What I\u2019ve Been Reading This Week:<\/strong><\/p> Probably too much, honestly, but I was overwhelmed with the spirit of Halloween. All re-reads this week, plus an anthology I\u2019d never read cover-to-cover. I ended up having a pretty busy October, like personal life stuff, but I managed to carve out good writing time for scary stuff I care about\/enjoy writing. SGJ <\/a>inspired<\/a> me<\/a>. Wanted to keep those good vibes going into poetry week. So I read Tiny Nightmares<\/em>, edited by and Nadxieli Nieto, The Book Of Whispering In The Projection Booth<\/em> by Joshua Marie Wilkinson, Fjords Vol. II<\/em> by Zachary Schomburg, <\/strong>and R E D<\/em> by Chase Berggrun.<\/p> Tiny Nightmares<\/strong><\/em>, edited by Lincoln Michel and Nadxieli Nieto: <\/strong>inspired by barreling through <\/a>Never Whistle At Night<\/a><\/em>, I decided to cover-to-cover this bad boy. On a back blurb, Carmen Maria Machado calls these stories \u201cliterary bonbons,\u201d and claims she could gorge herself all day. You totally can, all of these stories are 1,500 words or fewer. May I recommend, however, not. Read like two or three of these at a time. My complaint about collections of flash (Lydia Davis books, for instance) is that if I read all of them right in a row, everything starts to blur together. Then it\u2019s me doing a disservice to the stories. One of my top five favorite stories, \u201cThe Marriage Variations\u201d by Monique Laban, is in this anthology. I should do a column on my top five favorite stories. Right after I make a top five. Shoutout to fellow blogger for being one-half of this editorial team\u2014these stories are top notch and the book itself is a beautiful object (brilliantly sectioned into \u201cHead \/ Body \/ Limbs \/ Viscera\u201d categories, cover design by co-editor Nadxieli Nieto, and the thick, sturdy pages1<\/a>). If you are teaching a horror writing class, assign this anthology. <\/p> The Book Of Whispering In The Projection Booth<\/strong><\/em> by Joshua Marie Wilkinson: <\/strong>Agent Dale Cooper believes that every day, you should give yourself a little present. For me, a present is putting a JMW book on the calendar, then reading it in one sitting. This book has sections of tiny short poems and sections of long, fragmented ones that stretch on for pages and feel like someone spilled a photo album out of an old shoebox. Would Josh consider himself a horror poet? Probably not, but there is always the sense that something terrible and tremble-inducing is looming. Agent Cooper would love this book, I bet.<\/p> Fjords Vol. II<\/strong><\/em> by Zachary Schomburg: <\/strong>Speaking of something looming\u2014maybe booming with slowness? Ah, that\u2019s volume 1\u2014Zach\u2019s books are another gift I give myself. This is my second time reading volume 2, and it struck me that Tim Robinson should be given a show where he adapts Zach poems. Zach deserves TV millions you can\u2019t tell me you wouldn\u2019t watch I THINK YOU SHOULD FJORD.<\/p> R E D <\/strong><\/em>by Chase Berrgrun: <\/strong>Gifts! It\u2019s a Halloween miracle! Allowing myself any Dracula art is a gift. I adore this book. It\u2019s my third time reading it, and every time, something new unfolds.\u00a0 I\u2019ve only read Dracula once (though of course I\u2019ve seen multiple adaptions and watch the Coppola one every year) and was thinking it might be time to read these two books together\u2014a project for next year. Dracula is famously an epistolary novel with multiple narrators. reading this, though, I find myself hearing each line in either Mina\u2019s (ultimate object of the vampire\u2019s affection, oppressed and repressed Victorian housewife) voice or Jonathan\u2019s (emasculated and humiliated by the vampire and in turn oppressive Victorian husband) voice. I suspect this reading has to do with knowing the speaker is trans, knowing the speaker is journeying into their own womanhood. Me being a cis man, this next statement is certainly no tidy summation of all this book has to offer, but lemme say: all cis men could stand to read this book with an eye toward killing the oppressive Victorian husband that lives in your head.<\/p> LINKS!<\/strong><\/p> Something to listen to while you browse? Yo, I\u2019m just gonna hit you with another Haunt Season<\/em> trailer, come on, you gotta see this movie. <\/p>![](\"https:\/\/substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com\/public\/images\/ba893fa1-5d2d-4d30-a0c5-5e33b451aeb7_4014x1754.heic\"\/)
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