Our Contributing Writers put their best work on TMN, but their second-best work often ends up between book covers, raved about by critics and enjoyed worldwide! Here are the most recent books by our staff, all available for purchase from Powells.com or your local independent bookstore—the important thing is that you buy them!
The Creative License: Giving Yourself Permission to be the Artist You Truly Are by Danny Gregory (Hyperion)When Danny Gregory’s life was turned upside down by tragedy, he learned to cope by teaching himself to draw. The result was a complete transformation of his life, his priorities, his career, and the way he saw the world. In handwritten chapters full of his lush watercolor illustrations, Danny now offers readers a program for reconnecting to their own creative energies, using drawing as an example. He gently instructs us in the art of allowing ourselves to fail, giving up the expectation of perfection and opening our eyes to the beauty around us. The result is the permission to express ourselves fully and take part in the creative process without fear. Artist or not, readers of all stripes will find inspiration in this unique and beautiful book. |
The Believer Book of Writers Talking to Writers (includes an interview by Robert Birnbaum, Believer Books)Believer Books has collected, in alphabetical order, twenty-three conversations and correspondences between much-admired writers and the writers they admire. The interviews include favorites gleaned from the pages of the Believer magazine along with previously unpublished conversations. The book is rife with astonishing insights and profound quips. To wit: “All of these declarations of what writing ought to be, which I had myself—though, thank god I had never committed them to paper—I think are nonsense. You write what you write, and then either it holds up or it doesn’t hold up. There are no rules or particular sensibilities. I don’t believe in that at all anymore.” —Jamaica Kincaid, speaking with Robert Birnbaum |
Gary Benchley, Rock Star by Paul Ford (Plume)Originally serialized here on TMN, Gary Benchley, Rock Star is the coming-of-age story of Gary Benchley, a callow, indie-rock-obsessed 22-year-old who arrives in New York City from Albany, New York, with rock star dreams and great ambition—only to learn that life is more expensive (and more demanding) than he’d ever imagined. “Poignant and smart.” —The New York Post “For anyone now in their 30s with past musical ambitions, it’s a funny, rueful read.” —Publisher’s Weekly “Benchley’s tale turns out to be warm, human, and surprisingly sweet.” —Entertainment Weekly |
Fondling Your Muse: Infallible Advice from a Published Author to the Writerly Aspirant by John Warner (Writer’s Digest)“When I set out to write my New York Times best-selling book, I turned not to Strunk. Nor to White. But to Warner. Why? Because, unlike those other two cheap bastards, he sent me his book for free.” —Michael Ian Black (very famous celebrity, television’s The State) “This book should be required reading in schools. It’s funnier than A Separate Peace, shorter than Catcher in the Rye, and more instructive than To Kill a Mockingbird. Which, let’s face it, has very little to say on the subject of mockingbirds, and the killing thereof.” —Tim Carvell (Emmy-award-winning writer, The Daily Show) |
Cast of Shadows by Kevin Guilfoile (Alfred A. Knopf)How far would you go to look into the face of your daughter’s murderer? A bereaved doctor undertakes a diabolical experiment in a shattering philosophical thriller that anticipates the moral, social, and metaphysical dilemmas science is poised to confront. “A spellbinding novel…Mature, intelligent, stylishly written.” —Rick Kogan, Chicago Tribune “Gripping…Mr Guilfoile’s tricky, high-concept plot continually subverts and plays with the reader’s expectations.” —Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times “A masterpiece of intelligent plotting.” —Laura Miller, Salon |
Twelve Times Lost by Kevin Fanning (So New Media)This striking novella is an exploration of the fantasy and cruelty of memory. In spare, echoing prose, Kevin Fanning evokes a world where the distinction between waking and dreaming is as thin as perception, and we are haunted by what we choose to believe. “I read Twelve Times Lost when I feel lost. I can find it whenever I want.” —Deftone.com |
About Grace by Anthony Doerr (Penguin/Putnam)“Doerr traverses again the territory he had marked out in the stories of his lucent first book, the short-story collection The Shell Collector (2002): a rapture with nature expressed in prose that sings off the page; an infinitely subtle algebra of resonance and sympathy between minds, lives, objects, light, senses, weather; the majestic indifference of nature; the proper measure of man against natural forces. Doerr has a compulsion for observation and a passion for nature that borders on the religious.” —Neel Mukherjee, The New York Times “To say this book is beautiful, extraordinary or moving is futile. In comparison with Anthony Doerr’s word-perfect prose, any description of his first novel seems trite. Just buy About Grace, call in sick, switch off the phone and see for yourself how good contemporary fiction can be.” —Elena Seymenliyska, The Guardian “I loved this wonderful book—its strangeness, its obsessiveness, its beautiful sentences.” —Monica Ali, author of Brick Lane |
The Magician’s Study: A Guided Tour of the Life, Times, and Memorabilia of Robert “The Great” Rouncival by Tobias Seamon (Turtle Point Press)“Required reading—Take a whirl through the Jazz Age and the enchanted study of an all-too-human magician as he finds fame and succumbs to the darker charms of magic.” —New York Post ”[An] ingenious first novel…Seamon’s stylistic inventiveness and skill with memorable characterizations are nothing short of breathtaking. Rouncival and his colorful entourage herald the arrival of a major new talent.” —Booklist ”With such a brilliant cast of characters, Seamon can hardly go wrong. Imagination carries his story along at a crackling clip.” —Sydney Morning Herald |
Bending Heaven: Stories by Jessica Francis Kane (Counterpoint)“Bending Heaven is that rarest of debut collections: grounded but thoughtful, learned without being pretentious. Jessica Francis Kane’s stories take place in what feels like Lorrie Moore and Alice Munro country—they smartly uncork the heartache, panic and frustration of characters caught in situations that expose their vulnerability…Bending Heaven feels like the work of a writer who has a lot more to say.” —The New York Times Book Review |
