Thursday: I will be pretty much parked the whole night at the wonderful Sweetwater Tavern, where magical things will be happening all night long. First up is the AWP IRL Happy Hour. Free drinks! Hosted by Electric Literature, Tumblr, and Lapham’s Quarterly, which my lovely parents just gave me a subscription to for my birthday! FREE DRINKS! And best of all, you don’t even have to go outside to get to the next great event, Their Peculiar Ambitions: A Night of Presidential Fiction Readings! I’ll be hosting this puppy and giving out free swag to a lucky few here. This event is going to be killer – tons of your favorite writers reading flash fiction about the presidents of the United States – what could be more fun? Don’t even bother answering with anything else or you’re dead to me.

Friday I plan to eat and drink and play it by ear. Lit Party, maybe? Afterparty? I’m concentrating on food at this point.

Saturday’s a packed day. In the morning, from 11-12, I’ll be hanging out at the Curbside Splendor table at the bookfair and signing copies of May We Shed These Human Bodies – so please stop by and say hello if you get a chance! Then around happy hour time, I’m going to be reading for Curbside Spendor at a joint reading with Other Voices Books, at one of the nation’s best bookstores, the Brookline Booksmith - with Steve Almond, Steven Dau, Rob Roberge, and Thea Goodman. Incredible goodness – come out come out if you can! Then finally, ending up the night with one of those magnificent mega-readings, Heavy Feather Review, Big Lucks, Magic Helicopter Press, and Factory Hollow Press present There’s Still Good in You! an AWP 2013 offsite reading, featuring: Jensen Beach, Gabriel Blackwell, Rachel B. Glaser, Evelyn Hampton, W. Todd Kaneko, Seth Landman, Jordaan Mason, Caryl Pagel, Adam Robinson, and me!

Hope to see you all there, regardless of when and where and how! (Okay, well, the how might be kind of important. But you know what I mean.)

Atlantic Wire named MAY WE SHED THESE HUMAN BODIES the best small press debut of 2012! Thank you to Cal Morgan at Harper Perennial for sharing the book and his thoughts about it with the folks at the Atlantic. This is the best Christmas gift ever, for sure.

Oh – and if you haven’t bought the book yet but were on the fence, it’s half off at Curbside Splendor through the holidays!

What is your working title of your book? MAY WE SHED THESE HUMAN BODIES. That one was easy.

Where did the idea come from for the book? There were many ideas, and they came from all over the world. They fell from the clouds like rain, they came up like soft shoots into the soles of my feet, they seeded my brain and molded black on the inside of my heart.

What genre does your book fall under? Literary fiction. Or possibly blue cheese nachos.

Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition? Hmm, these questions are really more for a novelist than for a flash fiction writer, eh? Bobcat Goldthwait. He would play ALL of the characters. It would be like a reunion of the cast of Police Academy, only with just Bobcat Goldthwait. Wait, is he dead?

What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book? Stars and stars like seed pearls and a lot of darkness and sometimes a little comet or two.

Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency? Neither one. It was published in October by Curbside Splendor, and is not represented by an agency.

How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript? All my life.

What other books would you compare this story to within your genre? Maybe a little bit Angela Carter, a little bit Lorrie Moore, a little bit George Saunders, with a hint of Ben Marcus. And some Saltine crumbs in the flaps.

Who or what inspired you to write this book? My cats.

What else about your book might pique the reader’s interest? It’s green. Apparently no books are ever green. Well, mine is.

Up next week! Look for blogs by the fabulous fiction writer Lauren Becker, author of Shut Up/Look Pretty, the wonderful and very witty Steve Himmer, who is working on a fascinating new novel; and the ridiculously-talented Robert Kloss, author of The Alligators of Abraham, just out from Mud Luscious Press.

I am absolutely loving May We Shed These Human Bodies by Amber Sparks, a collection that is perfect for fans of Karen Russell, Kevin Brockmeier and Aimee Bender.

I’m also really glad I discovered Books on the Nightstand, by the way, because it’s a very engaging and interesting listen and I’m now a fan already. Check it out if you haven’t yet. These two folks (Michael, and Ann Kingman) are obsessed with books, and how can that not be a fun thing to listen to?

Sparks has intelligence aplenty on display, a talent for humor, and the ability to blend mythical resonances with contemporary anxieties. But her fiction is also rooted in the tactile and the physical, and it’s that quality that makes these works truly haunting.

Read the rest here!

Upcoming readings here (click for the Facebook invite and info:)

November 9th Vouched Atlanta
November 11th Ada Books in Providence
Nov 17th 510 Series in Baltimore
Nov 18th Big Hunt Three Tents in DC

While you’re waiting for the physical copy, here’s the book trailer to whet your appetite a little.

Seriously, this anthology is free and it is amazing and not even in that order. In addition to my story, in which I definitely imply that our heavenliest residents may be missing a screw or thousand, there are also fantastic stories by writers like Matt Bell, Robert Kloss, Meghan Lamb, Michael Czyzniejewski, Joseph Scapellato, Brian Oliu, Davis Schneiderman, and a whole bunch of other fantastic writers and poets and weirdos.

Really this is teh shit. Even the angel kitteh agrees.

Flavorwire named the book one of their 10 must reads for October! They say

Sometimes all it takes is a few sentences to knock you off your rocker. Or at least that’s the case in Sparks’s debut collection, which packs 30 short short stories, each its own modern fable, whimsical and wicked in equal measure, into one handsome book.

Right? I’m blushing. Plus I love all these references to the book as “wicked.” That’s all I’ve ever really wanted to be – a little bit wicked. In every sense of the word.

And Brad Listi was kind enough to have me as a guest on his truly awesome podcast, Other People with Brad Listi. It was a fun interview, and I got to talk about craft and books and how yeah, maybe I’ll run for office someday. Just maybe. You can listen here if you want to know how weird my voice sounds outside of my head.

Also kind enough to interview me: Curbside Splendor’s own Joey Pizzolato! Read the interview here. As usual, I ramble and make a fool of myself.

And finally – the very lovely and talented Erin Fitzgerald accidentally bought TWO copies of MWSTHB (how I will henceforth refer to my getting-really annoying-to type book title) and her enthusiasm is your gain! (And mine – thank you, Erin!) She’s giving away a free copy of the book, AND a copy of the chapbook we both have work in, Shut Up/Look Pretty, and all you have to do is comment on this post about what your favorite story of mine is! She’ll do a drawing from the entries on October 6th, so hurry up and put your comment in now if you want free stuff!

Come hear awesome local authors read original pieces on “shedding human bodies!” Come listen to me read from the new collection! Come for the free booze (when you buy a book, natch)! Come because Curbside Splendor is an amazing Chicago-based indie press and you want to support your local arts community. Come because you just want to say hi! Whatever your reason, please come!

Don’t live in Chicago? No worries. Here’s the rest of the tour this year, so far, and dates are being added all the time! So if you’re near one of these places, pretty please stop and say hi there instead!

SEPTEMBER

Midwest tour:
Sept. 22 Chicago Book Party/Launch
Sept. 25 Minneapolis, Magers and Quinn
Sept. 27 Oxford, Ohio at Miami University
Sept 29th Indianapolis Vouched Presents Reading

OCTOBER
October 21 NYC, East Village at Salon Series

NOVEMBER
November 9th Vouched Atlanta
November 11th Ada Books in Providence
Nov 17 510 Series in Baltimore
Nov 18 Big Hunt Three Tents in DC

DECEMBER
Dec Baltimore TBD

JANUARY
Jan 13 NYC,  Franklin Park Reading Series