$7.15

An overlooked feel-good classic of 2016 is now available at the bargain price of $7.15!

Gabino's Words of Wisdom

Best five gifts for the writer(s) in your life:
1. Leave them alone if they're typing
2. Leave reviewsof their books on Amazon
3. Tell folks to buy their work
4. Never tell them you have a story for them
5. Never ask them why they don't write "something more commercial"

— Gabino Iglesias (@Gabino_Iglesias) December 21, 2018

Rosenfeld's Orgone Box

"[William] Reich's pseudoscience, eventual mounting megalomania and insanity, and the quackery associated with the orgone boxes he promoted and that [Isaac] Rosenfeld and others embraced, have made Reich's teachings seem patently ridiculous. This box came to be the prime prop in stories of Rosenfeld's decline. [Alfred] Kazin wrote of him looking lonely in there, "as if he were waiting in his telephone booth for a call that was not coming through."

~~ from Rosenfeld's Lives: Fame, Oblivion, and the Furies of Writing by Steven J. Zipperstein

four or five stars

It's nice to see that the last three ratings for Fight for Your Long Day were extremely strong and all from people I've never met.

last three ratings are for five (2) and four (1) stars and from August, November, and December 2018: https://t.co/aDHopChDeH #feel #good #Christmas #holiday #novel #American #Literature

— Alex Kudera (@kudera) December 23, 2018

$1.45 less than Auggie. . .

Yesterday I received my print issue of Harper's in the mail. Michel Houellebecq's clickbait-esque "Donald Trump Is A Good President" is in there along with a short story from Lydia Davis, Luc Sante on Oulipo, and Ben Lerner introducing poetry by Fred Moten. In fact, after a twenty year run or so, I may be letting my subscription lapse, but that's more related to personal finances and organization. My second adjunct novel remains a steal at only $8.44 at Amazon right now, a mere $1.45 more than the retail price of a print issue of Harper's. There are far fewer ads in the novel.

Auggie is only $8.44

Auggie's Revenge is only $8.44 on Amazon right now. It's a great gift for any cynical, morbid souls in your life who'd enjoy an absurdly dark academic comedy focused on adjunct alienation and athletic corruption.

from The Forward for Rosenfeld's 50th Yahrzeit

In the last lines he ever wrote, Rosenfeld speaks of “finding the everlasting in the ephemeral things: not in iron, stone, brick, concrete, steel, and chrome, but in paper, ink, pigment, sound, voice, gesture, and graceful leaping, for it is of such things that the ultimate realities, of the mind and the heart, are made.”

Neither a Bellow nor baller be. . .

2018 is the year that parity came to the NBA with great games every night, but Isaac Rosenfeld will still be dead of a heart attack at age 38 no matter who wins the championship. One published novel, cramped living quarters, alone and forgotten, but not forgotten, because he's mentioned in almost every book about Bellow, Kazin, Schwartz, Rahv, etc. Commentary and The Forward write about him in the 21st century. He was too short for the NBA. Poor vision. Not a Bellow, not a baller. . . but he has a biography and various mentions in others.

Zipperstein's Rosenfeld

According to Steven J. Zipperstein's Rosenfeld's Lives, Isaac was a meticulous planner of walking excursions to the public library where he'd spend a good portion of his leisure time hidden in the cool rooms of the men's conveniences.

Convenience Store Woman

"The manager often says 'someone we can use,' and I wonder whether I'm someone we can use or not. Maybe I'm working because I want to be a useful tool."

World Literature Today

World Literature Today recognizes seventy-five notable translations for 2018.

then suddenly

"How did you go bankrupt?"

 "Two ways. Gradually, then suddenly."

~~ from The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway

Karl dug Post Office

“All the books I liked were basically about the same topic. White N-----s by Ingvar Ambjørnsen, Beatles and Lead by Lars Saabye Christensen, Jack by Alf Lundell, On the Road by Jack Kerouac, Last Exit to Brooklyn by Hubert Selby, Jr., Novel with Cocaine by M. Agayev, Colossus by Finn Alnæs, Lasso Round the Moon by Agnar Mykle, The History of Bestiality trilogy by Jens Bjørneboe, Gentlemen by Klas Ostergren, Icarus by Axel Jensen, The Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger, Humlehjertene by Ola Bauer and Post Office by Charles Bukowski.

Books about young men who struggled to fit into society, who wanted more from life than routines, more from life than a family, in short, young men who hated middle-class values and sought freedom. They travelled, they got drunk, they read and they dreamed about their life's Great Passion or writing the Great Novel.

Everything they wanted I wanted too.”

~~ Karl Ove Knausgard 

If you appreciate some of the books mentioned above, you'd likely enjoy Auggie's Revenge.

Post Office

“I had come a long way from a guy who had worked in slaughterhouses, who had crossed the country with a railroad track gang, who had worked in a dog biscuit factory, who had slept on park benches, who had worked the nickel and dime jobs in a dozen cities across the nation.”

~~ from Post Office by Charles Bukowski

interlibrary loan

Although purchasing copies for each of your fans, friends, and family members is a prudent move this holiday season, Fight for Your Long Day is available in at least ninety-five libraries around the world, so I'd encourage you to use interlibrary loan to access a copy today. Don't delay!

*You have to be logged into a university system to see at least ninety-five libraries; you'll likely see about seventy libraries with the book otherwise.

new bookstore on East Passyunk in Philly!

We are open for our second weekend! Give the gift of a book this year to your loved ones. We’re here until 7. pic.twitter.com/poxl3I9xet

— A Novel Idea on Passyunk (@anovelideaphl) December 8, 2018

Let them think you were born that way

"It's none of their business that you have to learn to write. Let them think you were born that way."

~~ Ernest Hemingway, as quoted in A Perfect Failure: Fante Bukowski III

Life is looking less bleak. . .

"Life is looking less bleak these days for Ms. Hanway, now 28. In September, she finally got her dream job, as a science writer at her alma mater. She’s now earning a salary of $52,000 plus full benefits. The day before her job started, she finally moved out of her parents’ basement into a one-bedroom apartment."

You know who kills tuna. . .

Now that it's certain that millennials are killing canned tuna, every option is on the table. Will there be threatening text messages? Extra credit? Increased allowance? Grounded with no TV for a week? A fancy new tuna doughnut? A duel? Detention?

Andrei Bitov

Andrei Bitov left on December 3, 2018.