Source of Lit - The Postman!

Okay, the postman and a friend, and even a little bit of purchasing.

The following titles have arrived via the mail this week:

Doctor Olaf van Schuler's Brain by Kirsten Menger-Anderson from Algonquin.  One thing I like off the bat?  It's like many Algonquin titles, smaller in size (I'm guessing 4 x 6" because I'm lazy), similar to the old Lewis Nordan books and Ellen Gilchrist titles and I'm sure many others as well.  And this description gives the book a fair chance of getting me to open it up:  "In 1964, Doctor Olaf van Schuler fled the Old World and arrived in New Amsterdam with his lunatic mother, two bags of medical implements, and a carefully guarded book of his own medicines."

Shaye Areheart Books sent a copy of Allison Winn Scotch's second title, time of my life, which has some nice comments from Amanda Eyre Ward and Laura Dave on the back cover.  While I don't always find the books from SAB to be up my alley, I can say they certainly know how to find authors that can tell a story.

Greg Bottoms' Fight Scenes, another uniquely packaged book - hardcover with no jacket, also 4 x 6" and with illustrations, arrived from Counterpoint.  I know I've seen Bottoms' Angelhead in the past and read good things about him.

Jon Fasman has a follow-up to what I seem to recall being a highly reviewed The Geographer's Library, with a new novel, The Unpossessed City which arrived via The Penguin Press.  This new one hits stores on November 3.

Two separate packages arrived this week from one of my favorite publishers - Southern Methodist University Press.  I've come to learn over the past four or five years - If Kathy Lang likes it, I probably will too (she's the editor there).  This time around a returning novelist for the press, Edra Ziesk, with her third novel, The Trespasser, and a short story collection from David McGlynn, The End of the Straight and Narrow, that has blurbs from EWN favorites Alyson Hagy and Lee Martin on it - two that have not led me astray yet, both as authors, and blurbers.

In the purchasing department comes Leni Zumas' story collection, Farewell Navigator, from Open City.  I've read a few of her stories in journals and really enjoyed them.  Thankfully there are stores out there like Shaman Drum in Ann Arbor that had four copies of this on their shelf.

In the thanks to the friend department, The Essential Pinter, from which that "like" excerpt appeared here at the EWN earlier today comes from.  A gift from my partner in Dzanc crime, Steven Gillis, a lifelong fan of the man's work who was sick and tired of being embarrassed by my own lack of knowledge of his writings.

Comments

[Steven Gillis]

daniel you are the best read man I know. I just happen to be a Pinter slappy of late - love his writing, his politics, his HUGE stones - and glad I could share a writer with you that you had yet to discover on your own. Had to resort to plays to find one but....

[kyle]

That David McGlynn book is very, very good. You're going to like it.

[aaron]

I'll look forward to reading and hearing about Fight Scenes! I really enjoyed Bottoms' Angelhead as well as his story collection, Sentimental Heartbroken Rednecks, a book you could probably tell I would love, from the title alone.

[david]

The Leni Zumas book is exceptional, and I happen to be typing up the Book Notes entry for Kirsten Menger-Anderson's collection right now...