I can't get enough of old psych-rock and heavy blues shit lately. As a bonus, it's always fun to fuck with Opeth fans by telling them I like Blackwater Park only to later reveal that I meant the German band and not that stupid album with the quiet parts that don't make sense next to the loud parts.

Writing-wise, I've made some progress on both the leg-work for the book and the writing-work for the chapbook. The first story for the chapbook--I mentioned it last week in a sideways way as "he's just wrecking cars with his buddies as of now"--is done. It's called "Jalapeno Summer" and it's a bit shy of a thousand words. It'll be a great story to kick off a collection with and it's a nice lead in to the next story, which starts off with the line, "My least favorite stripper was obsessed with past life regression." Thanks to my friend Joan LaRosa for texting me a picture of her holding two dozen VIP passes for Club Silk in Milwaukee and getting me hooked on strippers again.  Also, I get a stupid number of ideas and interesting things to add to a story just by listening to WTF with Marc Maron.

When I said that I've made some progress on the leg-work for the book, I actually meant Mike Sweeney has made progress on the leg-work for the book. We had a pool of about 70 stories to chose from and less than half of them were going to be in the book. I told Mike the ones I liked, the ones I liked but needed work, and the ones I thought kind of sucked. He read all 70 of the stories--most of them for the second or third time, this time with a collection in mind--and sent me back a tentative table of contents and title that looks something like this:

This Is How Long a Second Lasts: 30 Stories

Back and to the Left
Sergei Avdeyev
Look At How Fast I Can Go Nowhere At All
The King
Plots
Wide Right Game
When There Is No Road
It's Been Far Too Long Since You Woke Up In Someone Else's Shoes
Monsters: A Series of Non-Chronological Vignettes
Rust
The Vikings
Signal
--:--
The Sounds of the Earth Precede Us
God as a Jigsaw
Haunt
Follow the Water
Focus
Facts
Sweet Tooth
What Burns Never Returns
Let’s Go Shoot Her While She’s Crying
Jests At Scars
This Illusion
Where Is Your H?
Mythology
B Sharp, C Flat
Flood
Refund
Things That Are Glacial, Things That Are Gone

About a third of these are new stories that haven't appeared in the original Our Band Could Be Your Lit project, and most of those have never appeared anywhere before. This is definitely tentative, but I like the moves. Opening with "Back and to the Left" threw me a bit, but I can see it working, this sort of odd step into not an alternate universe, but an absurd one. The faux-time travel in "Sergei Avdeyev" solidifies that. It twists into the odd apocalyptic stories in the middle and then launches back into my standard storytelling before ending with "Glacial," my big abstract story that was half in response to the way I think kids write these days that ended up sounding pretty much exactly like how I write anyways. I wouldn't have thought of any of this myself, but I can see it now. Mike gets definite props for giving my work some vision, which it more than I can say for myself.

I'm not sold on the title, but that too is tentative. Mike's against the idea of making up a title specifically for the collection--my suggestion of I Scratched Your Name Behind the Jukebox was shot down for sounding too much like a title someone made up for a book, which I can't deny--and he really wants the title to come from the collection, either in the form of a story title or a line. We're leaning toward It's Been Far Too Long Since You Woke Up In Someone Else's Shoes which he's not sure of because of the length (and I'm not sure of because even though it's a literal thing with the shoes and the waking in the story, it sounds a little "my mom has this on a magnet on the fridge" as a stand-alone). Jests At Scars was brought up, but it's a line from Shakespeare and I totally can't pull that off. When There Is No Road was a possibility, too, but I've got a story/collection in the works called The Road Become What You Leave. (Stolen from the name of a documentary on Magnolia Electric Co. Which reminds me, I need to e-mail and get permission to do that.) I'm kind of at a loss for ideas.

Whatever. I'm working on it.

I'm glad I got to start reading some more, too, now that shipping out CDs has slowed down. Sara Levine's Short Dark Oracles just rocked my goddamn world. I ordered the six-pack from Caketrain for $32 (shipped!) and this is the winner. I did not like the MFA Mad Lib style of Take Care Fake Bear Torque Cake by Heidi Lynn Staples or Cure All  by Kim Parko. I think Ben Mirov's Ghost Machine is interesting enough and it's fun to try to interpret it, but in the end I thought it was several hundred beautiful sentences that didn't do anything. The Weather Stations by Ryan Call was solid and inventive, which is what I'll also say about Tongue Party by Sarah Rose Etter, except Etter's book is fucking creepy.

But Short Dark Oracles. Man. There's a lot of dialogue, which really adds a cinematic quality, but there are still enough moments that can only happen in a short story that make me truly believe that the book is operating on it's most pure level, that it aspires to be nothing but literature. There aren't any gimmicks or tricks here. The turns aren't twists, and when it gets to the point where the story rounds the corner, it actually rounds it. No need to twirl. It's enough to get there, and Levine took me there.

In short, I'm glad I found another talented writer to resent for all of their skill and success.

UNLESS YOU DONATE TO THE KICKSTARTER FOR MY BOOK AND THE OTHER BOOKS IN THE JERSEY DEVIL PRESS 2012 COLLECTION. THEN YOU'RE COOL AS FUCK, DUDE.

Okay. Be a real person.

RW

I think Bible of the Devil guitarist Nate Perry is the last of the real deal rock and roll heroes. Too dumb to live, too cool to die.

On the writing front, I've started working on a chapbook story collection/cycle using the narrator from my short story "Murmuration." That story appeared in the April issue of Jersey Devil Press. I got the idea for the story after someone posted a video on Facebook of a murmuration of starlings fucking around in synchronicity above a lake. They put ambient music in the background and probably turned it in as part of their art school thesis, but whatever, it was still pretty rad.

I finished the story in a couple quick drafts and was just sort of throwing ideas around, writing quickly and in a style I'd describe as "a shitty Amy Hempel story from Reasons to Live" meets "a really good story as told in the comments section of the AV Club website." There's a dead dog, a burn victim named Nurse Diamond (not a real nurse), pudding cups, and a bunch of sideways references to Whitesnake and KISS. I had just finished working on a story with a heavier, more labored-over tone called, at this junction, "Shoot Out the Bright Lights." After starting it a year or two prior I, with the help of the Chet Baker documentary Let's Get Lost, was finally able to really do justice to the parallel redemptions of an old jazz dude and a young widower. Needless to say, I was ready to do something a little more off-the-cuff and a little less heady after that 5500-word behemoth.

At this time I was also working on a story called "Who Wants To Live Forever" about a woman with OCD (based on what Maria Bamford multiple descriptions of her "unwanted thoughts syndrome") who keeps running into a guy who may or may not be in a Queen tribute band, as well as a story called "Devotion and Doubt" about a drunk dude. I tried to figure out something else to say about it, but that's pretty much it. He tries to fuck a pair of twins but just eats a bunch of breakfast.

Anyways, "Murmuration" turned out to be one of my favorites, and I had such a good time writing it that I'm going to track the narrator from the summer right after high school until the events in "Murmuration" ten years later. I'm shooting for 7500 words total on the chapbook. Doing a story for each year is out--"Murmuration" takes up a third of that space already, so I'm looking at about four pieces of flash fiction in addition.

As of right now, he's just wrecking cars with his buddies.

I've got some work to do. I'm looking at a friend's manuscript for her, too, and resisting the urge to do a complete line-edit on it. I'm addicted to working at the sentence level on everything, which is good for everything except issues concerning time.

The book through Jersey Devil Press is at the stage where I'm just waiting for the editor to shoot me a tentative table of contents. Once that rolls in, everything else rolls in behind it: editing, title, layout, artwork, etc. Mike Sweeney, the editor in question, and I have a lot of the same beliefs when it comes to short story collections, and so far the only problems that have arisen have come from me being overbearing and anxious. No, I can't keep adding stories. No, I can't just make up a random title because I think it sounds cool.

I'm finding out that a first book is like a first girlfriend: I don't know where to put my hands. I trust Mike and JDP head-honcho Eirik, but my natural response was to do everything. I'm used to the DIY rock and roll band mindset: write your song, play your song, record your song, design your album, press your album, promote your album, sell your album. Book the shows. Load the gear. Talk to promoters. I guess I'm just not used to having other people who will do some of those things. I'm not a control freak, but, well, I just don't know where to put my goddamn hands.

Okay. Enough of this. I need more time to read. I've been too busy packaging up CDs to get any reading done lately, and I've got The Ask by Sam Lipsyte calling my name. And there was one other thing.

DONATE TO THE KICKSTARTER FOR THE JDP FALL BOOK RELEASES, INCLUDING MY BOOK.

I'm not above a shameless plug.

(This blog post was brought to you by Taco Bell.)

(Let's sell out, kids.)

RW

I've had the Kickstarter discussion with lots of people. It's something I'm torn on. I think it's good for artists to support one another morally and financially, but I also think that it's not exactly the most noble of causes to ask people for $5000 to release your debut LP on 200 gram bleach-splatter vinyl in a double-gatefold foil wrapper. Then you're just being an asshole.
 

That said, I think it's possible to do Kickstarter right. I've donated to my friend Tim Connery's sci-fi full length feature film Easton's Article and to  Wifebeaters and Cut-Offs: Southern Summer Comfort Book Tour (featuring Chloe Caldwell, Elizabeth Ellen, Mary Miller, Brandi Wells, and Donora Hillard). (Still active! Donate now!). No big amount. A few bucks. Nothing you can buy a decent meal with or anything. Still, I saw merit in these projects and wanted to see them come to fruition.

So yeah. Jersey Devil Press, the dudes putting out my book in the fall, have started a Kickstarter for both my as-of-now-untitled short story collection and the other book they plan on releasing this year, Eirik Gumeny's Exponential Apocalypse: Dead Presidents. The best way to utilize Kickstarter is to have it basically be somewhere between a way to organize pre-orders and those candy sales outside of department stores where you buy a $0.75 candybar for $1 because it goes to a good cause. Or at least I like to think so.

Really, though, I think the rewards are pretty rad. Nobody's offering to come over and cook you dinner for a $500 donation. You get actual stuff, and because I'm assuming you're all as shallow as I am, that's a good thing.

I know some of you disagree with Kickstarter still, regardless of how it's done. And that's fine. Don't donate. Feel free to be upset about it if you'd like. (There are more important things out there to be upset about, but the choice is, like, yours or whatever, dude.)

Or you can toss a few bucks our way. If you want to know if I'm worth it, check my (Is Published) page and decide for yourself.

I ain't too proud to beg. Do it.

RW

I've been meaning to sit down and work out some new stories for the book, but I'm having a hard time making a selection. That's why I had other people pick the songs in the first damn place. It's too easy for me fall into navel-gazing fuckheadery if I pick the song, because I'm only going to pick a song I like, and if I like it that means there's something that draws me to it. Pretty soon I've got a story where two sad people in the Midwest sit in a diner and look at each other and there's a bad metaphor in there somewhere because the food is cold/the check falls from the table/it's snowing.

I'm also sneaking in revisions and new ideas between listing my entire CD collection on Amazon. That's 1400+ discs, and I'm getting rid of almost everything. (Neko Case, Thin Lizzy, and Black Sabbath get to stay, along with bands I've played with, local bands, and small indie bands that nobody really gives a fuck about but I've seen them in my hometown.) I'm averaging about $4.50 a disc after Amazon's special fistfuck fees and shipping, which is more than I'd make if I sold it all as a lot to one greasy dude, minus the sanity and time I'm losing from having to bubble/paper wrap every single CD because I'm too cheap to buy bubble-mailers. Selling Bob Mould's Black Sheets of Rain last night kind of took a bit out of me. There are some things I won't miss, though.

This money will go toward a car, which relates to writing because I hope to do some touring once the book comes out. My 2000 Saturn with 173,000 miles just isn't going to cut it anymore. I've lost some exterior parts that have definitely made it a bit more aerodynamic, but I've also lost some internal parts that don't let the car shift into fourth gear. A couple weeks ago an old friend asked me if I still have the same car and the only honest answer I could give was, "Most of it." So I'm looking at a 2002 Mitsubishi Galant with 71,000 miles. The woman at the bank asked me if it was a sports car, because Mitsubishi makes her think "exotic." It makes me think "someone in their late-20s whose mother still does their laundry and of course nobody will love them--and they're not capable of full-on, trusting love anyways--so they don't need something you can put a car seat into or even have another person ride in, which is fine because then everyone will be able to see the embroidered KISS (Love Gun era) car seat cover on the passenger seat."

But yeah, I've been having trouble trying to find a song. That Alejandro Escovedo song up top is what I'm leaning toward for the next one, but I can't think of anything for it. I also considered songs by Scud Mountain Boys and The Reigning Sound, but, again, no ideas. Aside from a review of J.A. Tyler's new novel Variations of a Brother War that I'm hoping [PANK] will pick up, I haven't sat down and written an entire story/essay/poem in almost a month. I told myself I was going to take the month of April off--I wrote a book review and three full-length short stories in March--but then the book deal came in and I started to sell the CDs and I needed to finish up writing some songs for both bands I'm in, one of which will be recording an LP and an EP at the end of this month. I think I've had my month off by now, though, so it's time to get back to doing what I do least worst.

Also, I read this killer story by Justin Lawrence Daugherty over at SmokeLong called "Blood." The beginning sucked me, and I couldn't believe it got even weirder and better. 

My father has a bullet lodged in his ass cheek. I was reminded of this as he leaned down to talk to Cerberus, our mutt, running his thick, car engine grease-covered, scarred hand through Cerb's russet-brown hair. It's all the blacks, he said after he'd been shot. It was a ricochet from a drive-by or something. 
He was training Cerb to dogfight. To tear other dogs apart. To rip their throats out. We had a stuffed dummy for practice. 

Cerb got loose and went after the dummy as if he wanted to eat it, like he had not eaten in weeks. Fluff torn from the open seams. 

"Why are we training Cerb to fight?" I asked. 

"Because he needs to rediscover his nature." 

"What's his nature?" Cerb ripped open the dummy's head. 

"This," dad said, pointing. I didn't get it. I'd seen Cerb eat his own shit once. "Like the wolf. Or, like, whatever came before the wolf, even." 

If that sounds awesome to you, go read the rest.

Thrash on, killers.

RW

I'm not as cool as Davy Vain, but I'm pretty cool. And pretty vain: I feel like a bit of a dickhead for making a website about me and my writing. I'd much rather run a website about wrestling botches or redheads. (Don't click that redheads link if you're at work or under 18.) (Don't click that Botchamania link unless you really like watching pro wrestlers make painful, hilarious mistakes.)

But here it all is anyways. You've been on the world wide web before, so I'll spare you the bit about what each of those links at the top do. If you haven't been on the world wide web before and this is the absolute first page you've ever visited, let me just say, "Hey." Also, good luck, you're either 80+ or a toddler and either way shit's fucked up and it's not getting easier.

The main reason I made this is because I've got a book coming out on Jersey Devil Press this fall, and I figured it's about time I start promoting myself and having an "online presence" as they say in "the biz," which is short for "business," which is short for "nobody says biz, asshole." Also, it's nice to have links to all of my publications in one place, as my parents can now ignore them all--again--in one felled swoop.

Just kidding. My parents love me. But they don't really read my stuff. I told them to "butt out of my life, JEEZ" when I was 14 and they listened way too well. You can come back now, Scott and Diane. I'm ready to hang.

I feel better already. Right. Right?

Let's go.

RW

I just made this site to have all my publications in one spot and to help me promote my upcoming book through Jersey Devil Press. If you've stumbled upon this before there's any information available, go somewhere else for awhile and then come back.

Yours in rock,

RW