writer on writer

Mary Hamilton thinks Theo Huxtable is cute. She works as an optician. And co-hosts QUICKIES! Chicago. She digs circus freaks and Bull Shannon from Night Court. She once worked as a barista. She once had long hair too. I remember it. And I miss it. She doesn't do dialogue and she is currently obsessed with the weather, though she may or may not have once been obsessed with Tootsie Rolls. Mary Hamilton also has a new collection out, We Know What We Are, the winner of the Fourth Annual Rose Metal Press Short Short Chapbook Contest, which is filled with blasts of sometime surreal short fiction that is equal parts obsession, an ode to freaks and outsiders, sadness and celebration of pop culture as a filter for all that bangs around Mary's still shorn head.

Theo Huxtable. What up?

The first time I met Peter Schwartz I was scheduled to follow him at a reading and he went from reciting poetry to belting out a quite emotional rendition of "Amazing Grace". My first thought was, what a f**ker, I’m supposed to follow that? My second thought though was this guy may be a f**ker, but he’s definitely my kind of f**ker and I need to get to know him. What has since transpired are a series of e-mails that have confirmed my initial suspicions. Peter Schwartz is a funny, talented, pop-culture spewing dude who is maybe just a little f**ked-up. He is also someone you need to know and you can start with his new chapbook, Old Men, Gods, and Monsters, which like Peter himself, is wonderful and heavy, in love with words and endlessly searching to make better sense of confinement and loss and their impact on his life. Now, how about some interview?

BT: There is much I want to ask you, but to start, what did you say to Susan Collins and Olympia J. Snowe to sway them on the healthcare vote?

How it goes on, a conversation with Claudia Smith by Ben Tanzer

I once knew this guy who fell in love with this beautiful woman from Texas. He knew he wanted to marry her the moment he met her and was very nervous when he had to meet her dad for the first time. Afterwards, I asked him how it went and he said that her father was a man of few words and that he said more in one sentence than the rest of us did in five minutes. I thought about this as I was reading the story “Ice” from Claudia Smith’s new short story/flash fiction collection Put Your Head in My Lap and came across the line “…you just like the word, it is all words to you, words, words, words.”

Scott McClanahan's first collection, Stories, has just been published (by the consistently excellent Six Gallery Press). Dubbed "non-fiction/fiction," Stories might be described as creative nonfiction in the best sense; i.e. the naked look at one's subject without sensationalistic fact-fudging or slumming sentimentality or Everyman posturing or alcoholic inertia etc. etc.--pick a trap, any trap. Scott avoids these by inserting something into these snapshots of his life in Rainelle, West Virginia that is all too lacking nowadays: genuine compassion, even affection, for his subjects.

Doing time with Johnny Cash by Ben Tanzer

I should begin by saying that assuming you can stand the ongoing lack of coolness in your life, well that, and somehow avoid becoming a stalker, being a fan boy is one of the easiest things in the world. You consume things you are overly excited about, and then you celebrate them endlessly anywhere and everywhere you can, regardless of what anyone else thinks. I recently had the chance to act on my own fan boy traits when I embarked on an effort to simultaneously interview two writers, Michael Fitzgerald, author of the quite killer Radiant Days (Counterpoint, 2007) and William Walsh author of the equally wonderful Questionstruck (Keyhole Press, 2009) respectively, whose work I have recently been consuming. While Michael and William didn’t actually know each other when I first approached them, I decided I could ignore this, because like any good fan boy I assumed they would be happy to ruminate on the kinds of things I tend to obsesses over.

I bought barry graham's book, THE NATIONAL VIRGINITY PLEDGE (another sky press), at awp this year. i had read his chapbook NOT A SPECK OF LIGHT IS SHOWING (achilles chapbook series) and wanted to read more. barry graham writes sad stories about people eating fast food and drinking keystone and smoking marijuana and trying to get along with each other. here is an interview i did with barry, who as far as i know, does not hate me:

Sam Pink (SP): barry graham, when you are editing your work, and you read a line that you still like and want to keep, do you say, "hell yeah," or do you put your hand over your mouth and go, "dang a lang" or do you just nod solemnly, or what do you do? do you maybe swing like you are hitting a homerun then put your hand over your eyes like you are watching the homerun?

Here is our second installment of the new writer on writer feature, and this week we have asked Karl Koweski to pick a writer to interview. He chose Melissa Hansen and the resulting interview is below.

Melissa Hansen is a rising force in the small press community. Her first book of poetry, little beasts, soon to be released from Scintillating Press, will solidify her position as one of the best female voices in the underground. Anyone interested in learning more about her, feel free to check out http://www.melissahansen.net/.

Karl Koweski (KK): Let's start off by telling the readers a little bit about your self.

Welcome to today's stop on Ben Tanzer's virtual book tour, "This Tour Will Change Your Life". We are honored to be involved in this tour, and Ben's journey in general. When we were approached by CCLaP we knew we had to do something special. So we are taking this opportunity to launch a new bi-monthly feature called writer on writer. This is where we will turn over the blog to a writer and have him or her interview another writer. It should be an exciting addition to the site. This week we asked Pete Anderson (Pete Lit) to interview Ben, and the results are below.