As previously mentioned, I foisted Edward St. Aubyn's last book (Mother's Milk) upon nearly everyone I know after reading it in 2005. It was published here by Open City and enjoyed a bit of extra publicity in when it was shortlisted for the Booker in 2006. Nonetheless, St. Aubyn doesn't seem to be as well known in the U.S. as in his native U.K., so I still recommend it constantly, along with his previously published trilogy, Some Hope.
So I was happy to see that Mother's Milk just won the Prix Femina Etranger. The Times on Sunday has an interview on the subject here. It talks a bit about St. Aubyn's two earlier novels, On The Edge and A Clue to the Exit, both of which I was desperate to read after finishing the trilogy and finally found via Amazon UK used books, although it made me $100 poorer because those books were apparently out of print at the time. Fortunately, recent accolades seem to have convinced Picador to republish them with a Feb 1 '08 pub date, so you can get them now via Amazon UK for the (relatively) low, low price of £ 4.75. (On the Edge takes place at Esalen, by the way--a detail of which should make it of interest to at least half of yuppie Brooklyn.)
One of my best friends, Dana Vachon (below), has a novel coming out in April (from Riverhead/Penguin). It's called Mergers & Acquisitions, and it is now available for pre-order on Amazon. Very exciting! The D-Nasty, as he is otherwise known, is a screamingly funny writer and the book is hilarious.
I just finished reading Nic Kelman's Girls in galley. It's dark and a bit psychologically manipulative, so of course I liked it. (The PR material compared it to "Damage," which is one of my favorites.) The book's essentially about a Wall Street type who's obsessed with power and has a predatory thing for younger women. American Psycho meets Lolita, interspersed with little bits of the Illiad and the Aeneid (literally.) It's written in second person, which is a little annoying and seems gimmicky, but the writing's very good. I don't know that it's a great "novel" per se, as it seems more like a series of vignettes than a cohesive narrative, but I couldn't put it down. It's the appeal of car-wreck voyeurism. I read it in less than a day.
Interestingly, the book was blurbed by four people, three with which I have some familiarity—Kurt Andersen, James Frey and JT Leroy—and none of whom I could imagine in the same room together, much less liking the same type of books.
Rob and Lockhart want me to explain myself re: Saturday's Dave Eggers reading.
Lock: "look who's slumming it in our little neighborhood, stepping waaaaay over the post-ironic line by actually showing up at the Eggers reading..."
Rob: "Boro6 went to trivia night at The Slipper Room yesterday evening, but we were left puzzled as to the whereabouts of quiz regular Elizabeth Spiers. Turns out she was nearby trying - unsuccessfully - to get into a reading by Dave Eggers. [Boro6 resident Eurotrash was also there.] Lockhart Steele points out that Spiers crossed the irony line by actually showing up alongside the doe-eyed high school girls, but Boro6 finds greater offense in her unwillingness to cry privilege to get in the door. What's the point of being quasi-famous if you don't have the stones to throw your weight around once in awhile? Liz Smith would have gotten in, you can bet your ass on that."
First of all, bloggers should never refer to themselves in third person plural. (*cough* Rob *cough*.) I read that and think, "When Bob Dole gets elected President, Bob Dole will take all the people Bob Dole doesn't like and tell them to shove it." Who is this mysterious "we"? Your other personality?
I'd make fun of Lockhart but I've already threatened to do a Gawker version Punk'd wherein we'd nail plywood to various Lower East Side facades and send him scrambling around the neighborhood frantically peering around boarded up storefronts in search of new restaurants.
But regarding Eggers:
It was Maccer's idea. I was drugged and dragged. Guns were held to my head.
But then again, Rob, I don't know that admitting that I went to an Eggers reading (whose books I've never actually read) is anymore embarrassing than you admitting that you went to quiz night.
But I digress...
Ernest Hemingway: Gin.
Bartender: So Charles Dickens was in here two days ago.
Ernest Hemingway: Joyce already told me that story. Fuck off.
Literary bar jokes [Iowablog via TMN]