The Elephant's Bookshelf

Boldtype has a wonderful interview with Pulitzer Prize-winning author Michael Chabon. Boldtype's newsletters are gathered in themes, and the one from late February (Hey, I can't read everything right away) is about collections. In the interview, Chabon talks about his baseball card and comic book collections, but overall it's an examination about his soon-to-be-released collection of nonfiction work, being published by McSweeney's. Beyond that, it seems like a collection of influences.

As I've stated before, I'm a big fan of Chabon; I count The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay among my favorite books written in the past fifteen years. I can relate to the idea of collection -- believe me, my wife can attest to large collections of books, baseball cards, and beer bottles that "litter" our house -- so this interview worked for me on many levels.

What did you think of it?

I've just finished the last of the Charlie Parker novels in my possession -- The Black Angel. While I enjoy a good thrilling movie as much as the next guy, I've never been much for reading thrillers. But I've enjoyed reading John Connolly -- though my favorite of his works is The Book of Lost Things, which is decidedly not a crime thriller. (TBOLT is a very clever twist on fairy tales and growing out of childhood.)

Connolly has definite talent for description, and the frequent themes of redemption and salvation are ones that I enjoy reading about, especially when done well. He's a writer I'd love to interview, which he might appreciate as an Irish journalist who interviews other authors. Check out his interview with Stephen King, who seems more candid or "willing" to speak about personal subjects than I think I've ever found in the oft-interviewed author.

One thing I'd love to talk to Connolly about is his intense depictions of brutality. I'm both appalled and intrigued by his willingness to express such vivid scenes of dismemberment and evisceration, for example. These are things that most mainstream writers -- and I consider Connolly in that category -- would not deign to show. Even in his later work, the scenes of murder and the details of fingers ripping through skin and organs continue and are not for the weak of heart. But if you can stomach scenes of sometimes cringingly disgusting murder, Connolly's Charlie Parker books are fast reads and cleverly crafted works.

I recommend one starts with Every Dead Thing, which feels like two books in one. It sets the background for why Parker is the way he is, and the horrifying death of his wife and daughter aptly prepare you for the steady stream of bloody murders that continue throughout the Parker books. While Charlie Parker makes a cameo appearance in Bad Men, it's not in the same family of works. Call it a neighbor, as it takes place in Maine -- as do most of the Parker books, at least in part. But Bad Men lumbers without quite the payoff. I'd have edited it differently.

Though I have The Nocturnes collection waiting atop one of my bedside stacks, I'm taking a break from Connolly for now. I recently bought The Mysteries of Pittsburgh, Michael Chabon's first novel, and began reading it last night (in the midst of a blackout). Chabon may be my favorite writer currently working. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay and Summerland were wonderful, and friends have told me that The Yiddish Policeman's Union is excellent too. And when I arrived on squad duty this morning, I found Rules for Old Men Waiting waiting for me. I read the first two paragraphs and discovered that Peter Pouncey is a wonderful novelist. It's nice when discovery happens like that, and I love when friends recommend good writers.

My mailbox remains open wide (as do my comment areas) for people who would like to recommend any fine work -- even your own -- and I'd be happy to share my thoughts on them.

[BTW, for those who don't catch the reference in my headline, it's a (somewhat hackneyed) reference to a Black 47 song, James Connolly. I didn't mean to imply that John Connolly has posted anything to my blog, though he would be most welcome.]

This is from a story in today's New York Times. The story is about the revelation that a woman's memoirs of being a gangmember and foster child were completely fabricated.

Nan A. Talese, who published Mr. Frey’s A Million Little Pieces, said the combination of these recent episodes could start to change the business’s practices. "I think what editors are going to have to do is point to the things that happened recently and say to their authors, 'If there is anything in your book that can be discovered to be untrue, you better let us know right now, and we’ll deal with it before we publish it,' " Ms. Talese said. But she added: "I don’t think there is any way you can fact-check every single book. It would be very insulting and divisive in the author-editor relationship."

Back from vacation and after digging through the first strata of emails, I received this today: an announcement that Barnes & Noble has launched a video magazine series called "Barnes & Noble Tagged!"

Though I've peeked at its first couple of minutes, I've not watched enough to say it's well done or not, but my initial impression is the image quality is good, the volume level may be a little low (which means you have to remember to turn your speakers down later or you may blast something later), and the books are decidedly mainstream. I intend to watch it more thoroughly, and I encourage book lovers and writers to give it a shot. We all need more ways to promote reading and to promote writers of all levels.

Personally, I'd like to see less about Jodi Picoult, who has done well to establish an audience, and more about excellent writers who remain relatively or completely unknown. Of course, I have a vested interest in that, since I hope to be one of those "relatively unknown" excellent writers who claws his way to everyone's consciousness and sells boxes full of books.

[And for those of you who asked: No, I didn't finish all the revisions this past week, which I regard as a blessing. It means that I'm putting in the appropriate amount of time to make sure I do it right (these weren't merely correcting a couple typos; it's a matter of weaving things in and tightening up loose strands), and that I actually relaxed a bit during the vacation. I needed that! And thanks for asking.]