Kevin Smokler has put together an interesting collection of essays called Bookmark Now. It's about writing and reading in our current time from writers who are young. He's given some interviews around blogland:
with LAist
How do I find time to read? Location location location. I have one book on my nighttable, one next to the toilet, one in my car, another in my backpack. Whenever I'm sitting still in any of these places, I read 5 pages. Then on the weekends, maybe an hour or two at a stretch. You'd be surprised how fast you go through books. Second, how do I select what to read? I have trusted sources (friends, blogs, book review sections) whose opinions I trust. Also, when I finish a book I do two things. Write about it in a notebook and on my blog and "tag it", so Sherman Alexie's Ten Little Indians might be "contemporary, short story collection, native american." The next book I read can't have any of those same tags which keeps things as diverse as I can manage.
and with Booksquare
In the introduction, I write about the NEA’s “Reading at Risk” report which, yet again, argued that people my age and younger don’t read because we’ve been lured away and drugged by television, video games and the Internet. I turned the accusation around and said that perhaps we’re doing a lousy job of making books as sexy as those other options and that we have the opportunity to turn the fortunes of of publishing and books around with a little imagination and lot of hard work. Anger is a fabulous motivator.
Kevin and some of the LA-based contributors will be giving a reading at Skylight Books on Sunday, the 12th. Unfortunately, I won't be able to make it since I'm heading there tonight for the Lisa Glatt reading.
Posted by Josh at June 10, 2005 10:31 AM | TrackBack