Author Archive for liz

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Kate Zambreno Reads From O Fallen Angel, With Friends

Published on April 23, 2010 0 Comments
May ’10
15
7:00 pm

OFallenAngel

Kate Zambreno will read from her debut novella O Fallen Angel, published in April by Chiasmus Press, winner of their “Undoing the Novel” contest. The work is a triptych of modern America set in a banal Midwestern landscape, inspired by Francis Bacon’s Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion, also a grotesque homage to Mrs. Dalloway. O Fallen Angel commits an act of anarchic literary sacrilege that calls to mind the rant and rage of an American Elfriede Jelinek, an exorcism of the culture wars and pop-cultural debris, a sneering indictment of deaf ears, blind eyes, and mute mouths. An editor at Nightboat Books, Zambreno keeps the literary blog Frances Farmer Is My Sister (http://francesfarmerismysister.blogspot.com/). An essay collection inspired by the blog will be published by Semiotext(e)’s Active Agents series in Fall 2011.

Like Angela Carter’s fairy tales, Kate Zambreno’s O Fallen Angel deftly exposes the psychic brutality that lies underneath the smooth glassy surface of parable. Set in Midwestern America in approximately 2006, Zambreno’s character/archetypes—a Mommy who names her golden retriever after Scott Peterson’s murdered wife Laci, a daughter who signs her suicide note with a smiley face and a doomed psychotic prophet—are all agents and victims of disinformation, but this doesn’t make their pain any less real. In Zambreno’s SUV-era America, unhappiness doesn’t exist because it can be broken down into treatable diagnostic codes. As she writes, “Maggie wants to be FREE but she also wants to be LOVED and these are polar instincts, which is why she is bipolar, which is a malady of mood.

” A brilliant, hilarious debut.”    -Chris Kraus, author of  I Love Dick and Aliens & Anorexia

Also joining the bill is John Beer, Jeremy Davies, Daniel Borzutsky, Megan Milks, AD Jameson and James Pate.

For more info: http://francesfarmerismysister.blogspot.com/

Zine Collection Heads Up

Published on April 21, 2010 0 Comments

zineposterlores

Damali Ayo Reads From Obamistan! Land without Racism: Your Guide to the New America

Published on April 20, 2010 0 Comments
May ’10
22
7:00 pm

Obamistan

Funny, unique and fresh, Obamistan! Land without Racism helps the American public take responsibility for its development, rather than sit at home and hurl disappointment at their televisions, newspapers, and web sites, claiming that President Obama hasn’t lived up to his promises. As the first black president becomes the easy and favorite target for many conservatives and liberals alike. This book uses humor to create a shift in the reader’s perspective. It holds firm the idea that we have work to do as the citizens of our country- amongst ourselves. It shows us that we can make a real difference in support of change by embodying the change ourselves. “Change” is a call to action that does not sit only on the shoulders of our president- but on our capable shoulders too. This book holds the voting public to their word and asks them to put up or shut up.

“Funny, poignant and consistently absorbing.” Davy Rothbart, Founder of FOUND Magazine and contributor to This American Life.
For more info: http://welcometoobamistan.com

Kate Zambreno and Friends

Published on April 20, 2010 0 Comments
Apr ’10
15
7:00 pm

OFallenAngel

Kate Zambreno will read from her debut novella O Fallen Angel, published in April by Chiasmus Press, winner of their “Undoing the Novel” contest. The work is a triptych of modern America set in a banal Midwestern landscape, inspired by Francis Bacon’s Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion, also a grotesque homage to Mrs. Dalloway. O Fallen Angel commits an act of anarchic literary sacrilege that calls to mind the rant and rage of an American Elfriede Jelinek, an exorcism of the culture wars and pop-cultural debris, a sneering indictment of deaf ears, blind eyes, and mute mouths. An editor at Nightboat Books, Zambreno keeps the literary blog Frances Farmer Is My Sister. An essay collection inspired by the blog will be published by Semiotext(e)’s Active Agents series in Fall 2011.

Like Angela Carter’s fairy tales, Kate Zambreno’s O Fallen Angel deftly exposes the psychic brutality that lies underneath the smooth glassy surface of parable. Set in Midwestern America in approximately 2006, Zambreno’s character/archetypes—a Mommy who names her golden retriever after Scott Peterson’s murdered wife Laci, a daughter who signs her suicide note with a smiley face and a doomed psychotic prophet—are all agents and victims of disinformation, but this doesn’t make their pain any less real. In Zambreno’s SUV-era America, unhappiness doesn’t exist because it can be broken down into treatable diagnostic codes. As she writes, “Maggie wants to be FREE but she also wants to be LOVED and these are polar instincts, which is why she is bipolar, which is a malady of mood.” A brilliant, hilarious debut.  -Chris Kraus, author of  I Love Dick and Aliens & Anorexia

Also joining the bill is John Beer, Jeremy Davies, Daniel Borzutsky, Megan Milks and AD Jameson.

For more info: http://francesfarmerismysister.blogspot.com/

James Greer reads The Failure at Quimby’s with Zach Dodson and Natalie Edwards

Published on April 20, 2010 1 Comment
May ’10
4
7:00 pm

Failure

The Failure is a picaresque novel set in Los Angeles about two guys who conceive and badly execute a plan to rob a Korean check-cashing store in order to finance the prototype for an impossibly  ridiculous Internet application. The main character, Guy Forget, is a twenty-something drifter with brains, good looks, and absolutely no ambition except to get rich without having to work. His best  friend, Billy, is a professional dog walker who ties the dogs to the rear bumper of his run-down car and drives very slowly. Along the way we meet, among others, Guy’s Midwestern parents, his  theoretical-physicist brother, his girlfriend Violet McKnight, and his secret nemesis, Sven Transvoort, who hates Guy with unusual passion for reasons that are not immediately clear. Using elements of pop culture,  tech jargon, and noirish satire, the book attempts to answer the question not enough people ask themselves on a regular basis: Am I a failure?

JAMES GREER is the author of ARTIFICIAL LIGHT (a selection of Dennis Cooper’s Little House on the Bowery Series), which won a California Book Award for Best Debut Novel, and the nonfiction book GUIDED BY VOICES: A BRIEF HISTORY (Grove), a biography about a band for which he once played bass guitar. He is currently working on a rock musical about Cleopatra starring Catherine Zeta-Jones. He lives in Los Angeles.

ZACH DODSON’s hybrid typo/graphic novel, boring boring boring boring boring boring boring, came out last year under the nom de plume Zach Plague. He hosts The Show N’ Tell Show. His writing has appeared in The2ndHand, ACM, Take the Handle, and Proximity Magazine.

NATALIE EDWARDS once worked at an Australian indoor theme park, but now writes about art. You can find her fiction in the Chicago Reader, theRumpus.net, Mcsweeney’s Internet Tendency, and on TripleQuick Fiction.

For more information visit www.akashicbooks.com and www.featherproof.com

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