Feeds:
Posts
Comments

Archive for the ‘Death’ Category

Marie Brennan–A Natural History of Dragons: A Memoir of Lady Trent (The Lady Trent Memoirs, 1) (2013) [audiobook 2013–Kate Reading]

Posted in Audiobooks, Death, Dragons, Fantasy, Feminism, Kate Reading, Marie Brennan, Rhys Davies, Sci-fi, Science, Sexism, Threats, Todd Lockwood, Unfinished series, Violence on November 15, 2021| Leave a Comment »

[LISTENED TO: November 2021] A Natural History of Dragons

This book sounded interesting. I knew nothing about it (aside from the title) and had no idea it would unfold the way it did.

Turns out that Kate Reading, whom I didn’t know, was an outstanding reader. She did male voices so compellingly that I forgot it was just one reader.

The book is a memoir.  The book feels like a Victorian novel (where a woman is not allowed to have the kind of adventures she ultimately does).  Reading reads Lady Trent in a kind of slow, deliberate, older, upper class lady voice.  It felt a wee bit slow at first, although I couldn’t imagine her doing it any other way.

Lady Isabella Tent is the leading scholar on dragons.  Indeed, the book starts:

All the world, from Scirland to the farthest reaches of Eriga, know Isabella, Lady Trent, to be the world’s preeminent dragon naturalist. She is the remarkable woman who brought the study of dragons out of the misty shadows of myth into the clear light of modern science.

Each chapter even has an olde-fashioned style in which the chapter heading summarizes what’s to be found within.  Lady Trent is an old woman now, finished with the excitement of her life and all that she has accomplished and she has decided that rather than answering all of the letters she gets all the time, that she would set the record straight and write her memoirs.

She starts from her early childhood and her tone is at one approving and occasionally disbelieving in the kind of person she was.

When Lady Trent was young Isabella, she had a unladylike desire to be scientific.  When she first captured a “sparkling” (this book is written as if we would know what she’s talking about since it is a memoir of a famous person’s exploits.  If you don’t know what a sparkling is, well, where have you been?).

Her mother was horrified by her behavior.  I mean what kind of girl dissects a bird to see how it can fly?  A scientific genius, that’s what kind. (more…)

Read Full Post »

Grady Hendrix–The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires (2020) [audiobook 2020–Bahni Turpin]

Posted in Alan Paton, Bahni Turpin, Book Club, Death, Fraud, Funny (ha ha), Grady Hendrix, Marriage Trouble, Monsters, Murder, Nazis, Quirk Books, South, Vampires, Violence, Yuck! on November 9, 2021| Leave a Comment »

[READ: Summer 2021] The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires

I loved the name of this book.  The fact that it was put out by Quirk Books was a major plus.

This book was read by Bahni Turpin and she was magnificent.  I was hooked right from the start.  I loved her Southern accents and the way she made each character unique and easily recognizable.

In the preface to the book, Hendrix explains that this novel is a kind of apology for his earlier novel My Best Friend’s Exorcism.   In that novel teenagers were the protagonists and parents were cast as trouble for them.  He felt the need to address the concerns of the parents this time around.

I love the way the characters clearly love their children but are also realistic about them:  “Being a teenager isn’t a number,” says Maryellen. “It’s the age when you stop liking them.”

The story opens in a hilarious way.

It’s 1988 and Grace Cavanaugh had started a book club,  She wanted all of the women in her circle to read the classics.  This month’s book was Cry, The Beloved Country.  Grace was the quintessential Southern woman.  Her house was perfect.  Her thick pile carpets were white and immaculate (the way she inwardly cringes as cheese straws land on the carpet is hilarious).  She did not allow for anything improper.  She expected people to do what was proper.  Like finish the book club book.

The story zooms in on Patricia Campbell.  She needed the book club,  But she did not read the book.

She was given twenty minutes to talk about the book.  And the way she tries to stretch it out is hilarious.  Eventually Grace calls her out on it.  And is very disappointed in her.  Soon enough, though, the other women reveal that they didn’t read it either.

On her way to her car Patricia is stopped by Kitty Scruggs, another book club woman.  She invites Patricia to join the book club that she has just started.  It’s going to be her and Slick Paley, a conservative Christian (with an amazing accent, thank you Bahni) who seems dumb but is far from dumb, and Maryellen, a Yankee transplant (who has a very different accent which is nice to hear).  Eventually, even Grace joins because they are going to be reading the most salacious true crime books they can find.

Each of the women is married and their families are very different.  Patricia’s husband is straight-laced.  Her daughter is just old enough to be sarcastic to her and her son, Blue (that name is explained about 3/4 of the way through the book) has suddenly become obsessed with Nazis.  Basically, she needs these women.

Five years later, the book club is still going and the women feel closer to each other than ever (although Patricia doesn’t feel super close to Grace, because who could, really).  Then one night, a night that Blue didn’t take out the garbage, Patricia walks to where the cans are stored and is attacked.  The assailant is an old woman.  She acts crazy and even though Patricia knows her, she can’t talk sense into her. The old woman bites off part of her ear (which becomes quite a conversation piece, obviously). (more…)

Read Full Post »

Terry Pratchett–The Colour of Magic (1983) [Discworld #1] [Rincewind #1]

Posted in Death, Death, Discworld, Fantasy, Funny (ha ha), Short Story, Terry Pratchett on September 2, 2021| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: hiatus

[READ: Summer 2021] The Colour of Magic

Back in the mid 1990s I was working at a bookstore in Boston (Wordsworth, R.I.P.).  They had a great imported books section (from England) and I bought the first four Discworld books in mini editions.  They were adorable and preposterous, with a font size of about 4pt. They were about four inches square.

Imagine reading a book that small.  I would be physically incapable of reading it now.

But I read all four books.

At least I thought I did.  Because when I decided to reread the Discworld series, I distinctly remembered that Rincewind was a bad wizard and that he wore a hat with the word “Wizzard” on it.  He traveled with Twoflower and Twflower had magical luggage.

But when I read this book, he never wore a hat that said “Wizzard” and literally nothing in the story was familiar to me.  So maybe I never read these books?  Granted it was over 25 years ago but still

So it was like reading them for the first time.

This first book is rally four interconnected stories.  But there’s enough repetition of basic information at the start of each story that you know that these were intended to be read separately.

Discworld itself is very well established already, though.

“The Color of Magic”

We start in the city of Ankh-Morpork which is presently on fire.  We meet Rincewind who is instantly revealed as a terrible wizard and a cowardly person (as many wizards prove to be). He has lodged in his brain one of the eight mega powerful spells from the Octavo and as a result can fit no other spells into his head.  No one know what will happen is he says the Spell, but it probably wont be good.

He is with (and sort of protecting) Twoflower, the world’s first tourist.  Twoflower is an insurance clerk from the Agatean Empire.  Hhe tries to sell “in-sewer-ants” to a tavern owner who is used to getting his inn burnt down in brawls.  And yes, Twoflower has luggage made of sapient pearwood.  It will follow its owner anywhere (on little legs that everyone finds very disturbing).  The Luggage is aggressive and always looks angry (as angry as a keyhole can look). It also tends to eat anyone who tries to break in. (more…)

Read Full Post »

Simon Rich–New Teeth: Stories (2021)

Posted in Alexandra Sauser-Monnig, Amelia Meath, Babe Ruth, Babies, Baseball, Corporate skewering, Death, Fantasy, Fears, Funny (ha ha), Humiliation, Josh Gad, Megafaun, Molly Sarlé, Monsters, Morality, Mountain Man, New Yorker, Pirates, Short Story, Simon Rich, Sylvan Esso, Technology, Wye Oak, Yuck! on August 12, 2021| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: FLOCK OF DIMES-Tiny Desk Concert #246 (August 10, 2021).

Flock of Dimes is a fun band name.  It’s the solo project of Wye Oak’s Jenn Wasner (I thought Wye Oak was a solo project as well–no, it’s a duo).  [Gee, why wasn’t Andy Stack invited to this sing along?]

For this Home Concert, the solo project turns huge with nine people sitting around having a big ol’ sing along (I’ll assume they are all vaccinated and that this was filmed before Delta took off).

The setup is pretty simple: three guitars (I love that the guys on the couch are lefty (Michael Libramento, baritone guitar) and righty (Alan Good Parker, tenor guitar) so it looks appealingly symmetrical). some percussion and a lot of voices (the men on the right of the screen seems somewhat less invested).

The friends who are singing along include the three singers from Mountain Man: Amelia Randall Meath, Molly Sarlé and Alexandra Sauser-Monnig.  Meath is also in Sylvan Esso and her bandmate Nick Sanborn is also present (he’s one of the less invested men).  The set is filmed at Sylvan Esso’s new studio in Durham, N.C., called Betty’s.

“Two” is a bouncy number with lots of percussion.  I like the way the backing singers join in from time to time, but not constantly–it introduces new voices throughout.

One of the invested men is percussionist Matthew McCaughan from Bon Iver–he’s got a full complement of instruments at hand.  Joe Westerland (from Megafaun) is the other percussionist, he’s just a bit more subtle in his actions, but you can see him gently tapping through “Two.”

“Price of Blue” is a little slower but it has a wonderful melody.  The harmonies really standout on this song.

I don’t know the originals of these songs, but I have to assume the blurb is correct

These acoustic performances actually shed new light, thanks to radiant and radically different arrangements, while fully capturing the warmth we look for from Tiny Desk concerts.

Whatever the case, the backing vocals are tremendous.  You can really hear Molly Sarlé’s gorgeous harmony vocals.

“Awake For The Sunrise” feels like an old fashioned fire side sing along.  I’ve enjoyed Wye Oak’s music but I don’t know it very well.  I rather like Wassner’s delivery here–but i feel like these songs might not be as good without these harmonies!

[READ: August 12, 2021] New Teeth

I’m guessing that Simon Rich had a baby.

This collection of stories is loaded with stories about little kids.  And that’s all right because he has a very funny take on being a parent.

The other stories tackle the corporate environment and are full of fish-out-of-water stories.

“Learning the Ropes” is about being a new parent.  But it is written from the point of view of two pirates. And hilarity ensues.

What’s odd to me is that in his first books, his stories were really short, but I feel like lately his stories have gotten much longer–sometimes too long.  This one in particular kind of dragged at times, because it’s pretty much a one-note joke: what? pirates raising a little girl?!  One pirate is a concerned parent which means he wants them both to care about the child.  It’s got a few very funny moments, and of course, when the pirates who speak in pirate style (“The only man I trust is me first mate”) say things like “Arr… it be called ‘limit testing.’ She be acting out because she be craving discipline,” well, that’s classic Simon Rich right there. (more…)

Read Full Post »

Graham Norton–Holding (2016)

Posted in Death, Drinking, Graham Norton, Ireland, Irish Writer, Marriage Trouble, Mystery, Romance on August 4, 2021| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: hiatus

[READ: July 2021] Holding

Graham Norton is a fairly peripheral entertainer in our lives  I’ve always enjoyed him when I’ve watched him, but I don’t watch him very often.  He’s a good (and funny) talk show host, but who knew that he also wrote novels?  And not comic ones.

This story is a mystery set in the remote Irish village of Duneen.  They have one policeman (guard), Sergeant P.J. Collins who is overweight and alone.  Collins is central to the story, as are Brid Riordan and Evelyn Ross.

Brid Riordan is a wife and mother and she is unhappy.  She’s been drinking a lot and her husband has been getting on her case about it–even taking the kids away to his mother’s a few times.

Evelyn Ross is the youngest of the three Ross sisters–a wealthy trio of (orphaned and single) women living in a large estate called Ard Carraig. Abigail and Florence are her older sisters and they dote on Evelyn because a) she found their father when he hung himself and b) she was more of less left at the altar.

Nothing much happens in Duneen.  The biggest news is the development that’s going up.  And what they find when they start to dig the foundation–human bones. (more…)

Read Full Post »

Domhnall O’Donoghue–Crazy for You (2020)

Posted in Brú na hAbhainn, Bulls, Death, Domhnall O'Donoghue, Ireland, Irish Writer, Romance, Unlikable main character, Vacation, Violence on August 2, 2021| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: hiatus

[READ: July 2021] Crazy for You

Clooney Coyle is an Irish actor on the Irish language soap opera Brú na hAbhainn.

He is vain but amusing.  He is invited to his best friend Isla’s house for a party.  Isla is a school teacher and she is inviting the staff over for a Halloween party. Unfortunately an insufferable volunteer named Vonnie insisted that she be invited.  Isla has complained to Clooney about Vonnie many times and he is tickled to meet someone so obnoxiously self-assured and assertive,

Vonnie arrives and she is a horror show.  It’s a shame, though, that O’Donoghue had to make her fat and ugly in addition to loud and obnoxious.  But she walks into the party, insults the host, insults the guests, takes wine that isn’t hers (she didn’t bring anything to the party) and is a general nightmare.  But Clooney is intrigued by her and decides to treat her nicely.

When he was younger, he was picked on for being gay in rural Ireland so he understands the need to shine when others put out your spark.  And soon enough he pledges that they are friends for life.

Vonnie has the best line ever: “As an adult, I am an artist.”  She says this all the time and everyone looks at her the same way…. wtf does that mean.  She means that all children are artists, but she is an adult who is an artist.  She also has a gallery which Clooney promises to go to.  Her art is terrible and she charges him admission.  When she insists that he sit for a portrait, and them charges him a sitting fee he still manages to say that they are friends for life.

And that’s what sets her off.

Vonnie becomes insanely jealous.  And that’s when the book goes from the outrageous to the ridiculous and all believability is lost. (more…)

Read Full Post »

Amy Meyerson–The Imperfects (2020)

Posted in Amy Meyerson, Austria, Death, Diamonds, Film & TV, Funny (ha ha), History, Parenting, Philadelphia, PA on August 1, 2021| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: hiatus

[READ: July 2021] The Imperfects

I saw this book at work–I didn’t think I’d be seeing as many interesting books at work with my new position, but here was one that I wanted to read!

The title was interesting and the concept was eye catching right from the start.

The story seems fairly simple.  There is a grandmother–Helen Auerbach–and three grandchildren.  The grandchildren are estranged from their mother, who is peripherally in contact, and their father, who thy have not seen in decades.  They are also kind of estranged from each other because of some bad choices each of them has made.  Incidentally all of the children are Millers, not Auerbachs from their estranged father.

The book opens in Vienna 1918 with a historical moment that weighs heavily on the rest of the story.  I didn’t really like the writing style of that section–it was not what i was expecting and I hoped the rest of the story wouldn’t be written in that way (and it wasn’t, thankfully).  But I enjoyed the way that moment ultimately tied into the story. (more…)

Read Full Post »

Edward O. Wilson–Naturalist: A Graphic Adaptation [adapted by Jim Ottaviani & C.M. Butler] (2020)

Posted in Ants, Autobiographies, C.M. Butler, Death, Edward O. Wilson, End of the World, Environmentalism, Graphic Novel, Harvard University, Jim Ottaviani, mafmadmaf, New Guinea, Non-fiction, Stephen Jay Gould, SXSW, Universities, Volcanoes on July 19, 2021| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: mafmadmaf–“Rapture” (SXSW Online 2021).

I never intend to go to SXSW–I find the whole thing a bit much.  But I also appreciate it for the way it gives unknown bands a place to showcase themselves. NPR featured a half dozen artists online this year with this note:

This year, the South by Southwest music festival that takes over Austin, Texas every spring happened online. Couch By Couchwest, as I like to call it, was an on-screen festival, with 289 acts performing roughly 15-minute pre-recorded sets across five days in March.

This list was curated by Bob Boilen.  He also notes:

 I didn’t enjoy hearing loud, brash music while sitting on a couch the way I would in a club filled with people and volume, so I found myself engaging in more reflective music instead.

I’m going in reverse order, so mafmadmaf is next.

mafmadmaf is a Chinese modular synthesizer artist. I’m not sure I ever saw his face onscreen, but it didn’t matter: This seductive and spellbinding set was perfect in my living room. Seeing his modular synthesizer and its many patch cables set up in a beautiful garden was more entertaining than simply watching some knob-turning on its own. Artfully done.

Anyone who knows Bob knows he loves modular synths.  I really have no sense of how they work, so this is all a mystery to me.  But I agree that the setting is wonderful.  And the music is very cool.

This piece is 13 minutes long and while it is mostly washes of synth sounds, there’s some melodies (synthesized sounds of water drops and chimes).

The song morphs in interesting ways, especially after 4 and a half minutes when the musicians enters the screen and you start to see him do something to his setup.  This adds new sounds and even a pulsing almost-beat.

At around ten minutes things slow way down.

[READ: July 15, 2021] Naturalist

I saw this book in the library and grabbed it because I love Jim Ottaviani’s work.  He has written and illustrated a number of non-fiction graphic novels and they have all been terrific.  I love his drawing style–very clean lines and excellent detail.  I also love his ability to compact big ideas into small digestible chunks.

But I had never heard of Edward O. Wilson, which, after reading this, surprises me. He is not only a Pulitzer prize winning author, an innovator in the field of biology and a writer of a massive book about ants, he is also controversial (as we see later on) and a devoted environmentalist.

The book opens with a young Wilson growing up in Alabama.  From when he was little he was obsessed with ants.  There were lots of fire ants where he grew up and there are few things more fascinating than fire ants (the book is chock full of all of the scientific names for all of these ants).

When he was still young, playing around in nature, he went fishing and when he pulled a fish out of the water its spines poked him in the eye giving him a traumatic cataract–he wound up with full sight in one eye only.   But this seemed to get him to focus more minutely on smaller things–ants.

Staring in fourth grade  his father was shuffled around the country a lot so Edward made his home in many places around the south, eventually settling in Florida.

There he met a friend who was obsessed with butterflies–they were two budding entomologists. (more…)

Read Full Post »

William Trevor–“Bravado” (New Yorker, January 8, 2007)

Posted in Coronavirus, Death, Dry Cleaning, Irish Writer, New Yorker, Quarantine, Short Story, Tiny Desk (Home) Concerts, Tiny Desk Concert, Violence, William Trevor on July 14, 2021| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: DRY CLEANING-Tiny Desk (Home) Concert #232 (July 6, 2021).

I thought I was familiar with Dry Cleaning, but I’m thinking I heard them discussed on an All Song Considered episode and maybe even heard the song they played.  But that was almost nine months ago, and things were quite different then.  So it’s interesting to hear that their music doesn’t typically sound like the way this Tiny Desk (Home) Concert sounds.  [I really like the sound of this].

Up until now, Dry Cleaning’s post-Brexit post-punk relied on a robust dynamism of jagged, thudding lushness and a speak-song voice. It’s music that coos and quizzes at once. How energizing to hear Dry Cleaning recontextualize its established sound for a relatively subdued Tiny Desk performance from World of Echo, a record store in East London beloved to the British band.

Tom Dowse trades his effects pedals and electric guitar for an acoustic; its weird bends and weirder chords surprisingly complement the atmospheric keyboards and minimal beats of Nick Buxton, who’s normally on drums. Lewis Maynard’s bass doesn’t throttle at this volume, but still grooves.

It’s actually Maynard’s bass that you notice right away once “Her Hippo” opens.  After a grooving riff, Florence Shaw starts speaking (not even really speak-singing, just reciting).

The house is just twelve years old
Soft landscaping in the garden
An electrician stuck his finger in the plug hole
And shouted “Yabba”

The acoustic guitars sound great in contrast here–soft and ringing–while Shaw sneers

The last thing I looked at in this hand mirror
Was a human asshole

Between songs they joke around a bit (which belies their more serious sounding music).  Buxton plays some dancey music between songs as they get set up for the next track.

Brash and unusual (for an acoustic guitar anyway) chords open “Unsmart Lady” before the rumbling bass keeps the rhythm.  This time Florence speaks even more quietly

Fat podgy
Non make-up
Unsmart lady

The middle portion is a terrific juxtaposition of unusual chords and rumbling bass.

Florence Shaw’s voice [is] an instrument of resolute deadpan…. Some might call her delivery wry, even disaffected — her lyrics non-sequitur — but here a sly inquisitiveness inclines a smile (“I’d like to run away with you on a plane, but don’t bring those loafers”) and burns a harsh memory (“Never talk about your ex / Never, never, never, never, never slag them off / Because then they know”).

For “Leafy” Dowse puts away his guitar and heads behind the keyboard for washes of synths.  After a verse or so, the slow bass comes in adding rhythm to Shaw’s lyrics:

What are the things that you have to clear out?
Baking powder, big jar of mayonnaise
What about all the uneaten sausages?
Clean the fat out of the grill pan
This is the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do, now
Trying not to think about all the memories
Remember when you had to take these pills

Dowse returns to his guitar for “Viking Hair” (from an earlier EP).  This song has something of a main riff and Shaw actually seems to be humming before the lyrics begin.

Stick up for me, do what you’re told
But sometimes tell me what to do as well
I just want to sexually experiment in a nice, safe pair of hands
Don’t judge me, just hold still

A lot of times, especially with pop bands, I like the way a band sounds in their Tiny Desk and don’t like their recorded output.  But the blub makes me think I’d enjoy their original recordings even more.  So I’ll have to check that out.

[READ: July 10, 2021] “Bravado”

(This story is about reprobates in Ireland.

It begins on Sunderland Avenue, where an Indian shop keeper is concerned about the group of five teens who approached the store.  He is closing up and they give him a hard time. The three boys are nasty but the girls are silent (this is unusual–usually the girls are drunk and terrible).  The shopkeeper pretends to be talking to the cops on the phone.

There were another two boys who had just left a club, they’d seen the band Big City.  And even though the had a mile walk home, they didn’t mind because the show was so good.

The fivesome included Manning and his girlfriend Aisling.  The other two boys, Kilroy and Donovan, were Manning’s mates. Ailsing found them harder and less enjoyable than Manning, but he hung out with them and she was stuck doing so as well. (more…)

Read Full Post »

David Sedaris–“Now We Are Five” (New Yorker, October 28, 2013)

Posted in Coronavirus, David Sedaris, Davisson Guitar Duo, Death, Essays, Franz Schubert, Funny (ha ha), Ifetayo Ali-Landing, Jerry Chang, New Yorker, Paulo Bellinati, Quarantine, Regrets, Suicide, Tiny Desk (Home) Concerts, Tiny Desk Concert, Yebba, Yuck! on July 12, 2021| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: FROM THE TOP-Tiny Desk (Home) Concert #230 (June 30, 2021).

Here’s three young classical performers playing some amazing piece of music.

From the Top is the radio program (distributed by NPR) that spotlights today’s terrific young players.

Teenagers from three locales around the country – Chicago, St. Louis and Palo Alto, Calif. – invite us into their homes for fresh takes on vintage classics, contemporary sounds and sophisticated pop arrangements.

Up first is a cello from Ifetayo Ali-Landing.  The song is by Yebba called  “Evergreen” (arr. Charles Yang).  I don’t know this song, but I really like it.  The cello sounds fantastic and the melody is delightfully complex and yet not unmelodic. I love the way she occasionally bounces the bow off the strings, for a really neat effect–very percussive.

Ifetayo Ali-Landing, an outstanding 18-year-old cellist from Chicago starts us off. She’s already performed with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and given her own TEDx talk. One of her calling cards is this propulsive performance of “Evergreen,” a pop song by Yebba, arranged for solo cello.

Up next is a guitar duo by Jack and Elle Davisson.  They play Paulo Bellinati’s “Jongo.” This is their favorite duo performance because of the rhythm and the beat.  Jack opens with some wonderful classical fingering and then Elle follows with a similar melody.  Then Jack plays a lead while Elle taps out a rhythm on the strings.  But from there it’s hard to pick out who is doing what–each player has something special and complicated going on.  Elle plays some lovely harmonics and a kind of bass string solo while Jack picks the complicated lead.  And just when you think you get the whole piece, the two of them play a lengthy percussive section tapping and slapping on all parts of their guitars–a drum solo in the middle of this classical piece.

Pairing up in Palo Alto, the Davisson Guitar Duo features Jack, 16, and his sister Elle, 13. Their signature piece is the rhythmically driven Jongo, which offers flavors from composer Paulo Bellinati’s native Brazil. The siblings finish each other’s musical phrases with startling lyrical precision.

The final piece is solo piano by Jerry Chang.  He performs Franz Schubert: “Impromptu Op. 90, No. 3.”  It sounds amazing and his description of the song that it reminds him of being in a garden, is really interesting.

Seventh-grader Jerry Chang, clad in his comfy exercise shorts, closes this cross-country Tiny Desk from home, playing Schubert’s G-flat major Impromptu like someone twice his age. The gentle, rippling effects he gets from his still-growing 13-year-old hands, and the way he makes Schubert’s wistful melody sing, is astonishing.

[READ: May 10, 2021]  “Now We Are Five”

Only Davis Sedaris could find humor in his sister committing suicide.  This piece is very poignant and quite moving but there’s still dark humor in there.

I begins by saying that his parents had six children and people were always startled to hear his.  Six kids!  But now that Tiffany had killed herself, they were only five.

Six months before she killed herself David rented a house on Emerald Isle in North Carolina.  The family had gone there when they were kids and he thought it would be a fun way for the family to get together.

When they were kids David always grabbed the master bedroom until he was kicked out.  Then he often wound up staying in the maid’s room–which was usually outside. The others banded together against him, since he was clearly the weakest at this point. (more…)

Read Full Post »

« Newer Posts - Older Posts »