A few days ago, I got my first byline at Lambda Literary: a review of Cecilia Gentili’s memoir-in-letters Faltas. I enjoyed this book a lot and I’m glad to see it’s starting to win some awards. Read my review here and then go get a copy from Littlepuss Press.
***
Several People Are Typing - Calvin Kasulke (Doubleday Books, 2021)
I’d heard a lot about this one, but wasn’t quite expecting what I got. Several People… is a really fun read, one that sucked me in enough that I read it in one afternoon. It’s about love, life, a person who poisoned a bunch of dog food, what it’s like to be sucked into a computer, and it’s all told in Slack messages. Even though it sounds like Gaddis’s novel JR or some of Barthelme’s short fiction, it never feels experimental or like Kasulke is trying to pop a wheelie. Instead it’s a book that’s pretty human, even when an AI might have gained sentience, and it’s very, very funny. I don’t think I’ve read a poop joke I’ve enjoyed as much as the one in here.. Recommended.
***
I’m a fan of Nora Fulton’s writing. I have a collection of her poems (Presence Detection System) and I try to read anything with her byline. She’s smart when it comes to poetics and philosophy (especially Heidigger; I think I’ve asked her to explain dasein a few times now), but she’s also well-versed in music. She’s written liner notes for Blank Forms records, and over at O Bod Magazine, she’s done an interesting and wide-ranging interview with the Swedish composer Catherine Christer Hennix.
***
The Merry Misogynist - Colin Cotterill (Soho Crime, 2010)
This installment - the sixth in a long running series- isn’t the strongest. Between a thin story about a sex killer, a hunt for a missing street person, and a subplot about who is living in Dr Siri’s house, this one has all the hallmarks of a blown opportunity.
It feels like three stories mixed together, none of which compliment the others. They don’t add anything when taken as a whole, and instead it feels a little padded out. You don’t get the wider strokes that Cotterill used in say, The 33 Teeth; you don’t get the same sense of mysticism as the dance scene near the Disco for the Departed.
And indeed that’s maybe my lasting impression from this book - it doesn’t feel as inspired and it doesn’t quite use the same ideas as the other Dr Siri books I’ve read - for the main mystery he might as well have been a private eye, not a coroner/shaman/grumpy yet lovable old communist.
It’s enjoyable in parts, although it does fall back on a creaky old trans stereotype in the back end. But it’s not the strongest of this series either.
***
I’ve known June Martin for a little while and I’m constantly surprised by how good her fiction is; every time I read a new piece of hers, it’s better than the one before. Her new piece of flash fiction An Afternoon Wedding just ran at Jake Magazine, and it’s great. Tense and erotic, disturbing and funny, Martin doesn’t waste a word in depicting a ceremony that’s… well, just read it.
***
I’m no longer on Twitter, which is good for both my mental health and for my writing/reading habits. But it’s harder to keep in touch with people - the best way to get a hold of me is to reply to these emails or to use the comment function if you have the Substack app. I have more freelance pieces running in the near future, and I’m planning on linking to them here, but I’m also planning on recapping the month’s links in a roundup like this. Let me know what you think.