Hey wow, My Father's House is on sale for eight dollars, what, yes, a quite low, and dare we say quite reasonable, eight dollars, at Main Street Rag, so please do hit it now, thank you, much.

No really, seriously, we welcome it. Totally.

This Book Will Change Your Life - Man of Clay by the CL Bledsoe.

There is the Bledsoe and Man of Clay from the Main Street Rag and it is all pre-order and we have read it and blurbed it and we are happy to report that it changed our lives and we believe it may just change your life as well, so please do hit it, like now, well done, thank you.

"With Man of Clay, CL Bledsoe crafts a lyrically soaring fable rooted in creation myths and the questions that underlie them: what is man, how do we know truth, and why is power abused when it can be used for good?"

The My Father's House Interview, Part III - A Myles and Ben Tanzer joint production.

More here. Or here.

CoffeeTree Books Main Street Rag reading photo love.

Most geeked we were, and are, about the opportunity to read with TBWCYL, Inc. favorites, fellow Main Street Rag authors and good friends Barry Graham and Tom Williams at the CoffeeTree Books over this past weekend in Morehead, KY. Big thanks as well to Tom for arranging it, CoffeeTree for overall awesomeness and to the really wonderful crowd who came out and supported us. Much good time and much appreciated.

Main Street Rag authors Tom Williams, 

Ben Tanzer and Barry Graham

"I ask your indulgence when once again I (truthfully) make the claim that it is his best work yet." My Father's House gets Baby Got Books'd. And likes it. A lot.

Massive Herculian thanks to the always fine Baby Got Books for a most kind review of My Father's House. Please take a look, please enjoy some excerpt, and drinks on us BGB when next we meet.

"You’ll know that my reviews usually begin with a disclaimer that I am totally biased, and I may even mention that the work in question is his best book yet. Ben has a new novella called My Father’s House. I ask your indulgence when once again I (truthfully) make the claim that it is his best work yet. You’ll just need to read it yourself to back my call."

The My Father's House Interview, Part II - A Myles and Ben Tanzer joint production.

More here. And here.

The My Father's House Interview, Part I - A Myles and Ben Tanzer joint production.

 

More here. Or here.

My Father's House is in the house. Part Two.

My Father's House is in the house. Part One.

Time of Death, Experiments in Manhood and My Father's House.

Big thanks to local scribe and TBWCYL, Inc. favorite Robert Duffer for inviting us to write a guest essay as part of his excellent blog series Experiments in Manhood. In keeping with our efforts to start building and spreading the hype around the soon to be released My Father's House, we not so subtly cross-pollinated our essay "Time of Death" with a handful of references to the new book, while only barely comprising, we hope, our professional mien and responsibilities. That said, we plan to do as much of this going forward as we can and we hope you enjoy it, all of it, including the excerpt below. Thanks again Duffer, and drinks on us, many, when next we meet.

"All this thinking about him not living has also got me wondering whether I will outlive him. Maybe? Probably? Okay, but what if I don’t? That’s only sixteen more years. Sixteen. That’s plenty of time to write more, which is good, because there are so many things I want to write about. Like a novel inspired by, or possibly as an homage to, how a character might cope with his father’s slow, though still way too fast death. (Yes, that is a quasi- and probably totally unprofessional plug for my soon to be released novella My Father’s House.)"

My Father's House. Blurb goodness from the John Reed.

"Tanzer is a goliard for our times, singing, laughing, and wise with our sorrows." John Reed

My Father's House. Blurb goodness from the Mel Bosworth.

"The prose of Ben Tanzer's My Father's House is a waterfall, crashing cool onto our fevered heads and then carving pathways straight through to our hearts, never slowing, never shying, laced with the glitter of honesty, fear, and a son's love for his dying father. Despite the torrent, Tanzer shows exemplary control as he brings us into his narrator's swirling mind to explore the black, bottomless pools of all things yet to be experienced, and he does so with humor and wit, often employing buoyant insights that crack the water's surface like summertime toes pointing to the mist as it rises through the trees, skyward." Mel Bosworth

Still pre-order. Still half-price. Still contractually obligated to remind you of such.

Here. There. And everywhere.

"Daring and impressive." My Father's House gets Outsider Writers Collective'd. And likes it. A lot.

So quite appreciative of the very kind words for My Father's House by good, and now maybe best, friend, ever, Caleb J. Ross at the Outsider Writers Collective. Drinks on us for sure, many drinks if that's your thing, when next we meet.

"Ben Tanzer, in his sixth book, takes the inherent heartache associated with a cancer struggle and redirects the focus from the sick (a father) to the coping (the son). In this seemingly simple but extremely important reversal Tanzer has crafted a book that simultaneously represents a perfect extension of his own canon while tapping into a previously unexplored sense of extended vulnerability."

This Book Will Change Your Life - The Mimic's Own Voice by Tom Williams.

Work. Travel. Read. More read. And The Mimic's Own Voice by Tom Williams. There were moments when we weren't sure we had the words we wanted to describe this book. Did we enjoy it? Yes. Wholly absorbed. Immersed. And wanting to know more about this fictional mimic and his gift for voice, his rise to fame and his demise, no not demise necessarily, but when a celebrity crashes back to Earth, undone by their own limitations, confusions or rejection, it is a sort of demise, right, it is. And when we throw issues of race into the discussion, what it means to be an artist and even threads on mental health, maybe, what we have is a story packed with contemporary themes integrated into what is almost historical, even sociological, in voice, or is that setting, and yes it's story, but there is an academic voice here as well. It's almost a study at times, survey or assessment, a cataloging of humor and craft, a history even, but fictional, sort of, all of it, a world that you believe exists, could exist, did exist, may have existed, and clearly actively does in the vibrant and rich imagination of Tom Williams. There is also the voice, William's voice if you will, which makes the book something else as well, a reflection maybe, some kind of observation or commentary on what it means to be an artist of color in changing world where a lack of color still holds sway, but may, will, not, for much longer. We're not entirely sure of this though, it is speculation, and we don't want to overstate or understate anything, much less forget, again, that there is story here, a story both moving and intriguing. So, please do read it, breathe it in, have it change your life, and please do pause if you will during the scene where the protagonist Douglas Myles is forced to confront his purported rival King David Blum on national television, a scene that reverberates, pulsates really, with William's energy and brio. Beautiful that.

And now we pause for a brief Michael Tanzer interlude.

It is June 3rd. And today is the birthday of TBWCYL, Inc. spokesperson Ben Tanzer's father Michael Tanzer, artist, advocate, raconteur, tough guy and pool player. He has been dead eleven years this coming fall and at the risk of being morbid, nothing about that seems sadder than the idea that he will slowly fade from our collective memory, something we know he would have hated. So, in an effort to avoid, or at least prolong said fade, please do take a moment to revisit our 2008 storySouth award nominated creative nonfiction joint and Michael Tanzer homage "PaintWriteDeathLifeArt (Sketches from a Life in Art)," and please do note, and yes this seems coarse as hell, that his last work of art graces the cover of our soon to be released novella My Father's House, something we couldn't be more excited about.

We Are Vespertine interview.

There is more Tanzer Tuesdays at the We Are Vespertine, and yes we are a day late as we were last week, well, and the one before last, but we are no less geeked, and quite appreciative, and today we are interview. Big thanks Vespertine. And drinks, many, on us, when next you're here, July, yes? Yes.


What can we look forward to next from Ben Tanzer?

We are very focused right now at TBWCYL, Inc. headquarters on expanding the various lines of our growing lifestyle brand, so there is a denim collection in the works; condoms, and sponges, do people still use those, the latter, not the former; and now that Liz Taylor has passed, may she rest in peace, perfume for sure. I’m always prepping for the X Games, you know, just in case. And in the literary universe, I have a humor collection called This America Life coming out this summer from Achilles Chapbook Press which gathers pieces of mine that have been published over the last several years and then sometime soon thereafter I have novella titled My Father’s House coming out from Main Street Rag which is intended to be both an extended riff on losing a parent and an homage to The Basketball Diaries. I’m also working on a science fiction joint, and we’ll see how that turns out.

A Nothing or Next to Nothing review intersection of sorts.

Excited for Nothing or Next to Nothing by TBWCYL, Inc. favorite Barry Graham we are. And when we see a rocking review of it by another TBWCYL, Inc. favorite, in this case the Lavinia Ludlow, even more excitement there is. Loads of excitement in fact. Waves. And buckets. Check it.

"Barry’s stories tend to read like bizzaro Twain or Steinbeck, but they seem believable because of his talent to write in grotesque detail. Some of his scenes made me shiver and crave a scalding hot bath with many bars of soap, maybe, to just wash out my eyes. But as vulgar as everything was, I think there’s a closet romantic lurking inside Graham’s rough-around-the-edges-tough-guy façade and it definitely bubbles up from the caverns of his subconscious and emerges in his writing."

Nothing or Next to Nothing. Review. Pank. Whoot.

We have been terrifically geeked to check out long time TBWCYL, Inc. favorite and This Podcast Will Change Your Life podcastee Barry Graham's soon to be released novella Nothing or Next to Nothing by the stellar Main Street Rag and are now geeked squared after reading this quite fine early review from the Pank. So, please do take a look, please pre-order and please be prepared to have any and all of this change your life, because we think it will, a lot, like now even.

"Nothing or Next to Nothing works. It doesn’t try to be too clever despite the non linear storytelling. It is as gentle-paced as amphetamine and inhabits a universe diametrically opposite from the Waltons."

Williams. Graham. And Main Street Ragness.

As excited as we may be about My Father's House coming out from Main Street Rag later this year, and quite excited we are, we are equally excited about two other joints coming out as well, Nothing or Next to Nothing by long-time TBWCYL, Inc. favorite and This Podcast Will Change Your Life podcastee Barry Graham and The Mimic's Own Voice by new BFF Tom Williams. We think you could be excited too, we also think that you could take this excitement, channel it, and maybe, just maybe pre-order your copies now as we have done. We can tell you that it will feel quite good. We can also tell you that it just might change your life.