California Shorts

Editied by Steven Gilbar, California Shorts includes my short story One Way

Short stories by twenty-two of America's most talented writers reveal some of the remarkable worlds that comprise modern California: the fast-paced urban centers of Los Angeles and San Francisco, the farmlands of the Central Valley, the lakes of the Sierra Nevada, the deserts, beaches, small towns, ranches, and redwood forests. Each story plunges the reader among people whose lives are variously chaotic, quirky, heroic, desperate, driven, or redemptive, but always compelling. Here, we witness a Japanese immigrant's lonely new life, the emotional upheaval of a couple after an earthquake, a California Indian girl's coming of age, a black runaway's search for shelter and companionship, a fire lookout's encounter with a disturbing visitor atop Mount Whitney. California Shorts provides a vivid, moving, and unforgettable portrait of the many faces of California. It also convincingly shows the vitality and power of today's short story, which, as editor Steven Gilbar notes, "more than any other literary form, best captures contemporary California on the wing." This is American writing at its best.

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The word California conjures up a variety of images: a land of dreams as well as devastating riots; a place harboring the wildest of ideas alongside the most conservative of agendas; deserts, sunny beaches, fog-drenched coastal expanses, and snowcapped mountains. California has sleepy Central Valley towns that give the impression they have changed little in decades, booming metropolitan areas, and communities that have been rebuilt after being destroyed by floods, earthquakes, and other disasters. Above all, it is home to millions of people of every imaginable background.

In short, you name it, we've got it. And much of it is on display in Heyday Books' latest anthology, California Shorts, a strong, entertaining, and challenging collection of 21 short stories by authors who live here or have lived here long enough to capture some of its wonderful idiosyncrasies.

It's a book with great provenance: winners of PEN Oakland/Josephine Miles, PEN/Faulkner, and PEN/Hemingway awards; a former Stegner Fellow at Stanford University; and a recipient of the John Dos Passos Prize for Literature are represented here. Included are such well-established writers as Alice Adams, Gina Berriault, and T. Coraghessan Boyle, along with more recently established literary stars such as Chitra Divakaruni (Arranged Marriage, The Mistress of Spices, and Sisters of My Heart), Dagoberto Gilb (The Magic of Blood and The Last Known Residence of Mickey Acuna), and Greg Sarris (Grand Avenue and Watermelon Nights). There are also plenty of stories by talented, prolific writers such as Gerald Haslam and Jess Mowry -- those who rarely appear on best-seller lists yet produce imaginative work all too often overlooked in the rush to judge literature in terms of sales figures.

Most importantly, California Shorts sticks to your hands and melts in your mind. It offers tales that will haunt your dreams and have you looking over your shoulder to see if the characters are sitting behind you on a bus or driving next to you on freeways or city streets. It will leave you wanting more -- additional California Shorts collections and more work by the authors whose stories are showcased in this provocative and entertaining book.

Brotherman

Edited by Herb Boyd and Robert L. Allen, Brotherman includes an excerpt from my novel Way Past Cool

The powerful opening excerpt by Frederick Douglass evokes his boyhood as a slave, and the collection closes with an eloquent discussion of the race problem today by Cornel West. A distinguished addition to black studies."

The purpose of this extraordinary anthology is made abundantly clear by the editors' stated intention: "to create a living mosaic of essays and stories in which Black men can view themselves, and be viewed without distortion." In this, they have succeeded brilliantly. Brotherman contains more than one hundred and fifty selections, some never before published--from slave narratives, memoirs, social histories, novels, poems, short stories, biographies, autobiographies, position papers, and essays. Brotherman books us passage to the world that Black men experience as adolescents, lovers, husbands, fathers, workers, warriors, and elders. On this journey they encounter pain, confusion, anger, and love while confronting the life-threatening issues of race, sex, and politics--often as strangers in a strange land. The first collection of its kind, Brotherman gathers together a multitude of voices that add a new, unforgettable chapter to American cultural identity.

Publishers Weekly (starred review)

From Booklist
The editors have swept widely but sensitively through African American literature, producing not only a forceful anthology but the first one devoted exclusively to male writings. More than 100 entries appear, some in full text, others in excerpted form (and some never previously published). Fiction is matched in eloquence and effect by nonfiction pieces, including slave narratives, autobiographies and biographies, and essays and poems. New voices stand strongly next to those of the past; famous individuals don't overshadow those who are less so. One minute, readers will believe they have read the most vigorous selection--Paul Laurence Dunbar's short story, "The Lynching of Jube Benson," for example--but then readers will turn to another page to find something that sends their mind reeling even further--for instance, the excerpt from Wallace Terry's book Bloods, an oral history of black veterans in the Vietnam War. For all literature collections.
--Brad Hooper

September 11
West Coast Writers Approach Ground Zero

Edited by Jeff Meyers, September 11 includes my eassay We Have Met The Enemy And He Is U.S.

Physical distance doesn't mean emotional or intellectual remove: in Seattle poet Meyers's anthology of diverse voices, 34 writers from the left coast weigh in on September 11 in poems, meditations, personal essays and polemics. Ken Kesey quotes heartfelt e-mails from his Web site, intrepidtrips.com; Alice Walker expresses her desire for "blessing and protection"; Jess Mowry (Way Past Cool) condemns U.S. policy (I have met the enemy and he is U.S.A); Lawrence Ferlinghetti muses how "in a blinding flash America became a part of/the scorched earth of the world." New and vociferous patriots beware: many of the contributors share criticism as strong as their grief.

Publishers Weekly

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DAVID KIPEN A West Coast perspective on terror
David Kipen Saturday, September 7, 2002 San Francisco Chronicle

At press time, Amazon.com comes back with 149 results in the category of "September 11 Terrorist Attacks." These include two titles from New York Times staffers and one from a former New York Daily News gossip columnist and his wife, a threesome disconcertingly labeled the "Most popular results for September 11 Terrorist Attacks."

There's another title, though, way down Amazon's hit parade, that deserves attention. It's "September 11: West Coast Writers Approach Ground Zero," edited by Jeff Meyers and published by Portland's new Hawthorne Press. This book has some highly thoughtful contributions that should be read with care on both coasts, and even in between.

Among the book's 34 essayists, memoirists and poets are, just for local starters, such lights as Etel Adnan, Susie Bright, Tom Clark, Joshua Clover, Peter Coyote, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Maxine Hong Kingston, Genny Lim, Beth Lisick, Jess Mowry, Ishmael Reed, Floyd Salas and Alice Walker.

Children Of The Night

Edited by Gloria Naylor, Children Of The Night includes my short story Crusader Rabbit

The "best" short stories seems an oddly cliquish categorization for any treasury of African American writing, if only because black authors have long expressed displeasure at their own exclusion from the canon. Yet this superb collection lives up to its billing; the 37 stories unabashedly depict the great diversity of black life. Compiled by Naylor (The Women of Brewster Place), the anthology includes such familiar names as Alice Walker, Maya Angelou, Charles Johnson, Ralph Ellison, Jamaica Kincaid and Ntozake Shange, and such relative newcomers as Edwige Danticat. In their tales, characters normally found in the wings of fiction move to center stage, and some conventional literary perspectives (as perceived by white Americans) are turned inside out. In the stories about slavery, literature challenges mythical history as a source of authority about the past. Sherley Anne Williams's "Meditation on History" is by turns ironic and heartrending in its account of a slave uprising from the points of view of the aggrieved, patronizing master and the desperate slaves. Likewise, depictions of plantation life by John Edgar Wideman, Samuel Delaney and Carolivia Herron explode the nostalgic myth of gentility and loss exemplified by Gone with the Wind. James Baldwin's "Tell Me How Long the Train's Been Gone," as well as coming-of-age narratives by Toni Cade Bambara and Harold Gordon, features protagonists looking back to that moment when their vague, pervasive uneasiness culminates in bitter recognition of disenfranchisement. Freed from ideological constraints, many of the writers lead their characters bravely through the shadowy realm of racial ambivalence. The collection, in fact, highlights an African American tradition that has itself come of age, one that is poised to irrevocably alter the country's literary sensibilities.

Publishers Weekly

Shiny Adidas, Tracksuits, And The Death Of Camp

Shiny Adidas... includes my essay Wake Up America There's Gangs Under Your Beds

This collection of essays from the late, lamented Might magazine deserves a place on any post-boomer's bookshelf. Shiny Adidas Tracksuits bristles with interesting thoughts and novel turns of phrase; most pieces are short (fewer than five pages), and all are well written and precisely observed.

Referring to Might's editorial principles, the editors write: "One rule was that every issue of Might had to have a lot of swearing in it, ideally in the headlines. Another rule was that, even though we had about a month or two to put each issue together, the magazine had to go to press with somewhere between thirty and forty egregious spelling and grammatical errors. But the one rule that really got us into trouble, the one that basically doomed us from the start, was this one: We would not publish anything we didn't care about.... In observing this rule, the one that said we had to like the things we printed, we were precluded from publishing the sorts of things that might have kept the magazine afloat: namely articles about celebrities, clothes, electronics, makeup, cars, video games, beer, nightlife generally, and beer." Instead, the writers in Shiny Adidas Tracksuits and the Death of Camp describe quirky personal quests, examine pop-culture doodads, and spout crackpot theories. The book, like the magazine, somehow avoids the creeping contagion of irony and remains absolutely fresh, vigorous, and friendly.

Apart from David Foster Wallace, most contributors aren't national commodities (which is sort of the point), but they deserve to be, and deserve your attention. This book is a fitting epitaph to a sparkler of a magazine. --Michael Gerber

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Prepare yourself for the best and brightest from Might magazine. These provocative accounts of cultural chaos tackle every tacky and/or annoying issue that has made the 20th century so ripe for the Apocalypse -- from the lost diaries of H.R. Haldeman to David Hasselhoff's world tour. Includes:

"The Perverse Blessing of AIDS" by David Foster Wallace

"Are Black People Cooler Than White People?" by Donnell Alexander

"Hey America! There's Gangs Under Your Bed!" by Jess Mowry

"The Future of Indentured Servitude" by R.U. Sirius

"College is for Suckers" by Ted Rall

"Get Out the Youth Vote, Then Get the Hell Out" by Marc Herman

"The T-Shirt: More Problems of Signification in American Low Culture" by Glasgow Phillips

"The Unsavory Rise of Faux-Caesar Salad" by Heidi Pollock

"The Tragic and Untimely Death of Adam Rich" by Christopher Pelham-Fence

"Why I Went Right Wing" by Paula Kramen

And much, much more!

School Is Not Cool

Edited by Steen Fiil and Inger Lehmann, School Is Not Cool includes an excerpt from my novel Way Past Cool

Forward:

English for all its restrictive, complicated, colonial aspects, is a remarkably adaptable and accepting literary language, full of nuance. flexiblity, minute coloration, as well as the possibility of growth from without. I never hear regarding English what I do of French in France, that he or she "knows perfect English". Except in the minds of fifth grade teachers and members of usage panels, there is no perfect English -- not in America anyway, and certainly not for the purpose of imaginative writing. There is only interesting English, vivid English (or) boring English.

Richard Ford, in The Granta Book of the American Short Story

The Penguin Book Of The City

Edited by Robert Drew, The Penguin Book of the City includes my short story Crusader Rabbit

Symbol of humanity's energy, optimisim, art and civilization, the city is the fount of intellectual and sexual freedom -- a continuing source of wonder and modernity. And yet, in uncaring mood, the city can be overbearing, annonymous, alienating, even savage -- with the ability to chill the soul.
The urban life, with all its challenges, pleasures and angst, is the theme of The Penguin Book of the City, an outstanding international collection of short stories selected by Robert Drewe. In their wonderful variety, they are as different -- and impressive -- as Paris and Los Angeles, London and Tokyo.
Deeply moving, wryly cynical, blackly humorous, these twenty-nine stories by today's most intriguing writers will leave you gasping. Set against the backdrop of some of our great cities, they reflect the extraordinary power and mystery of the city itself.

Where Coyotes Howl And Wind Blows Free

Edited by Alexandra B. Haslam, Where Coyotes Howl and Wind Blows Free includes my short story Animal Rights

The unifying theme for these 35 selections is that all the authors grew up in the American West and are writing to relate some aspect of that experience. Although generally of high quality, some of the works are better than others, and each will appeal to a different audience. The real impact of the collection, however, is found in the wide variety of ethnic groups represented; many voices from our country, each with different experiences and culturally varied responses to the remarkably similar emotional process of growing up. The editors chose well, providing for variety of style as well as diversity of viewpoint. This would be a wonderful tool for any unit with a multicultural bent, as well as a source for coming-of-age tales for those youths looking for something that addresses their culture in this country.

BookList - Jeanne Triner

Listening To Ourselves

Listening To Ourselves includes my short story Animal Rights

This is a solid collection of short stories that were originally read on the National Public Radio program that Cheuse and Marshall produce. Although Michener posits that these are "the writers who will ultimately replace Saul Bellow and Eudora Welty," names like Ann Beattie and Paul Theroux are already more than familiar. John Edgar Wideman offers a surprising sketch in the voice of a baby thrown into an incinerator on the day it is born, and Jess Mowry portrays a TV-entranced boy who, in order to forget the abuse he has suffered, must forget everything, including his own name.

But the other stories focus on small moments that change the lives of ordinary people. Pinckney Benedict's boy narrator risks ridicule when he follows his father's advice and takes some friends to a junkyard to see the petrified bodies of a family in a car. Ken Chowder's drifter finds himself fast-forwarding through the videotape of a close friend's funeral after having missed the real thing. Faye Moskowitz's high school teacher identifies women she sees on the streets of France with a former troubled student who ran away from home at 12 and had an abortion.

Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Strange Attraction
The First Ten Years of Zyzzyva

Edited by Howard Junker, Strange Attraction includes my short story Crusader Rabbit

An important quarterly for West Coast writers, ZYZZYVA joins an elite handful of literary magazines in celebrating its tenth anniversary. In honor of that celebration, a collection of ZYZZYVA's greatest hits from 1985 to 1994 has been assembled. Strange Attraction is an unusual and valuable anthology of contemporary writing in the Pacific states. Contributors include: Sherman Alexie, Alison Baker, Po Bronson, Peter Coyote, Robert Hass, Jess Mowry, Gary Snyder, and Lois-Ann Yamanaka. Named among the best anthologies of 1995.
Critics Choice.

Cornerstones
Edited by Melvin Donaldson, Cornerstones includes my short story Crusader Rabbit

From Olaudah Equiano's slave narrative to Queen Latifah's rap lyrics, this anthology captures the intricate history and diverse voices of African American literature. Readers will find here a rich collection of songs, sermons, and folktales from the oral tradition, as well as poetry, fiction, drama, nonfiction, and literary criticism by established and emerging writers.

This anthology provides a broad representation of African American writers, with 166 selections that span six genres -- oral tradition, poetry, fiction, drama, nonfiction prose, and literary criticism. Selected writers are examined in Focused Studies.

Something About The Author
Published by Gale Group

This is a reference book of young-adult author bios and autobios.

In The Tradition

Edited by Kevin Powell and Ras Baraka, In The Tradition includes my short story Animal Rights

In The Tradition is a provocative collection of works by some of America's most articulate young writers. Covering subjects which range from politics to love, this book crystallizes for its readers that the younger generation of Black poets and fiction writers have a serious grasp of the perils that beset their lives, their families and friends, their community -- the writing is strong, intelligent and mature.

In The Tradition explores sexism, racism, homophobia, Black-on-Black violence, the generation gap, police brutality and other issues, candidly. Like their predecessors, these new wordsmiths are in the tradition of tellin' it like it is, determined that their voices and the voices of their contemporaries will be heard and read and felt throughout the '90s and beyond.

Follow That Dream

Edited by Bitten Arildsen and Chris Plougheld, Follow That Dream includes my short story Crusader Rabbit

The Pushcart Prize, Best Of The Small Presses (1991-1992)

Edited by Bill Henderson, this edition includes my short story One Way

The big divide seems to be between the free spirits who sit down every morning to speak their minds without first calculating the market for it, and staff writers in what I call mule trains -- well-fed, nicely harnessed. with bits in their mouths and bottoms upraised for the whip of an editor -- who write cover stories for Time or dance in attendance upon the mindset of Vanity Fair, perhaps on retainer.

Stubborn, foolhardy, profitless writing -- the small press ideal -- may free one to say something new.

Edward Hoagland.

Free Within Ourselves: Fiction Lessons for Black Authors

Written by Jewell Parker Rhodes, this book includes my short story Crusader Rabbit

"We build our temples for tomorrow, as strong as we know how, and we stand on top of the mountain, free within ourselves." -- LANGSTON HUGHES, The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain, The Nation (1926)

"Good writing demands your whole self - writing freely, without limits, from your unique connections to your world. As an African American, you have incredible riches to draw upon, including a bittersweet history which created a new ethnic group capable of transforming heartache into art." -- Jewell Parker Rhodes

Author Dr. Jewell Parker Rhodes, professor of American literature at Arizona Sate University and recipient of the National Endowment of the Arts Award in Fiction, offers help to artists and visionaries in Free Within Ourselves: Fiction Lessons for Black Authors. Not only is Free Within Ourselves a top-notch writer's guide filled with practical guidance, essays, journal exercises and resources for publishing fiction, it is also a celebration of African American identity, culture and art.

"Never (in four years of college or five years of graduate school) was I assigned an exercise or given a story example that included a person of color. While the educational system and the publishing world have become progressively more welcoming of African-American authors, there is still little attention to educating, supporting, and sustaining the writing process of African-American authors," Rhodes explains in her introduction. Now, for the first time, Free Within Ourselves offers a step-by-step guide to fictional technique and publishing know-how, tailored to the specific needs of African American writers.

Free Within Ourselves runs the gamut of the intricate process of novel writing from emotional preparation, to specific writing techniques, to timeless sources of African American literary inspiration. Divided into four uplifting and informative sections, this book leaves no detail untouched.