Stephen continues to read from The Adderall Diaries. Part One. Part Two.

Small press power house Matt Bell just put up the newest issue of The Collagist, an online lit quarterly. As always, Matt’s discriminating tastes yields some choice words. Personal fave: Amazing Peter by Chad Benson. Chad’s got a funny, commanding voice and shows his characters clearly and simply. Also, it contains this line: It won’t be the fanciest party, but we’re not exactly talking Fishstick Tuesday, here, either.

So, kind of a winner in my book.

Stephen tells a story about getting the shit beat out of him and reads more from The Adderall Diaries.

Tuesday’s thread got me thinking about exposition. Is it ever necessary? What would happen if you cut out all the exposition  and backstory from your stories? Would your stories become more streamlined or would the audience not know wtf is going on?

Follow-up: how much do you trust the audience? How much, if at all, do you take into account their intelligence when writing?

Sheba posed this question to me the other day:

What “classic” of literature have you started, but not finished? This question was spurred by a mutual friend who’d failed to get through the first few hundred pages of Ulysses for the  fourth time.

What about you? What classic author or title are you embarrassed to tell the world that you’ve started but never finished? Or worse, never even attempted to read?

Things have been a little quite on the old blog this week, so to make up for it here’s the first installment of Stephen Elliott’s reading at Stardust in Winter Park, FL. Put your headphones on, hide the window and pretend like your working while you get  healthy dose of The Adderall Diaries.

In case you haven’t been paying attention to my media barrage, I talked Stephen Elliott into coming to Orlando.

It’s required by city law that if you spend more than 24 hours in Orlando you are required to go wakeboarding.

Stephen reluctantly obliged.

He was a good sport and pretended to have a good time.

He even showed off a little bit for us.

You’re a good sport, Stephen.

I didn’t take any pics from the Stardust reading cause I was too busy stressing out and keeping the drunks at bay.We did, however, shoot some footage from the Stardust event and will be cutting it together in a little bit. Keep your peepers pealed for that.

This was from the next night. Stephen read for a fiction writing class at Urban Think.

It was way quieter and much fewer drunks.

Thanks Stephen!

Taking a cue from PANK, Annalemma is announcing our nominees for Dzanc’s Best of the Web anthology. Get your tuxes pressed and dust off your sequined gowns:

– If I Could Lend Him My Words by Sam Nam

– The Big Dipper by Meg Pokrass

– Seducing Matt Mitchum by Tim Jones-Yelvington

This was seriously a tough decision to make. In the couple of months that we’ve been publishing stories online we’ve had the opportunity to post some good’uns, but these three slightly stand out as some of the best. Thanks to Sam, Meg and Tim for letting us run your work.

Sarah Manguso’s memoir concerning a blood disease that made her body turn against itself yields not one but two beautiful book covers. Above is the paperback (which I kind of like better, a bit more striking) and below is the more sedate, but equally beautiful, hardcover:

Not sure what those things are. Some sort of medical supplies (IV tubes? Catheters?) shaped to look like a kind of musical signature symbol or type embellishment. I’m guessing a nod to Manguso’s poetic roots and lyrical language. Designs by Alexander Knowlton and Jennifer Carrow, respectively.

Thanks The Rumpus and BDR.

Okay, so it’s pretty much a given that Satan is keeping a Choke Pear nice and glowing-hot for when Glenn Beck gets to Hell, but not for the reasons you’re thinking. Sure, whipping Fox News audiences into a fever storm of right wing fury that further polarizes our already fragile union (and making a shit ton of cash doing it) and refusing to take responsibility for his actions when it comes back to bite him in the ass, claiming it’s all entertainment and all in good fun, may seem like a damnable offense of the first degree. But what’s really earning him a red-hot goosing is his shitty book cover design.

What the fuck? You couldn’t get a real apple pie? Don’t you have art directors and production designers that cater to your every shitty whim? Couldn’t they at least make an apple pie out of resin and fiberglass or something? You of all people should know about things that may look nice on the outside but are actually filled with toxic chemicals. Instead of spending a few hundred dollars on production design you decided to stand there with your hands empty, mugging at the camera like an idiot. Then again, this is something you’re used to.