This Podcast Will Change Your Life, Episode Fifteen - Talking Heads. Redux. And Re-Release.

There is talking, there is Talking Heads and then there is Episode Fifteen with the John Domini.

This Podcast Will Change Your Life, Episode Fifteen - Talking Heads.

We are most excited to share the latest edition of This Podcast Will Change Your Life with you. In this episode we talk with the wonderfully eloquent writer John Domini - whose book Talking Heads: 77 we riffed on earlier this year - about a range of subjects including, but not limited to Dante, paying the bills, and being nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, the latter of which is a first in this series for those of you keeping track at home. And you do keep track at home, right? Good. And enjoy.

Planes, trains, automobiles and You Must Be This Happy to Enter and The National Virginity Pledge. That and big thanks to Beaverdale Books.

We are happy to report that we have been to Des Moines and back and we want to thank Alice and Beaverdale Books for hosting us and Most Likely You Go Your Way and I'll Go Mine last night. It is a killer independent book store and we think you just might want to visit them and buy many books. We are also happy to report that we got to visit with the John Domini and his lovely wife and fellow author Lettie Prell, and in the next day or so you can expect a most excellent new Domini-centric edition of This Podcast Will Change Your Life. Finally, sort of, as we drifted between planes, trains, cabs, shuttles, and cars, we got to read, a lot, and we are now excited to give a shout-out to two books we really enjoyed:

First up, You Must Be This Happy to Enter by long-time This Blog Will Change Your Life muse Elizabeth Crane. What's interesting about this book for us, is that it was watching Ms. Crane read the story Donovan's Closet several years back at the Metro when we really got hooked on her and her writing, but as Cranium as this story is, and as funny and at times magically twisted as the stories in this book are overall, it is the two closing stories Most Everything in the World and Promise, that reminded us why we are such fans of hers. Elizabeth Crane knows relationship, and she endlessly, and wonderfully, captures the pain, confusion, and glee that comes with them like few others.

Similarly, the most excellent Barry Graham pulls off a really neat trick with The National Virginity Pledge. On the surface what you get is a series of awesomely disturbed pieces rife with prostitutes, gamblers, tacos, Wal-Mart, car crashes, and bodily fluids. The thing is, while the interplay between these images are entertaining all by themselves, what you come to realize as you slowly lose yourself in Graham's cracked world, is that these stories are also a super-insightful exploration of all the myriad ways relationships go bad, get lost, and leave us wanting.

Do we hear road trip? We will be at Beaverdale Books tonight. Will you be there? Thanks, it means a lot.

TBWCYL, Inc. spokesperson Ben Tanzer will be reading from Most Likely You Go Your Way and I'll Go Mine, and maybe even his new joint, the tentatively titled You Can Make Him Like You, tonight at Beaverdale Books in Des Moines. The most excellent writer and man about town John Domini will also be in the house and we think you ought to come as well. What do you say, c'mon, do we hear road trip? Nice. See you there at 7:00pm.

Most Likely You Go Your Way and I'll Go Mine hits the Beaverdale Books on April 20th. Join us won't you. C'mon, you might get some Domini.

We are quite excited and most appreciative to have been invited to read from Most Likely You Go Your Way and I'll Go Mine at Beaverdale Books in Des Moines, Iowa on Monday April 20th. We hope to see you there and we are assuming that with three weeks notice you will be able to make it regardless of where you live or what you may already have scheduled. That is a correct assumption, right? Good, because did we also mention that not only is the illustrious, and fetching, John Domini likely to be there, but we may also read some stuff from You Can Make Him Like You the tentative title of the new novel we are working on? We didn't? Well, he just might be there, and we just might read the new stuff, so now you know and most definitely need to come, yes? Excellent. See you there.

Talking Heads: 77. Read now. Cool? Thanks.

The upside of a virtual blog tour of course is the endless focus on oneself and their work. This of course can also be a downside. For some anyway. And yes even for us here at TBWCYL, Inc. So, we are happy to take a moment and maybe even the next few days assuming we get approval from legal to riff on things other than our work. We will begin with a big shout-out to new friend and great writer John Domini and his book Talking Heads: 77 which we just finished. More than any other book we have read recently Talking Heads: 77 does a wonderful job of creating a sense of time, place and milieu, in this case Boston in the 1970's, all of which is filtered through a great, and even might we say, old-fashioned, in a good way, piece of storytelling rife with alternative weeklies, punks, crumbling marriages and political corruption. Its good stuff and we think you might just want to buy Talking Heads: 77 right now, well, we certainly think you might want to read it right now, and everything else John has written for that matter, because he's quite big-time. Meanwhile, for more insight into a truly interesting dude, way interesting in fact, we also encourage you to take a look at the two-part podcast John did with our good friends at CCLaP. Enjoy. And read. Listen. And enjoy some more. Cool? Great.

A quasi-AWP round-up, massive shout-outs and the new edition of this Podcast Will Change Your Life - No Screendoors. Nice, right? Totally.

AWP has been going for days and we barely scratched the surface in terms of events and networking. We did make two stops though and had much fun that we want to report on. First off, we hit the Orange Alert reading at the Book Cellar on Wednesday night and while there were many great writers both reading and hanging-out at the event we want to especially highlight long-time TBWCYL, Inc. favorites Jason Jordan, who read a killer piece of epistolary prose and S. Craig Renfroe, who we have not only published in This Zine Will Change Your Life, but who stars in the new and quite rocking edition of This Podcast Will Change Your Life - No Screen Doors; recent favorite, the awesomely dashing and black-clad John Domini; and new found kick-ass favorites Barry Graham of Dogzplot who read from his new slamming book The National Virginity Pledge and Peter Schwartz he of the wonderful poetry and singing voice. And last night we hit the Featherproof after-party blow-out and again, while there was much literary and musical love to be found we do want to highlight Amelia Gray of the new Featherproof flash-fiction collection AM/PM, quite funny and awesome; local playwright Chris Bower who is nothing less than spell-binding every time we see him; once and future rockstar Kyle Beachy of the terribly buzz-worthy new book The Slide, which we will be sure to report back on as soon as we read it, which will be soon, for sure; and last but not least, singer and too cool hip hop dude Serengeti, who ripped it up. Many thanks sir, we were floored. As we were all-week. Long live AWP.

Special AWP Orange Alert Press Reading Series madness. Check it out. No, seriously, take a look.

And it is madness. Look at this freaking line-up. Seriously, present company excluded, this reading is going to be killer. For more details please visit the Orange Alert Press blog and then you know come-out and join us. If you already have plans, cancel them, now, like immediately, because this reading will most definitely change your life.

Vacation. Reading. Vacation. Some writing. Vacation. No blogging. For real. We think. And happy holidays.

It's true we're heading off on vacation for the next week, we're shutting down the office and we don't really plan to blog, sorry, much less go on-line much at all, which we think we look forward to, it means less RedTube sadly, but it also means less time compulsively visiting ourselves on Goodreads which can only be a good thing. We will write, we have to write, right, of course, and we definitely plan to read, especially the novel Talking Heads: 77 by new friend and wonderful writer John Domini. It did occur to us, however, that if you, our devoted fans and customer base, don't have This Blog Will Change Your Life to read during the week, you may require some kind of additional options or outlets, other than RedTube, and so we have taken it upon ourselves to offer you the following literary possibilities, all of which are pieces by writers we love and we think you could love to. So, happy holidays, have a good week, we will miss you terribly, and enjoy some writing we think just might change your life: Stick by S. Craig Renfroe, Jr. at 3:AM MAGAZINE, who we believe has been grading papers, but we could be wrong; Holy Crap: The Unhappiest Place on Earth by Eric Spitznagel at Vanity Fair, yes that Vanity Fair; Alleys are the Footnotes of the Avenues by Pete Anderson at Shoots and Vines, and we know, we've been name-dropping Pete all week, what are you going to do; Iron Lung by the nicely bearded Jason Jordan at Red Peter; Sand #1 by J.A. Tyler at Word Riot, the J.A. Tyler; and last, but far from least, Brothers by Nick Ostdick at VerbSap, and big props to Nick for finishing his penultimate semester at school, nice work sir.