Found at Green Apple

Books I’ve come across by accident at my neighborhood bookstore, Green Apple on Clement Street in San Frnacisco.

On Memory

July 6, 2007

Ryszard Kapuscinski on Herodotus as the first journalist, in Travels with Herodotus. His task is complex: on the one hand, he knows that the most precious and almost the only source of knowledge is the memory of those he meets; on the other hand, he is aware that this memory is a fragile thing, volatile and evanescent–that memory has a vanishing point. That is why he is in a hurry–people forget, or else move away somewhere and one cannot find them again, and eventually they die.

Let the Northern Lights Erase Your Name

June 7, 2007

By Michelle

At five p.m. on December 16, my mother called me into her study. I waited until she said my name twice, so I didn’t appear too eager. There is something quietly heartbreaking in these words, spoken by the narrator of Vendela Vida’s lovely second novel, Let the Northern Lights Erase Your Name. Some years before the opening action of the novel, Clarissa’s mother disappeared, and a number of the brief, impressionistic chapters are devoted to the mercurial woman whose absence has left its melancholic mark on Clarissa. In one scene, Clarissa’s mother asks her young daughter how she looks,...

steve katz, + notebook nirvana

May 11, 2007

By Michelle

Again, in honor of EWN’s short story month: 43 Fictions, by Steve Katz. Published by Sun & Moon Press, 1992. I picked this up at Green Apple a couple of years ago. This snappy compilation contains very short stories from several of Katz’s previous published collections. A sampling from the story “Parcel of Wrists:” In this morning’s mail I received a parcel postmarked from Irondale, Tennessee. It was wrapped in heavy, glazed brown paper, like butcher paper. The box was of even dimensions, two feet high, two feet deep, three feet long, and it was packed from top to...

Travels with My Aunt

May 7, 2007

By Michelle

Not too long ago, I picked up a used copy of Graham Greene’s Travels with my Aunt at Green Apple. Just started reading it last night. The book is narrated by a retired bank manager who meets his aunt for the first time at his mother’s funeral. A taste from paragraph one: Everyone thought me lucky, but I found it difficult to occupy my time. I have never married, I have always lived quietly, and, apart from my interest in dahlias, I have no hobby. For those reasons I found myself agreeably excited by my mother’s funeral. And a...

Vice, Virgins, Detectives, and Cops

May 4, 2007

By Michelle

Just received my copies of Brad Vice’s The Bear Bryant Funeral Train from editor Jim Gilbert at River City Publishing. Interesting new cover featuring a film reel gives nod to the subject of the title story. This version of the book that caused such a stir (read my essay about it here in Oxford American) contains new essays by Jake York, John Dufresne, Don Noble, and yours truly. The new version was released on March 27. Plus, Eric Martin’s third novel, The Virgin’s Guide to Mexico, is out tomorrow. Hear him at his only San Francisco reading Saturday night...

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Sans Serif

Found at Green Apple

On Memory

Let the Northern Lights Erase Your Name

steve katz, + notebook nirvana

Travels with My Aunt

Vice, Virgins, Detectives, and Cops

Creative Writing Workbooks

Read the international bestseller about one woman’s search for a missing child

No outline? No problem!

The Girl in the Fall-Away Dress

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