Nonfiction | Tarpaulin Sky Magazine
Nonfiction | Tarpaulin Sky Magazine
THINGS THAT ARE NOT FICTION | IMAGE: NOAH SATERSTROM
“I Cannot Resist the Terror”: Essay by Olivia Cronk
"Dizzy time-travel alienation self/ selves sadnessexhilaration. To walk 'the edge of the abyss.'” Olivia Cronk examines multiple selves, Scenes from a Marriage, The Double Life of Véronique, and books by Dionne Brand, Amanda Goldblatt, and Maria Negroni.
Mariko Nagai, excerpt from “Body of Empire”
"As soon as surviving women and children are ushered into civilian camps like scared sheep, trading of flesh starts: an extra bowl of food for a fuck..." -- from Mariko Nagai's Body of Empire, co-winner of the 2019 Tarpaulin Sky Book Awards.
Yanara Friedland, excerpts from “Groundswell”
"I come from the border, Grenze, Grenzstreifen, nation, wall, barbed wire, west that is east that is a city and also a consciousness of rivers. I come from the swell, a city built on swamp. Whatever ground it is that grew me, the lines run firmly through it" — from Yanara Friendland's Groundswell, shortlisted for Tarpaulin Sky's 2019 Book Awards.
Kate Durbin, excerpt from “Hoarders”
"My name is Linda, and I love cooking rotting food" -- an excerpt from Kate Durbin's Hoarders, shortlisted for the 2019 Tarpaulin Sky Book Awards.
Steffan Triplett, excerpt from “Inclement”
"A storm came through Joplin and left all these broken trees, and homes, and bodies. It left all these dreams. People let go of their kids. Their parents. Their love. On the twenty-second day of May, we handed over gifts to the gray arm of the sky." Steffan Triplett's Inclement is shortlisted for the 2019 Tarpaulin Sky Book Awards.
Jody Servon and Lorene Delany-Ullman, excerpts from “Saved: Objects of the Dead”
"30,000 people in a cow pasture, the Rosary prayed in four languages, “live” Stations of the Cross, and Polaroids of the sun at noon." -- from Saved: Objects of the Dead, by Jody Servon and Lorene Delany-Ullman, shortlisted for the 2019 Tarpaulin Sky Book Awards.
Original Obsessions: “Late Morning When the World Burns” by Shamala Gallagher
Original Obsessions seeks to discover the origins of writerly curiosity -- the gestation and development of these imaginings -- focusing on early fixations that burrowed into an author's psyche and that reappear in their current book. In this installment, Tarpaulin Sky interviews Shamala Gallagher, author of Late Morning When the World Burns.
“The Straight Story”: nonfiction by Julia Madsen
"Some crimes never resolve themselves but go on for miles before disappearing into the vanishing point" -- Julia Madsen explores her family's legacy and the intersection of true crime, intergenerational trauma, and the Midwestern Gothic.
“Nine Nevada Depressions”: Nonfiction by Kelly Krumrie
"The road extends westward like a ray, and from far away, from miles, a bright light: fine, white-yellow, on the side of the highway. The light grows: an orb in the distance, a star, a UFO, a small sun."
“[Dragging the real],” nonfiction by AM Ringwalt
"Memoirs are performances of memory. To choreograph memory, you have to be lucid enough to move with it, to bend to it, to place yourself before it and know there’s always more to learn."