It's a Book!

Michael Kimball Writes Your Life Story (on a postcard) started five years ago at a performance arts festival. Between then and now, I wrote over 300 postcard life stories, condensing over 10,000 years of life. Now it's a book. You can get it directly from Mud Luscious or from Amazon. Unfortunately, I couldn't publish everybody's postcard life story in the book or it would have come in around 700 pages. So the book is a selection from the project. Here's the Table of Contents: #45 Adam Robinson, #46 Karen Lillis, #52 Josh Maday, #49 Red Delicious Apple, #66 Blake Butler, #67 G, #70 Elizabeth Ellen, #75 Moose the Cat, #76 Deborah Ling, #91 Kathryn Jachowski, #98 Chair, #100 Jonathon Bender, #101 Elizabeth Crane, #102 Shanti Perez, #103 Rachel Joy, #111 Aaron Goolsby, #114 Sammy the Dog, #117 Baby C, #118 Nate Jackson, #125 J, #129 Matt Bell, #130 El Duque the Cat, #131 Tao Lin, #133 Rahne Alexander, #137 Rhode Island Red, #141 Steve Katz, #149 Christopher Douglas Bowles, #158 Patrick King, #161 L, #166 Beowulf the Cat, #167 Ken Baumann, #170 T-Shirt, #176 Cyndy Taylor, #184 Stephanie Barber, #188 R, #195 Kaya Larsen, #197 A. Jarrell Hayes, #199 Luca Dipierro, #200 Grendel the Cat, #209 Julie Riso, #210 F, #221 Effie Gross, #228 Nick Kane, #240 Monte Riek, #242 N, #249 Umbrella Cover, #255 Andy Devine, #263 Edgar Allan Poe, #265 Abby the Horse, #267 Michael Kimball, #280 Brin-Jonathan Butler, #282 Robin Black, #288 Stephen Graham Jones, #290 Catherine Lacey, #302 John Quincy Adams, #304 Shannon Sullivan, #307 Soap.

Vouched

The good Christopher Newgent did an awful interview with Andy Devine, which is how they do interviews at Vouched. So there's that. Also, Andy will be reading in the Vouched Presents reading series on January 15th with a killer lineup--Sean Lovelace, Aaron Burch, and Matt Bell. This announcement is brought to you as part of Being Andy Devine.

It Was a Good Year

Here is my year in words, by the numbers.

44 publications in magazines and anthologies.
20 interviews of other writers.
16 readings.
12 readings by my pseudonym, Andy Devine.
11 screenings of films.
10 interviews of me.
2 translations: Dear Everybody in Korean, How Much of Us There Was in Spanish.
1 documentary, 60 Writers/60 Places.
1 paperback, Dear Everybody.
1 book under a pseudonym, Andy Devine's Words.

Andy Devine Does Teleportal

After reading in two places at once on November 14th (Champaign and NYC), Andy Devine needed a little recovery time, but Being Andy Devine, the national book tour for WORDS, just passed through Austin, Texas for the Teleportal Readings, which was part of the Indie Lit Roadshow. Many thanks to the wonderful Jess Sauer for organizing, and, as always, to brilliant Andy Devine for being Andy Devine. Here is Andy's reading from Teleportal, which had to be recorded in a van outside the venue because of legal reasons.

Andy Devine Does Teleportal... from Monofonus Press on Vimeo.

Devine Remix

As I mentioned, below, Robert Kloss is doing a series of remixes at Necessary Fiction this month. Up today is the Andy Devine story, Plots, which is from WORDS, which Publishing Genius published earlier this year.

Being Andy Devine

After reading in two places at once on November 14th (Champaign and NYC), Andy Devine needed a little recovery time, but Being Andy Devine, the national book tour for WORDS, continues in Portland on December 9th at the Smalldoggies Reading Series--along with Tom De Beauchamp, Jackie Treiber, Michael Roberts, and musical guest Antique Summer. Thanks to Matty Byloos and Carrie Seitzinger for organizing and hosting.

Smile Politely, Andy Devine

There's a nice conversation with and around Andy Devine and his national tour, Being Andy Devine, at Smile Politely. It includes his publisher, Adam Robinson, his editor (me), as well as writer Aaron Burch, the host of Stories & Beer, where Andy Devine will be reading on November 14th. At the same time on the same day, November 14th, Andy Devine will also be reading at the Soda Series in NYC, with Mairéad Byrne, Daniel Groves, Stephanie Barber, and Adam Robinson.

Plus, there's a really nice post by Tom DeBeauchamp about reading Andy Devine's novel, Apartment City, over at Htmlgiant.

Only Jackasses Use Whom

I have an interview with Andy Devine up at The Faster Times. We talk about alphabetical stories, making people cry, aphorisms for t-shirts, etc.

More interviews @ The Faster Times: Gary Lutz, Blake Butler, Laura van den Berg, Brian Evenson, Robert Lopez, Dylan Landis, Padgett Powell, Sam Lipsyte, Dawn Raffel, Kevin Sampsell, Gina Frangello, Evan Lavender-Smith, Ken Sparling, Matt Bell, Ingrid Burrington.

Four Years of Genius

November marks the four year anniversary of Publishing Genius. To celebrate the head genius, Adam Robinson, has posted a selection from Andy Devine's "A Grammar for Fiction Writers" at Everyday Genius.

Electric Literature

There's a great piece on Andy Devine and WORDS and the national book tour for WORDS, Being Andy Devine (BAD), over at Electric Literature. Andy would like to thank Julia Jackson and Adam Robinson -- who talk about pseudonyms, Andentity, and Andy Kaufman.

Being Andy Devine

Being Andy Devine (BAD), the national book tour for Andy Devine's first book, WORDS, is underway. The next stop is Atlanta for the Solar Anus reading series. That's with Gabe Durham and Todd Dills and music. That's November 5th, 8pm, at the Beep Beep Gallery. Then it's Champaign for the Stories & Beer reading series on November 14th and NYC for the Soda Series on November 14th -- yes, Andy Devine will be in two places at once.

Being Andy Devine

Being Andy Devine (BAD), the national book tour for Andy Devine's first book, WORDS, is underway. The next stop is Providence for couscous sur l'herbe on October 26. From 9-10, there is music with Jonathan Bonner Cape Breton Fiddle and Laila Aukee Ukelele plus Vocals Extraordinaire. From 10-11, it's Andy Devine with Mairead Byrne, Karen Donovan, Rachel Glasser, and Mike Young. From 11 on, Dave and Mark play the blues.

Mudluscious Stamp Story Anthology

The mudluscious 2011 titles are up for looking at their covers and subscribing and such. I have a little piece in [C.] the stamp story anthology, as does Andy Devine.

#255: The Alphabetical Andy Devine

Andy Devine was born in Flagstaff, Arizona and it is probably significant that his first name begins with the letter A. From an early age, Andy loved to play with his wooden letter blocks and as he got older he would alphabetize them into walls of letters. In kindergarten, he was mesmerized by the alphabet that hung over the chalkboard—both the uppercase and the lowercase. Andy did not talk much, though, so it was a while before his parents realized that he had a speech impediment, a kind of stutter (which some have sited this as a possible explanation for his conceptual fictions). When he was 8, there was a terrible incident concerning the family’s baby being killed, though it is unclear how and who killed the baby. It is known, however, that Devine was sent to live with his maternal grandparents in Toms River, New Jersey after this and worked in the family grocery store growing up there. He spent a lot of the daytime in the backyard where he taught himself to sit so still that birds would land on him and squirrels would crawl over him. In middle school, Andy started reading a lot of books, his favorites being dictionaries, encyclopedias, and thesauruses—anything that arranged the material alphabetically. In high school, Andy was a small forward on the basketball team and a middle-distance runner on the track team. He began to notice girls and fell in love with girl after girl whose names started with the letter A—Abby, Alice, Amy, Angie, Ann, Anna, Audrey (in that order). The first girl he ever kissed was named Birdy. In college, Andy played in a punk band called Babylonia that only played covers of songs that were written in languages they didn’t understand. And Andy studied library science and, after graduating, worked for a time at the main branch of the New York Public Library, but he eventually became disenchanted with the Dewey decimal system as an organizational system. While living in NYC, Andy developed a hatred for actors and a taste for a thoughtfully constructed indexes. In his late 20s, his girlfriend Zooey broke up with him and she was the last woman that he ever loved. Andy tried to read novels to console himself, but he felt as if novelists were choosing the wrong words. In response, Andy started creating lists of words that should and shouldn’t be used in fiction, works that became implicit critiques of contemporary writing and publishing. In spring 2010, Publishing Genius will bring out his first book, WORDS. Other acknowledgments of his remarkable work are the fact that Andy Devine Avenue (in Flagstaff, Arizona) is named after him and his mention in a Frank Zappa song (“Andy”). Someday, there will probably be a bridge or maybe a mountain that is named after him.

[Update: Andy Devine is currently on a national tour for his first book, Words (Publishing Genius). See Being Andy Devine for tour dates.]

Being Andy Devine

Being Andy Devine (BAD), the national book tour for Andy Devine's first book, WORDS, is underway. The next stop is Philadelphia, October 16, 7pm, Fergie's Pub, which is 1214 Sansom--with Andy Devine, Jamie Gaughran-Perez, James Belflower, Kate Greenstreet, Joe Hall, Steven Karl, Lauren Bender, Dan Magers, Adam Robinson, and Ben Segal.

The Andy Devine Tour

The Andy Devine Tour kicked off in Baltimore, made its way to NYC (attached), and will move on to dates in Muncie, Indiana -- Portland, Oregon -- Nashville, Tennessee -- Philadelphia, Pennsylvania -- back to Baltimore, Maryland -- Ann Arbor, Michigan -- Brooklyn, New York -- et cetera. Even if you don't live in any of those place, you can still read WORDS to yourself.

What Is Andy Devine's Words?

There's a very nice write up of Andy Devine's Words by the good Thomas Baughman in which he asks this smart question: "Is this a fine example of avante-garde writing or a brilliant parody of postmodern pastiche and reader-response criticism?" Can the answer be yes to all parts of that question?

The 5ive:Ten Readings

Sure, we took the summer off from The 5ive:Ten Readings, but we want you to know that we missed you and that nothing has changed between us. The first episode of the Fall 510 is going to feature readers from Unsaid Magazine, one of the greatest literary magazines ever published. The September line-up features Michael Kimball, Kim Calder, Kate Wyer, and Andy Devine. That's Saturday, September 18th, 5pm at the Minas Gallery. There are some good looking photos and bios at the link.

The Saturday after that, the 25th, The 5ive:Ten Readings will be at the Baltimore Book Festival in the CityLit Tent at 5pm with Paula Bomer, Aryn Kyle, Jen Michalski, Michael Kimball, Justin Kramon, and the writing duo of Jon Cotner and Andy Fitch.

I'm going to be reading brand new work. I hope to see you there or there.

Andy Devine @ Big Other

The good Davis Schneiderman interviewed my pseudonym, Andy Devine, at Big Other. Andy and Davis talk about numbers v. words, dead parents, how to write alphabetically, and, of course, WORDS.

Dark Sky Magazine

The wonderful Ethel Rohan interviews me over at Dark Sky Magazine. We talk about writing, fancy hats, something you don't know about me, and I do a 5-minute free write using the word blood, a little piece that will end up in the new novel that I'm working on.