my friends jaime fountaine and jeremy eric tenenbaum are both excellent fiction writers (also other things, like comedians and designers) and excellent performers of their own fiction, which they do regularly at toiling in obscurity.
toiling in obscurity is a good description of what it feels like to be a fiction writer in philadelphia and is also the reading series that jaime and jeremy curate. i’m trying to invite you to it.
we're older than we act
what i’ve been holding back is that i’m reading too. here is a small portion of the piece i’ll be reading at high speed:
Now imagine that – what are the Mongreloids doing? – could be one of your concerns for the next month or two, in fact your only, minus the first couple of days. The first couple of days school’s closed, like shooting is a virus likely to spread through the country unless the kids are quarantined at home, you’re in your room like all the other kids. What the nonkids don’t realize is everything’s a virus nowadays and the kids in their quarantines are downloading videos the shooter made in the hours before the shooting within hours of the event. Four more kids in three separate states catch the sickness before the quarantine’s lifted, though they won’t know it ‘til a few months have passed with a dozen more dead.
this story appeared in a great journal/anthology called the lifted brow/the fake bookshelf and will also be in my first collection, the one i mention in every post but don’t tell you much about. that will change soon. the story is offensive so don’t bring your children.
another great thing about this reading is that it will include an old colleague of mine, sebastien aguedelo, who just released his first book of poetry. and also my brother. and two of the readers are former students of mine from back in the good old days when i was teaching. so even if you don’t want to hear me read, you can come enjoy them, and play a game with yourself and your friends. the game is:
- who was christian’s colleague?
- who was christian’s brother?
- who were christian’s students?
it’s a drinking game. drink when you get it right or wrong. and tip your bartender.
