Book Fight

This week's story is "What You Pawn I Will Redeem," by Sherman Alexie. This week's shorts are boxers. Trigger warning: We're gonna talk about our underpants.

Direct download: ShortsEp6-Alexie_and_Boxers.mp3
Category:general -- posted at: 6:00am EDT

We're joined this week by Matt Jakubowski--writer, critic, and interviews editor for the international journal Asymptote--to discuss the English translation of Aglaja Veteranyi's Why the Child is Cooking in the Polenta. Veteranyi was originally from Romania but lived most of her life in Switzerland, after growing up with a family of circus performers, an experience which certainly informs the novel. We also talk about Matt's ongoing project to read only women for 2014.

Direct download: Ep_66-Aglala_Veteranyi_Why_the_Child_Is_Cooking_in_the_Polenta.mp3
Category:general -- posted at: 6:00am EDT

This week we're discussing Mary Gaitskill's "The Girl on the Plane," and also gym shorts. What more could you possibly need to know?

Direct download: ShortsEp5_Gaitskill_Gym_Shorts.mp3
Category:general -- posted at: 6:00am EDT

This week we read two long stories (novellas, maybe?) by some guy named J.D. Salinger. Maybe you've heard of him. Kind of a recluse? Didn't like phonies? Both stories are about Seymour Glass, and the Glass family more generally, who make appearances in a number of other Salinger stories, like A Perfect Day for Bananafish and Franny and Zooey. 

Direct download: Ep65-Salinger.mp3
Category:general -- posted at: 6:00am EDT

We welcome special guest Dave Housley (Barrelhouse editor, author of the forthcoming If I Knew The Way, I Would Take You Home) to discuss Edward Porter's "The White Guy's Guide to Marrying a Black Woman" and also cargo shorts. Talking points include: second-person narratives, writing honestly about race, goatees, Phish tour, Tyler Perry, and buying things only because they're on sale.

Direct download: Shorts4-PorterAndCargos.mp3
Category:general -- posted at: 6:00am EDT

This week Tom continues his year-long exploration of books outside his usual reading patterns, with Finnish writer's Anita Konkka's A Fool's Paradise, published by Dalkey Archive Press. And Mike continues his exploration of fan fiction, quizzing Tom on a variety of tropes and terms, some of which might actually be useful if they were adopted by writers of non-fan fiction, too. 

Direct download: Ep64-Konkka_AFoolsErrand.mp3
Category:general -- posted at: 6:00am EDT

This week is all about genre-bending. We talk about Jo Ann Beard's essay "Werner," which was included in the 2007 edition of Best American Nonfiction, edited by David Foster Wallace, and which makes use of fictional techniques to tell a story that is (more or less) true. We also talk about skorts, against which Mike has a long-standing grudge. 

Direct download: ShortsEp3-Beard_and_Skorts.mp3
Category:general -- posted at: 6:00am EDT

We welcome guest Leslie Jamson (The Empathy Exams) to discuss Michael W. Clune's memoir White Out: The Secret Life of Heroin. Clune was a PhD student in literature at John Hopkins in Baltimore and also a daily heroin user. We also talk about addiction memoirs more generally, Leslie's own forays into writing creative nonfiction, pie shakes, Iowa City, and Haley Joel Osment. 

You can preorder Issue 13 of Barrelhouse (the comedy issue) at the Barrelhouse website. You can learn more about us, and the show, at bookfightpod.com

Direct download: Ep_63-MichaelClune_WhiteOut.mp3
Category:general -- posted at: 6:00am EDT

Welcome back to the Summer of Shorts! This week we're talking about an Andre Dubus story, "The Fat Girl," which follows its protagonist, Louise, from childhood through marriage and pregnancy as she struggles with body image issues and her relationship with food. We're also talking about jorts, the much-maligned (and possibly misunderstood?) garment of choice for construction workers, heavy-metal fans and, more recently, hipsters with scissors.

Direct download: Shorts2-Dubus_and_Jorts.mp3
Category:general -- posted at: 6:00am EDT

Our last donor pick of the year, this book by Peter Sotos is pretty disturbing. We talk about trigger warnings, both in general and in relation to this particular book, which delves into pedophilia, child pornography, and several real-life child abductions and murders. We discuss Sotos's career as a transgressive, button-pushing author, and debate the relative merits of this book. Is Sotos seeking to shine a critical eye on the psychology of pedophilia? Or is he just wallowing around in the filth?

We've also got our first official listener rebuttal: Joshua Isard, author of Conquistador of the Useless, took issue with our panning of Howard Jacobson's The Finkler Question in Episode 58. So we gave him a forum to fight back. That happens at around the 30 minute mark, if you'd like to hear Josh but want to abstain from our possibly triggering discussion of Sotos.

Direct download: Ep62-PeterSotos_Mine.mp3
Category:general -- posted at: 6:00am EDT