New Publication at BODY PARTS MAGAZINE: THE JOURNAL OF HORROR & EROTICA
Got another story published! Hop on over to the digital edition of Body Parts to read my story "Murder and Cruelty Free" and please don't assume anything negative about my…
Next Door Lived a Girl
First off, this is an extremely graphic book. There is sexual abuse and violence directed at children, and it is dark and extremely graphic. If you are sensitive to that…
Heart of Darkness: Another Hike up the Literary Canon
Another piece of the canon that I’m just now getting to. Still not sure how I made it through my English undergrad without reading this. I guess professors are just…
Book Fight Blurb
I got blurbed by Book Fight! And it's a good one: (more info about Book Fight and their relationship with book blurbs here- https://bookfightpod.com/blurbs/) “Sean VanSickel is like Roadhouse meets Cormac…
Reading Animal Farm with eighth-graders
This particular re-reading of Orwell’s classic novel has been brought to you by my eighth grade English class, who picked Animal Farm over two other books, the names of which…
Matthew Vollmer’s Gateway to Paradise
This is the third book of Vollmer’s I’ve read, the most recent, and the one I’d be least likely to recommend. I loved “Inscriptions for Headstones” -it was a fantastically…
Reading fees, classism, and literary privilege
http://rhizomaticideas.com/the-fallacy-of-the-serious-writer/ Rhizomaticideas.com recently published a great short essay on the problems with literary magazines charging a reading fee. As someone with a serious Marxist chip on my shoulder, (see attached…
Kurt Vonnegut’s Player Piano and Grading Debut Novels on a Curve
Debut novels are interesting. I’m a big Vonnegut fan. I’m planning to read all of his novels and then get a tattoo of the asshole he drew in Breakfast of…
P.G. Wodehouse and the Role of Humor (vs. Comedy)
The writings of P.G. Wodehouse might suggest themselves as antithetical to everything I cherish in literature, but that suggestion would be erroneous. In spite of my rabid disliking of golf,…
“Fun Home” and aesthetic cohesion (featuring possibly offensive cartoon breasts and implied cartoon cunnilingus)
I’m a bit late to the party on this one, but I’m certainly glad I picked up Fun Home. It had been on my radar for a while, but I…