(Dora: A Headcase, the book trailer)
Actually, it wasn’t on my way home.
It was afterward. Way afterward. Yesterday, in fact.
After reading and loving Dora: A Headcase by Lidia Yuknavitch, I stumbled upon her book trailer.
Which lead me to her publisher’s website.
Where I found Poe Ballentine…and thought, “I want to read this.”
And then a light went on in the closet of cluttered details and unkempt strands of thought that is my brain.
Poe Ballentine. Poe Ballentine. Poe Ballentine. Poe. Bo. Ballentine. Valentine.
One of my favorite sessions at this year’s AWP was a panel discussion on memoir writing. I sat a two rows away from Cheryl Strayed, Stephen Elliot, Lee Martin, and a writer I remembered as Bo Valentine while they discussed their experiences writing about family.
When I failed to keep a conference program, all I had for reference was my memory. Days later, I was unable to find any books by Bo Valentine. No Google searches turned up his essays.
Of course, if I had searched Poe Ballentine, I would have found his work right away. But, that’s memory for you.
Isn’t life funny?
And how books we want find us anyway?
And what we think we know and remember and what actually is?
And how the loose thread I’m trying to pull through all these lines of thought started in an AWP panel discussion titled: “Selling out everyone you love: The Ethics of Writing Nonfiction.”
What a perfect name for an author, too. Poe Ballentine. Sounds like a poet’s name, or a character in a literary novel.
i think he sounds like a larry mcmurty character–i’m not sure if it’s his name or hearing him talk.
Ah, the Hawthorne folk. I just want to put a plug in for Rhonda Hughes and Hawthorne Books. They have this tireless dedication to creating beautiful books that take chances. Very Portland. I keep wanting to interview Rhonda about her process in the book-making biz, and then not following through. I really think her perspective is unique and brave.
Thanks for taking us down the merry path here, Josie.
Oh, and if you’re on Facebook, check out Lidia’s “Dora” game today. It’s full of, well, tits!
i saw dora’s contest and didn’t have the guts. plus i was home reading in my bedroom with the kiddos running around my bed and making tents out of my comforter when i first read it and had a fear of my daughter catching me taking a photo of myself in a bra to post online.
yes, chicken, would be the most appropriate adjective. (chicken as in scaredy cat)
I just talked about this with my old agent, Erin Reel (who is now a writing coach). We admitted that we both have a bit too much Victorian scaredy-catness to post a boob shot on our own walls (I did post one on Lidia’s though, but, thankfully, it was quickly buried by the masses).
I love that. I keep trying to remember Poe Ballentine and come up with Polenta, so perhaps there is something blocking me as well about the name. Certain names are like that for me, where I just have a blank spot.
Lucky for me, every time I see Josey I fill in, “and the Pussycats” so I’m all set.
“…loosen up my buttons, babe, but you keep front’n
(wait, that’s the pussy cat dolls)
I like the word Polenta, and I get blocked on dates. It took me years to get my husband’s b-day right and even now I have to stop and think (I always want to make it the 7th when it’s really on the 6th.)
Yes, I’m not sure those lyrics would’ve made the Archie comics!
Books want to be read and will rush to fill a vacuum . . . which is exactly what my memory is, these days, so it’s not so bad.
Poe, Poe, Poe, Ballentine, Ballentine, Polenta—darn it, Lyra . . .
if only that vacuum thing worked in reverse for books that wanted to be written–i’d have authored my own damn library by now!
Word(s).
The books we want find us anyway. Yes.
“The closet of cluttered details.”
(I just wrote a giant paragraph about these words, your words, but it made no fucking sense so I hit the delete button. Some days I swear I don’t know what I think.)
I also loved that AWP session. I remember sitting there, listening to all of them describe how to write about family, etc… and thinking, “I’m just looking for permission.” I need to stop looking to people, even these extraordinary writers, for permission, for approval, and just do it already.
i’m looking for forgiveness.
To receive or give?
Receive, as in, “Please forgive me for what I’m about to write…” (i felt and urge to make the sign of the cross after typing this)
Hahahahaha! My sister-in-law sent me a Facebook message the other day, playing all fake-nice, and I thought, “Oh man, she is going to be so pissed!”
I’m reading Tinkering now. I should have read it when it won the PUlitzer but I’m never on time. But then I went to do a reading and I found myself at a lectern just after Paul Harding had spoken there (when I went home and told my man, I pantomimed licking the lectern and inhaling deeply to take some of the magic in). But I never would have read it if I had not found it in the street. Yes, literally, walked by and picked it up from the pavement. The book has been screaming READ ME and I finally am.
This made me smile! I really enjoy Po’s work in The Sun magazine.
Also, if you want a refresher of that fabulous AWP panel discussion, here’s a flashback to my post about it: http://lauramaylenewalter.com/?p=7775 Of course, it includes quotes from everyone BUT Po, since I had to leave early. There I go again, being super helpful…
Poe. Poe. Poe. I just wanted there to be no “e” I guess.