You Do Hoodoo

The Hartman Family I gave up on graduate school almost immediately—by day two, maybe. Getting a master’s in English was like having a full-time job, a serious one. Because I’d applied at the last minute, I didn’t receive an assistantship, so I supported myself with two part-time gigs: washing dishes in a girls’ dorm cafeteria … Continue reading The Joys of Midwestern Gothic Television Back i...

On Emily Wilson’s Translation of The Odyssey Then felt I like some watcher of the skies When a new planet swims into his ken John Keats, “On First Looking into Chapman’s Homer” In the introduction to her widely acclaimed translation of The Odyssey, Emily Wilson makes the commonsensical point that dressing up the epic in costumes of … Continue reading On Emily Wilson’s Translation o...

I’ve received a contract for my new novel Winter Break. so I thought I’d post a short excerpt. The boy Dwayne is the nephew of a serial killer who picked Rusty up hitchhiking. Bigelow is Summerville’s Chief of Police. 201 Dogwood Circle, 2 January 1973 Rusty’s up early, so he’s in the kitchen when the … Continue reading Excerpt from WINTER BREAK, the Sequel to TODAY, OH&#16...

When he’s not fronting the band Danger Muffin, my pal Dan Lotti is a partner in a film company that acquires screenplays. Several months ago at Chico Feo,[1] Dan was all hepped up about a script that his company had optioned called Late Fame. It was in production, and they had landed Willem Dafoe to play the … Continue reading Musings on Late Fame

In my new novel Winter Break, lovely Jill Birdsong is sitting in the Ashley Plaza cinema in 1972 with her girlfriends watching the Robert Redford feature Jeremiah Johnson. Here’s a brief excerpt (note: Ollie is her slightly-on-the-spectrum ex-boyfriend from high school): Although Jill admires the scenery, she never becomes fully absorbed in the story. At the moment, Jeremiah, &#8230...

On my way home from Chevy Chase after celebrating Mighty Julian Levi Moore’s fifth birthday, I recognized the journalist George Will sitting primly at one of the gates at Charleston International with a white-haired woman I assumed was his wife.  He had on a blue-and-white seersucker sports coat (but no bow tie, dammit), and his … Continue reading Celebrity Sighting

The Flacci Conspiracy I’m not going to lie. I’m getting frustrated trying to find an agent for my novel Too Much Trouble. I’ve visited dozens of literary agency websites. They might consider a manuscript involving serial-killer Cub Scout den mothers, dragon-riding interior decorators, sexually repressed werewolves, psychosocially damaged hydro-therapists, or emotionally available Navy SE...

Yesterday afternoon, Caroline and I met Cathy Coulter and Chuck Sulliavan at Lowlife to celebrate Chuck’s 83rd birthday. As so often is the case, Donald Trump, our most Liberacean[1] of presidents, elbowed his way into our conversation because earlier in the day at the G-7 conference in France, he made such an egregious ass out of himself … Continue reading Oh Shame, Where Is Thy&#...

A Dead End Hedonistic Septuagenarian Foresees His Death for Chuck Sullivan The years to come seemed waste of breath,A waste of breath the years behind. I know I shall meet my fate one day,while crossing Second Street East,neglecting to look both ways . . . A MAGA JACKED UP PICKUP TRUCK . . . not … Continue reading A Dead End Hedonistic Septuagenarian Foresees His Death

OD-ing on Confederate Jasmine Down here in the Lowcountry of South Carolina,I’m suffering the odiferous overloadof Confederate Jasmine in full bloom mode. It smells like a perfume that Edgar Alan Poemight pour all over his Lost Lenore,way too sentimentally sweet this scent of lost causes thankfully lost,an overpowering aroma thatmakes the sweetest, sweet tea seem … Continue reading OD-ing on...

Strunk and White on Steroids Hypocrite lecteur,—mon semblable, —mon frère! Baudelaire, “Les Fleurs du mal”  Last night I did something mildly perverse: I fed a commercial Facebook post into my ChatGPT—the same one I use for research, copy editing, and tech triage—and asked it if the copy had been generated by AI. BTW, I refer … Continue reading Strunk and White on Steroids

Yesterday’s being 4/20 and all, I committed a cliche— got confunctificated on cannabis.[1]   As I made my way home on foot from Chico Feo, East Erie Avenue was blessedly empty, which meant I could recite out loud the lyrics looping in what I’ve come to call my mental jukebox. Saying the words—or singing them—is therapeutic, … Continue reading Mental Jukebox Tourette’s S...

The Old Testament Ain’t the New Testament But It’s Pete Hegseth’s Testamentthe air without refuge of silence,     the drift of lice, teething, and above it the mouthing of orators,     the arse-belching of preachers. Ezra Pound, “Canto XIV” One of the most puzzling paradoxes of the Trump era is the veneration he receives from ev...

When I was five years old living in Biloxi, Mississippi, I was fortunate enough to contract rheumatic fever, an autoimmune reaction to untreated strep throat that triggers the immune system to rev into overdrive, attacking healthy tissue along with invasive streptococcus bacteria. I say “fortunate” because the disease left no permanent heart valve or joint … Continue reading The...

I’ve come up with the male equivalent of “resting bitch face,” that sexist slight used to describe women who don’t dutifully beam sun-splashed smiles as they slog through yet another day of taxing responsibilities. Unfortunately, my term for the male equivalent—resting ogre face—aptly describes—to echo Eliot’s “Prufrock”—the face I prepare to face the faces that I … Continue...

I’ve submitted this one minute video entitled Edge Connections for an art show in Charleston. If accepted it would play in a loop projected on one of the walls of the gallery. The audio would be provided by the curator. The theme is Folly Beach Noir, the Edge of America. Click on the box below … Continue reading Submission for Beeple Art Show