Ryan W. Bradley has pumped gas, painted houses, swept the floor of a mechanic’s shop, worked on a construction crew in the Arctic Circle, fronted a punk band, and more. He is the author of eight books of poetry and fiction, including the story collection Nothing But the Dead and Dying. He received his MFA from Pacific University and lives in Oregon with his wife and two sons.
In this episode, Editor-in-Chief Jordan Blum speaks with Bradley about balancing life as a writer and graphic designer, reflections on a scary run-in with a white supremacist, and thoughts on Twin Peaks and the new Queens of the Stone Age LP (among many other things).
– Ryan W. Bradley…
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I have to admit: I wasn’t planning on writing about Living the Dream when I was originally scheduling my review coverage. The book I had initially chosen to talk about this month was a darker, more “literary” pick, but with the news covering natural disasters and violent protests, I needed to immerse myself in something lighter. Instead, I chose Lauren Berry’s debut novel, and I’m so glad I did. It was such a pleasure to get lost in the lives of twenty-something Londoners as they made messes out of their careers, romantic relationships, and friendships (and tried their damnedest to clean them up.…
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Leyna Krow has an MFA from Eastern Washington University. Her work has appeared in Santa Monica Review, Sou’wester, Ninth Letter, and Hayden’s Ferry Review. Her first collection, I’m Fine but You Appear to Be Sinking, was published earlier this year by Featherproof Books.
The stories in I’m Fine but You Appear to Be Sinking veer back and forth between ones that seem pretty rooted in the real world and ones that are less plausible, at least for the present moment. Do you think of your work as straddling genres? Is genre a valuable concept for your collection? What is accomplished, in your view, by juxtaposing these different modes in a single collection?
I’d call the genre of the collection “domestic fabulism.” Each story has people who are either dealing with a very strange problem in a very normal environment, or the opposite.…
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“I’d love to turn you on.”
AN EXPLOSION OF POSSIBILITIES
In the early 70s, a little after my 10th birthday, I sifted through my parents’ stacks of 50s and 60s Broadway musicals (South Pacific, My Fair Lady), James Bond soundtrack LPs, comedy albums (Bob Newhart and Beyond the Fringe), and one-off oddities like God Bless Tiny Tim.
In that stack was Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. Putting aside my childhood fear that rock and roll was somehow scary or indecent, I put the record on the turntable and gazed at the densely packed cover.
I was intrigued by the faux-audience sounds that accompanied the title track; moved by the communal sympathy of “With A Little Help from My Friends”; captivated by the throwback music hall charm of “When I’m Sixty-Four,” and transported by the visionary landscapes that unfolded in “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds,” “Being for the Benefit of Mister Kite,” and “A Day in the Life.”…
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Justin Grimbol’s parents were Presbyterian Ministers. They raised him on the east end of Long Island in a town called Sag Harbor. He attended Green Mountain College in Vermont where he wrote for the school paper. After dropping out, he moved into his girlfriend Heather’s dorm room where he wrote his first book, Drinking Until Morning. He and Heather eventually moved around the country together. They lived in Astoria (Oregon), Portland (Maine), Racine (Wisconsin), Oneonta (New York), and are now back in Vermont, where they met. He has published some books. His most recent is Mud Season, which was published by ATLATL Press.
In this episode, Editor-in-Chief Jordan Blum shoots the breeze with Grimbol regarding Mud Season, writing in general, nature, horror, punk and metal music, and much more.…
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As the vocalists of Black Flag and The Misfits (among many other projects), Henry Rollins and Glenn Danzig, respectively, are widely considered two of the most outspoken, manic, and/or hypermasculine figures in punk/hard rock and metal. Of course, Rollins has also established himself as an impassioned and intellectual socio-political author, actor, and radio host, but his original persona still follows him somewhat. As for Danzig, his fascinations with horror, eroticism, and the occult/theology—joined with his often-chronicled imbalanced behavior—have made him quite the interesting character.
It makes wonderfully twisted sense, then, that they’d be turned into an off-the-wall domesticated couple in Henry & Glenn Forever & Ever, an underground comic series by Tom Neely and his Igloo Tornado troupe that ran for the past decade or so.…
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Gender roles are constructs built by communities and society to define the expectations those communities have on women and men. These constructs are often based on political and religious influence and are problematic in how they contribute to individual development and growth. Over time, these expectations serve to further divide women and men, excluding individuals from accomplishing even daily tasks because they are seen through the lens of these social constructs. Even small gender roles (assigning things like cooking to women and household maintenance to men) contribute to the continual divide between genders and impact the interactions between women and men. Chinua Achebe’s short story “Girls at War” is a commentary on gender roles, reflecting the interpersonal struggles that arise when someone does and doesn’t meet the expectations placed on them by society.…
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