Bookslut

An Interview with James Hannaham

One of the things a novel teaches you to do is write it. I didn’t realize that until I was way into it. Once you know how to write it, you know how to write it. You just know what his voice sounds like. That’s kind of how I ended up editing a lot of it. You just start to hear voices in your head. When I read this book, I start out trying to use my own voice, and I start sliding into a southern accent. by Drew Toal

An Interview with Colm Toibin

I suppose I was trying to, for once, write about what happiness looks like. And then of course, I said, “I’m not good at this.” For the reader it looks like happiness. But of course, for Eilis, it looks like a sort of trap. There are moments where she’s watching Tony. And it’s about Ireland and America. If you have an Irish guy who’s all charm he doesn’t mean it. And you meet his darkness and you’re searching for how much darkness is there. You need to see him drunk. You need to see him using very bad language. You need to see him in a rage. And then you’ll know him. But don’t bother with his charm. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Irish people can do charm. And we don’t mean it. So her problem is an entirely cultural one. She cannot find anything beneath the charm. And if it’s just charm then that’s fine with her. But she can’t deal with it when it’s coming in her direction. Because she doesn’t do charm. She does something else… by Paul Morton

Polyamorously Perverse

I was looking forward to reading The Ethical Slut from a luxurious distance, making fun of its self-help exercises and probably turning up my prudish nose at its sex-positive sensibility. So, imagine my surprise when I found out that it is entirely inclusive of people who choose monogamy (as I did in the past), people who aren’t getting laid because they can’t find a willing partner they are attracted to (me now!), people who don’t want to get laid, and, well, basically everyone. And, imagine my even greater surprise when I started loving the book in all its thoughtful sluttiness, enough that I wanted to talk about it. by Elizabeth Bachner

An Interview with Catherynne M. Valente

Take a whole lot of the present, make it faster, shinier, smaller, and noisier, and you've got the future. Minus a few more antediluvian morals if we're lucky, plus a few dystopian tantrums if we're not. Eventually, like it or not, and frankly, I don't, the paper book will die, whether from lack of resources to make them or lack of offline audience to buy them. Fiction, as a whole, will go electronic, at the least. That ship has already sailed. The question is only who will make money from the new model, who will protect authors, how will readers sift through a nearly infinite supply of text? How will it actually work? by Selena Chambers

Wild Justice: Morality in Dogs, Elephants, and Rats (and Yes, Apes!)

Here, morality is defined as “a suite of interrelated other-regarding behaviors that cultivate and regulate complex interactions within social groups.” Bekoff and Pierce go broad with their definition on purpose, because “giving a broad description that encompasses [morality’s] diversity and range is going to give it more meaning, not less.”  by Barbara J. King

An Interview with Reif Larsen

I think a lot of people are married to a map is a geographical object. For me a map is a way of making meaning of the world around us on some kind of paper or screen or whatever it is. It’s that meaning making, or the translation, that’s the important part. I love maps often because they show so much about the mapmaker. I realize the book is kind of gently pressing up against the definition of what a map is. I hope in some ways it expands the conversation. I think a very good map or a personal map is very personal or emotional.  by Michele Filgate