Chuck Palahniuk Anthology ‘Burnt Tongues’ Will Include…ME!!

a few years ago i joined a workshop. i was getting long in the tooth and decided it was about time people KNEW i wrote stories all the time, as opposed to just scribbling them down then hiding them in notebooks, folders, envelopes, folding them up and shoving them in books as markers, and what have you. maybe at some point i wanted actual humans to see them. so, other people working to become better writers seemed a good place to start.

fast forward a few years, and it’s very difficult for me to keep ANY of my fiction to myself. and one of those stories – “The Line Forms on the Right” – that i oh-so-fearfully handed over to be judged, praised and shredded in the writing workshop ends up here:

Chuck Palahniuk news release:

http://chuckpalahniuk.net/news/the-cult-anthology-burnt-tongues-has-a-publisher?fb_action_ids=137646729749885&fb_action_types=og.likes&fb_source=other_multiline&action_object_map=%7B%22137646729749885%22%3A503271313067906%7D&action_type_map=%7B%22137646729749885%22%3A%22og.likes%22%7D&action_ref_map=%5B%5D

Medallion Press news release:

http://www.prnewschannel.com/2013/04/03/fight-club-author-chuck-palahniuk-to-release-new-book/

Burnt Tongues! Coming Summer 2014!!

 

Another List

okay, fine, i want to do a Most Influential in 2012 List, too. i’m making it up right now but i’m sure it will still be fairly accurate.

TOP TEN, in no particular order:

1. Tom Hardy

2. Tom Waits

3. Justin Townes Earle

4. Kevin Corrigan

5. Sheri Moon Zombie

6. Eric Gowin

7. Craig Wallwork

8. Vincent Louis Carrella

9. Lady Gaga

10. my awesome zen demon cat Billie Idol.

music, pictures, ideas, conversation, companionship. YES!

 

 

 

To New Beginnings

places to go and people to see, strangers to meet and friends to excavate. words to find and words to make.

Happy 2013

‘Trotlines’ in Menacing Hedge, Spring 2012

the Apocalypse is probably not going to be nearly as exciting as we hope. even if there ARE zombies.

my take on that:

http://menacinghedge.com/spring2012/entry-gowin.php

also, Menacing Hedge is awesome in general. You can download the whole Spring Issue for Kindle/Nook etc. check out this cover:

Menacing Hedge Spring 2012

 

 

ThunderDome REVAMPED!

Thunderdome just had an overhaul. The site is sexy and easy to navigate, and there are lots of new projects – wander around:

http://thunderdomemag.com/index.php

keep peeking around for news – i’m about to become a co-editor. so far that job has entailed digging up pretty photos from my hard drive, but i have a feeling it’s going to get a BIT more intense than that. for now, here are the updated links for my stories in the Thunderdome:

“Teetotaler” http://thunderdomemag.com/component/k2/item/44-teetotaler

“Fever” http://thunderdomemag.com/component/k2/item/25-fever

“Tin Man”  http://thunderdomemag.com/collections/the-collective-speaks/writers-in-residence-warmed-and-bound/item/100-tin-man

Congrats, Mike, on a site well done!

Appalachian Acumen in ManArchy Magazine

ManArchy Magazine launched yesterday, and somewhere in all the comedy and cleverness i managed to weasel in a column of my own – i now have a place to dump all that  have learned about Appalachia and white trash etiquette!

link to Manarchy Mag’s main page: http://manarchymag.com/core/

link to my column: http://manarchymag.com/core/2011/12/50-ways-to-leave-your-lover-well-5/

picture of my hair as of New Year’s Day:

 

The Girl in the Curtain

andrea, and snow…

i’ve been dreaming andrea into a lot of dreams….

there’s a sort of disconnection from the real world going on right now, that feeling of all the kitestrings being pulled waaay too tight – and i’m hiding box cutters behnd my back and sighing and wondering what to do, because there aren’t that many strings left and who knows if it’s the eggshell dome sky or  holiday loneliness or typical winter melancholy clouding my judgement as to whether i should slash the strings or wait…. ugh too much purple prose.

for three, i do not hold the blade. andrea, not for you. a—-, i love you, come back when you’re ready and send pictures of your cats in the meantime if you get the chance.  m—, you may or may not hold scissor of your own, but i’m happy to let you drift in and out as you please.

in the dreams, i can see the scenes i want to write, and sometimes andrea is wearing the corset with the red yarn laces that run up the side, over top the places where the scars would be – and other times i pass her while i run down the street, she’s at an iron table reading a newspaper, posture flawless, and i think  ”hey, that’s…”  but whatever i’m chasing takes precedence and i run on, barefoot.

h— is troubling. i believe she is attacking the string with a chainsaw, trying to make sense of her world by eliminating disagreeable people. and i keep plucking at the string, seeing what will happen. sending mixed vibrations down the line to louisiana, thinking “maybe if i were MORE offensive, she’d pick up the phone…”

i’ve found some new strings, and i’m half-heartedly tugging, trying to keep emotional investment out of it at this juncture. k—, with the use of candles, pulling you slowly into my orbit if possible… and m—, we just dropped the string for many years. i’m jiggling rather than pulling.

all of you shall be written in. each in your own shop, in a town that doesn’t exist, each with a list of words or phrases that will emerge if prompted by the yank of a string or the twist of a key.

boring melancholy!! but no emotion fits wet december as snugly. like a latex glove. on an embalmer. in a mint green room in the basement.

I NEED SNOW.

so andrea, what’s up? how is life? do you OWN a corset, and will you be in town for the holidays?  i have a new book for you, and wonder if there’s a knot in the string somewhere, or a snag…. 

LA1K (In Search of a City: Los Angeles In 1,000 Words)

BUY HERE!!

 http://thundadome.com/LA1K/ 

 

BOOKED REVIEW AND INTERVIEW WITH MIKE:

http://www.bookedpodcast.com/2011/11/30/episode-53-michael-paul-gonzalez-and-in-search-of-a-city/

 

and NOW, i name drop:

 Table of Contents

Ryan Wilson – “American Trash”
Stuart Gibbel – “Break on Through”
Craig Clevenger – “Obsolescence”
Nik Korpon – “South of Thirteen”
Dennis Cruz – “Smile Now, Cry Later”
Pela Via – “Bathhouse”
Stephen Conley – “Don’t Feed the Animals”
Grigori Black – “This Was Heaven”
Doc O’Donnell – “Your Personal Apocalypse”
Nikki Guerlain – “Sick Ticket”
Patrick Verhagen – “Swim”
Craig Wallwork – “El Bordello Alexandra”
Nicholas Merlin Karpuk – “Ahm’s Bay”
Nik Houser – “Subtitles for a Silent Film”
H.R. Tardiff – “Walls in the Sand”
Richard Thomas – “The Jenny Store”
Bob Pastorella – “Alexandra”
Simon West-Bulford – “Project Asmodeus”
Jay Slayton-Joslin – “The Fantasy of California vs. The Reality of London”
Amanda Gowin – “Gilded Bones”
Chris Deal – “Padre Nuestro”
Boden Steiner – “Here”
Gordon Highland – “Fry Girl”
edward j rathke – “All the Dreams You Dreamt Retold”
Michael Paul Gonzalez – “Tidal”
Victor Bengtsson – “Venice, Forever”

Thunderdome – “In Search of a City: Los Angeles in 1,000 Words” – the anthology is coming…

that’s right. it’s almost here. like, think near Thanksgiving. it’ll be available through amazon and the thundadome site. it will feature 26 incredible stories by 26 incredible authors, each of those stories in some way about L.A., each of those stories exactly 1,000 words long. and overflowing with incredible photographs by the editor himself, one Mr. Michael Gonzalez. so, this holiday season you now have something else to be thankful for: a picture book with awesome stories. here’s a sneak peek photo:

i’m not even going to name-drop on the authors included. that will come soon enough. for now, i give you just this one photo, and the imagined sound of me dancing in my socks on linoleum while singing (poorly) ‘Hold On’ by Wilson Phillips…

busy, busy… and inspirational!!

WOOOO!!! Interviewed by a zombie for Craig Wallwork’s blog, which should with any luck go up about the same time this weekend as the Booked podcast i guest-hosted (i have tourette’s, they’re saints to let me anywhere near that podcast) with Chris Deal for Craig’s story ‘Revenge of the Zombie Pussy Eaters’ and general horror topics. chris is so damned smart about that stuff – screw you, chris, you hear me?? i rambled about frickin’ ted nugent and false penises on female hyenas, and pretty much everything you said was insightful and funny. yeah, i’m calling you out right here on this blog no one reads, chris deal!!

so anyway. this weekend both of those things should be up. links forthcoing, also to be found in their respective homes in the blogroll list to the right ->

only two soccer games left. i love the kids. they’re so awesome. i’m actually considering doing this again in the spring. i’m vicariously living their happiness just running and jumping and kicking and getting SNACKS!

rehearsal every night the rest of this week and all next week (except soccer night). i’m trying. my big fear is to be the ‘okay’ one – like, not the one that ruins it, but the one that ‘didn’t ruin it’ – but just barely. like keanu in Bram Stoker’s Dracula. please god don’t let me be keanu….

Friday is our five year wedding anniversary. FIVE FRICKIN’ YEARS! i forgot that we made this joke agreement to go on five year contracts and re-evaluate if we’d go another five at each interval. i sure hope we sign on for another five, because i can’t hold a job. only thing i’m good at is teaching my kid stuff and rambling and… well, to be honest i could always be a hooker.

in conclusion, i would like to say, don’t let anyone tell you that rambling like an idiot about zombies won’t get you anywhere. because it can. believe in yourself, damnit.

this is my inspirational post. i feel pretty good about it.

Sunday Mornin’ Comin’ Down (featuring pumpkins, coffee and Gaga)

this is the most freakishly busy and not-falling-apart i may have ever been. i mean, i’ve been lots busier than this in my life – more lists on my palms and crammed in my pockets, more things scribbled in pen and pencil in smaller then even smaller lettering turning little calendar squares into something resembling boxes overfull of springs, less sleep, more night-thinking, etc and on and on – but the difference is i’m ENJOYING this frantic autumn.

my body is always tired and i can’t turn my brain off at night – so i drag myself out of bed on ‘brain break’ nights to scribble lists, revise, send emails, read – and i keep forgetting what day it is and there are bags under my eyes. once again, the weird difference: this is pretty fun.

the fact that all the things i’m doing are completely voluntary (except laundry and matching my son’s constant amazement that the mere switch of a word –  i.e. 2 PLUS 3 is 5, but 2 BESIDE 3 is 23 – can change the meanings of things in spectacular ways) plays a part, i know, but i think something has shifted. i don’t feel frantic – yes, i know i’m manic. but the coil is not so tight and i’m perfectly capable of sitting still.

tomorrow and tuesday are adam’s first soccer games, wednesday and friday are Bug rehearsal – i’ve never coached soccer and haven’t been on a stage in over a decade, but it’s cool. i’ll wear tube socks the first half of the week and cut fake lines of coke the second half and be happy about it. friday morning while adam’s in dance class i’ll try and read but instead send myself reminder emails from my phone and check messages.

there are profound things here, profound clockwork adjustments that have been made – but it’s past noon now and the time i thought i would have to ruminate on it a little has been cut short…

i can dig it. it makes me cranky but i can dig it – in five minutes i’ll be ejecting kiddo’s gaga dvd for the day and rustling up clean clothes for the birthday party in a couple hours and i won’t remember to be cranky because i have lines to go over with eric and a story to revise and sci-fi scenes to finish (at 9pm each night i grease my phalanges and crack my wrists, take a deep breath and hope for the best) these nights after dark, and halloween costume possibilities saved in another tab and ghost lights and fake blood to put on the windows, and jerseys to wash and….

happy autumn. happy survived the apple festival. happy tired brain body – i would not stay this pace this course forever, but the lack of quaking on my insides foretells a longer life than i expected, i think.

 

 

 

hello, september, i love you

summer is dead, thank god for that. i hate those last few weeks, the grass shriveling and insects coughing up their own dusty innards. now we have CHILL. now we have striped knee sock mornings and piles of wrinkled sweaters and sweatshirts in my back seat – shoes that stay attached firmly to your foot the entire time you walk – none of that gum-smacking flip-flop shit. proper shoes lashed in place.

karma or fate or maybe just plain old time has taken something from me that i will not say aloud, only maybe that i have shown hubris in my declaration of raccoon magpie squirrel lock-picking wallet-stealing persuasive manner of life, and my hand – very literally my hand – was smacked, and i lost a tiny and meaningful piece of something that was in fact my most prized Acquired Object. i have had it for 16 years exactly, one year longer than my 2nd most prized Acquired Object (a half inch orange plastic horse from a quarter machine in Wyoming). extra xanax and two hours of flashlight house-combing could not bring this speck of preciousness back to me. not that i thought it could, but try try we had to try. i’m not saying i’ll tuck my sticky fingers back in my pockets (i am a magnet for treasures and it is my nature to keep people with me by keeping people on me), i just think all the bravado and downright puffed chest about the whole thing was/is unnecessary. stomach-turning, this was. i lost my most precious confiscated Precious….

speaking of hats, i have collected many new ones. i am now Coach Gowin (laugh, it’s funny) and R.C. (if you live within 90 miles and don’t come to portsmouth to see BUG and watch me do fake lines of coke and kiss a girl on the mouth then i renounce my love for you) and screenwriter (again! same project – should be doing that now, in fact, but my batteries are loooow). so if I were Batman, as the question was once posed, i think Soccer Mom would be drunk-partying persona Bruce Wayne, R.C. and prose/screenwriter would be ass-kicking slightly-detached-from-sanity Batman, and me sitting here in the recliner with a crayon (for underlining of course) tucked in my book and script within reach and cat at my feet would be lucid-between-role-playing Bruce Wayne. id, ego, superego? right?

OH! OH!!!! but on a happy note – i found the fucking Batman ring. that’s gotta be the note on which i end this post:

(the batman ring post)

Warmed and Bound Goes Hollywood

 

Here Is Nowhere by Edward J Rathke

 

http://thundadome.com/index.php?option=com_k2&view=item&id=123:now-here-is-nowhere&Itemid=56