Kevin Allman

Sometimes a great title

There are some books that I pick up just on the strengths of their titles, and today it happened with Brock Clarke's brilliantly titled An Arsonist's Guide to Writers' Homes in New England.

And if the title didn't get me, the first paragraph would:

I, Sam Pulsifer, am the man who accidentally burned down the Emily Dickinson House in Amherst, Massachusetts, and who in the process killed two people, for which I spent ten years in prison and, as letters from scholars of American literature tell me, for which I will continue to pay a high price long into the not-so-sweet hereafter. This story is locally well known, and so I won't go into it here. It's probably enough to say that in the Massachusetts Mt. Rushmore of big, gruesome tragedy, there are the Kennedys, and Lizzie Borden and her ax, and the burning witches at Salem, and then there's me.

The funniest novel I've read this year

...is Winner of the National Book Award, by Jincy Willett. (Yes, that's the title.)

I picked it up because Willett showed up on that New York magazine list of The Best Writers You've Never Read, which was dead-on in this case. The back cover had blurbs from the likes of David Sedaris, Tom Perrotta, and Augusten Burroughs ("the funniest novel I have read...ever"). The phrase "laughing out loud" has been seriously devalued in our LOL world, but twice in the first 20 pages I had to stick my finger between the pages to keep from losing my place as I shook from laughter.

What's it about? Well -- middle-aged twins. Abigail is the town pump and accused murderess whose story has just been told in a cheapjack true-crime book; Dorcas is her mordant sister, the town librarian who is leafing through the book while awaiting Hurricane Pandora. That's it. And it's hilarious.

Willett's website, "I Would Not Burn the Library of Alexandria For You," is just as funny; her sales page is called "Buy Something, You Cheap Chiseler," and it has the best author biography ever:

Who is Jincy?

An aging, bitter, unpleasant woman living in Escondido, California, who spends her days parsing the sentences of total strangers and her nights teaching and writing. Sometimes, late at night, in the dark, she laughs inappropriately.

I half-love Jincy Willett, and I'm quite sure the sentiment is not reciprocated, which makes me love her even more.

She literally exploded

"Pan-fried." "Serving suggestion." "First invented by."

It's not available in the USA yet, but I'm anxious to read She Literally Exploded: The Daily Telegraph Infuriating Phrasebook, a sort of Devil's Dictionary for our times, compiled by Christopher Howse and Richard Preston. From the publisher:

What phrase enrages you most? "How are you spelling that?" perhaps, or, "issues around"? When the question came up in the Letters page of The Daily Telegraph, hundreds of readers nominated the ones they loathed, and thousands more were posted on line. Provoked beyond endurance, Christopher Howse and Richard Preston compiled The Infuriating Phrasebook, drawing on written and spoken insults to the intelligence from television, radio and the press.

God, I hope they have my own bête noire (note: not "my own personal bête noire") -- "most unique." Though I did see one for the ages last week (and it was written by a former newspaper editor!):

During this recent breakfast at one of my favorite not-so-crowded cafes, Natalie's happy noises were well within the accepted range of restaurant din. Nevertheless, a few minutes after being seated at the booth behind us, a middle-aged foursome apparently took offense to the baby noises and asked the waiter to be seated across the restaurant....Again, I suppose I'm spoiled by experiences with fellow booth occupants who would normally smile and coo at my noisome infant.

For the record, here's what Howse and Preston have to say about those earlier terms:

Pan-fried - instead of being fried in an old dustbin-lid.

Serving suggestion - On the label of a prepared meal, a warning that the plate, tablecloth, and accompanying boar's head shown in the picture are not included in the small plastic container.

First invented by - The second inventor is deservedly less well known.

My personal opinion is that it should be one of the most unique books of the year, and the buzz around it in the UK should be noisome.

Hat tips: For the book, Bill Eichenberger of the Columbus Dispatch; for "noisome," Retread Ranger.

The worst title of '07

Publishers Weekly and The Oregonian both report on a remarkable title change:

Penguin Books has forced Portland publisher Tin House to change the name of a 784-page art book based on Thomas Pynchon's novel Gravity's Rainbow.

The book's title has been changed from Gravity's Rainbow Illustrated to Pictures Showing What Happened on Each Page of Thomas Pynchon's Novel Gravity's Rainbow.

Stickers with the new title will be placed on copies of the book before they are shipped from the warehouse....

Those better be some pretty big stickers.

Great Titles, Part IV

- Rebel Without a Cause

- Remembrance of Things Past

- Something Wicked This Way Comes

- A Streetcar Named Desire

- She's Gotta Have It

- The Spy Who Loved Me

- Tender is the Night

- The Texas Chainsaw Massacre

- Their Eyes Were Watching God

- To Wong Foo, Thanks For Everything, Julie Newmar

- Valley of the Dolls

- War and Peace

- Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown

- Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

- Why I Live at the P.O.

- Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

Great Titles, Part III

Going from M to P:

- My Face For the World to See
- The Naked and the Dead
- Naked Lunch
- No Exit
- Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All
- The Postman Always Rings Twice

Great Titles, Part II

More titles, this time from F to L:

- Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
- From Here to Eternity
- Geek Love
- The Grapes of Wrath
- Heart of Darkness
- I Been in Sorrow's Kitchen and Licked Out All the Pots
- Imitation of Life
- The Importance of Being Ernest
- The Jew in the Lotus
- Lady Slings the Booze
- Learned Pigs & Fireproof Women

Great Titles, Part I

What makes a great title? Something memorable, catchy, profound, lurid, or just perfect for the project? For me, it's something that makes me want to pick up the book, the CD, or go see the play.

Years ago I started compiling a list of memorable titles. Here's an even dozen from the beginning of the alphabet:

- And the Ass Saw the Angel
- As I Lay Dying
- Bad Girls Go To Hell
- Bastard Out of Carolina
- The Bonfire of the Vanities
- Brave New World
- A Clockwork Orange
- Confessions of a Failed Southern Lady
- Diary of a Mad Housewife
- Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant
- Eternal Curse on the Reader of These Pages!
- Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!

Additions? Suggestions?