Blog Post
Jessica Shattuck wrestles with her family's Nazi history in "The Women in the Castle"
by christopherporter
Jessica Shattuck says that it wasn’t a big secret in her family. She always knew her grandparents were “ordinary Germans” during and before tWorld War II. “But in my late teens, I grasped that they had also enthusiastically joined the Nazi party in the late 1930s,” Sattuck said. Learning this family history from her grandmother prompted Shattuck to begin writing what became her new book, The Women in the Castle, which she'll read from, discuss, and sign at Nicola's Books on Friday, Jan. 12.
Blog Post
Blog Post
January 2018 Book & Author Events
by christopherporter
What does having an amazing university, a plethora of fantastic local independent bookstores, and a pretty slam-bang public library system (if we do say so ourselves) bring to a town?
Authors. Lots and lots of authors.
Blog Post
Townie Tales: Richard Retyi's "The Book of Ann Arbor" at Literati
by christopherporter
On Dec. 7 at Literati, Richard Retyi read from his new book, The Book of Ann Arbor: An Extremely Serious History, which tells 41 townie tales in a humorous, accessible fashion.
But Retyi didn't originally set out to write a book. His project began as a podcast, Ann Arbor Stories, which Retyi produces with Brian Peters in partnership with the Ann Arbor District Library. (Retyi recently became the marketing and communications manager at AADL.) The podcast was modeled after another audio show, Memory Palace.
Blog Post
Poems Provoke: U-M's Institute for Research on Women and Gender discussed Petra Kuppers’ "PearlStitch"
by christopherporter
The cover of Petra Kuppers’ PearlStitch is provocative. It draws the eye and keeps it as the viewer takes in an open mouth and an extended lace-covered tongue with a bead of clear fluid at its tip. Her poetry is provocative, too, and after the Nov. 29 panel of University of Michigan faculty members discussing PearlStitch as a part of the Institute for Research on Women and Gender’s "Gender: New Works, New Questions" series, I knew I wanted to dive into Kuppers’ latest collection. But I wasn't unable to put my hands on a copy of the book following the reading as Ann Arbor bookstores were sold out.
Kuppers is affiliated with several U-M departments and is a visual artist, creative writer, activist, and founder of The Olimpias, an artists' collective and a performance research series. Joining her on the panel were professors Naomi Andre and Melanie Yeargeau.
After the panel invited the dozen or so audience members to the front of the room, Andre began to discuss PearlStitch, plotting for us the coordinates of this lyrical landscape. Andre pointed out that Kuppers’ book consists of nine unequal parts and talked about the importance of space in the work. As I listened to Andre’s nuanced and well-considered interpretation of Kuppers’ work, I began to watch the poet who nodded in agreement. "As a woman, what is home? What is community among women?" --Professor Naomi Andre in response to "PearlStitch" Then Yergeau took a turn discussing the work, and the space between the two interpretations struck me. They were not in conflict, but they served to remind that there are worlds that exist beyond the words on the page, particularly when engaging with poetry.
Yergeau described the work as multisensory and pulled out an anti-capitalist thread. She found herself thinking about the coexistence of beauty and horror in the book; questions about labor and representation; and of the book’s pedagogical offerings, particularly in relation to disability studies. Both professors remarked on the role of the body, of physicality in this work. They both made reference to a poem about The United Society of Believers in Christ’s Second Appearing, more commonly known as the Shakers. Yergeau asked in response to this poem “what it means to convulse with devotion.” Kuppers took a moment to digest these different interpretations of her work from her colleagues, remarking that it was quite unusual for her to hear responses to her work in real life. Kuppers had been in a residency when she read a Vogue article that inspired her to write a poem out from which the rest of the collection grew. The article talked about factory workers, but in an uncomfortable, sensationalized way, which bothered her enough that she took the time to figure out why. It turned out to have a connection to her family life. Growing up in Germany, she had watched the work her father had performed in factories. As a teenager, she herself had spent time in these spaces, working for a time in factories that made cookies, earning both the blisters and eventual aversion to cookies that came with the territory.
She began to consider the factory as a place where the realities of physical repetitive work and other dangers await women. Kuppers read a poem she wrote about her grandmother who would perform the German tradition of boiling lead, plunging it into cold water, and then using the shape that formed to tell the future. It was a beautifully rhythmic; Kuppers moved as she read it, her body following her voice as it danced through her words. Even though this was a family poem, a poem about roles and fortune, lead’s potential corruption of the body loomed in the background. “Just take stuff into your mouth and play with it. There you go. Poetry.” --Petra Kuppers When asked what it was like to write poetry in English rather than her native German, Kuppers told us that she had never really written poetry in German. She said that she is excited by the rhythm of the words, and that she thinks that writing in this language that isn’t her native language is actually essential to her poetry. “I heard one of your stories on Podcastle.’ This never happens to academics.” --Petra Kuppers
Currently, Kuppers is in the proof-reading phase of her newest work, Ice Bar, a collection of short stories. These are speculative stories influenced by Donna Haraway’s Staying With the Trouble and Octavia’s Brood: Science Fiction Stories From Social Justice Movements. Bodies are important in this work, too. Each of these stories involves bodily transformation. Of her stories, Kuppers says that only one person dies in the stories and that one person is a bully. “We’re not seeing women eviscerated,” she said, and then pointed out how often women are destroyed in the speculative genres. Interested in understanding a variety of different literary spaces, Kuppers submitted work to both literary spaces and genre-specific places. She talked about how differently literary poetry and science fiction writing are received by people in passing conversations. There is a world of difference between the polite nods that come in response to the poetry and the eager how-can-I-read-this response to the genre fiction. But I felt the how-can-I-read-this-now urge, which is why I went book shopping right after. Provocation works.
Sherlonya Turner is the manager of the Youth & Adult: Services & Collections Department at the Ann Arbor District Library. She can be found diving headfirst into all sorts of projects over at sherlonya.net.
Blog Post
Balancing on the Edge of Motherhood: Anna Prushinskaya, "A Woman Is a Woman Until She Is a Mother"
by christopherporter
The end of pregnancy is a strange time. You wait for the biggest change that can happen to a person other than death and yet, for most, you don’t know when the change will happen.
When will the baby be born? When will a woman become a mother?
When I was pregnant with my son, I read the title essay of A Woman Is a Woman Until She Is a Mother by Anna Prushinskaya probably 15 times. It became almost a talisman to me, a promise that he would eventually be born, that I would be able to cross over to motherhood.
When my water broke just like Anna described in her essay, unexpectedly and fast, I still had no idea what was coming. I was still perched between womanhood and motherhood.
In A Woman Is a Woman Until She Is a Mother, Prushinskaya writes beautifully about her experience balancing between places, between states: between pregnancy and motherhood, and between her Soviet homeland and her current home of Ann Arbor.
I spoke with Prushinskaya about her experience writing the book, how motherhood has changed her as a writer, and the birth of her second son. Our conversation has been lightly edited for clarity.
Q: Your essay “Uncertainty: Or a Woman Is a Woman, and Then Sometimes She Is a Mother” meant so much to me as I was preparing for the birth of my son. The description of your house shifting after your son’s unexpected home birth sticks with me -- it encompasses so much that is heartbreaking and wonderful about birth. You also had your second child at home, right? How did that change the feel of your house?
A: I’m so happy to hear that reading that essay was helpful -- one of the wonderful things about publishing these essays has been getting the chance to hear more birth stories and other experiences related to pregnancy, birth, motherhood (or not). I did end up having my second son at home, too. I don’t think I will ever feel the same about school buses! I live by a school, and right around the time my second son was born, I could see the school buses lining up through the windows. Now around that time if I’m home, I’m taken back to the birth, even if for a moment.
Q: One of the most profound changes that I went through after giving birth was a sudden, almost painful, tenderness, as though I had lost all of my armor. I’m so impressed with your ability to stay articulate in your writing through the postpartum emotional landscape. Was that difficult?
A: Actually, the experience of writing this felt similar to my experience of growing a baby and giving birth, in that I also sort of felt like a portal for the writing. Writing this book, the writing just sort of flowed, and I haven’t experienced that kind of creative energy since. So, it was surprisingly easy to get the pages written in that way, although I agree with you, for me the postpartum emotional openness was also wild. The more difficult aspect of working on this book was being more open with the world about my experiences, and I doubt I would have been able to write this book and allow for that kind of openness without the context I was writing in. (Though I don’t think pregnancy and birth exclusively allow for this kind of experience -- I imagine other trying and transformative life experiences can carry the same kind of energy.)
Q: Your book includes photographs between each essay. What made you decide to include these?
A: MG Press, my publisher, also puts out a journal called Midwestern Gothic, in which the work of Midwestern photographers is featured alongside writing. My publisher suggested that I have a look through the MG photos for possible interstitials for the book. I had been thinking about how to create pauses between the essays, and I wanted the pauses to invoke a similar feeling of an imprint in time. So I found the images sort of serendipitously within the MG photo collection.
Q: What has been the most surprising way that motherhood has changed you as a writer?
A: I’m not sure if it’s a direct correlation, but becoming a mom made me want to have more direct impact through my writing. For example, I wanted to learn more about the 1,4-dioxane pollution here in our area and ended up writing some stories on the issue about one year after my first son was born.
Q: The last essay in the book takes the form of a short play. What made you chose to write it this way, and why did you pick this piece to end the book?
A: I mention the 36 questions to love study in the book, the study I came across in The New York Times, which “explores whether intimacy between two strangers can be accelerated by having them ask each other a specific series of personal questions.” I was thinking about my relationship with the baby, who felt sort of like a stranger though I was already in love with him, and I was also with the baby for long stretches of time, which I remember as feeling very strange at first. So, that’s the inspiration for that piece. I liked that piece as the end because for me motherhood creates more questions than answers.
Q: You mention a wide variety of writers throughout this book. Is there a book or author that you return to over and over again?
A: Yes, definitely! I have a few that I have returned to a couple of times, including many of the authors I mention throughout the book. Right now the book I am re-reading is Pema Chödrön’s When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times.
Q: Other than the library, where can folks find your book?
A: In Ann Arbor, folks can stop by Literati Bookstore. Also, there are a few options for buying online.
Evelyn Hollenshead is a Youth Librarian at the Ann Arbor District Library.
Anna Prushinskaya will do a quick Michigan book tour for "A Woman Is a Woman Until She Is a Mother" in spring 2018, kicking off at Literati around early April.
Blog Post
Midwest Meditations: Cal Freeman, "Fight Songs" at Literati
by christopherporter
“This is a lot of people for a poetry reading," said writer Cal Freeman. "I’ve read for three people before.” On Nov. 11, Michigan poet Freeman read from his new book, Fight Songs, at Literati bookstore. The crisp November evening seemed perfect for listening to regionally focused poetry as the temperature made its way downward.
Freeman is the kind of poet I would have spent a semester in a creative writing class peeking at over a copy of the latest student work being workshopped. He’s tall, though not quite lanky, and was dressed in mostly gray. I wouldn’t describe his look as rumpled, but the word crossed my mind. Very Midwestern.
A Literati staffer introduced Freeman by describing his “compassion for the unsung among us.” When Freeman approached the podium, he got right down to the business of poetry reading. As he read, he rocked back and forth a bit -- a gentle, swaying rock -- and stood with his hips in front of his shoulders.
Freeman asked whether anyone in the audience has ever had roaches, then told us a story about trying to get rid of them from a storage unit. A man in the audience said, “Oh, those kind of roaches.” Freeman responded, “I’m not a stoner, dude,” then shared a poem written from the cockroach's point of view.
The sun captures the best
and worst alike in various stages
of slouching ambulation, God,
as we slow and sicken.
--from “Fight Song of the Roaches”
Freeman told the audience the poem came as a result of him "writing these letters to a lot of creatures and outmoded nouns.” An entire third of "Fight Song" is made up of these letters, where Freeman e writes to, among other things, “cops on a wintry night,” the innocent, and a malt-worm.
After telling us that “elegy is a really important form for (me),” Freeman told us a story about a friend of his who had died of a drug overdose. It had been over a decade since he had seen the friend when the friend died, and Cal was asked by the family to play guitar that the funeral. He felt like an imposter, like he hadn’t been a good friend.
Each song is a vague guess
At its own meaning.
--from “To Be Sung at Certain Funerals”
Freeman finished the evening as simply as he started: “Thanks,” he said, and stepped away from the mic.
Midwestern, indeed.
Related:
➥ Michigan poet Cal Freeman champions the underdog (Detroit Free Press interview)
➥ Local poet, Cal Freeman, brings a rustic flair to social advocacy (Michigan Daily interview)
Sherlonya Turner is the manager of the Youth & Adult: Services & Collections Department at the Ann Arbor District Library. She can be found diving headfirst into all sorts of projects over at sherlonya.net.
Blog Post
She's Picking Up Good Vibrations: Lynn Comella, "Vibrator Nation" at Literati
by christopherporter
When it comes to other adults’ sexual choices, I’m very live and let live. And in my personal life, I’m very willing to make a joke or tell a story laden with sexual innuendo, and I’ve long ago accepted that I’m the person who will robustly fall face-first into a strange double-entendre, I found myself a bit shy at the bookstore when I purchased my copy of Lynn Comella’s Vibrator Nation in advance of attending her discussion of the book which took place on November 14th at Literati.
This book was based on more than 80 in-depth interviews with sex-toy shop owners, employees of said stores, and pornographers. Comella herself worked at Babeland in New York City, which provided her ethnographic access from both sides of the sales counter. Her book synthesizes this and examines the role of feminist sex-toy stores on the larger adult industry.
Why study sex-toy shops?
Comella knew to answer that question for the audience right away.
It turns out that this project began as a part of her graduate coursework. She had taken a field methods class in cultural studies and had an interest in sexual politics. The class required her to conduct a small-scale ethnographic project. She asked herself, "Where are the places that women can be sexual subjects as opposed to sexual objects?" As a part of her work, she spoke with Aileen Journey, the owner of a store called Intimacies, which had just opened in the town where she studied. The owner told Comella that she saw her store as a feminist way to empower women and that she had modeled her store after Good Vibrations, a store that had opened in the 1970s in San Francisco’s Mission District.
Good Vibrations shared the idea that sex education could be empowering and helped Journey on the road to establishing her own store. This help included selling a vendor list for a mere $50 -- such magnanimity is an anomaly in the business world. But it turns out that this, as Comella calls it, “non-competitive ethos” was a reason why some saw the businesses as activism.
In 2008, there was a shift in the adult store industry. According to Comella, before this point, the industry had catered to the perceived desires of stereotypical men. She argues that 2008 was a game-changer due to both the recession and also the proliferation of free Internet pornography. Suddenly, the women’s market became appealing, as it was a rare growth area in the industry. Comella, however, became interested in the history of this already growing market, which had been building since the early 1970s.
Comella read from a chapter in her book titled “Living the Mission,” where she talked about the lived experience of working at Babeland. Here, she says, “Every shift I worked at Babeland put me on the front lines of its mission, which was ‘to promote and celebrate sexual vitality by providing an honest, open and fun environment, encouraging personal empowerment, educating our community and supporting a more passionate world for all.’”
Feminism provided a healthy dose of friction inside of this passionate world. For example, early on, men weren’t allowed into some of these spaces. Joani Blank of Good Vibrations, however, recognized that not all men were comfortable in the more traditional shops and that her store was appealing to some men. These business owners, then, were forced to decide whether or how to include men. Feminism also complicated things, raising the question of how erotic videos fit into the equation. How does one respond to such a market demand when some of the feminist thought behind these shops was anti-pornography? How do shops adjust to the construction of feminism, how do they embrace intersectionality? How do they become trans-inclusive? How do these businesses remain responsive?
There was also the matter of what sort of bedfellows feminism and capitalism made. Some individuals felt that a store, a capitalist enterprise, was antithetical to feminism. Others feared that once the market for women-centered sex shops became viable it would be co-opted and would no longer be about empowerment, liberation, and education. Babeland faced this matter head-on. The store had sold shares to its employees, yet the management still felt like profits weren’t as important as the social work that they provided. The employees, now owners, disagreed.
Comella argues that it’s “easy to think about sexuality as something we own,” but larger forces that act upon sexuality, such as cultural norms and public policy, impact it.
In the Q&A portion of the evening, the audience’s questions pushed at the larger cultural forces. Economic class factored in, as Comella acknowledged. For instance, finding body-safe materials from ethical sources sometimes priced-out certain consumers. She also acknowledged that within the field that storeowners talk a great deal about gender equality and sexuality, but not as much about class or race. This presented her with a challenge; it’s difficult “to write about things people aren’t really talking about.”
In examining this segment of the adult industry, Comella answers many questions about the rise of the business and the circuitous paths that female and queer-friendly sex-positive sex-toy stores have taken. She also begs the question of what happens next within this dynamic trade.
Sherlonya Turner is the manager of the Youth & Adult: Services & Collections Department at the Ann Arbor District Library. She can be found diving headfirst into all sorts of projects over at sherlonya.net.
Blog Post
Personal View of a National Tragedy: Alexandra Zapruder's "Twenty-Six Seconds"
by christopherporter
“My grandfather came to America hell-bent on becoming an American.” --Alexandra Zapruder
Alexandra Zapruder’s Twenty-Six Seconds tells the story of the 26-second home video, recorded by her grandfather Abraham, that came to be known as the Zapruder film, the one video that showed President Kennedy’s assassination. On Wednesday, Nov. 7, Zapruder spoke at the Ann Arbor District Library about her book to an audience of about 80.
Zapruder never thought that she would write this book. She grew up in Washington, D.C., in a family that rarely talked about the film. She said that she is often asked whether the film was taboo or somehow a secret in her household. “It wasn’t that,” she said.
She always knew about the film, but inside of their family, it wasn’t a central part of their identity. Inside of her family, the film and surrounding events had been traumatic to her grandfather. It had been painful to the next generation. There were family mores surrounding the film. They were not to brag about it. They were not to call attention to it. They were not to take it lightly.
In 2004, Alexandra’s father, Henry, who had for years been the custodian of the film, became sick and suggested that someone should interview him about the film. That someone was understood to be Alexandra. However, this was not to be to Zapruder’s “everlasting regret.”
Alexandra did, however, inherit the task of making sense of the film and what it meant. She says she “came to understand the ephemera and historical documents surrounding the film and that someone would need to take responsibility for it.” Realizing that she didn’t know much about the film, she began her research. Of the experience, she says, “As I began to read, I started to see that the history of the film was incomplete.” She noticed mistakes and, as she diplomatically phrased it, “inaccuracies” about her family and what they had done.
“The main thing that was missing in the public stories was the understanding of this as a home movie.” --Alexandra Zapruder
Abraham Zapruder came to the United States as a young man. His granddaughter describes his experience as that of the “archetypal life of Jewish immigrants who came to this country.” In the United States, Abraham saw opportunities that would not have been available to him in imperial Russia. It is said that he bought a violin with his first paycheck. He went to night school and learned English there. He went to work in the garment industry on Seventh Avenue. Abraham Zapruder’s was a story of upward mobility. A business opportunity landed him in Dallas, and ultimately led him to work in the Dal-Tex Building, adjacent to Dealy Plaza.
Alexandra Zapruder talked to the audience about the morning of the assassination. Multiple members of her family, who were strong Kennedy supporters, had gone out to participate in Kennedy’s visit to Dallas. Her aunt had gone to Love Field that morning with her best friend. Her uncle had gone to see the parade go by on Main Street. Her grandfather had been in the Dal-Tex Building, and had left his camera at home that day. His longtime assistant, Lillian Rogers, had convinced him to go home and get it. “If you knew the family, you would know that this is how everything operated for him. He held back. ... He needed someone to push him.”
It is difficult to imagine from 2017 that an individual could take a video such as the one that became the Zapruder film and maintain possession of it. It is difficult, also, to imagine what it could mean to be the sole person to have captured such an instant on film. From the moment that Zapruder captured the film, having seen the assassination clearly through the camera’s viewfinder, he felt an immense sense of responsibility toward it. This man who had been taking home videos, by this point for around 30 years, had on his hands something inextricably tied to a national tragedy. This tragedy was now tied to his beloved hobby.
"Even when most people saw the film, one of the strange, odd things about the film is that it shows what happened to the president, but it doesn’t tell us what happened to the president." --Alexandra Zapruder
Ultimately, Zapruder sold the film to Life magazine. He had felt like he could trust the magazine. He had wanted the film to be treated with dignity and good taste, and he ensured that the agreement stipulated Life would defend the film's copyright. That he had been the one to record this moment placed him in a terrible position. He knew that he couldn’t keep the film. Yet he believed that it should be treated carefully, that it shouldn’t be sensationalized. He also realized that profiting from such a video came with its own issues. He feared that he, his family, and other Jewish people in the area would suffer if he profited, an anti-Semitic backlash. In fact, he gave the first installment of the payment he received from Life magazine to the widow of J.D. Tibbett, a Dallas police officer who had been slain by Lee Harvey Oswald the same day as the president.
Alexandra Zapruder successfully reminded us that the Zapruder film wasn’t always the Zapruder film. She points out that, unlike today, when videos are instantly available, it took 12 years for this film to be viewed by the public. Conspiracy theories sprouted and grew. Along the way, bootleg copies got out. The differences in what people saw in the film and what people had read in the Warren Commission’s report on the assassination watered those growing theories.
When I think of Geraldo Rivera a few things happen. I think about the time he got his nose broken on his show in 1988. I think about his shirtless selfies from a few years ago. I didn’t know that Geraldo had anything to do with the nation at large seeing the film, that it had aired for a national audience for the first time in March of 1975 on the ABC show he hosted, Good Night America.
This was the same year that the film came back into the possession of the Zapruder family. Life had grown tired of dealing with everything that came with the film, so the magazine returned the rights to Zapruders for the price of one dollar. Henry Zapruder, then, became the film’s guardian and immediately had to face the larger question of what to do with the film. The pressure was greater in this now post-Watergate, Vietnam War-era America. Henry Zapruder did not want to put the film in the public domain because he predicted that images from the film would wind up on hats and T-shirts. That is not what he wanted for his family’s legacy.
With that in mind, he made decisions one license at a time.
In 1992, the JFK Records Act was passed. It stated that any U.S. government records pertaining to President Kennedy’s assassination would be housed by the National Archives and Records Administration, and publicly disclosed in full by October 2017 unless the president determined, based on specific criteria, that it should not be. With that act came the question of whether it pertained to the Zapruder film. By this point, the film was on loan to the National Archives. A struggle between the federal government and the Zapruder family followed. In the end, the matter was settled. The government kept the film. The Zapruders were awarded $16 million.
Alexandra Zapruder ended the evening reading from the epilogue of her book where she asks, “What is the compelling lure that makes the assassination researchers, the film, art, and cultural historians, the writers and journalists, the academics and students and hobbyists and Kennedy buffs return to it as a touchstone time and time again?”
I leave thinking about something else:
Personal stories become national ones. Then, national stories become personal ones.
Sherlonya Turner is the manager of the Youth & Adult: Services & Collections Department at the Ann Arbor District Library. She can be found diving headfirst into all sorts of projects over at sherlonya.net.
Blog Post
Fifth Avenue Press launches nine titles with a book release party
by christopherporter
"Publishing is a business," writes mega-selling author Nicholas Sparks (The Notebook) in the "Advice for Writers" section of his website. "Writing may be art, but publishing, when all is said and done, comes down to dollars."
Except with Fifth Avenue Press, the new publishing imprint of the Ann Arbor District Library.
Fifth Avenue helps local authors produce a print-ready book at no cost -- from copyediting to cover design -- and the writers retain all rights. In return, the library gets to distribute ebooks to its patrons without paying royalties, but authors can sell their books -- print, digital, or audio -- however they choose and keep all the proceeds.
Fifth Avenue launches on Sunday, Nov. 5, with a reception from 1-3 pm on the 3rd floor of AADL's downtown branch, featuring author readings from the imprint's first nine titles:
Technical Solace by Rebecca G. Biber (poetry) ► PULP INTERVIEW
Ginger Stands Her Ground by Virginia Ford (memoir) ► PULP INTERVIEW
Tales From the Dork Side by R.J. Fox (humor, memoir) ► PULP INTERVIEW
Michigan Moon by Meg Gower (picture book)
Takedown by Jeff Kass (mystery)
Chad Agamemnon by Carolyn Nowak (comic book) ► PULP INTERVIEW
The Book of Ann Arbor: An Extremely Serious History Book by Rich Retyi (humor, history) ► PULP INTERVIEW
A Monster on Main Street by Emily Siwek (picture book) ► PULP INTERVIEW
Light From the Cage: 25 Years in a Prison Classroom by Judy Patterson Wenzel (memoir) ► PULP INTERVIEW
Q: Give us a short synopsis of the book.
A: A suicide submarine parade. Ann Arbor’s top 10 astronauts. Shakey Jake, the Embassy Hotel, and train/building collisions. The birth of Iggy Pop. Nazis getting punched. Visits from heads of state, from presidents to a dictator. The Music Mobile, the Naked Mile and a round-the-world flight. Plus, a few tales of murder, because it happens here too. These are a few of the stories that make up The Book of Ann Arbor.
Q: What was the most enjoyable part of writing your book?
A: Finishing. Writing is a lonely exercise, which I enjoy very much, but reading what I've written is the worst. It's never good enough -- never quite right. The fact that I'll never have to read these stories again is like a warm hug from a warm person. The most enjoyable part of the process was working with graphic designer Jen Harley, who not only did the covers and title page but created individual graphics for every story. It was delightful to have these texted to me a few apiece over weeks. Working with my editor Sara Wedell was also a highlight because she asks keen questions and calls me on bad writing. She also kept the train moving on time, which I sorely need.
Q: What was the most difficult?
A: Anyone who likes writing wants to write a book. Books are so cool. And they're SO hard to finish. I've been varying levels of obsessed about writing a book since college, and I've never had the willpower, talent and/or time to pull it off. There is a 0% chance I write a book without Fifth Avenue Press. All of it was hard, but Sara and the Fifth Avenue Press team made it actually possible.
Q: Do you have any writing rituals?
A: Location is big. There are a handful of great places in Ann Arbor to set up shop and get great work done. For the stretch run on Book of Ann Arbor, I was without a computer, so in three, four or five hour stretches every day for a week, I wrote and edited on the public computers at the AADL Westgate Branch. Some coffee from the cafe, a pretty quiet nook in the library -- I could have done a lot worse.
Q: People who like your book will also like ...
A: Let the record show that footnotes were not my idea -- though I LOVE footnotes in books. Oh gosh, I love footnotes. Hunter S. Thompson, David Foster Wallace -- it didn't take much to convince me to incorporate them. That's not your question though. I wish I wrote as well as those two guys, or Colson Whitehead or Mary Roach or Shea Serrano or Michael Chabon. I am none of these people. My stuff is my stuff. Hopefully it's not too derivative. Hopefully it's a slightly more accessible take on local history stories. Maybe I should use more swear words? Read these authors to experience how I wish I could write. The kinds of sentences that make me grit my teeth and pound my desk because they're so damn good.
Q: What advice would you give other authors who would like to submit their works to Fifth Avenue Press?
A: Do it! It's such a terribly difficult endeavor. Seek help. Get an editor. Copywriter. Layout. Project management. All of it. If not with Fifth Avenue Press, someone. Know there are writers 10 times worse than you who have books -- all because they had some help finishing. I'm one of them! You can do it, but try not to do it alone.
Q: Give us a short synopsis of the book.
A: Short answer: A collection of humorous, nostalgic essays looking back on a bullied childhood. And how I lived to write about it.
Full synopsis: Growing up is never easy. Growing up with bullies is even harder. And when you’re a skinny kid with no social skills, no athletic ability, and a speech impediment? You might as well be covered in bully bait. Bobby Fox was the boy eating alone in the cafeteria, playing alone at recess, and trying to stay away from the mean kids. But somehow, they always found him. And when they did, they tied him to a tree. Or tried to make him lick dog poop. Or got him in trouble with the police. But that didn’t stop Bobby. If he couldn’t play baseball, he’d make up his own version. If he didn’t have friends, he’d carry his pet Sea-Monkeys everywhere he went. And who wanted to play soccer at recess when there were holes to dig under the swings? No matter what the other kids said or did to him, Bobby always knew that someday, he’d be okay. His bullies didn’t defeat him. They simply gave him more to write about.
Q: What was the most enjoyable part of writing your book?
A: Turning negative experiences into something positive -- and most importantly -- funny and optimistic.
Q: What was the most difficult?
A: The editing process. The material was pretty raw to begin with and we -- my editor Alex Kourvo and I -- had a short window of time to get everything right, which includes trimming, revising, flat-out cutting, and even writing new pieces to create a cohesive, narrative thread. Even though it's a collection of individual essays, Alex really helped spin it into something with a narrative spine and thread.
Q: Do you have any writing rituals?
A: I have a really hard time writing at home. Too many distractions. Easy to fall asleep. I have two small children, so I do most of my writing after kids' bedtime. Or in the window of time between when my school day ends -- I teach at Huron High School -- and when I have to pick them up from school/daycare. So instead of falling asleep on the couch, I write until I fall asleep at a coffee shop or bar -- only half-kidding.
Q: People who like your book will also like ...
A: David Sedaris, Sarah Vowell, Augusten Burroughs, Justin Halpern, Bill Bryson, Sloane Crosley, Aziz Ansari, Mindy Kaling.
Q: What advice would you give other authors who would like to submit their works to Fifth Avenue Press?
A: You have nothing to lose! You get assigned a top-notch editor, you get to pick your own cover artist, you get fantastic layout, publicity, AND you get to keep all the royalties and the rights!
Q: Give us a short synopsis of the book.
A: Strange sightings are all around in this simply sweet story inspired by Ann Arbor's beloved Violin Monster. Rendered with loose, playful illustrations, this string-playing werewolf encourages readers to give scary things a second look.
Q: What was the most enjoyable part of writing your book?
A: Seeing the illustrations bring the text to life and working with the Fifth Ave Press staff who were so supportive and encouraging.
Q: What was the most difficult?
A: Finding just the right word or rhyme to go with the feeling of the book ... and then trying not to use that word on every page!
Q: Do you have any writing rituals?
A: Whenever I have a thought I try to write it down it before I lose it, that way I can always come back to it later and re-read it with fresh eyes.
Q: People who like your book will also like ...
A: Leap Back Home to Me by Lauren Thompson
Little Blue Truck by Alice Schertle and Jill McElmurry
Frances Stories by Russel Hoban
The Gruffalo by Julia Donaldson
The BFG by Roald Dahl
Q: What advice would you give other authors who would like to submit their works to Fifth Avenue Press?
A: Think about how your work might relate to the local community and convey how it's unique.
Q: Give us a short synopsis of the book.
A: Concise, vivid poems on themes of music, family, Jewish heritage, love, loss, and identity. Working in both free verse and structured forms.
Q: What was the most enjoyable part of writing your book?
A: The most enjoyable part of writing is the elusive instant when the parts of a poem click into place. It could be in the initial writing, or in the 10th draft. There is always a moment when ideas, sound, and meaning start to coalesce. So satisfying!
Q: What was the most difficult?
A: The most difficult part was putting the poems in a sensible order, thinking of transitions between subjects and styles.
Q: Do you have any writing rituals?
A: No writing rituals. Parts of poems, or fragments of lines, occur to me spontaneously (sometimes it seems arbitrarily). Then there is a lot of word jockeying and unplanned revision crammed in between other life activities.
Q: People who like your book will also like ...
A: I’m about to self-aggrandizingly lump myself in with some much better poets whom I really admire. People who like my work should, and probably will, also like Alicia Ostriker, Kay Ryan, Charles Simic, and Naomi Shihab Nye.
Q: What advice would you give other authors who would like to submit their works to Fifth Avenue Press?
A: Don’t hesitate! It’s a fun and fulfilling experience, and the library staff gives great help and advice. Writing and publishing a book is work that is fun, and fun that is work.
Q: Give us a short synopsis of the book.
A: The prison fence with its rows of razor wire stands as a powerful symbol, sending a message that the people inside are all bad and dangerous. The fence keeps people locked in, and it keeps the rest of us away from our fellow citizens who live behind bars. Judy Patterson Wenzel taught high school completion classes in prison in the only program beyond GED in the federal prison system and knew that the experiences with her students needed to be shared. Light From the Cage: 25 Years in a Prison Classroom spins out stories of and by the men she worked with as they accomplished the treasured goal of graduating from high school. The book is about journeys as both students and teacher work toward wholeness, men making amends for dropping out of school and becoming the students they were born to be, and the teacher learning as much as she teaches about what and how to teach her students. The book reveals a more complete understanding of the country and its continuing problems of racial injustice as the teacher witnesses the expansion of mass incarceration and the reality of more and more people of color filling her classes. Organized around themes of place, identity, community and the spiritual gifts of inclusion, gratitude, generosity and caring, these poignant and funny stories illuminate-old truths: Lines and fences cannot separate good people on one side and bad people on the other. And, the people we cast out and lock away often become sources of great wisdom and uncommon grace -- of light and love in a dark world.
Q: What was the most enjoyable part of writing your book?
A: Many of the men I taught were interesting and colorful characters, and what I loved most was writing about them to better remember who they were. I worked to describe them as accurately as I could by using vivid descriptions and dialogue with their own speech.
Q: What was the most difficult?
A: My biggest hurdle -- and one I failed at -- was developing an online platform big enough to attract an agent in New York. Talking to many groups about my students and my book was a joy and gave me needed energy to keep going.
Q: Do you have any writing rituals?
A: I didn't work seriously on the manuscript until after I retired. An old friend suggested I treat the writing like going to work every morning. That approach failed. It felt too much like the job I had just left. So, I worked on recognizing my own writing energy, and let that dictate when and how much I could get done.
Q: People who like your book will also like ...
A: Light from the Cage is about mass incarceration, racial injustice, and education. Three authors whose books guided me and gave me the encouragement to keep going were Michelle Alexander's The New Jim Crow, Bryan Stevenson's Just Mercy, and Shaka Senghor's Writing My Wrongs. Anything by Parker J. Palmer guided my teaching, especially The Courage to Teach and A Hidden Wholeness.
Q: What advice would you give other authors who would like to submit their works to Fifth Avenue Press?
A: My advice to other writers is to develop good self-care and get enough time away from your manuscript to allow for better perspective. Also, go for it and get it out there!
Q: Give us a short synopsis of the book.
A: From the back of the book: Ginger Visel contracted polio in the winter of 1950 when she was not yet 5 years old. Her life would never be the same. By the time the virus was through with her, she had a withered leg, weak muscles, and hip trouble that required multiple surgeries. The University of Michigan Hospital became a second home, the March of Dimes a reliable support system, and leg braces an everyday part of her wardrobe. In the era before ramps and automatic doors, Ginger had to learn to adapt to a world not built for her. Surrounded by 10 siblings and guided by an unstoppable mother, she met every challenge with determination and an unshakable faith in God. With equal parts cheerful humor and honest vulnerability, Ginger recalls desperately trying to fit in at school, the terror of learning to drive a hand-controlled car, the near-impossibility of finding an accessible college, and the worry that she’d never get married and have a family of her own. Both a universal coming of age story and a look at the complexities of being disabled before the ADA, Ginger Stands Her Ground is an inspiring story of the meaning of family, the importance of faith, and the ultimate triumph of love.
Q: What was the most enjoyable part of writing your book?
A: Being able to write about my family. There's so many of them and they're so diversified, and I can look at them from the time they were little to how they ended up. I think that's interesting.
Q: What was the most difficult?
A: You know the literary term "bleeding on the page"? To open up about the emotional part of polio, that was the hardest part. Bleeding on the page.
Q: Do you have any writing rituals?
A: I live at Portage Lake. Just park me anywhere on the property, set me up with a yellow legal pad, sharp No. 2 pencils, a cup of coffee or fruit smoothie and I'm good to go.
Q: People who like your book will also like ...
A: I just read a ton of memoirs. Michael J. Fox's Lucky Man; he has Parkinson's. He was a good model for me. I liked his humor and I liked his love of his family. It was positive, too. I teach elementary school, so I have to put in my very favorite children's book: Charlotte's Web by E.B. White. A lot my book is from a child's point of view and I could relate to E.B. White like nobody's business. Also:
Gift From the Sea by Anne Morrow Lindbergh
The Florist's Daughter by Patricia Hampl
The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd
Sea Glass by Anita Shreve
The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls
Q: What advice would you give other authors who would like to submit their works to Fifth Avenue Press?
A: Don't rush through your work. Give it the gift of time. Go over it again and again until you've done your very best and then go for it. You'll know when it's time.
Christopher Porter is a library technician and the editor of Pulp.
Fifth Avenue Press' book release reception is Sunday, Nov. 5, 1-3 pm on the third floor of the Ann Arbor District Library, 345 S. Fifth Ave. Visit aadl.org for more information.