When I was a kid, for Lunar New Year we went and bowed to our parents and received red envelopes full of money to go and celebrate. We also made this soup, which you’re supposed to make and eat for good luck. For the record we used beef bullion as well. Other things: My friend [...]
Entries from January 2009
January 22, 2009
January 22, 2009
Before I leave to go back to Paris for more research, I have a lunch with my friend Sabina Murray, in which she describes what I think is the perfect method for doing research for fiction: “I read everything I need and then when I start writing I reread the parts that are necessary in [...]
January 9, 2009
Books You Have Waited For Late At Night When You Had Nothing To Read
Miles From Nowhere, Nami Mun, Riverhead – Nami Mun’s novel in stories, Miles From Here, the life of a Korean American runaway in the Bronx , is the book I hoped existed after I finished reading Denis Johnson’s Jesus’ Son in 1994. So, that’s a long time, but, it’s here. The Torturer’s Wife, Thomas Glave, [...]
January 6, 2009
Honoré de Balzac Used Coffee to Write La Comédie Humaine and That’s Good Enough For Me
Scene: My office, yesterday afternoon. I’m making tea for my friend and collaborator Teddy after a short lunch at Veracruzana. Teddy [looking out window]: Uh oh. Someone spelled “CRYSTAL” out there on the soccer field. Amherst! Me: I guess it’s time to have the annual “Hitler’s Drug of Choice” conversation.
