I’m a serial mover, living in 18 cities in three countries (so far) – though that has settled down (kinda) now that my lady and I find ourselves with three kids + a fish, kitten, and 100-pound dog. Wherever we land, we single-handedly support the entire local restaurant industry. My debut novel was lucky enough to do well and has inspired a short film, which will hopefully usher it down the long road to TV series…
Sugar Land follows the life of Dara, a prison cook in the 1920s, who is inspired by real life blues singer and prisoner Lead Belly to break out of her own prisons and become the fabulous, gay matriarch to a family of Texas trailer park misfits.
My friend, Richard, gave me this book. He is not selfish or stingy, but he is also not the sort to give away books. He insisted and—stunned—I gently took it from his outstretched hand.
I’ll admit I was a little like meh before I started reading, not being someone who enjoys hearing other people’s dreams or reading their pithy and edited diary entries. But this is pure genius, in a very meta way since we all know how the end turns out: David becomes famous.
Here, though, are the early days cleaning houses and doing too much cocaine. His family is, of course, captured, alongside his husband and their life in France. But even better are all the random and strange people who cross his path, making this not really a diary but, rather, a flash fiction collection of essays by someone whose fascination with the odd gleefully attracts more and more odd.
One of the most anticipated books of 2017: Boston Globe, New York Times Book Review, New York's "Vulture", The Week, Bustle, BookRiot
An NPR Best Book of 2017
An AV Club Favorite Book of 2017 A Barnes & Noble Best Book of 2017
A Goodreads Choice Awards nominee
David Sedaris tells all in a book that is, literally, a lifetime in the making.
For forty years, David Sedaris has kept a diary in which he records everything that captures his attention-overheard comments, salacious gossip, soap opera plot twists, secrets confided by total strangers. These observations are the source code for…
A few years ago we at Gertrude lit journal decided to answer the question that kept coming our way: What are some great books written by queer people with narratives that center on queer people? Before the pandemic made a mess of things, we ran GERTIE, a book club that chose two fabulous queer books every quarter. This was our very first book selection, and—like with many firsts, perhaps—it holds a special place.
The Angel of History takes place during one night in the waiting room of a San Francisco psyche ward when visits by the Devil and 14 Saints reveal the life of Jacob, a Yemen-born poet who was born in an Egyptian whorehouse. Yes, you read that right.
A Washington Independent Review of Books, Literary Hub, and Shelf Awareness Best Book of the Year
An Unnecessary Woman
won the California Book Award and was a finalist for the National Book Award, the National Book Critics Circle Award, and the PEN Open Book Award and was a Best Book of the Year for the Washington Post, Kirkus, NPR, Amazon, Christian Science Monitor, Newsday, The Boston Globe, and The Wall Street Journal
As with most of Dorothy Allison's work, Two or Three Things I Know For Sure lives in the dramas and intersections around abuse and anger and hope, fueled by her gritty, emotional lyricism. With this explosive, unapologetic narrative about herself and her “trash” family, Two or Three Things has the southern pacing that creeps up and swallows you. And in it we really learn who Allison is: a gritty, rugged, loving survivor in the truest sense.
Bastard Out of Carolina, nominated for the 1992 National Book Award for fiction, introduced Dorothy Allison as one of the most passionate and gifted writers of her generation. Now, in Two or Three Things I Know for Sure, she takes a probing look at her family's history to give us a lyrical, complex memoir that explores how the gossip of one generation can become legends for the next.
Illustrated with photographs from the author's personal collection, Two or Three Things I Know for Sure tells the story of the Gibson women -- sisters, cousins, daughters, and aunts -- and the…
I was hooked from the log-line: “Gideon has a sword, some dirty magazines, and no more time for undead bullshit.”
Gideon is a glorious comic fantasy horror with some romance sailing between the genre-jumping. In this debut novel, representatives from each of the nine planets (or "Houses") of an empire meet on the first planet/House to uncover the secrets of necromancy (you read that right) that will show them the path to becoming a powerful Lyctor. In the process some of the representatives - all odd in their own delicious ways - are beheaded, some are brought back to life, and some have their souls pulled from their bodies and then eaten in order to gain power. Gideon, our heroine, and her arch-enemy Harrow - both from the Ninth House - battle with others, but mostly themselves, until they unite forces in a grand cinematic fashion and... (go read it).
15+ pages of new, original content, including a glossary of terms, in-universe writings, and more!
A USA Today Best-Selling Novel!
"Unlike anything I've ever read. " --V.E. Schwab
"Lesbian necromancers explore a haunted gothic palace in space!" --Charles Stross
"Brilliantly original, messy and weird straight through." --NPR
The Emperor needs necromancers.
The Ninth Necromancer needs a swordswoman.
Gideon has a sword, some dirty magazines, and no more time for undead nonsense.
Tamsyn Muir's Gideon the Ninth, first in The Locked Tomb Trilogy, unveils a solar system of swordplay, cut-throat politics, and lesbian necromancers. Her characters leap off the page, as…
We chose Carmen Maria Machado’s Her Body and Other Parties (short stories) for our book club, one day before the news came out that it had been nominated for the National Book Award. A debut collection nominated? It’s that good.
My favorite story (aligning with many) is "The Husband Stitch", which was nominated for a Nebula Award for Best Novelette. In life, The Husband Stitch is a surgical procedure where more stitches than necessary are used to repair the cut or torn perineum during childbirth so the woman's vagina is tighter to increase her husband's sensation during lager intercourse - and is the absolute most spot-on title for this story I may have ever read. The story is about subjugation and a unified loneliness and, in the end, sacrifice. It has a beauty that reminds me of dark grey skies.
My second favorite story, a novella (as opposed to novelette), is created by streaming 272 synopses from the first 12 seasons of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. It's an insider's reimagining that you might not like, however, if you haven't seen Law & Order - but who hasn't seen Law & Order?
It also mixes genres, so if you enjoy reading psychological realism, sci-fi, comedy, horror, and fabulism rolled into one, this is your next, delightful and disturbing distraction.
SHORTLISTED FOR THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FICTION PRIZE 2017 SHORTLISTED FOR THE INTERNATIONAL DYLAN THOMAS PRIZE 2018
'Brilliantly inventive and blazingly smart' Garth Greenwell
'Impossible, imperfect, unforgettable' Roxane Gay
'A wild thing ... covered in sequins and scales, blazing with the influence of fabulists from Angela Carter to Kelly Link and Helen Oyeyemi' New York Times
In her provocative debut, Carmen Maria Machado demolishes the borders between magical realism and science fiction, comedy and horror, fantasy and fabulism. Startling narratives map the realities of women's lives and the violence visited on their bodies, both in myth and in practice.
One summer night in a small prairie city, 18-year-old Gabriel Reece accidentally outs himself to his redneck brother Colin, flees on his motorcycle, and gets struck by lightning on his way out of town.
He’s strangely fine, walking away from his melted pile of bike without a scratch. There’s no time to consider his new inhuman durability before his brother disappears and his childhood home burns down. He’s become popular, too—local cops and a weird private eye are after him, wanting to know if his brother is behind a recent murder.
On Friday, Gabriel Reece gets struck by lightning while riding his motorcycle.
It's not the worst thing that happens to him that week.
Gabe walks away from a smoldering pile of metal without a scratch-or any clothes, which seem to have been vaporized. And that's weird, but he's more worried about the sudden disappearance of his brother, Colin, who ditched town the second Gabe accidentally outed himself as gay.
Gabe tries to sift through fragmented memories of his crummy childhood for clues to his sudden invincibility, but he barely has time to think before people around town start turning up…