January 13, 2013
Malarky selected as Chatelaine: Top Five Books Picks of 2012
There’s something rather post-Blanchot about this one I quite enjoyed. Blanchot maintained (correct me if I am wrong) that the writers intention should not be considered, nor the readers response, but the text alone. Hence this one leans toward a pre-digestion of the text! The conjuring of an appetite. Thanks to Laurie Grassi for this nod. I am glad to know thinking women on Twitter are thinking about Our Woman.
“Everybody’s come up with a list of their fave books of 2012, but I thought I’d try something a little different: My picks of my top unread books of 2012.”
Click here to discover the other 4 books along with Malarky, (including Rebecca Lee’s Bobcat and Other Stories.)
January 2, 2013
Read all about it: New Statesman Books of the Year 2012
To see Malarky show up in The New Statesman, a publication I am long familiar with from my London and Dublin days and my lifelong cultural left inclinations, was a big surprise will hereby ever be referred to as my Jimmy Knapp moment. I may not get another Jimmy Knapp moment, hence it was special. (I am sure there will be further surprises as my knitting and plumbing disasters appear steadfast and always surprise me.)
To sit beside Deborah Levy’s Swimming Home (published by the fine and progressive And Other Stories) only solidified this as my Jimmy Knapp moment.
Jenny Diski, who je remercie mille fois, wrote the following:
Anakana Schofield’s Malarky (Biblioasis, $19.95) and Deborah Levy’s Swimming Home (And Other Stories, £7.99) are quite different novels, each with their own notable style and imaginative power. Good new novels are rare and here are two of them. Diana Souhami’s Murder at Wrotham Hill (Quercus, £18.99) is a brilliantly formulated and well-written account of a tawdry murder that shines a bright light on postwar austerity
Full evidence of Jimmy Knapp moment found here.
To read Tom McCarthy’s intro to Swimming Home click here and scroll to More Information.
To read Malarky, well you know exactly what to do. Hop on down to your local bookstore or click on over to the various online stores. You may or may not experience a Jimmy Knapp moment. You will certainly experience multiple moments for Malarky is an episodic narrative in which each episode is an extrapolation of a single moment in Our Woman’s life.
If you’re in the UK or Ireland or Australia, India or South Africa: Malarky will be published by Oneworld and on your doorsteps during 2013, likely summer. I shall post the publication date as soon as I know.
January 2, 2013
Malarky chosen by Apple iTunes, iBookstore BEST OF 2012 Fiction
Thanks a million to the (Apple) iBookstore who selected Malarky as one of their 10 BEST OF 2012 FICTION titles.
iBookstore described its chosen 10 titles as “spectacular books” which sent rather a bounce of reverb between my kettle and toaster!
Among the 10 titles selected were writers I personally admire such as the brave Tamara Faith Berger’s Maidenhead (I read with Tamara at Incite at VPL which was delightful), Junot Diaz’s This is How You Lose Her. (I was actually due to read with Junot in Toronto but there was a double booking with another festival, hopefully we’ll have another chance to read together in this lifetime) and Ben Stephenson (who if I am not mistaken contributed flash fiction to the same Boulderpavement issue I did in May, along with Stuart Ross.)
I also thank and commend the iBookstore Canada for their strong support of Canadian Independent Publishers. I am a fan of ibooks as an interface and enjoy swiping my way through novels.
January 2, 2013
Edmonton Journal: Malarky selected for Five Favourite Reads of 2012
How lovely indeed to see Malarky selected as one of Five Favourite Reads of 2012 by the Edmonton Journal Book Columnist Michael Hingston alongside Cesar Aira’s Varamo / The Miracle Cures of Dr. Aira (New Directions) and Leanne Shapton’s Swimming Studies.
I recently alighted on Aira’s work and have delighted in him. I appeared on a panel with Leanne Shapton at IFOA and admire the interdisciplinary approach in her work. Swimming Studies took me back to the swimming pool. Sadly disasters abounded upon my return so I shall stick to vicarious swimming through reading that memoir and keep my feet dry until I can afford some serious swimming instruction. (Again! I must have taken the most swimming lessons in history and made so little progress I’d have to wonder if there’s in a swimming gene I lack). I also really hope that 2013 or even 2014 will result in a reading in Edmonton. Never has a writer been keener than I to visit the home of the former Toonerville Trolley. (Not even sure many writers even know of the one time existence of this historical transport system) I have studied the weather in Edmonton and now own a parka for this impending visit.
Here’s some snips from the article (full piece click here)
2. Anakana Schofield, Malarky (Biblioasis) “an obsessive, voice-driven novel about a grieving Irish housewife that runs along irregular timelines and lingers at unusual places. It also never, ever apologizes for itself. More importantly, it all works….”
3. Leanne Shapton, Swimming Studies (Blue Rider Press)
“Midway through this gorgeous, buoyant hybrid of a memoir, Shapton inserts a 26-part photo series documenting, with captions, every swimsuit she owns…”
5. César Aira, Varamo / The Miracle Cures of Dr. Aira (New Directions)
“…Aira’s fiction is an ongoing, off-the-cuff record of his magpie imagination…Read Aira in the morning and you won’t need coffee.”
December 18, 2012
Unison
There’s a construction worker belting out a song on the site next door. The notes came in through my window so I opened the door to hear them. Outside it is pelting a hailstone-ish sleet and his notes curved around and out from the building into it. It might well be the most perfect unison of note and weather I have ever heard.
The lyric he sang was something like “whatchuwawnt” with a reggae sound. Reggae and snow on a Tuesday who knew?
December 8, 2012
Georgia Straight: Malarky selected as a best book of 2012
This week’s Georgia Straight contained some pretty wild and cheery news.
In the Georgia Straight Best Books of 2012 round up an extraordinary occurrence (by my standards anyway) three different critics chose Malarky as one of their picks in the same article!
Thank you to Brian Lynch, Michael Hingston and Alexander Varty for the thoughtful reflections on Malarky. Much appreciated.
Was also glad to be beside Karolina Waclawiak‘s novel How to Get Into the Twin Palms published by the dynamic Two Dollar Radio and Leanne Shapton’s Swimming Studies, which has to be a serious contribution to what Lidia Yuknavitch (another swimmer: see her Chronology of Water) termed “a literature of the body” during our panel discussion at Wordstock — The Portland Writers Festival.
Here are the three extracts:
Malarky
(By Anakana Schofield. Biblioasis)
In her debut novel, the Vancouver-based writer rolls out a fully realized marvel of a character, one who seems like she’s been there all along, waiting to be written into story form. Our Woman, as she’s named here, belongs to the settled ways of the Irish countryside—until her world is capsized by the hidden sexual lives of her husband and her son. Schofield has fashioned a truly memorable figure, clear as day from the opening pages of this raw, sad, funny book, and yet consistently surprising. (Brian Lynch)
Malarky
(By Anakana Schofield. Biblioasis)
Great fiction takes risks. That’s why descriptions of a classic and an utter fiasco can sound so similar. And yes, in theory, the debut novel by Vancouver’s Anakana Schofield is far from a sure thing: it’s an obsessive, voice-driven novel about a grieving Irish housewife that runs along irregular timelines and lingers at unusual places. It also never, ever apologizes for itself. More importantly, it all works. Joe Biden may have done more to repopularize the word malarky this year, but Schofield’s electrifying novel will leave a much longer impression. (Michael Hingston)
Malarky
(By Anakana Schofield. Biblioasis)
I laughed, I cried, and I’m not kidding. The immensely gifted Anakana Schofield’s vivid study of a middle-aged Irish housewife’s nervous breakdown has a huge heart and a fierce brain; Malarky is, by a wide margin, the most memorable fiction I’ve read this year. Our Woman invents some dubious remedies for her diabetes, not to mention her sense of shame and loss over her husband’s philandering and subsequent death; nine out of 10 doctors would not prescribe fruitcake and sex with strangers. But sometimes cures can take curious form, in life as in this extremely delicious novel. (Alexander Varty)
December 8, 2012
Gerry Gilbert
I was just thinking in the last half hour of a Gery Gilbert poetry book from the Gronk series called May 1931. Maybe 3 years ago I made a video reading a bit of it one night. I was v tired when I recorded it, but when I couldn’t recall the name of the poetry book I went hunting for the video. Lo there it was! The book captured and not just the title and details and poems recorded but my long gone candy stripe couch for posterity. Who knew Gerry Gilbert would imprint my candy stripe couch to digital pixels along with providing me with a weather treasure. Rock on Gerry whereever you may be now — resting peacefully I hope.
*
Did you feel that chilly wind today? What an arctic gust she was! Lordy! The weather data insisted 6 or 4 degrees but it was so cold I find that measurement did not capture the experience. Science bedamned. It was fecking freezing and I had my arctic parka on.
December 3, 2012
Warmth
Dear friends,
Here is a blast of warming for you all during these darker winter days. Today we have a wind warning for overnight, but the world is quite still and almost a tad pulpy looking out there. Wherever you are I hope you enjoy this collaboration. I especially appreciated the hilly twinkles in the piece Pendulum. On an off beat note, I did wonder how the Mr Fain fiddler manages to play all those notes in such a restrictive jacket and how he doesn’t overheat. I wrote many parts of my novel Malarky listening to Metamorphosis 4 on repeat. I wonder if you can hear it under the prose.
I send you all my best Winter warmth and gratitude for your warm support throughout the year for Malarky. AK.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-_jDwx9TYo4&w=560&h=315]
November 20, 2012
Winter Reading Rituals
Here is a piece on Winter Reading Rituals I wrote for the International Festival of Authors blog back in October:
I’m not long returned from the Brooklyn Book Festival where the weather was beautifully warm and I had to pace about wearing shorts. Last weekend I travelled to the Victoria Writers Festival and Wordstock, the Portland writers festival, and tonight have just arrived home from the launch of the Vancouver Writers Fest.
I remember all four recent festivals by the weather and conversations. In New York I had to turn on the air conditioner. In Portland I had to turn on the heater and yesterday night I could not sleep because it was so windy here in Vancouver.
I love the fall season in Vancouver and pay close attention to the wind and rain. It signals for me the start of my winter reading rituals. The weather closing in, the sky turning grey means it’s time to turn in to the page.
All year I turn to the page, but in winter I embrace the page amid additional attention to physical comfort.
To establish any ritual it’s necessary to repeat it. It’s not a ritual if you only ever do it once. My reading rituals are particularly employed and important when it’s raining. As it’s regularly raining in Vancouver, I am committed.
Comfort is vital. I adopted two couches from a generous couch shedder because I deemed we needed a couch-per-reading-person (in this case two). I have invested in four hot water bottles because I deemed we needed two per person. I bought my son the softest blanket in the world which I subsequently commandeered and he has yet to raise a loud protest since he has disappeared into the vortex of video gaming. Quilts are very important in our apartment, they are dragged up and down stairs and sometimes found under the kitchen table and are thus umbilically connected to winter reading rituals. Pillows and cushions are critical.
Liquids. Liquid comfort matters during a winter reading ritual. In this case: teapot, teacups, milk jug, glass of hot port have proved trojan company. For smaller participants I admit to providing endless bags of chips and token chopped apples.
Finally I have found fuzzy or warm socks a most important part of my winter reading ritual. If my feet are cold or itchy it’s very distracting to my reading.
Once comfort is established and the weather has been noted, this liberates my brain and reading begins.
A stack of books is always within arms reach of the couch because I practice inter-reading. I might wish to digest a paragraph by reading a different work after it, or I might just dig in for the long haul with the same text.
Walks are taken only to refill hot water bottles or the teapot. Generally the plan is not to get up. Naps are sometimes taken at the book, but this isn’t encouraged. The teapot is the weapon against slumber. The curtains are always open, darkness is welcome but the curtains stay open because the weather doing its thing outside is a pleasing visual carnival.
Titles vary, but I would not necessarily reread Madame Bovary in winter. She is usually reserved for the wooden chair on Grandma’s deck.