Avery #3


Okay, so I will say this quickly - if you go and buy a copy of Avery #3, the editors of Avery will email me your mailing address so that I can send you a free copy of the newest Phoebe. This is a limited time offer. This special deal will end on the last day of July. This once in a lifetime opportunity will exist for two months. 

Send $ to Avery. I will send you a Phoebe.

So, I just finished reading Avery #3. I read it quickly, all in one sitting. It is 55 pages long (the shortest of the 3 issues Avery House Press, Inc. has released so far) and consists of 5 stories by Sherrill Alesiak, Malcolm Dixon, Tom Whalen, Rob Roensch, and Blake Butler. The cover is really really good. Doug Mack did a good job with the cover. I am jealous of the cover, actually. The little yellow leaves, the crisscrossing wires, the mail truck are very nice to look at.

This issue of Avery is disorienting. I mean this in a good way. This also may have been due to my laziness as a reader, but maybe not. When I read Alesiak's story, "Birds of Paradise/Birds of Prey," I did not understand at all what was going on until the third page. Perhaps my inexperience with leper colonies added to my confusion? Well, I feel a little more knowledgeable about leper colonies now.

And Malcolm Dixon's story, the language of it, disoriented me with its odd rhythms, the odd meanings of each word, how the characters spoke to one another. I could have read that story for another ten pages. Thank you, Dixon.

I resisted most Tom Whalen's story, "Faculty Meeting." I felt mean towards the story. I wanted to beat up the story. I felt as though I did not want the narrator to survive the faculty meeting. I cannot explain my urges here. I apologize.

Rob Roensch's story has dogs in it. I liked it. There is some vague, sad matter that happened in the spring before the dogs appear in the story. But the story only mentions the dogs. All kinds of dogs.

Blake Butler's story is ________.



Also, changes are happening over at Avery. Andrew Palmer and Doug Mack are leaving. Emma Straub and Mike Fusco are taking their places.

Emma Straub was Stephin Merritt's assistant? That sounds fun.

I am tired. I'm sorry. This was a lazy post.