Video Games are Real

Category: Publication Announcements

  • Guess who paid to be one of 65 authors included in No Colony’s Pushcorpse project.

    Guess who paid to be one of 65 authors included in No Colony’s Pushcorpse project.

    A single story? 65 authors? Yes. Who? These:

    Shya Scanlon, Christian Ochoa, Brian Spears, David Erlewine, Christopher Higgs, Alan Horn, Jason Cook, Matt Kirkpatrick, Amy Letter, Gene Morgan, Vaughan Simons, David Peak, Brian Carr, Claire Kohne, Caleb J. Ross, Michael Jauchen, Alec Niedenthal, Christopher Heavener, Jac Jemc, Peter Rawlings, Joseph Goosey, Darby Larson, Nathan Tyree, Michael Inscoe, Roxane Gay, Jonny Kelly, Alan S. Carl, Aaron Gilbreath, Travis Kurowski, Caitlyn Dibble, Jackie Corley, J.A. Tyler, Andrew Borgstrom, Christopher Newgent, Phoebe North, Laurence Wilhelm Lillvik, Jonathan Keeperman, Christian Smith, Meredith Turits, Audri Sousa, Barry Graham, Matt Jasper, Danny Barron, Matthew Savoca, Josh Kleinberg, Robert Alan Wendeborn, David Naimon, Benjamin Spivey, Hassen Taiari, Christopher Stokes, Josh Maday, Bradley Billey, Christopher Deal, Elizabeth Ellen, Alexander Fletcher, Nik Korpon, Richard Thomas, Christopher J. Dwyer, Kellie Walsh, Kasey Carpenter, D. Hammer, Timmy Waldron, Angi Becker Stevens, Erin Flaherty, Ryan Call

    Want to own? Buy here.

  • Coming in the future: As a Machine and Parts, a novella that will blow your robot brain

    Coming in the future: As a Machine and Parts, a novella that will blow your robot brain

    In the next few years I’m going to be pushing more paper on you than the schoolyard drug dealer’s less popular friend, the Zig Zag dealer. My novella, As a Machine and Parts, will be published by Aqueous Books sometime in the future. Yes, I could qualify any of my unpublished books with such a loose time frame. But I mean it. The contract has been signed. The Zig Zags have been distributed.

    The party probably won’t happen until 2012 or later, however. That should give you plenty of time to read my other two forthcoming books, vomit a few times, and forget them long enough to make that mistake a third time.

  • Coming early 2011: Stranger Will (the book, not the creepy old man)

    Coming early 2011: Stranger Will (the book, not the creepy old man)

    Just when you thought you had over a year before getting offended by a book from me (I Didn’t Mean to Be Kevin, November 2011), I go and do something crazy like sign with another publisher to release a novel in March 2011. Stranger Will, a noir story of apathy and abortion, is coming early next year from Otherworld Publications.

    Otherworld Publications is a young publisher, but one with an impressive drive to promote its authors. This fact is not the sole reason I signed with them, though. This press seems to have acknowledged something that I, and the below authors, have known for a long time: The Velvet and The Cult are cesspools of untapped talent. Of the 11 current Otherworld authors (some noted on the Otherworld site, others not yet public knowledge), 5 have grown up at The Velvet and/or The Cult forums. I think we have Mr. Richard Thomas (Otherworld’s first author) to thank, as I am certain his word helped shimmy all of us followers in the door.

    Be on the lookout for these other forthcoming titles:

    December 2010 | Stay God by Nik Korpon. I had the privilege of reading an early draft of this novel. It’s good. Damn good. Preorder it in October.

    2011 | Out of Touch by Brandon Tietz. Otherworld is republishing Tietz’s originally self-published novel of decadence and excess turned sour

    2011 | We Are Oblivion by Michael Sonbert. I have his debut, The Neverenders, high on my to-read shelf. It is above Paul Auster and a book about beer. Consider my expectations high.

  • Coming late 2011: I Didn’t Mean to Be Kevin (the book, not the apology)

    Coming late 2011: I Didn’t Mean to Be Kevin (the book, not the apology)

    It’s official. Negotiations have been negotiated. Signatures have been signed. Bells have been sleighed. I Didn’t Mean to Be Kevin will be published in late 2011 by Black Coffee Press. I’ll keep this announcement short and tidy; there is plenty of time for me to drone on about how proud I am of this book. For now, just make sure your nutting pants are clean.

    Perhaps not coincidentally, I do drink my coffee black.

    Black Coffee Press has a quite a list of books lined up for 2011-12. Some I am especially looking forward to are:

    A Shiny, Unused Heart by J.A. Tyler (2011)

    This guy is everywhere. J.A. Tyler is one of those names that materializes on every lit site, from the smallish to the giantish. Sometimes I theorize these appearances are simply to make me feel inadequate. Well done, sir.

    Code for Failure by Ryan W. Bradley (2012)

    Again, a writer whose name appears everywhere. I am not as familiar with Mr. Bradley’s work as I am with the other two fellows on my list, but based on what I do know, Code for Failure is not code for failure (ha, see what I did there).

    When You Are Sleeping I Will Evolve Into A Bird by Nathan Tyree (2012)

    Nathan Tyree and I put together a grand collection of stores called Oprah Read This >> Oprah, Read This, featuring too many fabulous writers to list here. Go to the site, read the stories, and anticipate Tyree’s Black Coffee Press book.

  • My Tom Waits inspired non-fiction piece is now live in the first issue of Cannoli Pie Magazine

    My Tom Waits inspired non-fiction piece is now live in the first issue of Cannoli Pie Magazine

    Back in February during the AWP Conference in Denver, CO, I read a non-fiction piece called “The Author Who Gets Free Drinks: a (Hopefully) True Story.” Fine man extraordinaire Stephen Krauska was in the audience. After the reading, I spoke with him for a bit, and got the (eventually proven true) impression that he’s an all around damn nice guy. So nice in fact that for the first issue of his (and co-editor Claire Suellentrop‘s) Cannoli Pie Magazine he asked to print the AWP piece.

    That issue is now live at the Cannoli Pie homepage. Download the .pdf, give the story a read, and be sure to listen to the AWP reading, available as part of The Velvet Podcast.

    Oh, and for those curious, yes, it worked. My next piece will be called “The Author Who Gets Lap Dances and Pizza For Free Every Morning.”

  • Our Guy is your guy at the Orange Alert Podcast

    Our Guy is your guy at the Orange Alert Podcast

    Professional Orange Alert kind gent, Jason Behrends, invited me to contribute to his weekly arts and literature podcast. I’ve been dabbling in podcasting lately (contributing to The Velvet Podcast and getting things in line for next week’s AWP Conference, where I’ll have an audio feed to document the event), so to have this additional swath of experience is nice.

    For this week’s episode, I read my story “Our Guy” which originally appeared at Word Riot.

    I’m really happy to be a part of this thing. Thanks to Mr. Behrends for having me. And be sure to check out past episodes for some great songs and readings. Scott McClanahan reading “The Rainelle Story” and Hosho McCreesh reading “Another Kind of Life” on episode 2 for starters.

    Click over to the Orange Alert Podcast post to listen.

  • Dialogue with Pablo D’Stair for Predicate #1

    Dialogue with Pablo D’Stair for Predicate #1

    Someone needs to murder Pablo D’Stair. He’s making all of us, who for so long have relied on passion as a vehicle for discussing literature, look like asses. I’ve never met a person more in love with books (possibly more in love with the idea of- and the ideas within- books than the books themselves). This guy makes me imagine a beautiful world of quiet dive bars and smokey conversation.

    He recently asked me to be a part of the re-emergence of his literary journal, Predicate. What he’s done here is amazing. He invited seven authors to wax ever-so eloquently about literature. Sounds boring, I know. But these are not simple Q&A sessions. These are in-depth examinations of the meaning of literature. Okay, still sounds boring. But trust me, it’s not.

    Despite what my description above may imply about my ability to be entertaining, I’m quite proud of my contribution. Pablo has a way of evoking all the thoughts I’ve had for so long about literature, providing the prodding I’ve been missing.

    Best of all, copies of Predicate #1, (all 300+ pages!) are available at-cost via Amazon.com ($6.50 US) (link forthcoming), or for free .PDF format at the dedicated Predicate website.

    On a side note, I’ll be drinking with Pablo sometime during the AWP Conference in Denver. Ohhhh, what should I wear!!!
    In other Brown Paper Publishing news, Chris Deal’s flash story collection Cienfuegos has just been released. I am lucky to have known Chris for a few years. Everything this guy writes, I eagerly read. So, when he asked me to take a look at an early version of this collection, I jumped at the chance. I had this to say:

    ‘These stories render emotion in shades of stark gray. Like sculptures, Deal subtracts from his Cienfuegos superfluous elements, leaving a base from which the reader is allowed to interpret, perhaps participate in, his characters’ disjointed lives. Each word hints at two others; each line implies a life; each brief fiction describes a world.’

    Author Stephen Graham Jones has this to say:

    ‘Prose haikus, fiction bullets, one-sentences novels, two fingers of story neat, no chaser . . . I don’t know what to call these, really. But I want more.’

    Like all titles from Brown Paper Publishing, Cienfuegos is available as a free .pdf download, or at-cost for a print copy. I suggest you download and read now.