Posted by connor on May 1, 2011
Vladimir Nabokov woke up one morning and found himself in a big bedroom without any ornamentation except for a large bed of fused wrought iron and a single framed painting on the wall. He climbed out of bed and stepped barefoot, nightgown swooshing around his legs, up to the painting. On closer inspection he realized that it was actually a photograph, blurred like the ink had been streaked by wet fingers against wet photo paper. He strained to recognize the features of the man there, a man wearing a short old-fashioned hat – not quite a fedora – with a wry, a cynical, a vaguely superior smile. The man there, streaked as he was, would not interview without seeing questions in advance. He liked butterflies a little bit too much, and had little nice to say about communism. And that was the moment when Vladimir realized that he was just a character in someone else’s story.
“Son of a bitch!” he swore, and knew this was uncharacteristic.
How utterly ironic.
Posted by connor on March 14, 2011
“Bella has nothing on Meredith Malady.”
You can read the interview
here. We talked about 2nd person fiction, self-publishing, writerly education, the avant-garde, and Rust Belt art.
You can read Lee Ford’s Amazon Review
here. She wrote that “this novel is part poem, part Sweeney-Todd drunken butcher’s opera, with a dash of logging-town historical fiction. What starts as a dark, licorice-flavored coming-of-age story poses, by the end, a serious mystery in which we as readers feel compelled to choose an allegiance.”
Posted by connor on February 15, 2011
Lesa Quade from Flint Talk Radio‘s Flaminpit Show is going to be interviewing me about Hungry Rats.
Flint Talk Radio
http://flinttalkradio.com
Thursday, February 17 · 2:15pm – 3:00pm EST
Lesa Quade hosts the Flaminpit Show for Flint Talk Radio. It is an eclectic forum where many subjects are discussed. Recent guests have included Flint Mayoral Candidate Kayamone Sutton and Youth Advocate Kenyetta Dotson.
Connor will be making a special trip to Flint for this interview. The studio is located in the Eastside’s State Street district, a couple blocks from the house where Meredith Malady lives.
We hope you’ll tune in for what we’re sure will be a wide ranging and exciting discussion.
TIP: Invite 5 friends to this event!
Post the event to Facebook and Twitter!
For more info: http://hungryrats.com/
Posted by connor on February 1, 2011
It’s been a big week already for Hungry Rats, with two of our biggest events in the last six months breaking over two days.
First, the book has been the subject of front-page Sunday coverage for the Flint Journal, Genesee County’s main newspaper with a readership of almost 230,000. It’s hard to overstate how significant this is for the future of the novel, although I would happily have written the book for greater obscurity without overhanging violence and tragedy. You can read the whole piece here: Flint native wrote novel before serial stabbings with eerie coincidences related to Abuelazam case.
“Coyne, who has a master’s degree in creative writing, crafted a novel sparked by that image about a teenage girl from a dysfunctional family who runs away from home in pursuit of the serial killer dubbed “The Rat Man.””
Second, Hungry Rats has been reviewed for the first issue of the Cleveland Review, and it was a juicy review at that. You can read it in its entirety here: Hungry Rats by Connor Coyne.
“Hungry Rats is a murder mystery that imparts not only the eerie feeling that the reader is being watched — or is on trial for a crime she may or may not have committed — but also suggests that she is trapped in an increasingly macabre Choose Your Own Adventure.”
I don’t know if the rest of the week can possibly live up to the excitement of the first two days. Although with my reading coming up at Quimby’s Bookstore in Chicago this Saturday, I’m going to give it my best shot!
—
Photo of the Flint Journal building provided by The Flint Journal.
Cover of the Cleveland Review provided by The Cleveland Review.
Posted by connor on November 30, 2010
Listen in at http://www.blogtalkradio.com/creativewritingpodcast.
6:00 PM EASTERN Standard Time, Tues. 11/30
I’ve been invited to participate in next Tuesday’s edition of the Creative Writing Podcast. I hope you’ll join me by listening!
Subjects to be discussed will include (but not be limited to): second person storytelling, the adventure of self-publishing, and the process of writing.
From the website: “The Creative Writing Podcast is here to aid in helping you to enhance your craft. There will be writing games, pep talks, challenges, writing resources to help you along. We’ll also be showcasing the works of writers on our shows, allowing them to discuss it in a live forum. Published authors get a lot of attention for what they do, but some times they forget that they were once like us: Writing for fun not quite for the glory. Everything talked about on the show can and will be found on the site. We’ll post the responses to the challenges that people send in.”
