At Electric Literature, in a fascinating conversation with J.R. Ramakrishnan, author Marie-Helene Bertino explains how she used time as a storytelling device in her latest novel, Parakeet. “I very much wanted to do to time, to use everything I could possibly think of, on a page with time, to help tell the story of time, of how sometimes it reverses, rewinds, moves faster and moves slower, the way it does when you’re in a catastrophic incident, and the way you do for every moment after that incident. The trauma forever changes you. Anytime you remember something, you re-experience it and time works in that same way on you again. It was a literal representation of how time begins to move independent of logic,” Bertino says. “I was focusing on trauma, but I think it works the same way when you’re in love. Days can feel like years when you’re waiting for a loved one to return or when you’re waiting to see your child or when you’re waiting to give birth to your child. There is nothing emotional that doesn’t land on time somehow. I was very literally trying to represent that.”
Marie-Helene Bertino on Manipulating Time in Fiction
Scottish Book Sculptures
Someone’s been leaving book sculptures in Scottish libraries. They’re exquisite.
So Tired Today
Recommended Reading: Year in Reading alumna Roxane Gay on the importance and exhaustion of continually bearing witness.
All In The Family
“It will be as long as a book, about 65,000 words. I’m writing my story, weaving together what life is like for LGBT people in Oklahoma and my story of growing up there as well.” Starting this week, Oral Roberts’ grandson, Randy Roberts Potts, is publishing his memoir on Instagram. The Bible Went Down with Birdie Jean takes the form of 300 individual posts, and tells the story of Potts’ rejection from his family alongside interviews with LGBT students at Oral Roberts University. Earlier this year we also considered what might make the Next Great Gay Novel.
A Tale of Two Daredevils
In The Guardian, our own Mark O’Connell reviews TransAtlantic, the new novel by Year in Reading alum Colum McCann. If you’ll recall, we featured the book in our Great 2013 Book Preview.
Curiosities
Olsson’s, a small chain that was an old standby among Washington D.C. independent bookstores, is likely to file for bankruptcy. It was the stores’ ample music sections and gentrification that contributed most to its downfall. “‘The book business is getting a little soft. It’s not selling as much as it used to,’ Olsson said. ‘Our music sales went from 50 percent of our business to maybe 15. We lost a lot of revenue, and at the same time rents went up and real estate taxes went up. I don’t know what we would have done differently. It’s a killer.'”The linguistic capabilities of modern world leaders. Well done, Pope, well done.For those whose fantasies involve real estate: Private Islands for SaleAnd a pair of audio items:Nam Le’s The Boat is getting rave reviews. Here he visits The Leonard Lopate Show.Garth covered the PEN World Voices Tribute to Robert Walser. Interested readers can now listen to the entire event.