The things I love about this issue
The interviews in The Paris Review are a treasure. In issue 239, Jamaica Kincaid inspires.
“…if you’re a great writer, your people will stone you to death. It’s when they embrace you that your decline is imminent.”
“While I’m writing, I feel “...as if I have been made new. I’m sure it’s because of that Robert Johnson experience of searching for someone at the crossroads. Every time I sit down to write, I think, Will I find someone at the crossroads? And sometimes I do…”
“I suspect that I became a writer to support my reading habit.”
“I’ve always been amazed by writers who have routines. They seem, mostly, to be men.”
THREE STORIES THAT SLAYED ME
Wild about Kathryn Scanlan’s “Backsiders” in this issue. What a voice! And basing a story on transcribed interviews with this gutsy horse trainer is a bold move, weirdly brilliant. Can’t wait to read the novel from which this is excerpted, “Kick the Latch,” so I can dive back into this world.
“Tomorrows,” a story by Lakiesha Carr is crazy good. I am so there with this woman, working the slots in the game room behind the convenience store, talking smack, drinking my Crown and Coke. A story full of life and longing and hope. What I pray for.
Oh, to be young and sexy! Paul Della Rosa’s “I Feel It” let me remember those heady days. Feeling alive to the possibilities of the body. Going out to see what lovelies the night will provide. Dancing, drugs. Being someone’s little bitch. Divine!