It’s been a while since I’ve posted any photos of people reading Box Cutters, but I have a few cool new photos.
From author and poet Marie Marshall (all the way over in Scotland!).From Portland author Jenny Forrester, who picked up Box Cutters at Powell’s Books.
And then there’s my brother’s photo. Way way back, my great-grandfather (“Daddy Bill”) handcrafted an exact replica of his home as a dollhouse for his granddaughter — my mother. It was a stunning piece of work, exacting in its detail, but with the roof off, it was also a wonderfully functional top-view dollhouse. I should know: my mother kept it, and I used to play with my Star Wars action figures in this thing — it was a perfect scale for them.
This is the repainted dollhouse.
Recently, as a gift for my mother’s birthday, my brother — the artist Jon Snoek — refurbished the dollhouse, complete with handmade miniature artwork and furniture, all my brother’s painstaking handiwork.
This is my Granny’s bedroom. That’s my brother’s artwork (in miniature) on the wall.
And in my Granny’s bedroom is a tiny bookshelf that my brother made by hand — complete with tiny books. And on the bottom shelf of that bookshelf: a teeny tiny replica of Box Cutters!!!
From artist Jon Snoek, my brother.
[These photo are from my father’s cell phone (hi, Dad!), so they’re a bit grainy. I’ll post cleaner pics as soon as I get them!]
Stay tuned for more pix in a couple of weeks, gang. I’ll be at AWP in Seattle next week, and on Thursday, I’ll be hanging around the sunnyoutside press table (Q9) in the bookfair from 11 to noon. I’ll probably be by there a lot more often than that, but I’ll definitely be around from 11 to noon. And while I’m there, I’ll be taking photos of anyone willing to pose with the book. If you’re at AWP, come by and find me! I’d love to take your picture.
Author and editor Michael Seidlinger has been engaged in a hell of a project this year. For the past couple of months, he’s been gathering a list of pretty much every indie book coming out this year. And it’s a hell of a list, including news of forthcoming books by Jacob M. Appel, David S. Atkinson, Ryan W. Bradley, Percival Everett, Molly Gaudry, Ashley Iguanta, Jac Jemc, Edward J Rathke, Ben Tanzer, Meg Tuite, and Michael J. Seidlinger himself. And those are just the names I recognize on a first quick scan!
(PS: Gang, I can’t tell you how excited I am for new Jac Jemc!)
Also on the list: My novel, Hagridden, out from Columbus Press this fall.
But that list is just phase 1 of Michael Seidlinger’s project. Phase 2, called The Great 2014 Indie Press Preview, brings in a gaggle of writers-turned-readers, who have laid claim to these forthcoming books and are writing not reviews but anticipatory previews of the books! And today, over at The Outlet literary news blog, The Great 2014 Indie Press Preview went live, and Hagridden is in the first batch of previews.
Two women attempt to live in the bayou of Louisiana as the Civil War rages in the rest of the country outside. I’ve seen so many books about people wrapped up in the war itself, I’m curious to see how Snoek-Brown develops characters who are affected by the war but are still removed from it to some degree. Given the magnitude of emotion Snoek-Brown called up in Box Cutters, this one promises big.
Many thanks to David for claiming my novel and to Michael for putting all this together (seriously, look at the list, let alone the compiled previews — Michael is engaged in a Herculean endeavor here!).
(You can read more advanced praise for Hagridden on the Hagridden page here in my website.)
But there’s also the other news: lungs aren’t cheap. Even with insurance, there’s going to be hella hospital bills and recovery medical care to pay.
Of course, if we at JDP could foot the bill ourselves, we would, but as you all probably know, literature doesn’t often make you rich, and all the poop jokes in the world aren’t going to cover this thing. But we can help Eirik bide his time while he’s waiting on his lungs, and so our former content editor, Mike Sweeney, has come out of retirement for one special issue of Jersey Devil Press. And he’s assembled an all-star roster of some of JDP’s favorite writers — Danger_Slater, Ryan Werner, Craig Wallwork, Amanda Chiado, Ally Malinenko, and Mike himself — to fill out the issue. We’ve even brought back one of JDP’s most popular covers in a special variation, thanks to cover artist Crystal Elerson.
And I have to confess I’m always surprised when someone coming out is news. It seems the most normal thing in the world to me to love another human being. And if it’s so normal, why do we turn celebrity announcements into headlines?
But I know that I’m always surprised because I’ve never had to come out. I’ve never had to call my parents into a room and sit them down and explain to them, carefully and tearfully that I am straight. I’ve never had to live for years in fear that they might find out I’m straight. I endured all the usual teasing in school from people who called me gay, as thought it were some kind of insult, but it never really bothered me because I knew I was straight and I had nothing to worry about.
“I suffered for years because I was scared to be out,” Page said in her speech. “My spirit suffered, my mental health suffered and my relationships suffered.” Later, she added, “It can be the hardest thing, because loving other people starts with loving ourselves and accepting ourselves. I know many of you have struggled with this.”
This is something society has never demanded I struggle with. So I have the privilege of believing that love is love no matter what, without any of the fear so many have had to attach to their love, of themselves as well as others.
And this is why this is news. This is why Page’s announcement is so important: it and all the others like it can help dispel that fear.
“And I’m standing here today, with all of you, on the other side of all that pain,” Page said. “I am young, yes, but what I have learned is that love, the beauty of it, the joy of it and yes, even the pain of it, is the most incredible gift to give and to receive as a human being. And we deserve to experience love fully, equally, without shame and without compromise.”
This blog of mine isn’t about sexuality or social commentary; it’s about writing and teaching. But I can think of few things more worthy of sharing than the words Ellen Page wrote down and spoke aloud today. Including these: “I’m here today because I am gay. And because maybe I can make a difference.”
I started writing this as a simple post to share on my Facebook page. Then I noticed I had my privacy settings on a limited group, and I switched them to my default setting, which is Friends only. But then I thought about what Page said about why she was coming out — that she hoped she could make a difference in reassuring others, in helping alleviate the fear of something no one should be afraid of — and I realized that if I was going to share her words, I needed to share them with a MUCH wider audience. Because I have no idea what it’s like to come out, or to be gay, and I don’t have the personal experience it takes to help make the kind of difference Page is making.
But I know what it is to love. And as Page says, we ALL “deserve to experience love fully, equally, without shame and without compromise.”
From time to time — not often enough — I’ve written about the importance of the writing community, of connecting with fellow writers and sharing work, ideas, even just support.
It’s a beautiful thing to behold, these connections these three writers share. It’s especially thrilling for me because all three women are Portland writers, practically neighbors of mine. (I do know Lidia Yuknavitch a little bit, and I’ve met Cheryl Strayed a couple of times, but I don’t know Suzy Vitello yet, and I can’t claim any close friendship with any of these women. We just happen to run in overlapping circles.) But regardless of how well or how little I know any writer, reading a conversation like this is a fascinating window not only into the writer’s life but into writers’ lives, collectively, and that latter perspective is something we don’t pay enough attention to. So now’s your chance: go read Rebecca Rubenstein’s “Writerly Friendships: Cheryl Strayed, Lidia Yuknavitch, And Suzy Vitello.”
Bit of an update to the website, gang. Nothing major, but I’m starting in on my reading season, so I’ve added a new Events page to the website — check out the menu bar at the top of the screen. And while you’re there, you might notice that I’ve replaced the Box Cutters menu link with a new Books drop-down menu, where you’ll find Box Cutters as well as some early news about my forthcoming novel, Hagridden.
Just thought the regular readers would like to know. 🙂
I love doing readings, gang, and I have three three of them coming up over the next several weeks. And if you haven’t bought your copy of Box Cutters yet, you’ll be able to grab one at any of these events.
The first is at AWP in Seattle. If you’re at the conference, you’ll probably see me at some of the panels, a lot of the readings, but if you’re having trouble finding me, look for the nearest coffee place (before lunch) or bar (after lunch), or come on down to the bookfair, where I’ll probably be lurking around the sunnyoutside press table (Q9 — we’re sharing space with The Austin Review). In fact, I’m scheduled to hang out at the sunnyoutside table on Thursday from 11 to noon. (More on my time at the conference in another post soon.)
I’ll also be practically the last thing anyone sees at the conference: I’m joining an amazing line-up of sunnyoutside press authors for the Sweet Fanny AWP late-night reading. If you’re at the conference or just happen to be in the Seattle area, come find us Saturday night, 10 pm til 1 am, at the Georgetown Liquor Company.
Then, just a few days later, I’m joining a gang of poets for the monthly Ink Noise Review reading in Portland. We’ll all be down at the Jade Lounge in southeast PDX; we start at 8 pm but come early and get yourself a beer.
And on March 17 — St. Patty’s Day! — I’m participating in Smallpressapalooza at Powell’s City of Books downtown. This is a HUGE small press festival featuring some stunning poets, fictioners, and essayists. We’ll be in the Pearl Room from 6 to 10(ish), but I’m up in the first half of the evening, so come early and hear us all.
It’s that time of year, gang! When the stores are stuffed with pillowy heart-shaped boxes full of diabetes and the flower shops are spilling out into the streets and elementary school kids are covering shoeboxes with pink construction paper to hold all the little notes from their secret admirers moms and the severed heads float on ponds like beach balls . . . .
It’s the month that frames Valentine’s Day, as only Jersey Devil Press will bring it to you. And in addition to those floating heads (seriously, that’s the opening of one of our stories), we’re giving you candy-coated fiction and literary bouquets full of horse dreams, twisted fairy tales, the torture of growing horns, and sexually transmitted gnomes. Plus the flying demon heart that is cover artist Daniel Langhans’s “Carnecupulus.”
So settle in for the broken hearts and the floral allergies and the overpriced romantic dinners and the sugar rush, JDP readers! And don’t say we never gave you anything.
I’m sure I’ve mentioned this before, but I’m part Scottish. Descended from Frasers from Fraserburgh; we still have family in Aberdeenshire.
Yet somehow, I’ve never celebrated Robert Burns Night. Not officially, anyway. I don’t know how I keep missing out on this, but I do.
This year, though, I decided to wade in and give a kind of celebration a go. Most of this was easy to arrange, even at the last-minute (I just made this decision tonight): I have two kilts to choose from, bagpipe music to play, some Robert Burns to read, and whisky (both blended and single malt) in the house. All that was left was the haggis.
I’ve actually never had haggis. I gave up meat before I ever had a chance to sample it. But I know there are plenty of recipes for vegetarian haggis, so tonight I looked one up and gave it a go.
The version I started with is from AllRecipes.com, but I didn’t have all the ingredients immediately to hand, and since this was a last-minute decision, I was going to have to wing it. Fortunately, I know that according to tradition, haggis is essentially a mash of hearty leftovers you might expect to find on a Scottish farm, so throwing together whatever was in the kitchen made sense. So here’s how I faked the recipe (and stripped it down for just one serving):
olive oil
1/4 onion, chopped
1/3 cup (total) of veggies (I used peas, carrots, and corn)
1/2 cup of vegetarian “meat” crumbles
a small handful of crushed walnuts
1/3 cup hashed potatoes
ground black pepper
season salt (this is a special blend a friend gave us; it’s basically salt, garlic, and thyme)
nutmeg
cloves
rosemary
parsley
1/2 cup of vegetable broth
1/3 cup of instant oats
1 egg (lightly beaten)
I preheated the oven to 375, and then I heated the oil over medium-high heat in a wok (I know — bare with me; there’s a reason) and then sautéed the onions. After a few minutes, I added the other veggies, and after a few minutes more, I added the “meat” crumbles and the nuts. I stirred these in the oil for a few minutes and then pushed the veggie/meatless mix aside, up the wall of the wok. I added a little more oil in the bottom of the wok and tossed in the hashed potatoes. I fried these on both sides and then mixed everything together again. I added all the seasonings and then sautéed the mixture for a few more minutes.
Once everything had cooked, I pushed the mixture up the walls again, away from the heat. I turned up the burner to high and poured in the vegetable broth. Once it boiled, I added the oats, stirred them until they were moist, and then I pushed the whole veggie mixture down into the broth, cut the heat to low, and covered the wok to simmer for 10 minutes.
While the mixture was simmering, I beat the egg and sprayed a crockery dish with cooking spray. Then I cut the heat altogether and moved the wok off the burner, mixed in the beaten egg, and transferred the whole mixture to the crockery dish. I covered the dish and baked it in the preheated oven for another 10 minutes.
And that was that.
Honestly, this isn’t really anything like any haggis, vegetarian or traditional, that I’ve seen. It was just a first run at things using whatever I had on hand. The texture wasn’t minced and “pudding-like” enough; in future runs, I’ll chop everything finer, and I’ll probably include mashed beans for a thicker, more paste-like texture. I also should have let the mixture cool completely before adding the egg, so it wouldn’t cook into fried-rice-like chunks as soon as it came into the mixture, but I was short on time and it was fine. And I wish I’d had a vegetarian “sausage casing” or even a filo dough — something to stuff the filling into or wrap it with, instead of just spreading it into this dish. I also would omit the hashed potatoes (which I included mostly because I was short on time and didn’t want to bother with the traditional side dishes of “neeps and tatties” — mashed turnips and mashed potatoes).
Still, the oats and the nuts gave it a nice gritty texture, and covering the dish allowed it to bake in its own seasoned juices, so it tasted fine to me. And considering the whole thing took me little more than half an hour to cook, beginning to end, I think it turned out pretty decently. Better still, it was a terrific complement to my whisky (nothing fancy — just a simple Walker Black — but I’m having a nice single malt later tonight).
[UPDATE: I said I’d scaled this down for one serving. It’s actually more like two. Sitting there in the dish, it looks like a nice little dinner, and when I ate it, it went down fine. Not too filling at all. But — and I should have foreseen this given the ingredients, especially the oats — it kept expanding in my stomach all night, so much so that when I awoke this morning I was overfull and suffering from some pretty gnarly indigestion. I suspect if I’d simmered this recipe in the oven for at least a half hour, or as much as an hour, the oats would have cooked out and it wouldn’t have expanded in my stomach overnight. Of course, that defeats the intent for a quick fake haggis, so word of warning, anyone making this recipe: if you do it the fast way, like I did, only eat half of it. Your stomach will thank you in the morning.]
And yes, I walked my dish from the kitchen to the dining table to the tune of bagpipes, and I read Burns’s “Address to a Haggis” before sitting down to dinner.
Address to a Haggis
Fair fa’ your honest, sonsie face,
Great chieftain o the puddin’-race!
Aboon them a’ ye tak your place,
Painch, tripe, or thairm:
Weel are ye worthy o’ a grace
As lang’s my arm.
The groaning trencher there ye fill,
Your hurdies like a distant hill,
Your pin wad help to mend a mill
In time o need,
While thro your pores the dews distil
Like amber bead.
His knife see rustic Labour dight,
An cut you up wi ready slight,
Trenching your gushing entrails bright,
Like onie ditch;
And then, O what a glorious sight,
Warm-reekin, rich!
Then, horn for horn, they stretch an strive:
Deil tak the hindmost, on they drive,
Till a’ their weel-swall’d kytes belyve
Are bent like drums;
The auld Guidman, maist like to rive,
‘Bethankit’ hums.
Is there that owre his French ragout,
Or olio that wad staw a sow,
Or fricassee wad mak her spew
Wi perfect scunner,
Looks down wi sneering, scornfu view
On sic a dinner?
Poor devil! see him owre his trash,
As feckless as a wither’d rash,
His spindle shank a guid whip-lash,
His nieve a nit;
Thro bloody flood or field to dash,
O how unfit!
But mark the Rustic, haggis-fed,
The trembling earth resounds his tread,
Clap in his walie nieve a blade,
He’ll make it whissle;
An legs an arms, an heads will sned,
Like taps o thrissle.
Ye Pow’rs, wha mak mankind your care,
And dish them out their bill o fare,
Auld Scotland wants nae skinking ware
That jaups in luggies:
But, if ye wish her gratefu prayer,
Gie her a Haggis
After dinner I smoked a pipe with another whisky, and now I’m nibbling shortbread and writing this. Not exactly a traditional Robert Burns Night, but it’s mine, and for a first, it’s been grand.
There are, as of 3 pm PST, still almost 9 hours left to contribute to the Revenge of the Scammed Anthology — and, if you’re interested, pick up a signed copy of my chapbook — but folks, we have officially helped out Edward J Rathke! The project has been funded and we’ve rescued a fellow writer’s year! This is huge news.
This post I’m reblogging here is Rathke’s own heartfelt outpouring of thanks to all you who made this possible (and I know some of you who read my blog contributed to this project, and you have my thanks, too). Go check it out.
But you can still contribute if you want, especially if you’re keen to grab one of the very cool perks on offer!
Samuel Snoek-Brown 