Book Buzz
On September 10, the Library of Congress is going to present, for the first time, an award for lifetime achievement in fiction-writing. The award will be presented in a ceremony to –
Well, wait a minute. Before I actually name the lucky author, let’s speculate on whom it could be. Let’s consider the obvious choices for a lifetime achievement award in fiction writing. Of course, one criterion is that the writer be, you know, living.
On with the thinking cap. Here goes.
John Updike
Joyce Carol Oates
Philip Roth
E.L. Doctorow
Toni Morrison
Anne Tyler
Thomas Pynchon
Don DeLillo
Ernest J. Gaines
Richard Ford
Reynolds Price
Cormac McCarthy
J.D. Salinger? (He’s alive. Or aliveish.)
Doubtless my literate readers will have other suggestions. Remember, though, that the award is for a lifetime of writing achievement, not for a few well-known books, so maybe Salinger doesn’t qualify. Don’t forget, Norman Mailer is dead.
So, while you’re placing your bets and trying to slake your anticipation, I’ll tell you that the winner of the first Library of Congress award for lifetime achievement in fiction is –
Herman Wouk. 
You’re all smacking your foreheads and going, “Duh, well, yeah, of course, Herman Wouk. ‘The Caine Mutiny.’ ‘Marjorie Morningstar.’ ‘Youngblood Hawke.’ Those mini-series about WWII.”
Perhaps the intention is to present the award for longevity. Wouk, born May 27, 1915, happens to be 93, which makes him 16 years older than the next oldest possibility, E.L. Doctorow (b. Jan. 6, 1931). In fact, the award could simply be made each year to the next author in the chronological line, eliminating the cheap and petty element of suspense. There wouldn’t even have to be a ceremony. A certificate could be emailed to the winner. In that case, the roster would look like this:
Wouk (May 27, 1915)
Doctorow (Jan. 6, 1931)
Morrison (Feb. 18, 1931)
Updike (March 18, 1932)
Gaines (Jan 15, 1933)
Price (Feb. 1, 1933)
Roth (March 19, 1933)
McCarthy (July 20, 1933, a big year for writers!)
DeLillo (Nov. 20, 1936)
Pynchon (May 8, 1937)
Oates (June 16, 1938)
Tyler (Oct. 25, 1941)
Ford (Feb. 16, 1944)
See, that takes care of the award for the next 12 years, assuming that these authors all live that long. Pesky ol’ Death. The Library of Congress comittee doesn’t even have to have another meeting. They should have called me first.
Dixie Cash is in Memphis, apparently. If you don’t know who or what this is, you can check out Jon W. Sparks’ article on CommercialAppeal.com proper. Here’s an excerpt from his story and his video:
If we say Dixie Cash were in town last week, we’d be sorta correct. The author is (are?) sisters who bring a thoroughly outsize Texas sensibility to their series of comic mysteries.
The latest novel under the Dixie Cash moniker is “Don’t Make Me Choose Between You and My Shoes,” the fourth adventure with characters Debbie Sue Overstreet and Edwina Perkins-Martin, who are specialists in styling big hair and have a private investigation firm known as “Domestic Equalizers.”
The other titles hold a few clues as to subject matter and tone: “Since You’re Leaving Anyway, Take Out the Trash,” “My Heart May Be Broken, but My Hair Still Looks Great” and “I Gave You My Heart, but You Sold It Online.”
William Bearden, also, or mostly, known as ‘Willie’ or even ‘Willy,’ will talk about his Memphis Legacy Project and sign copies of his books at 5 p.m. Thursday (June 5) at Burke’s Book Store, 936 S. Cooper.
Bearden is an enthusiast and Memphis is his favorite topic. He’s created books about Overton Park and the history of cotton in the Mississippi Delta and Memphis, and he’s written and produced documentaries about Elmwood Cemetery and local garage bands. He has taken thousands of pictures of architectural details of the houses and churches in Victorian Village. That effort is the first installment in Bearden’s Memphis Legacy Project, an early result of which is Bearden’s film about Victorian Village, “The View from Adams Avenue: 19th Century Memphis,” which had its debut Saturday at the Mallory-Neely House Museum.
For more information, call [901] 278-7484.)
When Franz Kafka was dying horribly of tuberculosis in 1924, he asked his good friend and executor Max Brod to burn all of his papers and manuscripts. Though regarded since the 1940s as one of the progenitors and masters of 20th century literary modernism, Kafka was unknown in his lifetime, having published only a few short stories. After Kafka died, Brod disobeyed his friend’s request and began to edit and publish his books; thus those icons of angst, dread and black humor, the novels “The Trial” (1925), “The Castle” (1926) and “Amerika” (1927), as well as Kafka’s “Diaries,” which Brod also edited and published, became available . The landscape of 20th century literature, indeed of European and American culture itself, would be far different without Kafka’s immense presence and influence.
Did Brod betray his friend? Or did his responsibility lie with his faith in Kafka’s genius and his belief that the world would profit from knowing Kafka’s writings? Brod justified his action by saying that he repeatedly told Kafka that he would not execute his wishes: “Franz should have appointed another executor if he had been absolutely and finally determined that his instructions should stand.” This statement may illustrate a fine bit of legal sophistry — isn’t an executor required to carry out the instructions of a will (as long as they’re not illegal)? — but who, having read and been affected by Kafka’s work, would not thank Brod for what he did, or, rather, didn’t do?
A new and similar case has arisen.
Kevin Brockmeier’s fiction deftly, uncannily and poignantly treads the delicate lines that connect and separate fantasy and science fiction; dream and nightmare; fable and parable. 
Brockmeier grounds his fiction in reality, but turns reality inside-out or at least slightly askew, asking readers to look around ordinary corners into odd angles where small but potent revelations stand illuminated. In the touching novel, “The Truth about Celia,” for example, a father attempts to deal with his sorrow and guilt about the disappearance of his daughter by writing a series of widely divergent short stories in which she figures (more or less), only to find that the truth about Celia is more complicated than his imagination can grasp.
Brockmeier lives in Little Rock. His new collection of stories is “The View from the Seventh Layer” (Pantheon, $21.95). The author will be at Davis-Kidd Booksellers Tuesday at 6 p.m. to read from and sign the book. His previous efforts are the short story collection “Things That Fall from the Sky”; another novel “The Brief History of the Dead”; and the children’s books “City of Names” and “Grooves: A Kind of Mystery.” The store is at 387 Perkins Ext. in Laurelwood. Call 683-9801.
The following interview with Kevin Brockmeier, presented here in excerpts, was conducted by Corey Claireday, a student of creative nonfiction in the English department at the University of Memphis.
Jonathan Miles’ debut novel “Dear American Airlines” is due to be released by Houghton Mifflin on June 5. However, if you go to www.dearamericanairlines.com, you can download the complete novel for free; the offer is good for a week, according to an ad that ran in this morning’s New York Times.
Why do we care?
Because Miles grew up in Oxford, Miss., hung out, drank tons of beer, attended a few classes at Ole Miss but never graduated and was a prodigious protege of the novelist and short-story-writer Larry Brown, who died in 2004. In fact, Miles became such a part of Brown’s family that he is listed on Brown’s tombstone along with his other children. Not that “Dear American Airlines” is like anything that Brown wrote; oh no.
Miles, who lives north of New York City, is a prolific freelance writer, books columnist for Men’s Journal, as well as writing the weekly cocktail report in the Times’ “Sunday Styles” section. O supreme gig! Two weeks ago, at The Oxford Conference for the Book, Miles served as moderator for a panel on the art and the state of print book-reviewing; I was a member of that panel, along with Dwight Garner, senior editor at The New York Times Book review, and J. Peder Zane, former book review editor for the News and Observer, in Raleigh, N.C., now that paper’s “ideas” columnist — another supreme gig — and editor of “Remarkable Reads: 34 Writers and Their Adventures in Reading” and “The Top Ten: Writers Pick Their Favorite Books.”
Heady company, indeed, and it got headier when, after the conclusion of our panel discussion, we met at Ajax on the Oxford town square for a lunch of chicken and dumplings, country fried steak and the restaurant’s signature pimiento cheese po-boy. Joining us were Miles’ wife Cat, who works for the wine importer Bartholomew Broadbent, and their three amazingly well-behaved children, and Zane’s wife Jeanine. Many beers and Bloody Marys were consumed. It was a long, hilarious lunch, but somehow not long enough.
There’s an excellent (and pretty hilarious) interview with Jonathan Miles at popmatters.com.
There’s a phrase: “You could hear a pin drop.”
That’s what it sounded like this evening at the Thacker Mountain Radio recording session in Oxford, Mississippi, when Kevin Brockmeier, of Little Rock, read one of his uncanny, evocative short stories, the one that begins “Once there was a man who happened to buy God’s overcoat.” The story is called “A Fable with Slips of Paper Spilling from the Pockets.” It appears in Brockmeier’s new book, “The View from the Seventh Layer” (Pantheon, $21.95)
The reason that this silence was interesting in that Thacker Mountain Radio is a raucous affair. Usually, the event is held at Off Square Books, the used books annex to the well-known and beloved Square Books, an institution in the literary town. Tonight, however, Thacker moved to larger quarters in the old Power House, two blocks off the old town square. The facility features a huge industrial space with a stage and lights and rows of padded seats. And to add to the audience for this debut, this is also the first day of the 15th Oxford Conference for the Book (which is why I’m in the town Faulkner made famous, to serve on a panel Saturday), so the audience swelled to unprecedented proportions; staff members brought in more chairs and still people lined the side walls and crowded at the back. As master of ceremonies Jim Dees said: “One can only hope that the fire marshal is under sedation.”
The longlist for Britain’s Orange prizewas unveiled Monday, and charges of sexism immediately were unleashed, continuing a 13-year debate about whether women should have their own prize.
Officially known as the Orange Broadband Prize for Fiction, it was created by a group of folks in the publishing world who thought women writers weren’t getting their due in other literary contests, namely Britain’s big boy, the Booker, which has been bestowed on a woman 15 times out of 41. (Incidentally, the award has been known as the Man Booker Prize for the last several years. The name has nothing to do with gender — it’s sponsored by Man Group plc, an investment firm — but it does nothing to thwart the perceived bias…)
Some argue the Orange — which comes with some nice money and a small sculpted statuette called the Bessie — has outlived its usefulness. The last two Bookers were awarded to women. The most celebrated author of the last 10 years is a woman — OK, maybe not literary, but everyone knows who J.K. Rowling is. Even A.S. Byatt herself, who won the Booker many years ago, says it’s wrong to think women can’t compete against men in the literary world. She has refused to let her books be submitted for the prize, as have other authors.
At the very least, the Orange prize raises awareness of women authors, which can’t be a bad thing. Or can it? As the vitriol rises every year, the prize may become more of a mockery than a celebration of women authors.
Any men want to weigh in on this one?
You may not be able to judge a book by it’s cover, but apparently you can sell it better that way.
Saw a story in The Wall Street Journal about a decision by Borders to start shelving more books with their covers facing out. The move is intended to increase sales. But it also means there will be fewer books — the number of titles will go down 5 to 10 percent.
It sounds like a good move. Haven’t you ever noticed how you’re drawn to all the books Davis-Kidd has out on the tables, face forward? And even in the stacks, your eyes are drawn to the one shelf on each case that has a few books prominently displayed?
If it doesn’t work, at least we won’t have to crane our necks to read the titles…
The National Book Critics Circle Awards were presented in New York Thursday amid readings by talented authors and laments of newspapers closing or cutting staff — the Books page is often the first thing to go…
The prizes are given in six categories. No cash, just kudos. And they go to:
Fiction — “The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao” by Junot Diaz
Non-fiction — “Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present” by Harriet Washington
Autobiography – “Brother, I’m Dying” by Edwidge Danticat
Biography — “Stanley: The Impossible Life of Africa’s Greatest Explorer” by Tim Jeal
Poetry — “Elegy” by Mary Jo Bang
Criticism — “The Rest is Noise: Listening to the Twentieth Century” by Alex Ross
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