Don't you wish you'd never, never met her?

[sovay]

Got my page proofs for "The White Swan" (in TEL : Stories) today, and they are beautiful. I can't wait to see—and read—the entire anthology. [edited 2005-03-31 16:28] And it has a nice-looking advertisement, too!

TEL : Stories Edited by Jay Lake Wheatland Press August, 2005 ISBN: 0-9755903-3-2 Pre-order soon from Wheatland Press Did you ever read a story and say to yourself, "Oh my God, someone can do that with the language?" TEL : Stories is dedicated to the idea that there is no such thing as stylistic excess. Featuring a reprint of Greer Gilman's "Jack Daw's Pack," as well as new fiction from Forrest Aguirre, Gregory Feeley, Jeff VanderMeer and many other fine authors, TEL : Stories offers twenty-eight different views of what style in fiction can be.

In other news, I'm trying to figure out how on earth I managed to make it all the way to grad school without ever listening to PJ Harvey. I love her work. A professor of mine introduced me to her last fall with To Bring You My Love: it was instant addiction. A day ago, I borrowed Rid of Me; and given that I've been listening to it almost nonstop since then, it may be about to displace To Bring You My Love as my favorite PJ Harvey album. I'm not really familiar with any of her recent stuff, though. I've got Dry and Is This Desire?, which are likewise fantastic—I retain a certain preference for the three earlier albums, but Is This Desire? has "Angelene," "The Wind," "A Perfect Day, Elise," and "No Girl So Sweet," which are individually some of my favorites—but I've never heard either Stories from the City, Stories from the Sea or Uh Huh Her.

Recommendations, warnings, abstract thoughts, anyone?

Comments

[rushthatspeaks.livejournal.com]

My beliefs about copyright indicate to me that should I like the songs I will shortly be spending a fair quantity of money on P.J. Harvey, so that would be great!

I'd assumed you'd heard of Patti Smith because she's a) one of the proto-punk-gothic people who is the direct musical ancestor in some ways of the things that, say, the Dresden Dolls do and b) she's one of the great poets and wordplayers of rock music, and uses language in an impressionistic and layered way that reminds me of, for instance, Angela Carter. So she seemed like someone you'd have been likely to have run across.

[sovay]

Nah, I'm all backwards. I heard the Dresden Dolls first (live in 2002) and branched out from there. (I'm pretty sure I'd heard Jill Tracy before that, however. That must count for something.) But any songwriter who reminds you of Angela Carter definitely goes to the top of my to-hear list.

Music forthcoming!