Don Riggs redux redux

My first online interview, with writer-teacher Don Riggs, is now available in full in Romanian:

http://contemporaryhorizon.blogspot.com/2010/05/new-contemporary-horizon-magazine.html

It first appeared--why yes, in English!--at USK last March:

http://kudera.blogspot.com/2009/03/don-riggs-on-writers-and-writing.html

From Chapel Hill to East Falls to Bucharest, the legend of Riggs grows.

readings for 2010

OK, I'm posting the books I've read in 2010. Remember that these are the titles I would want any stranger browsing the internet to see that I've read; they may or may not be the titles I've actually finished this year. For that list, send legal currency that is not too difficult to exchange. Thanks.

The Lazarus Project by Aleksandar Hemon
Last Night at the Lobster by Stewart O'Nan
Running Away (Fuir) by Jean-Philippe Toussaint
Ham on Rye by Charles Bukowski
Post Office by Charles Bukowski (first time I've read a novel by Bukowski)
Home Land by Sam Lipsyte (exaggerated claim: best ever loser-guy suburban angst available in paperback)
Inherent Vice by Thomas Pynchon (I finally finish my first new Pynchon novel since Vineland; liked the idea of Doc Sportello but it was hard to turn pages at times)
Women by Charles Bukowski
Factotum by Charles Bukowski (in progress)
Lost Cosmonaut: Observations of an Anti-Tourist by Daniel Kalder (in progress and it's great!)
These Shining Lives by Melanie Marnich (a rather touching play about exploited workers in the 1920s and '30s)

seen cyrus duffleman?

I was so busy in April that I failed to notice that my main character escaped from my novel, Fight for Your Long Day. On April 1, no joke, I told him he should sit and stay and self-promote as shamelessly as the rest of the Atticus staff (http://atticusbooks.net/), but in fact, he has chosen a new direction.

And now I can't find him!

He won't friend me, but please do me a favor and see if he is open to your request. On http://facebook.com/, friend "Cyrus Duffleman," and if possible pass along the message that his author wants him back. Preferably at the same weight and medical history as when he ditched me five weeks ago.

The book is due out in September and still needs a good thrashing (final edits), so thanks in advance for anything you can do. I hope to avoid desperate measures although I am inquiring about the legality of civilian tasers and bear traps.

Sincerely,
Alex Kudera

may one

I celebrated May Day by working for thirty minutes, reading Romanian literature in translation for twenty, and then losing track of time.