New year, new book: Stop Me If You’ve Heard This One Before is twelve tales of the weird, including a previously unpublished story and novelette, by the author of Lars Breaxface: Werewolf in Space.
It’s currently available on Amazon & Barnes & Noble but should be up on Bookshop.org & elsewhere shortly (ebook version too, if you’re into that). Booksellers & librarians can get it straight from Ingram.
Along w/ the book, there’s a reading Friday, January 14th hosted by White Whale Bookstore in Bloomfield. Yes, it’s a Zoom thing, which is not my preference (& I greatly look forward to doing some live events again this year!), but given that half the readers are in Rhode Island, it makes sense for this one. RSVP at Eventbrite & tune in at 7 PM ET on the 14th to hear Brandon & co. tell you stories you likely haven’t heard before.
Please register for this event by snagging a ticket on Eventbrite! There are both free tickets and pay-what-you-can tickets available. Registration will end at 6:30pm ET on 3/26.
Think you’ve got a bad job? Take consolation that you’re not scraping mold for a living, that you don’t have any tentacles in your head, and that you’re not sewing tents from the discarded skins of the creatures who’ve taken your world over. A wonderfully odd novella with a profoundly human core.
-Brian Evenson, author of Song for the Unraveling of the World and The Warren
At its best, Rick Claypool’s work makes the disturbing and surreal feel believable. The true horror in this book isn’t the alien overlords, but the alarmingly relatable journey of a man navigating a world he will never understand, willing to stoop ever lower just to get by.
-Daniel McCloskey, author of Cloud Town and A Film About Billy
Claypool’s post-apocalyptic novella draws readers into a world that’s compellingly surreal, darkly imaginative, and just not… quite right.
-Premee Mohamed, author of A Broken Darkness and Beneath the Rising
A character struggling between the twin horrors of alien invasion and economic degradation, I found Rick Claypool’s Mold Farmer a voice that held me in its grip. Full-on body horror merges with the most human of concerns – family, and how to protect it – to produce a fascinating, frightening tale.
-Aliya Whiteley, author of The Loosening Skin and The Beauty
Rick Claypool is the author of Leech Girl Lives (Spaceboy Books, 2017) and The Mold Farmer (Six Gallery Press, 2020). His short fiction appears here and there online and has been anthologized in Not My President: The Anthology of Dissent (Thoughtcrime Press, 2018) and The Future Will Be Written by Robots (Spaceboy Books, 2020). By day he works for Public Citizen researching corporate crime. He spent most of his life in Western Pennsylvania and now lives in Rhode Island, where he goes looking in the woods for fungi as frequently as he can.
Elwin Cotman is a storyteller from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He is the author of three collections of speculative short stories: The Jack Daniels Sessions EP (Six Gallery Press, 2010), Hard Times Blues (Six Gallery Press, 2013), and Dance on Saturday (Small Beer Press, 2020), a 2021 Philip K. Dick Award finalist. His work has appeared in Grist, Weird Fiction Review, Black Gate, The Southwestern Review, and Cabinet des Fées, among others. He was a core member of the Cyberpunk Apocalypse Writers’ Cooperative in Pittsburgh, has toured across North America doing readings, and has curated many readings and reading series. Cotman holds a BA from the University of Pittsburgh and an MFA from Mills College.
Robert Isenberg is a freelance writer, playwright, photographer, stage performer, and documentary filmmaker. His books include The Archipelago: A Balkan Passage (Autumn House Press, 2010), Wander (Six Gallery Press, 2011), The Green Season (The Tico Times Publications, 2015), and three entries in the ongoing Adventures of Elizabeth Crowne series: The Mysterious Tongue of Dr. Vermillion (Backpack Media, 2015), The Woman in the Sky (2020), and Curse of the Qattara (2020). He earned his MFA in Creative Writing from Chatham University, where he served as Whitford Fellow. Originally from Vermont, he lived in Pittsburgh for 16 years. For two years he lived in Costa Rica, where he served as a staff writer for The Tico Times. He freelances widely and teaches for numerous institutions, including Arizona State University. Isenberg now lives in Rhode Island, where he is a contributing editor for Providence Monthly.
Daniel McCloskey founded the Cyberpunk Apocalypse, a writers’ project which housed 45 writers from across the US and Canada and hosted hundreds of literary events. He is the author and illustrator of the prose/graphic novel hybrid A Film About Billy (Six Gallery Press, 2012), the comics Top of the Line (soon to appear in graphic novel form as Made Monsters) and Free Money, and the graphic novel Cloud Town (Abrams ComicArts, forthcoming). His work has been anthologized in BOTTOMS UP! True Tales of Hitting Rock-Bottom (Birdcage Bottom Books, 2017) and published on The Nib.
Provided we make it there intact, Six Gallery Press will be representing at #AWP16 this weekend. Sharing scenic table 558 will be 6GP scribblers Daniel McCloskey (A Film About Billy), Elwin Cotman (The Jack Daniels Sessions EP, Hard Times Blues), & Robert Isenberg (Wander), plus Jess Simms of nascent literary institution The Haven.
In addition to books by this sick crew, we’ll have recent selections from Ally Malinenko, Che Elias, Joseph Musso Jr., Chuck Kinder, Don Wentworth, & Jason Baldinger, plus a selection of hits from the back catalog.
We’ll also have books by a duo of fellow Pittsburgh small presses, Low Ghost & Coleridge Street, featuring the poetic stylings of Adam Matcho, Scott Silsbe, Bob Pajich, & John Grochalski, PLUS the Good Noise! anthology by Thrasher Press, featuring even more Pittsburgh poets writing on musical themes.
Feel free to visit us & buy all the books so we don’t have to lug them all home on the Greyhound!
Expat writer Robert Isenberg will read from his new book, The Green Season at East End Book Exchange.
Thursday, February 18th, 7-9pm. Free and open to everyone.
In 2013, Robert Isenberg sold all his belongings, bought a plane ticket, and moved to Costa Rica. There he worked as a staff reporter for The Tico Times, zigzagging across the country in search of stories.
The Green Season is a collection of essays, profiles, and travelogues written during his first year in Central America. The first book from The Tico Times Publishing Group, The Green Season is a love letter to the world’s happiest country: Readers meet national heroes, surf instructors, indigenous crafters, and survivors of the sex trade. Throughout, Isenberg uses his trademark humor and observation to illustrate the country’s complex cultural landscape.
About Robert Isenberg:
Born and raised in Vermont, Isenberg is author of The Green Season (The Tico Times Publications Group) The Archipelago (Autumn House Press), and Wander, a poetry collection (Six Gallery Press). An award-winning writer and stage actor, Isenberg has contributed to such diverse publications as Lonely Planet, McSweeney’s, Mental_Floss, The Christian Science Monitor, and Pittsburgh Magazine. His many stage-plays have received enthusiastic reviews, as has his Pittsburgh Monologue Project, a stand-up performance series based on overheard conversations (co-authored with Brad Keller). He earned his MFA in Nonfiction Writing from Chatham University, where he served as Whitford Fellow, the program’s highest honor. He has taught for Duquesne University and currently teaches for Arizona State University. A proud New Englander, he has traveled to 35 countries on five continents. He currently lives in Arizona and contributes to The Phoenix New Times.
& THIS FRIDAY…
An original radio play written by Robert Isenberg
and produced by No Name Players
Why would three ordinary men risk their lives to rob a bank? Who put them up to it? And what does all this have to do with an old vaudeville theater? Only one woman can solve this riddle—Elizabeth Crowne, Uncannologist.
In the beloved tradition of vintage serials, Arcade Comedy Theater presents Elizabeth Crowne and the Vaudeville Conspiracy, a live radio drama “broadcasting” on Feb. 19, 2016, at 8 p.m. The show is packed with suspense, paranormal mystery, and witty one-liners.
Elizabeth Crowne is produced by the acclaimed No Name Players and directed by artistic director Don DiGiulio. The cast includes such local stars as Karen Baum, Tressa Glover, and John Feightner, with live music by Jesse Landis-Eigsti.
Written by longtime Pittsburgh writer Robert Isenberg, the script is an extension of his pulp fiction stories, The Adventures of Elizabeth Crowne. The first volume of this series, The Mysterious Tongue of Dr. Vermilion, was released by Backpack Media at the end of 2015.
$10/$5 student rush. BYOB
Stay tuned as the tour continues in March, w/ a TBD reading for AWP & two more in Arizona!
So, Isenberg is bicycling across Costa Rica & writing about it. He clued me in to this a couple weeks ago & sent a link to the first Tico Times article (of 11), but I’m just now catching up.
Aaand he’s done, as of 9/10.
A cool little series, & there are short videos for some of the articles. Also, you actually can click on the numbered circles on the map at the top to navigate, even though the cursor doesn’t change.
At the end of the month, Robert Isenberg is abandoning (yes, abandoning) the Steel City & moving to Costa Rica. Two opportunities to see him perform one last time (until he comes back) & bombard him with overripe tomates y aguacates exist. The first is TODAY at Bar Marco.
The second, featuring Joe Lyons, Fred Betzner, Joanna Lowe, Parag Shanti G & Brad Keller, is Saturday at Arcade Comedy Theater.
TOMORROW @ 7pm, storyteller Stacy Keene brings her sharp eye for the telling detail to East End Book Exchange for the first True Story Party. She will be joined by author/filmmaker & 6GP poet Robert Isenberg,
comedian Derek Minto, MOTH producer Kelly Dee,
author/actor Pete Butler,
Jasmine Davis & Andrea Laurion of 808 improv comedy troupe,
author/comedian Michael Buzzelli,
actor Michael McBurney,
storyteller/globetrotter Jia Ji,
& host, comedian John Dick Winters. The theme is “taking flight”. Pizza by Spak Bros. & some kind of wine will be provided, but also BYOB if it’s your True Will.
Six Gallery Press 