The Ghost Writer by Philip Roth

Jernigan by David Gates

Silences by Tillie Olsen

Tell Me A Riddle by Tillie Olsen

Empire Falls by Richard Russo

The Dead and the Living by Sharon Olds

Open Secrets by Alice Munro

Enormous Changes at the Last Minute by Grace Paley

The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen

The Plot Against America by Philip Roth

Cloudsplitter by Russell Banks

Run River by Joan Didion

Atlantis: Poems by Mark Doty

A Curtain of Green by Eudora Welty

Selected Poems by William Carlos Williams

Goodbye Columbus by Philip Roth

First Term
Rabbit, Run by John Updike
Home Land by Sam Lipsyte
The Stranger by Albert Camus (Translation by Matthew Ward)
Last Exit to Brooklyn by Hubert Selby
Billy Phelan’s Greatest Game by William Kennedy
This Side of Paradise by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Reasons to Live by Amy Hempel
We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson
Falconer by John Cheever
Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates
Giovanni’s Room by James Baldwin
American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis
Drown by Junot Diaz
In Cold Blood by Truman Capote
Aspects of the Novel by E.M. Forester
Affliction by Russell Banks
Hunger by Knut Hamsun
Tropic of Cancer by Henry Miller
Jesus’ Son by Denis Johnson
A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway
In the Bedroom by Andre Dubus
The Girl in the Flammable Skirt by Aimee Bender
Naked Lunch by William Burroughs
The Wonders of the Invisible by David Gates

Second Term
Ironweed by William Kennedy
Ham on Rye by Charles Bukowski
The Sweet Hereafter by Russell Banks
The Boys of My Youth by Jo Ann Beard
What the Living Do by Marie Howe
Maps to Anywhere by Bernard Cooper
Veronica by Mary Gaitskill
Where I’m Calling From by Raymond Carver
Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson
Given Sugar, Given Salt by Jane Hirshfield
Angels by Dennis Johnson
Strike Anywhere by Dean Young
Birds of America by Lorrie Moore
The Safety of Objects by A. M. Homes
Cracks by Sheila Kohler
Safekeeping by Abigail Thomas
Going Places by Leonard Michaels
Corpus Christi by Bret Anthony Johnston
Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout
Like Life by Lorrie Moore
The Woman Who Walked On Water by Lily Tuck
One D.O.A., One On The Way by Mary Robison
The Beggar Maid by Alice Munro
A Better Angel by Chris Adrian
Dreaming in Hindi by Katherine Russell Rich
Slow Days, Fast Company by Eve Babitz
Because They Wanted To by Mary Gaitskill
Bad Behavior by Mary Gaitskill

Third Term
The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton
Mohawk by Richard Russo
The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Díaz
Legs by William Kennedy
American Pastoral by Philip Roth
The Moviegoer by Walker Percy
Boomerang by Barry Hannah
Dog Soldiers by Robert Stone
Everyman by Philip Roth
The Human Stain by Philip Roth
Molloy by Samuel Beckett
Malone Dies by Samuel Beckett
Ray by Barry Hannah
The Reserve by Russell Banks
I Married a Communist by Philip Roth
The Unnameable by Samuel Beckett
Rabbit Is Rich by John Updike
Don’t Cry by Mary Gaitskill
Zuckerman Unbound by Philip Roth
Rabbit Redux by John Updike
Hilda and Pearl by Alice Mattison
City of Refuge by Tom Piazza
The Stories of Breece D’J Pancake by Breece D’J Pancake
Exit Ghost by Philip Roth

The piece is an excerpt of the novel manuscript I’m working on now. I’m tentatively calling the novel Fine Creature. We’ll have to see what it becomes.

Thinking about all the awesome books I should read next term. I’ll be studying under Amy Hempel. Rock.

There’s a decent amount of dirty Jersey politics in this book. I needed some distance from the intense reporter days to really reflect on the politics so as not to let it subsume the other elements of the book or correlate too closely to actual events. I think I’ve acquired that distance. At least, I hope I have. I’ve got a little under 25k words to the book so far. I’m aiming for 60k though it looks like this will wind up being longer. I’m hoping to have a first draft done by the end of the year.

1) 34th Parallel has an interview with me and the first short story I ever wrote in their 5th issue.

2) I started Bennington’s MFA program in January. Best decision ever. It’s a low-residency program, so I have to go up to Vermont twice a year for 10-day residencies. The rest of the time I work from home and mail in packets of writing and book annotations to my professors.

This is my book list this term:

Rabbit, Run by John Updike
Home Land by Sam Lipsyte
The Stranger by Albert Camus
Last Exit to Brooklyn by Hubert Selby
Billy Phelan’s Greatest Game by William Kennedy
This Side of Paradise by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Falconer by John Cheever
American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis
Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs
Beautiful Children by Charles Bock
Drown by Junot Díaz
Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates
Giovanni’s Room by James Baldwin
Reasons to Live by Amy Hempel
Tropic of Cancer by Henry Miller
The Girl in the Flammable Skirt: Stories by Aimee Bender
Affliction by Russell Banks
Hunger by Knut Hamsun
The Wonders of the Invisible World by David Gates
We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson
Jesus’ Son by Denis Johnson
In the Bedroom by Andre Dubus
In Cold Blood Truman Capote
A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway
Molloy by Samuel Beckett
Black Tickets by Jayne Anne Phillips

3) Word Riot Press news: New version of Midnight Picnic by Nick Antosca arrived from the printer. Galley copies for World Takes by Timmy Waldron are in the works.

4) I have a reading in Mass. coming up:

Dire Reading Series
Friday, March 6, 2009 @ 8 p.m.
106 Prospect Street
Cambridge, Massachusetts