The Rumpus Book Club Discussion with George Saunders
The Rumpus Book Club chats with George Saunders about Tenth of December, sudden celebrity, why escalation matters if you’re a writer, and how to stick with a story
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Posts Tagged: The Rumpus Book Club
The Rumpus Book Club Interviews T Cooper
The Rumpus Book Club chats with T Cooper about Real Man Adventures, meditations on masculinity, vintage-style book design, and why writing is really fucking hard.
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The Rumpus Book Club Interviews Jami Attenberg
The Rumpus Book Club chats with Jami Attenberg about The Middlesteins, the fair portrayal of an overweight protagonist, and food addiction in the face of an unforgiving culture.
...moreA Lifetime of Literature
Joe Queenan reads books. Lots of books.
In fact, he surrounds himself with them (1,340 lay about his house to be exact). Queenan reads at least four hours a day every day, and although he is admittedly a slow reader, he has still managed to read 6,128 books in the last 55 years.
...moreHow Books Clubs Went Indie
“Forty-something Betsy Birdsall jokes that she likes the Rumpus group because it enables her to hang out in her bathrobe and slippers while pretending she has friends. She says Elliot encouraged her to get active with the club’s discussion group. ‘This is the first online community I’ve been a part of,’ Birdsall, a paralegal from Agoura, California, said.
...morePraise For Dispatch From The Future
This month’s Rumpus Book Club selection – Leigh Stein’s Dispatch from the Future - gets an outstanding review from Guernica Magazine:
“Stein’s poems are the very perfect product of a frenetic in-between culture where knowledge is currency but also poverty, and its artistic output is underscored by a perennial ennui—like the girl in high school who wears a black beret and talks about death all the time.”
Also, be sure to watch the trailer for, as well as The Rumpus’ own Brian Spears reading from, Stein’s book here.
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The Rumpus Book Club Interviews Emily St. John Mandel
The Rumpus Book Club talks with Emily St. John Mandel about The Lola Quartet, panthers in Florida, her writing process, and more.
...moreProtected: The Rumpus Book Club Discussion 35 – Matthew Specktor
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...moreProtected: The Rumpus Book Club Discussion 34 – Emily Rapp
There is no excerpt because this is a protected post.
...moreFall’s Rumpus Book Club Selections
The Rumpus Book Club is proudly presenting Zipper Mouth, Laurie Weeks’s debut novel as our October pick. Published by the Feminist Press, it tells the story of a New York junkie, along with the “exalted night-club epiphanies” and “devastating morning-after hangovers.” And the book comes with a ringing endorsement from Michelle Tea.
An Interview with Alex Shakar
Last month’s Rumpus Book Club selection, Luminarium is blowing up all over the interweb. The Bat Segundo (a “cultural podcast”) interviews Alex Shakar. You can hear it or read an excerpt from the interview here. Shakar discusses his perspective on novelists as scientists vs.
...moreThe Rumpus Book Club Interviews Jim Shepard
The Rumpus Book Club talks with Jim Shepard about his story collection You Think That’s Bad, alpine life, the empathetic reach, and imperial Rome.
The Rumpus Book Club Interviews Adam Levin
The Rumpus Book Club talks with Adam Levin about The Instructions, Bar Mitzvahs, thinking you’re the Messiah, and what it’s like to publish a 1,000+ page book.
The Rumpus Book Club Interviews Lan Samantha Chang
The Rumpus Book Club talks with Lan Samantha Chang about All Is Forgotten, Nothing Is Lost , MFA programs, writers experiencing non-writing periods, and biker bars.
Notable San Francisco, This Week: 9/27-10/3
This week in San Francisco: The Rumpus Book Club meets IRL, Litquake!, art at Benders, Litquake (Ferlinghetti style), and Barely Published Authors (AKA Litquake!).
Monday 9/27: Are you a member of The Rumpus Book Club yet? Want to “audit” the class before you commit to the reading assignments?
...moreThe Rumpus Book Club Interviews Tao Lin
The Rumpus Book Club talks with Tao Lin about Richard Yates, writing what you want to read, and when it’s okay to steal a book:
Dinaburg’s Cake
A short story from Doug Dorst’s latest collection, The Surf Guru, our Rumpus Book Club pick for July.
...moreSurf Guru Notes, #3
Rumpus Book Club Member John Francisconi with thoughts on July’s Book Club pick, The Surf Guru by Doug Dorst.
The Surf Guru is simply, and rather consistently, great. It’s a story collection I’d gladly recommend to anyone, without hesitation. I finished the book in one long stretch.
...moreThe Rumpus Book Club, Where I Live #9: Alyce Connolly
I live on an intentional community in Middlesex, New York – about an hour south of Rochester, near Canandaigua Lake. While I haven’t been here long, and don’t know how long I’ll stay, I do live here.
I sleep in the attic, but mostly I live in the garden.
...moreThe Rumpus Book Club, Where I Live #8: Kim Locke
My name is Kim Locke and I live in the suburban commuter metropolis of Brampton, Ontario, Canada.
...moreThe Rumpus Book Club Interviews John Brandon
The Rumpus Book Club talks with John Brandon about Citrus County, his second novel from McSweeney’s.
The Rumpus Book Club, Where I Live #7: Charlene Keeler
I live in Huntington Beach, which is in Orange County, California. We are famous for surf contests and skinheads, but I have only seen the latter, usually at 7-11. Skinheads like 7-11 coffee.
...moreThe Rumpus Book Club, Where I Live #6: Shanna Mahin
I live two hours and a lifetime away from Los Angeles. I’m still trying to figure out how I feel about that. My mother’s an actress, I told the kids on the playground, or my father is a producer, both marginally true and also total fabrications.
...moreThe Rumpus Book Club, Where I Live #5: Patrick Maier
I live on Bomarc Lane, which is located in Satellite Beach on Florida’s Space Coast and is about two miles away from Patrick Air Force Base. The street is named after the Bomarc missile, the only surface to air missile deployed by the Air Force.
...moreThe Rumpus Book Club, Where I Live #4: Betsy Birdsall
I live on 1.5 acres in the Santa Monica Mountains in a house that was built in the 1920s out of local stone. Most of the original buildings in the area are made out of the same stone, from the old post office to a local biker hang-out. I live among coyotes, rabbits, deer, snakes, woodpeckers, gophers, bobcats and bugs galore. To me, it is the most beautiful mountain range in the world.
...moreThe Rumpus Book Club, Where I Live #3: Andréa Ford
I live on 13th Street in apartment #13. The superstitious address came with a discounted rent. My roommate is a high school English teacher, so our bookshelves are stacked with multiple copies of classics like The Color Purple and The Elements of Style, which is comforting.
...moreThe Rumpus Book Club, Where I Live #2: Corey Duncan Stewart
I wake sticky hot in the early afternoon to the sounds of construction next door, Rottweilers barking down below and Chinese workers squabbling as a Puerto Rican woman screams from her window for someone unknown. I take out my earplugs and remove my eye mask as the fan ripples the sheets.
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