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The 10 Most Recent Dispatches
- The Bat Segundo Show: Stephen Fry
- The Bat Segundo Show: Deborah Scroggins
- Komen for the Cowards: Betraying Breast Cancer
- The Bat Segundo Show: Susan Cain
- Forgotten Writers: Dorothy Uhnak
- Dwight Garner’s Revisionist Ignorance: Ayaan Hirsi Ali
- Forgotten Writers: The Novels of John P. Marquand
- The Situation in American Waffles
- The Bat Segundo Show: Elliot Perlman
- The Death of the Heart (Modern Library #84)
Modern Library Reading Challenge
On January 10, 2011, Managing Editor Edward Champion pledged to read the top 100 fiction books from #100 to #1. Read about his progress as he makes his way through the Modern Library canon!
84. The Death of the Heart (January 6, 2012)
85. Lord Jim (November 30, 2011)
86. Ragtime (October 30, 2011)
Books To Jump Up and Down Over
The Call by Yannick Murphy: The always interesting author of Here They Come and Signed, Mata Hari returns with a novel that whips up a worldview from a rather quirky set of limitations: namely, the call logs that a veterinarian maintains as his son is unexpectedly put into a coma and an unforgiving economy denies him work. What emerges is a surprisingly optimistic, often funny, and very moving account on how one family uses acceptance and forgiveness as a way to atone for hard knocks. (Bat Segundo interview with Murphy)
Birds of Paradise by Diana Abu-Jaber: Forget Franzen and Eugenides. If you're looking for a social novel that counts, Diana Abu-Jaber is the author you're looking for. Building from the free-form exploration of consciousness and identity in Crescent and the gripping procedural structure of Origin, Abu-Jaber's latest novel is her finest, equally fluent with gutterpunk culture and smarmy real estate men. It has been suggested by The Washington Post's Ron Charles that you will likely gain some pounds while reading this novel. This is certainly true. Abu-Jaber's description of food is so precise that it often made me want to do more cooking. But I very much admired the way in which Abu-Jaber presents all her characters as unwitting victims of rough capitalism, which permits them some dignity even as they perform terrible acts.
The Last of the Live Nude Girls by Sheila McClear: This memoir isn't so much about the decline of the Times Square peepshow, as it is about one young woman's efforts to pull herself up by by her bootstraps when presented with few economic options. Filled with self-introspective candor and a quiet dignity, McClear's story is one that might befall any of us in these volatile times. While McClear does get back on her feet, her book leads one contemplating the terrible fates of other young women now moving to New York and falling into deadlier vocations. (Bat Segundo interview with McClear)
McSweeney’s Archive
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Oscar Villalon Abruptly Leaves McSweeney’s
Posted on March 3, 2010 | 2 CommentsThe SF Weekly‘s Joe Eskenazi reports that former San Francisco Chronicle books editor Oscar Villalon has abruptly left his position as publisher at McSweeney’s. Villalon has not returned calls to... -
Dave Eggers and the Journalism Sweatshop Model
Posted on January 5, 2010 | 3 CommentsIn recent months, Dave Eggers has continued to insist that newspapers, contrary to recent developments, are not dying. In May 2009, Eggers spoke before a crowd and announced, “If you... -
Wholphin, Eggers and Why I Can’t Believe
Posted on January 11, 2006 | 6 CommentsI picked up the January 2005 issue of The Believer, partly with the intention of seeing if the magazine was showing any signs of shedding its feel-good trappings (short answer:... -
Chuck Klosterman: A Manboy Who Must Be Stopped
Posted on August 24, 2005 | 29 CommentsBack when Chuck Klosterman’s Sex, Drugs and Cocoa Puffs came out, Mark Ames penned a remarkably vicious review for the New York Press. At the time, I was only familiar... -
Momentary Sayonara
Posted on November 19, 2004 | 5 CommentsThere’s nothing really to say. And the last thing I want to do is lecture like Neal Pollack. So I’m going the hell away for a week or so. I... -
Quickies
Posted on January 26, 2004 | No CommentsPrimer: Winner of the Sundance Grand Jury Prize and the Alfred P. Sloan Prize. The film was made for $7,000, doesn’t appear to have a distribution deal yet, but somehow... -
Did the Van Man Wear Ray Bans?
Posted on January 21, 2004 | No CommentsRonald Jordan, known as the White Van Man, stole tens of thousands of Lonely Planet guides and hawked them on the street with help of a few shadowy vendors. But... -
Shorties
Posted on January 7, 2004 | No CommentsAnd the Whitbread goes to Mark Haddon’s The Very, Very Curious Incident of the Dog Who Was Let Out by the Baja Men in the Morning, Afternoon and Night Shortly... -
An Open Letter to Sara Bauer
Posted on December 10, 2003 | 16 CommentsDear Young Woman Who Writes Snotty and Unfunny Open Letters for McSweeney’s: The first moment I read you, I knew you were the same. The same as all those other...