In the first pages of Carmen Boullosa’s powerful yet whimsical novel Texas: The Great Theft, we are introduced to dozens of characters – butchers and lawyers and chicken dealers and grocers and judges and escaped slaves and housemaids and vaqueros, Mexicans and Americans and Indians and Africans and Germans – everyone trying to survive in the precarious, often violent territory between the Rio Bravo and Nueces rivers. It’s a place bursting with stories, a place where every perspective – no matter how small or marginalized – has something to add to the conversation. The story begins with an insult. It’s…
Posts Tagged with writing
Playlist for “The Midnight Man”
These songs served as inspiration for my first novel, “The Midnight Man.” I’d listen to them while writing, jogging, driving in the car, whatever. Listen up, there’s some powerful stuff here.
A Post-Graduate DIY MFA Reading List
If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Another reading list for another novel.
DIY MFA Reading List: “Our Story Begins” by Tobias Wolff
Tobias Wolff’s stories are honest, heartfelt and moving. Our stories, indeed.
DIY MFA Reading List: “Geronimo Rex” by Barry Hannah
Barry Hannah sings a drunken ode to youth, beauty and the power of language.
DIY MFA Reading List: “Disgrace” by J.M. Coetzee
South Africa after apartheid is no country for old men in J.M. Coetzee’s “Disgrace”