Monday, June 2, 2008

Peter Markus & Lindsay Lohan's Tits

Hi.

I reviewed PETER MARKUS's new novel BOB, OR MAN ON BOAT out now from DZANC BOOKS at NEW PAGES along with other good reviews by Josh Maday, Sean Lovelace, Matt Bell and others.

GET IT



Also, LINDSAYLOHANSTITS.INFO is now live. I am going to do something else with it but I'm not sure what yet.

I will be launching another site this or next week that will actually provide a useful service I think.

Um, something something.

Oh also, DEREK WHITE is selling a ton of his stuff before he moves to Africa, the lucky bastard. You can browse a chunk of his music and book library and buy them for cheap. It is fun to shop from photographs. I already snagged several good books including stuff by Deb Olin Unferth, Joyelle McSweeney, Brandon Hobson, plus two copies of literary mags I really wanted. Go get some shit from Derek's GOAT RODEO.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!I want to move to Africa too !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Rewatched SONGS FROM THE SECOND FLOOR last night, a Swedish surrealist film by Roy Andersson with some of the best filmwork in recent memory and really funny. I bought it years ago right after I first saw it and forgot and hadn't even opened it yet. I would be hard pressed to find a movie more up my alley. Weird conversational steadicam scenes in highly stylized rooms while all this chaotic shit goes on the background and no one really even mentions it. End of world, something, something. I'd forgotten. I want to get Roy Andersson's new film YOU, THE LIVING but it's only on PAL dvd, fuck.

Roy Andersson also makes really strange commericals in Sweden, like this one:



and this one



You can read what they are saying in the 2nd one in the youtube page description. It is funny. A lot of SONGS FROM THE SECOND FLOOR has the same look and feel as that 2nd commercial.

America is a neon pisshole.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!I want to go to Sweden too!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

8 comments:

Michael Kimball said...

Hey Blake,

Nice review of Bob. I interviewed Peter about the book for Avatar Review: http://avatarreview.net/AV10/Kimball.htm

And here's a questions I was thinking about yesterday: Do you think Bob could be about addiction?

BLAKE BUTLER said...

very very nice interview Michael. you have a way of drawing people out.

I could see addiction. addiction as obsession. the same way i feel when i can't go running on certain days, the way my body kind of aches for it as if the motions are a drug. bob as an addict of so many years there's not even a choice anymore. most definitely.

i didn't really talk about it in my review but some of the sections that really slayed me about the book were between the narrator Bob and his son, the wife wanting Bob to be with his son instead of chasing his father and the fish, and Bob unable to give it up even when the son himself asks. those scenes are just brutal, in the same way a child's book can be brutal, the same way i feel about harold and the purple crayon or something or certain sections of dahl's matilda or something.

god

BLAKE BUTLER said...

if anyone wants to read the first part of Bob online, it is here:
http://avatarreview.net/AV10/Markus.htm

chris killen said...

you, the living is amazing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=43R1k8vHCh0

BLAKE BUTLER said...

i want to see so bad

Shane Jones said...

i'm really excited about the Peter Markus book - just ordered a copy. boo-yah.

jereme said...

Chris and shane are not putting forth their best effort.

Too much delay between the two posts.

BLAKE BUTLER said...

good job shane

jereme send them a directive