. Given how marked our preference is for shortness (on the web, for example), I wouldn’t be surprised to see even more interest in short stories. That said, I don’t think the novel is in any danger of being knocked off its champion’s pedestal.

Scott Dominic Carpenter_headshot copyright Paul Carpenter

4) On your website, you note that you ‘came to creative writing rather late’. As someone whose academic background is in nineteenth-century French literature, what eventually led you to creative writing, and how has the journey shaped you as a writer?

In some ways, it’s the most natural of transitions: you spend twenty-odd years studying literature, and that gives you the tools you need to start writing it. It’s certainly true that reading is the best preparation for writing; I may just have pushed that formula a little farther than most. What’s been interesting to me is how my creative writing still revolves around the preoccupations I developed in my reading: the difficulty of expression, the search for transcendence, humour. I find myself drawing on my analytical background quite often, though in indirect ways.

5) What’s next for you? Could you say something about Theory of Remainders, your forthcoming novel with Winter Goose Publishing, and how it compares with This Jealous Earth?

As you say, the next thing up is the novel. Theory of Remainders is a wonderfully exciting project (they’re already trying to hawk the movie rights), and we’ve just finished the galleys. (It comes out in May.) Theory… is a literary novel with a well-honed edge of suspense. It deals with an American psychiatrist, Philip Adler, who seeks to resolve a trauma he suffered — the death of his daughter — over a decade earlier. Most of the story takes place in France, where Adler lived for several years, and it weaves together notions of insanity, language, and cultural difference in a tale that is both moving and touched with humour.

At the same time, I have other pots simmering on the stove: more stories, some travel writing, and another novel.

[ED: We'll publish Ian's review of Scott's collection, This Jealous Earth very soon, so keep an eye out for it...]

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A Fiction Round-Up 2012

In End of year round-up on December 23, 2012 at 5:35 pm

-Decided by Richard T. Watson-

‘Tis the season to be making lists and round-ups of the previous year, so it’s just the right time for a look back over the year for Sabotage Reviews and our fiction coverage. Arguably, we could do this at any time of year, but it seems more fashionable in December.

Our Poetry Editor, (now Dr) Claire Trévien, has already given her best bits and highlights from Sabotage’s poetry coverage, which you can read here. Now it’s my turn.

Following last year’s pattern of giving a ‘Top Ten’ [or Three] of most-viewed reviews, I’ve prepared a list of the most successful fiction reviews of Sabotage’s 2012. The publications might be considered as Christmas presents for that special reader in your life…? Just a thought.

#1 I Wrote This For You
A printed selection of posts from Jon Ellis’ and Ian Thomas’s blog I Wrote This For You, which the two men have composed through a process of intercontinental collaboration. There’s a narrative and a theme, but much of it is left up to the reader – Ian Thomas claiming that ”There’s no story I can tell you that is as powerful as the story you can tell yourself”. Our reviewer, Ian Chung, praised the way that ”Thomas and Ellis seem to have distilled something of what it means to remain profoundly human in a digital society”.

#2 Acquired for Development By…
A hyper-local collection of poetry, fiction and non-fiction based around and inspired by the London Borough of Hackney, and published by Influx Press. Our reviewer, John McGhee said: ”The collection neatly pinpoints some of the most critical tensions in modern urban life – tradition versus innovation, the real versus the perceived, the modern versus the post-modern – and sees how these play out in a borough perceived as both lawless and cool.”

#3 Armchair/Shotgun #3
Following the success of Armchair/Shotgun #2 in this year’s Saboteur Awards, their third instalment has also been popular. Our reviewer, Rory O’Sullivan, had this to say of the New York-based collection of poetry, pictures and short stories: ”The magazine manages to embrace so many art forms and yet remain a predominantly literary offering; storytelling is at the heart of literature, and indeed central to this publication’s mission statement”.

On a more subjective and personal note (as if the previous paragraphs have been really objective), I was pleased that the winner of this year’s Saboteur Awards in May was the second issue of Armchair/Shotgun, a review from Sabotage’s Fiction stable, and that their third issue also got a very positive review. We also got a rather lovely mention over on the Guardian website, thanks to Dan Holloway.

If you’re looking for more round-ups of Sabotage activity this year, why not have a look at the results of this year’s Saboteur Awards?

This is also a good time to thank all of our reviewer team for their hard work in the past twelve months, and to thank you all for supporting the independent and often low-budget publishing we cover on Sabotage. So thank you all. Well done you.

Oh, and have a happy Christmas.

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‘Post-Experimentalism’ from Bartleby Snopes

In anthology on December 14, 2012 at 9:20 am

-Reviewed by Ian Chung-

Post-Experimentalism is the new project from the Bartleby Snopes team, and bills itself as the world’s first issue of Post-Experimental fiction’. This naturally raises the question of what constitutes post-experimentalism, and both the Post-Experimentalism issue and website offer up several definitions. Reading through these, two related threads emerge. One has to do with the belief that post-experimentalism blends – or even transcends – storytelling genres. The other is the notion that, as Bartleby Snopes Associate Editor Rick Taliaferro puts it, ‘Post-experimentation, what the writer owes to the reader is literary satisfaction’. So the pendulum of post-experimentalism swings away from formal and structural experimentation for its own sake and back towards story, to settle somewhere in their middle. Nathaniel Tower, Bartleby Snopes Managing Editor, describes this as:

“Something different going on with the form that pushes it past traditional writing, but it’s underneath the story. Form becomes background, but it still is functioning in a major way that affects the story. The form is manipulated somehow, but not at the expense of story. And the story takes nothing away from the form. It’s a harmony of story and form.”

Post Experimentalism Bartleby Snopes

Definitions aside, the stories in the issue do not disappoint. There are too many to go into each in detail here, so the stories mentioned here are the ones that particularly stood out for me. The stories have been grouped thematically, and the issue opens strongly with Christopher James’s ‘Sweet Enough’, under the heading of ‘Friendships’. James’s story is written in tweet-sized paragraphs, intended as a reflection of what he calls ‘something lacking in the attention span of a lot of people nowadays’. Of course, there is a wonderful irony in that the act of reading for pleasure should demand that we slow down and pay attention, even as James’s sentences act to compress decades in the lives of a group of friends into a couple of pages, hurtling them towards their fates and us towards the story’s downbeat resolution.

Other stories in the issue seek to deconstruct the techniques of how we build narratives. Jacqueline Doyle’s ‘The Last Metaphor’ makes us privy to the thought processes of a writer ‘[d]runk with the power of words’, who copies down a quote from Anatole Broyard’s Intoxicated by My Illness: ‘Just as a novelist turns his anxiety into a story in order to be able to control it to a degree, so a sick person can make a story, a narrative, out of his illness as a way of trying to detoxify it.’ The quote is intended to be sent to a writer friend, who then dies of cancer, with the beautiful description of her as ‘curled like a comma around her silence’ at the end. Doyle’s flash fiction ultimately ends with an empty numbered list, which is supposed to be a catalogue of things for death to be compared to, which seems like a wry statement on either the incommensurability of death or the failure of metaphor.

On the other hand, Leland Neville’s ‘American Outlaws’ offers a topical commentary on the absurdity of how the contemporary phenomenon of reality television constructs stories to pander to its voracious audience:

“After emerging victorious Emma will be inundated by questions during the obligatory media junket. “What is your definition of love?” “How should the criminal justice system be changed?” “Do you believe in gay marriage?” “Is the government doing enough to stop terrorism?”
Emma will charmingly ignore the verbal ambush. Her public won’t be disappointed in her evasiveness because it already knows all about Emma.
For one hour a week she is you.”

The most striking story in Post-Experimentalism, however, is Andrew Battershill’s ‘Laundry under cover of darkness’, placed under the theme ‘Innovations’. The story is divided into two columns, proceeding down the page in parallel, which allows for simultaneity of perspective as it tracks how the lives of three people intersect in a laundromat. Battershill’s story reads like a film script breakdown, complete with descriptions of character close-ups and interior/exterior shots. This is also one of the longest stories in the issue, which gives it time to build to an emotionally gratifying ending, as the couple Nicole and Sergei experience ‘the desire to take Arthur’s hands on either side like dads and moms’, right when Arthur feels ‘the desire to have his hands held, as if by parents’. The final page of the story only has a single column, as the arc of all three characters merges into ‘the physical processes of holding hands; three smiles; the physical processes of looking; a set of triangular metal racks, their points facing towards each other like dinosaurs a second away from kissing’, in a graceful moment that bears out Taliaferro’s comment on the importance of ‘literary satisfaction’.

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Published Poetry 2012: a Top 10

In End of year round-up on December 10, 2012 at 12:14 am

-Listed by Claire Trévien-

June

As the end of the year approaches, it is customary to attempt round-ups of sorts. Last year, I asked for people’s favourite poetry pamphlets on twitter. This year I will be taking inspiration from last year’s fiction top ten and providing links to the top ten most read published poetry reviews (from this year). If you are looking for gift inspirations or wanting to stumble on something new, you could do worse than take a look at this list.

They are:

1. Four 2011 Poetry Business Prizewinners (Smiths/Doorstop 2012). Reviewed by Sophie Mayer.

2. Catechism: Poems for Pussy Riot. Reviewed by Harry Giles.

3. Human Shade by Robert Peake (Lost Horse Press). Reviewed by Martha Sprackland.

4. lapping water by Dan Flore III. Reviewed by Ian Chung.

5. ILK #1. Reviewed by John McGhee.

6. Fleck and the Bank by Rob A. Mackenzie (Salt Publishing). Reviewed by Harry Giles.

7. All the Rooms of Uncle’s Head by Tony Williams (Nine Arches Press). Reviewed by Charles Whalley.

8. Antiphon #1. Reviewed by John McGhee.

9. Poland at the Door by Evelyn Posamentier (Knives, Forks and Spoons Press). Reviewed by Ian Chung.

10. Four Rack Press pamphlets. Reviewed by Angela Topping.

Originally published in 2011, Charles Whalley’s review of Megan Fernandes’ Organ Speech (Corrupt Press) would have otherwise appeared third.

There’s a pleasing presence of webzines and self-published work on this list. Group or anthology reviews also appear to have been popular, though I suspect that the popularity of the Smith/Doorstop and Catechism reviews is in part due to their controversial natures – but if so, where is Eireann Lorsung’s thought-provoking meditation on poetic tourism in Colette Sensier’s début pamphlet How Many Camels is too Many?

So far the least viewed review of a poetry publication is Diidxadó by Víctor Terán (Poetry Translation Centre), which seems a shame considering its reviewer, Judi Sutherland, describes it as ‘Pablo Neruda in a bitter mood’, what’s not to love?

If I were to construct my own personal 2012 list free of the constraints of what has been reviewed in Sabotage, and comprising magazines, anthologies, and pamphlets, I should no doubt curse my poor short-term memory. Such a list would undoubtedly include however: Cat Conway’s Static Cling (Dancing Girl Press, being reviewed soon for Sabotage), Agenda vol. 46 no. 4, Azita Ghahreman’s Poems (Poetry Translation Centre), Kayo Chingonyi’s Some Bright Elegance (Salt Publishing), and Adelle Stripe’s Dark Corners of the Land (Blackheath Books). A couple more impose themselves, but would be ineligible since I have poems in them: Adventures in Form (Penned in the Margins), Fuselit: Contraption, and Poems in Which. What would be on your list? Please do share in the comments.

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Top Website for Self-Publishers Award

In Uncategorized, Website on December 1, 2012 at 7:07 pm

-We interrupt the usual broadcast with Claire Trévien-

We were delighted to find out today that Sabotage Reviews was nominated by members of The Alliance for Independent Authors for their Top Website for Self-Publishers Award. Here is the shiny badge they gave us for it:

topwebsite

Also nominated and worth a look were:

  1. World Literary Café http://www.worldliterarycafe.com/
  2. Lindsay www.lindsayburoker.com
  3. Louisa Locke http://mlouisalocke.co
  4. Rachel Abbott http://www.rachel-abbott.com/
  5. David Gaughran http://davidgaughran.wordpress.com/
  6. http://www.bragmedallion.com/
  7. www.janefriedman.com
  8. www.IndiePENdents.org
  9. Joanna The Creative Penn http://www.thecreativepenn.com/

It’s also been wonderful to be name-checked in the Guardian recently by Dan Holloway, who recommends us (along with the fab  htmlgiant and 3:am) as a good place to find out about exciting self-published work (as well as ‘chapbooks, zines and true one-offs’: our favourite things! Send us more of those to review please!)

In this spirit, I have plunged into our archives and come up with eight recommendations of works that can be categorized as ‘self-published’, each interesting in its own right, but please, make use of the comment box to expand this.

I found this task harder than I expected, partly as we have not systematically tagged works as ‘self-published’, partly because Sabotage is so invested in indie enterprises that it is hard to know where to draw the line. I have mostly limited it to works produced and written by the same author. I probably pushed the boundaries by also including an edited work in the selection but it is such a one-off published by Claire Askew’s one-woman micropress that it seemed churlish not to. Some of these reviews have aged better than others, and it was sorely tempting to edit out sentences patting self-publishing on the back for being almost as good their ‘professionally’ printed counterparts. What I have come to appreciate in the two and a half years of Sabotage’s existence is that yes, while self-publishing can equate work of dubious quality, it can also be a veritable treasure trove of unique and exciting ventures, and I hope that we bring more of the latter to light in years to come.

Let’s all remember that fabulous China Miéville quotation:

‘We piss and moan about the terrible quality of self-published books, as if slews of god-awful crap weren’t professionally expensively published every year’

-Living Room Stories by Andy Harrod. Extract from Rory O’Sullivan’s review: ‘What a collection this is. It would be no exaggeration to say that I have not taken pleasure out of a reading ‘experience’ quite like this before. I think that this was helped by reading each story aloud while listening to the corresponding piece from Arnalds’ collection. Harrod’s work should be regarded as a new form that calls on influences from literature, poetry and music. This project is a stunning marriage of the three, and I cannot wait to see what comes next.’

-Muses Walk by Christodoulos Makris. Extract from Rishi Dastidar’s review: ‘the notion of the street as a muse is artfully explored through these sixteen poems, and Makris strikes an excellent balance between a sharp, urban sensibility, an unhurried languor and an elegiac air which reminds us that, even on our streets, there are always stories to be found, to be recreated and to be inspired by.’

-Starry Rhymes: 85 years of Allen Ginsberg  edited by Claire Askew and Stephen Welsh. Extract from Chris Emslie’s review: ‘Starry Rhymes is a loving testament to the work of an undeniably important poet. This shows in the care with which the chapbook has been conceived and collated. Its most powerful moments do not, however, rest in the flattery of imitation. [...] Undaunted by the not-small task of responding to a giant of modern American poetry, this assembly of thirty-three voices reflects (or possibly refracts) Ginsberg at his most feverish, human and heartbreaking. It is Michael Conley who best summarises how the poet himself might reply to a birthday gift like this: “I am grateful / you have kept me alive. / I am. Listen to me.”’

-Everything Speaks in its Own Way by Kate Tempest. Extract from Dan Holloway’s review: ‘Both sound and sight stand on their own (on which note I have to mention the layout of the words – presented on the page as paragraphs more than poems, which works incredibly well, not forcing us to guess or impose rhyme and metre but to let the words flow through us), but this does what beautiful artisan books should do – it is both a full introduction to an author’s work and a collector’s item, perfect for fans and newcomers alike, and a fitting way of bringing a genuinely landmark book to the world.’

-Anatomically Incorrect Sketches of Marine Animals by Sarah Dawson. Extract from Ian Chung’s review: ‘Far from being terrible, Dawson’s poems are lyrical observations, shot through with imagery that is tactile and visceral.’

-Reasons not to live there by Humphrey Astley. Extract from Afric McGlinchey’s review: ‘Today’s world is complex, and in his pamphlet, Astley has captured the confusion faced by the youth in Britain, where identity is no longer established simply by an accent. Here is a thinking poet, with a natural talent, whose work shows considerable promise.’

-lapping water by Dan Flore iii. Extract from Ian Chung’s review: ‘Ultimately, the most compelling feature of lapping water is its intimacy. The danger for the lyric ‘I’ to lapse into solipsism is averted in Flore’s collection because his poems frequently reach out to draw a ‘you’ into their imaginative space.’

-Markets like Wide Open Mouths by Tori Truslow. Extract from Claire Trévien’s review: ‘Truslow’s Bangkok comes across in this work as a culturally rich, touristy, buzzing, cosmopolitan, ghost-infested and endlessly fascinating city. In her hands, even a bus journey becomes extraordinary.’

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Unthology #3

In anthology, Novella, Short Stories on October 16, 2012 at 11:30 am

-Reviewed by Charlotte Barnes-

Unthology 3

Unthology 3, the third short story anthology to be released in this series by Unthank Books, is kicked into gear with an introduction that claims, “In these uncertain, frightening and recessionary times… it’s only natural to want to switch off the daily terror and hide in a warm fantasy.” The statement immediately lulled my mind into believing that what may be on offer in this new collection was warm fantasy, though that statement also concludes with ‘there is some sex in it’, so it seems the anthology offers something for a wide scope of readers.

There was however a slight pang of confusion upon reading the opening story, ‘Terra Cotta’ by David Rose; the narrative, which weaves readers through a maze of artistic creations as we find ourselves on the tour of a gallery, is not only original and complex, but also maximises the opportunity to explore the visual side of literature through vivid, convincing and all-round inspired descriptions. Having said that, I couldn’t help but feel somewhat underwhelmed by the overall premise of the story, particularly after I had prepared myself for something much more fantasy-based. ‘So Long Mariane’, by Sandra Jensen, completely redeemed this initial reaction, and explained that this was much more than a collection of fantasy tales, with a relevant tale that begins with, “When Mariane asked me to help her kill herself, I thought it would be relatively easy.” The first person narrative provides a gut-wrenching insight of the perspective of someone playing party to euthanasia. Jensen’s narrative, with infrequent and unmarked speech, revolves mainly around the accomplice and the emotional effects, allowing a truly unique voice to become apparent through the inspired tale.

At a later stage in the collection you will discover ‘Even Meat Fill’ by Gordon Collins. My initial reading of this story left me feeling a little underwhelmed and admittedly, slightly confused. However, after returning for a second reading, I eventually found myself bowled over by not simply the story but the narrative used to articulate it. The introductory paragraph to the piece is repeated throughout, which either accidentally or deliberately, perfectly complements the repetition that can be noted in the action the paragraph itself depicts. The story, through the use of this significant paragraph and the repetitive actions that are addressed, succeeds in telling a tale while clearly capturing the monotony of every day life and, I suppose, every day work. This is followed by ‘The Triptych Papers’ by Ian Chung, which is definitely a personal favourite from the whole collection. The story is broken down into parts, allowing for different narrative voices to be exploited and ultimately collaborate towards an eerie, perhaps even science fiction style piece. Similarly, ‘Before the Song’ also benefits from shifts in narrative allowing for the perspective of each member of a family to be voiced throughout.

‘Paradise’ by Sharon Zink and ‘Trans-Neptune’ by Ashley Stokes, which I will refer to as the relationship stories of the collection, cater to the promise of sex offered during the introduction. ‘Trans-Neptune’, which is significantly longer than other stories in the collection, presents a fairly normal situation (a woman, under-nurtured by her husband, contemplates finding sexual attention elsewhere) however still manages to offer something special through the complicated narrative voice that, despite toying with the idea of infidelity, seems to offer readers something familiar that they may even relate to.

‘A Publisher Surveys the Changing Literary Scene’, by CD Rose, caused a definite smirk for me, as a committed book reader. The detective tone of the piece truly throws you off track whilst addressing regular elements of the publishing industry in a unique and inevitably amusing manner. Skipping ahead again leads to ‘The Theory of Circles’ by Debz Hobbs-Wyatt which is a truly fascinating story executed through the use of a unique, modern and inspired narrative style. The story is told through a series of prose-written paragraphs, Facebook updates, Twitter updates and blog posts which keeps the reader continuously guessing about the next twist of the narrative style. The use of repetition in language contributes to this further by  expanding on the circular idea that suggests itself in the title and lingers throughout the body of the text.

Another clever manipulation of literary techniques is embedded within ‘My Oldest and Dearest Friend’ by Charles Wilkinson; the story seems to follow an unexpected avenue which involves two major characters being calmly murdered by their partners, however the shock is quickly snatched away by the reality that they are all in fact uncomfortably devouring dinner together at the close of the story. An equally fascinating style is presented in the final story ‘Eleanor: The End Notes’ by David Rose, in which the narrator guides us through a tragic love story, which on its own probably offers nothing particularly unusual; however it is an experience heightened greatly by the tendency to directly address the reader through asides such as “(you know the passage, I’m sure)” which inevitably draws in a reader, making the story much more intense and involving.

The collection unquestionably offered a welcome break and did indeed usher me into a world of warm fantasies, although some authors achieve this much more effectively than others. While some contributors to this collection opted to explore a world of fantastic, original and sometimes unbelievable ideas, others, such as Sarah Evans in ‘Terms and Conditions’, addressed real life issues in a touching way, without dressing it up with an overly complicated narrative and such like, which certainly isn’t a criticism. The entire publication was a welcome escape from reality, or in some cases a look at reality through new eyes, and I sincerely hope that there will be a fourth addition to this series in the future.

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‘Losses’ by Robert Wexelblatt

In Novella on October 7, 2012 at 1:30 pm

-Reviewed by Ian Chung-

At first glance, the description of Robert Wexelblatt’s Losses on the Vagabondage Press website sounds promising: ‘A single father who is a new IRS agent, his cherished and imaginative little girl, a divorced woman having second thoughts about motherhood, a couple who think two ways about becoming parents, a mysterious and crooked financial wizard – these are the people from whose relationships, enterprises, gains, and losses this story is woven.’ With such a range of characters, one might be forgiven for expecting Losses to use them to provide a healthy dose of domestic-meets-business intrigue, or perhaps some sort of social-cum-corporate satire, in the vein of Max Barry’s novels Jennifer Government and Company.

Losses by Robert Wexelblatt

Unfortunately, this is precisely where Losses falls short, as the novella’s length does not really permit a great deal of narrative complexity in order to service so many characters. Two storylines proceeding in parallel move the novella’s action forward, one involving the narrator uncovering a tax scam, the other concerning his relationship with his daughter, Augusta. The two are kept largely separate until the final chapters, when a plot twist reveals that they have been connected all along. However, this attempt to tie all of the characters together, while not exactly predictable, is also not particularly convincing. If anything, it comes off as somewhat anticlimactic, the narrative equivalent of a deus ex machina that the first ten chapters have given no indication of, only for the final three to hurriedly push it to the forefront and retroactively alter the reader’s perspective of the preceding writing.

Hence, by the end of Losses, the characters remain largely reducible to the stereotypical descriptions given on the publisher’s website. This is a shame, given that Wexelblatt’s breezy first-person narration actually makes for lively, highly readable prose. This quality shines through most in the scenes featuring the father-daughter relationship, e.g. in the opening paragraph’s wry description: ‘Like most children, Gus was a first-rate abstract expressionist up ‘til the age of three, whereupon she was made into a fifth-rate realist. Now she likes to create what she calls ‘designs’. Or when following a call from Augusta’s mother, announcing her intention to sue for custody of her daughter, Augusta tells the narrator, “Oh Daddy! The way I see it, you need me more than I need Mommy. […] But what’s all this stuff about needing? Faker [i.e. Augusta’s imaginary friend] says that grown-ups say you need when they really mean I want.”

Ultimately, although Wexelblatt’s writing style does make Losses an entertaining read while it lasts, I still found myself wishing that both plot and characters had been given more room to breathe. Then the two halves of the narrator’s life, the domestic and the business, and the storylines tied to them, would likely have felt more organically connected within the wider narrative, instead of seeming as if they had to be shoehorned to fit together. If this all sounds like nitpicking, it is only because I think the material Wexelblatt is working with in Losses contains unexplored potential, and more importantly, what writing there is here actually suggests that he ought to be up to the task.

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