Monthly Archives: August 2009

Significant Object: Bird Figurine

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bird-figurine-550

Last summer, my wife and I held a barbeque in our back yard. After the event, I saw a little yellow bird with a black crown and wings on the knickknack shelf above the toilet in the bathroom. I’d never seen this figurine before. The bird, its head turned ninety degrees to the left of its body, gazed at me squarely with unblinking black eyes.

When I asked my wife about where she got the figurine, she had no idea what I was talking about. The figurine suddenly took on the cold heft of an object that existed only to tell us how much it didn’t belong here.

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[bid on the object on eBay]

[about the Significant Objects project]

Raconteur and the Hunterdon County Library

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A couple of weeks ago, I read at The Raconteur, one of the coolest used bookstores in Jersey.

0807091946I have no idea who that guy is, but he’s in the next picture, too.

0807091946aI read from the chapter “Jhee Hong,” which I thought was appropriate since it takes place in a used bookstore.  It was a great event, lots of interested readers and Q&A afterwards.

0807092140And since I can’t leave a bookstore without buying some books, these are the titles I left with.

raconteurbooksThat’s Matrimony by Joshua Henkin (who was at the BooksNJ festival earlier in the year and I should’ve gotten the book then, but we were pressed for time – but no matter, I got a signed copy!), Voodoo Heart by Scott Snyder, and Richard Price‘s Freedomland.  Haven’t read any of them, but that’ll soon change.

And this past week, the Hunterdon County Library invited me for a reading.

hclA little while ago, the director who put together BooksNJ asked the participating authors if they could say something about libraries, and here’s what I wrote.

Without libraries, I never would’ve discovered books on tape.  I’m still surprised that so many people haven’t experienced the joy of listening to a book narrated by a professional — they are, without question, missing out in a big way.  What hooked me was Frank Muller‘s narration of Chris Crutcher‘s collection Athletic Shorts, and since then, I must’ve gone through the majority of Muller’s performances (The Prince of Tides, 1984, The Great Gatsby — you can’t go wrong with anything he reads).  It’s unfortunate that he’s no longer with us, but his work will live on, thanks to all the great libraries.

If you have a road trip coming up or would like a change of pace for the daily commute, go to your local library and get yourself a Muller.

A Pair of Interviews

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fictionwritersreviewI was fortunate enough to be interviewed by two excellent publications recently.  The first one is in Fiction Writers Review, conducted by Jeremiah Chamberlin when I was in Ann Arbor for the book festival this past May.   We gabbed for a good hour and had a grand old time about my novel and writing in general.  If you haven’t visited Fiction Writers Review, do so immediately.  The number of wonderful writers who’ve contributed so many sharp analyses about the art of fiction is nothing short of staggering.

thebrowserThe second interview was with The Browser, and this one is a little different.  Anna Blundy asked me to name five books about the Asian American Experience, and although I was initially stumped (five is tough!), I managed to come up with a list that is representative of my very personal view at that specific point in time (i.e., totally, completely subjective).  Regardless, it was a great opportunity to discuss a quintet of very different Asian American works.

Hyphen Review and Kindle-ing

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hyphen_choTwo nice bits of news today:ea_kindled

1) The good folks at Hyphen Magazine (which is one of the most beautifully designed glossies you’ll come across)  were kind enough to give me a nice capsule review (which I had converted to text automatically via Free OCR).

2) There’s now finally a Kindle version of my novel.  Not that I can see it since I don’t have a Kindle, but it’s nice to know that for those who do, they can now read it on their fancy-schmancy ebook reader.

J. Robert Lennon’s Pieces for the Left Hand

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Every time I open a new book of fiction, there’s a part of me that hopes for the improbable: to encounter something new, something utterly original.  So as you can imagine, I’m let down a lot.  But sometimes I get lucky.

It’s been two weeks since I finished reading J. Robert Lennon’s Pieces for the Left Hand, but here’s this little gem of a book, still sitting on my desk.  I don’t know when I’ll return this paperback to its designated shelf, but it won’t be anytime soon, for I keep going back to it, reading one of the 100 anecdotes in this collection at random, smiling and chuckling along the way.

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A review I wrote a couple of weeks ago, actually.  But the book’s still right here, on my desk.