What do you think?
Rate this book
AM/PM
If anything's going to save the characters in Amelia Gray's debut from their troubled romances, their social improprieties, or their hands turning into claws, it's a John Mayer concert tee. In AM/PM, impish humor and cutting insight are on full display. Readers tour the lives of 23 characters across 120 stories full of lizard tails, Schrödinger boxes, and volcano love. June wakes up one morning covered in seeds; Leonard falls in love with a chaise lounge; Betty insists everything except flowers are a symbol of her love for her husband; Andrew talks to his house in times of crisis. Written every morning and night for two months, these brief vignettes (50 to 100 words) recall Donald Barthelme in their whimsy and subtle yet powerful emotions. An intermittent love story as seen through a darkly comic lens, AM/PM mixes poetry and prose, humor and hubris to create a truly original work of fiction.
120 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2009
18 people are currently reading
1,978 people want to read
About the author
Amelia Gray
43Ìýbooks736ÌýfollowersAmelia Gray is a writer living in Los Angeles, CA. She is the author of five books, most recently ISADORA. Her writing has appeared in The New Yorker and VICE.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 145 reviews
March 30, 2019
Examples from Lucifer’s Lexicon of Book Review Adjectives*
I decided to consult this new, now indispensable reference (written, no doubt, with a nod to Ambrose Bierce) for words I could use in a review of Amelia Gray’s notable first book. Her collection of stories, snippets really, was short but full of creativity, and a lot of adjectives apply. Here are the ones I’ll be using (sometimes as antitheses) along with Lucifer’s definitions:
Awesome - formerly, capable of producing awe; now come to mean far less due to grade inflation and overuse
Claustrophobic - had Haruki Murakami and Margaret Atwood ever produced a child, and that child wrote a Franz Kafka knock-off about a shackled body and soul, this would be the top word on the list to describe it
°ä±ô¾±³¦³óé»å - a description of work characterized by hackneyed expressions or concepts that the reviewer has recently stopped repeating and now considers tiresome
Discerning - in full agreement with the reviewer
Labyrinthine - containing one turn too many for the reviewer to follow
Laugh-out-loud funny - typically used to describe a very overt form of humor, often the kind we should be embarrassed by, like anything involving scrotums, painful falls, or stooges
Masterful - having a self-perceived talent that the reviewer hopes to reinforce through recognition of the same, but legitimate, talent in others
Metaphorical - prone to a writing device whereby inherently boring topics or descriptions are jazzed up like wings drenched in hot sauce or, uh, what’s an analogy for an analogy?
Nuanced - adjective to use when encountering complexity that's probably insightful but the reviewer can only pretend to understand
°¿³Ü³Ù°ùé - an intelligent sounding word when the reviewer isn’t sure whether something’s weird for the sake of being weird or weird for a higher purpose
Philosophical - as Bierce himself said, this is a quality “of many roads, leading from nowhere to nothing�
Poignant - just about any emotion except joy, raised to the fourth power
Purple - (as applied to prose) label describing a writing style that in the eyes of some beholders should be attached to anything wordier than Hemingway and to other beholders that which applies only when a seemingly endless proliferation of modifiers enters injudiciously, gracelessly, and gratuitously
Sappy - prone to sweetness or sentimentalism (to be used sparingly since to serious, literary writers this is the kiss of death)
Spare - a self-descriptive substitute for the word “short�, opposite in every way to “interminably elongated and ponderous�
Trenchant - sarcasm trained towards proper targets (in contrast to sarcasm trained towards the reviewer’s pet causes which would instead be described as uncouth, impertinent, or sociopathic)
Wise - compared to synonyms "smart" and "clever", this is often applied prejudicially to older writers or those with an owlish countenance
Though this spare bit of writing may be short on words, it’s long on nuanced insight and pleasure. Some label this work flash fiction. Whatever it is, I think it’s masterfully writtenâ€� never ³¦±ô¾±³¦³óé»å, never sappy. Her fragments of text were not typically LOL funny, but there were quite a few instances of knowing winks and subtle observational humor. Here’s one example:
Her writing is often described as poetic, but unlike some of her literary peers, her prose/poetry never crossed into the purple end of the spectrum. She was also adept with her similes:
And much of her writing could be called metaphorical. She was discerning about what to include, never getting bogged down with philosophical issues (in an academic sense), but still having plenty to say in her reflections:
Characters in one short piece would often show up in later pieces, not in a labyrinthine, nonlinear narrative, but because it fit their personalities. Often her little slices of life had poignant aspects; resonant and clear. Others were trenchant, sometimes claustrophobic, or perhaps a little ´Ç³Ü³Ù°ùé and harder to decipher. Almost all make you think, though, which leads me to believe that Gray is very clever (I might have said wise, but Lucifer advises against such usage for her youthful demographic).
I’m putting this in the 4+ category. Not quite
awesome
awe-inspiring since not every one of her entries spoke to me, but still awfully good. [Now I need to check back with Lucifer to get his take on “awful�.]
*I had originally thought to call this Steve's Book of..., then thought The Cynic's Guide to... for the anonymity, but finally settled on Lucifer's Lexicon for the alliteration and the closer correspondence to Bierce's immensely fun Devil's Dictionary.
I decided to consult this new, now indispensable reference (written, no doubt, with a nod to Ambrose Bierce) for words I could use in a review of Amelia Gray’s notable first book. Her collection of stories, snippets really, was short but full of creativity, and a lot of adjectives apply. Here are the ones I’ll be using (sometimes as antitheses) along with Lucifer’s definitions:
Awesome - formerly, capable of producing awe; now come to mean far less due to grade inflation and overuse
Claustrophobic - had Haruki Murakami and Margaret Atwood ever produced a child, and that child wrote a Franz Kafka knock-off about a shackled body and soul, this would be the top word on the list to describe it
°ä±ô¾±³¦³óé»å - a description of work characterized by hackneyed expressions or concepts that the reviewer has recently stopped repeating and now considers tiresome
Discerning - in full agreement with the reviewer
Labyrinthine - containing one turn too many for the reviewer to follow
Laugh-out-loud funny - typically used to describe a very overt form of humor, often the kind we should be embarrassed by, like anything involving scrotums, painful falls, or stooges
Masterful - having a self-perceived talent that the reviewer hopes to reinforce through recognition of the same, but legitimate, talent in others
Metaphorical - prone to a writing device whereby inherently boring topics or descriptions are jazzed up like wings drenched in hot sauce or, uh, what’s an analogy for an analogy?
Nuanced - adjective to use when encountering complexity that's probably insightful but the reviewer can only pretend to understand
°¿³Ü³Ù°ùé - an intelligent sounding word when the reviewer isn’t sure whether something’s weird for the sake of being weird or weird for a higher purpose
Philosophical - as Bierce himself said, this is a quality “of many roads, leading from nowhere to nothing�
Poignant - just about any emotion except joy, raised to the fourth power
Purple - (as applied to prose) label describing a writing style that in the eyes of some beholders should be attached to anything wordier than Hemingway and to other beholders that which applies only when a seemingly endless proliferation of modifiers enters injudiciously, gracelessly, and gratuitously
Sappy - prone to sweetness or sentimentalism (to be used sparingly since to serious, literary writers this is the kiss of death)
Spare - a self-descriptive substitute for the word “short�, opposite in every way to “interminably elongated and ponderous�
Trenchant - sarcasm trained towards proper targets (in contrast to sarcasm trained towards the reviewer’s pet causes which would instead be described as uncouth, impertinent, or sociopathic)
Wise - compared to synonyms "smart" and "clever", this is often applied prejudicially to older writers or those with an owlish countenance
Though this spare bit of writing may be short on words, it’s long on nuanced insight and pleasure. Some label this work flash fiction. Whatever it is, I think it’s masterfully writtenâ€� never ³¦±ô¾±³¦³óé»å, never sappy. Her fragments of text were not typically LOL funny, but there were quite a few instances of knowing winks and subtle observational humor. Here’s one example:
Just because you made it warm doesn't make it yours. A lesson for felines.
Feline Posits: What if one makes it warm for a long time?
A Response: I will still put it on the towel rack, because it is still a towel.
Her writing is often described as poetic, but unlike some of her literary peers, her prose/poetry never crossed into the purple end of the spectrum. She was also adept with her similes:
June was the kind of woman who not only talked to her cats, but consulted them seriously about world affairs and life changes. Mr. Pickles, she would say in that adorable voice women reserve for their cats and when they want a large favor performed. [...] Mr. Pickles, what is your opinion of the recent World Bank shake-up? The cat would look up at her, thinking for one wild moment that the tendrils of hair around her face were lizard tails.
And much of her writing could be called metaphorical. She was discerning about what to include, never getting bogged down with philosophical issues (in an academic sense), but still having plenty to say in her reflections:
One day, everyone stopped over-thinking. We started thinking just as much as we should, and not any more than necessary. There were no more misunderstandings whatsoever. Minor disagreements were forgotten, not turned into proof of larger things. Trivial errors of speech or judgment were just as important as items on the breakfast menu: you chose waffles and I chose eggs and it was a god damn miracle.
Characters in one short piece would often show up in later pieces, not in a labyrinthine, nonlinear narrative, but because it fit their personalities. Often her little slices of life had poignant aspects; resonant and clear. Others were trenchant, sometimes claustrophobic, or perhaps a little ´Ç³Ü³Ù°ùé and harder to decipher. Almost all make you think, though, which leads me to believe that Gray is very clever (I might have said wise, but Lucifer advises against such usage for her youthful demographic).
I’m putting this in the 4+ category. Not quite
*I had originally thought to call this Steve's Book of..., then thought The Cynic's Guide to... for the anonymity, but finally settled on Lucifer's Lexicon for the alliteration and the closer correspondence to Bierce's immensely fun Devil's Dictionary.
September 14, 2022
’Pressing on in the winter makes more sense,� posits Amelia Gray, ’there’s snow, and when you press on through the snow, you can feel it and sense the difficulty.� AM/PM, the debut from Gray, was that precious relief from the dregs of winter. This compact book, written in the style of flash-fiction, features 120 pages of pure crystalline joy. The ephemeral nature of these succinct peepholes into the various lives of Gray’s creations serve as a writing prompt for the imagination, allowing the readers mind to spread forth coloring in the ambiguities and form the attachments to their lifeline.
Similar to the works of the wonderful , you will often wonder how so much depth and meaning was hid in the tiny amount of type that resides humbly upon the page. Gray possesses a potent talent of saying so much in so little, often denying anything concrete to delivering a sense of floating through the sweet haze of her words and ideas that dance weightlessly about your head. Yet, these brief stills of life glow with poignancy as they deliver cutting insight and reflect on how it is the little things that matter in life, which, in a way, makes this book serves as a metaphor for itself. ’This book is a symbol,� she writes in the dedication, and throughout the book, she explores just how her cast of characters attach symbolic meaning to the tiny details of their everyday lives and love lives, despite how zany or mundane they may be. These symbols come in all shapes and sizes, from a lovers overgrown hair, to a pivotal John Mayer concert tee, and then there is Betty who sees everything as a symbol of her and Simons love except flowers. The theme of love winds through the pages, especially in regards to failed love, yet Gray manages to explore them with a delicate, bemused tact without ever falling into a sappy or sad sack pothole. She does just the opposite, and these shorts of break-ups, longings and heartache will bring a smile to your face with their quirky wry humor, and a smile to your brain with their perspicacity.
One may feel the urge to dash through the pages, devouring them as small snacks, however, Gray preforms more of a feat akin to prose poetry, and these flashes are best when sipped to allow the flavors to express themselves. The unspoken really accrues meaning when given a chance to blossom, and, coupled with a surprisingly large number of re-occurring characters for such a compact book, a cohesive effect begins to take the shape of a beautiful portrait of life that is much more than the sum of it’s parts.
This offbeat book is a real treat, and I do hope Amelia Gray’s fan-base continues to grow, as she is quite deserving of high praises. She manages to take an unconventional path without sacrificing content and preforms with superb dignity. This struck me so profoundly that I immediately ordered her follow up, a collection of short stories in a similar style, . I can't wait for further visits into her world or words.
This review is a symbol for my love of this book
5/5
Also, I highly recommend as well, it's the whole reason I read this book!
Similar to the works of the wonderful , you will often wonder how so much depth and meaning was hid in the tiny amount of type that resides humbly upon the page. Gray possesses a potent talent of saying so much in so little, often denying anything concrete to delivering a sense of floating through the sweet haze of her words and ideas that dance weightlessly about your head. Yet, these brief stills of life glow with poignancy as they deliver cutting insight and reflect on how it is the little things that matter in life, which, in a way, makes this book serves as a metaphor for itself. ’This book is a symbol,� she writes in the dedication, and throughout the book, she explores just how her cast of characters attach symbolic meaning to the tiny details of their everyday lives and love lives, despite how zany or mundane they may be. These symbols come in all shapes and sizes, from a lovers overgrown hair, to a pivotal John Mayer concert tee, and then there is Betty who sees everything as a symbol of her and Simons love except flowers. The theme of love winds through the pages, especially in regards to failed love, yet Gray manages to explore them with a delicate, bemused tact without ever falling into a sappy or sad sack pothole. She does just the opposite, and these shorts of break-ups, longings and heartache will bring a smile to your face with their quirky wry humor, and a smile to your brain with their perspicacity.
One may feel the urge to dash through the pages, devouring them as small snacks, however, Gray preforms more of a feat akin to prose poetry, and these flashes are best when sipped to allow the flavors to express themselves. The unspoken really accrues meaning when given a chance to blossom, and, coupled with a surprisingly large number of re-occurring characters for such a compact book, a cohesive effect begins to take the shape of a beautiful portrait of life that is much more than the sum of it’s parts.
This offbeat book is a real treat, and I do hope Amelia Gray’s fan-base continues to grow, as she is quite deserving of high praises. She manages to take an unconventional path without sacrificing content and preforms with superb dignity. This struck me so profoundly that I immediately ordered her follow up, a collection of short stories in a similar style, . I can't wait for further visits into her world or words.
This review is a symbol for my love of this book
5/5
Also, I highly recommend as well, it's the whole reason I read this book!
June 26, 2011
So many of the books I've been reading lately are conjuring up storms in my head that coagulate into the word Inspiring. I'm feeling really inspired by everything I've read in the last few months or so. Inspired in the sense of getting really strong, revelatory feelings about the aesthetically and "" redemptive possibilities of fiction writing. Magnetic Fields by Ron Loewinsohn; everything by Matthew Sharpe, most recently Jamestown; the flash fiction of Lydia Davis; big obvious ones like Blood Meridian and The Pale King; Lance Oslen's 10:01; even the surprisingly impressive and inspiring Letters to Emma Bowlcut written by first time fiction-attempter and well established indie musician demi-god, Bill Callahan; Steve Erickson's The Sea Came In At Midnight; and Amelia Gray's AM/PM, a sort of natural outgrowth in some ways from the pioneering flash fiction of the above mentioned Ms. Davis.
I wrote a thank you note to an author for the first time in my life and was thrilled to get a response:
I wrote down these two quotes among many quotable lines while reading AM/PM:
"Why does the rain make us feel so romantic and strange? Maybe it's the fact that we are unnatural spectators of it, from inside our homes, and it is a reminder that we have the power to live our whole lives like this, if we choose. It's not the smell of fertile ground kicked up by raindrops, or the slick leaves, or the way we must amplify our voices to be heard over this larger presence. It's the power of the rooftop that makes us want to fuck under it."
"She was the kind of girl who climbed the tallest tree and cried to be let down, but she was also the kind of girl who would scramble and jump down on her own as soon as someone went in for the ladder."
I wrote a thank you note to an author for the first time in my life and was thrilled to get a response:
I wrote down these two quotes among many quotable lines while reading AM/PM:
"Why does the rain make us feel so romantic and strange? Maybe it's the fact that we are unnatural spectators of it, from inside our homes, and it is a reminder that we have the power to live our whole lives like this, if we choose. It's not the smell of fertile ground kicked up by raindrops, or the slick leaves, or the way we must amplify our voices to be heard over this larger presence. It's the power of the rooftop that makes us want to fuck under it."
"She was the kind of girl who climbed the tallest tree and cried to be let down, but she was also the kind of girl who would scramble and jump down on her own as soon as someone went in for the ladder."
May 2, 2013
The functional division between morning and not morning is arbitrary and artificial because we are too conditioned to face the honesty of admitting otherwise. The natural definition of the two is measured by daylight and darkness. Which is why a book like this is best appreciated as 4:14 a.m. bleeds its way toward dawn and the day's potential to become one thing creeps along to reach the other; when you're either so hungover you can only view the world through the safety of metaphors that won't make sense in later lucidity or too consumed with your own mortality to move, you watch as sunlight and shadow wrestle their way across the battleground of your pillow's unoccupied half, the line between them moving like the minute hand that drains opportunity from the day before you realize that nothing will make tomorrow feel any different.
When she stretches upon completing the book she hadn't realized she'd read in a sort of upright fetal position, she overextends her right thigh muscle and the distance between the initial pain and its excruciatingly slow march toward the exit will be how she remembers all 23 characters and their hundreds of stories when she finally limps back to bed.
When she stretches upon completing the book she hadn't realized she'd read in a sort of upright fetal position, she overextends her right thigh muscle and the distance between the initial pain and its excruciatingly slow march toward the exit will be how she remembers all 23 characters and their hundreds of stories when she finally limps back to bed.
May 26, 2017
PM:0
"There's no need for poetry," Andrew said. "I'm just here for my chair."
Well sit down and let me wax lyrical.
This book consists of 120 beautiful fragments wholes fragments of prose poetry prose, I don't know. They're beautiful. I love them. Four stars.
Amelia Gray, my imaginary cousin, I want to read everything that you have written and ever will.
I want to take your last name and share it with you.
I want to wear a tee-shirt with your image on it. You are that good.
Here is an example of what I mean, prose that could be re-engineered as poetry, or vice versa, even if there is no need for poetry any more:
"Martha: It makes me nervous.
Emily (reassuringly): It's normal to be nervous.
Martha: Great, I'm nervous and I'm normal."
She started to cry."
There are no more heroes any more. Only words. And music.
This book should be found everywhere, on every bedside table, but might remain hidden under the floorboards.
Or both.
AM:121
This little haiku
Is a symbol of my love
For you and your book.
PM:164
Like every other person in Ian's life, FM Sushi, his wife, with whom he shared a bed, thought that Ian only ever read one "currently reading" book at a time.
It sat on the bedside table next to his pillow. Right then it was something by Gene Wolfe.
But Ian had a secret.
One day, when FM Sushi was at work, he realised that one of the timber floorboards under his side of the bed was loose. He got a screwdriver from his toolbox in the laundry and gently managed to lift the whole board intact without splitting it. He shone a torch into the opening and tested its size with his fingers.
He had been reading "AM/PM" by Amelia Gray and, because it was a little book and he loved it, he wondered whether it would fit in his secret place under the bed. It did. He gently replaced the floorboard on his secret.
Each day, when FM Sushi was at work, he levered open the floorboard and read one story in the book and put it back.
Some things in your life are so important, you can't share them with anyone else.
"There's no need for poetry," Andrew said. "I'm just here for my chair."
Well sit down and let me wax lyrical.
This book consists of 120 beautiful fragments wholes fragments of prose poetry prose, I don't know. They're beautiful. I love them. Four stars.
Amelia Gray, my imaginary cousin, I want to read everything that you have written and ever will.
I want to take your last name and share it with you.
I want to wear a tee-shirt with your image on it. You are that good.
Here is an example of what I mean, prose that could be re-engineered as poetry, or vice versa, even if there is no need for poetry any more:
"Martha: It makes me nervous.
Emily (reassuringly): It's normal to be nervous.
Martha: Great, I'm nervous and I'm normal."
She started to cry."
There are no more heroes any more. Only words. And music.
This book should be found everywhere, on every bedside table, but might remain hidden under the floorboards.
Or both.
AM:121
This little haiku
Is a symbol of my love
For you and your book.
PM:164
Like every other person in Ian's life, FM Sushi, his wife, with whom he shared a bed, thought that Ian only ever read one "currently reading" book at a time.
It sat on the bedside table next to his pillow. Right then it was something by Gene Wolfe.
But Ian had a secret.
One day, when FM Sushi was at work, he realised that one of the timber floorboards under his side of the bed was loose. He got a screwdriver from his toolbox in the laundry and gently managed to lift the whole board intact without splitting it. He shone a torch into the opening and tested its size with his fingers.
He had been reading "AM/PM" by Amelia Gray and, because it was a little book and he loved it, he wondered whether it would fit in his secret place under the bed. It did. He gently replaced the floorboard on his secret.
Each day, when FM Sushi was at work, he levered open the floorboard and read one story in the book and put it back.
Some things in your life are so important, you can't share them with anyone else.
June 14, 2012
So this is my third attempt at a review of this book and each time I get off on some tangent or lose myself in this or that idea. But I have some review-writing music on and I’m confident that this will turn into something worth posting.
I was first introduced to Amelia Gray’s work through her novel debut Threats and my experience with that book was a bit shaky. Although, I ended up giving it four stars and a positive review at first, after it had stewed in my mind a bit, I fell a bit out of love with the book. I think this may have to do with the fact that what impressed me initially struck me as contrivance later. The book insisted upon this dark and depressive tone that was constantly in your face with its weirdness, yet it failed to fully convince me of its reality. The book fell short of its intentions. This resulted in scenes of various oddities without much substance to support them. The phrase “weird for the sake of being weird� has floated around on a couple reviews and threads of the novel.
So I had largely pushed Ms. Gray’s writing aside for the time being and focused on other interests and projects. That was until I found this reading that she gave of her books AM/PM and Museum of the Weird: . Along with her readings was a talk dedicated towards the merits and practices of experimental writing. What I found was not the dark brooding MFA-type writer, as I had unfairly classified her as before, but instead a quirky, fun and genuine person that her earlier work gives evidence of within the equally off-beat and delightful words of the flash fiction. What I enjoyed the most about her talk (besides the fact that she talks about aspirations to read Infinite Jest in a single sitting because “novels should be read in one sitting� and almost succeeding if not for needing to like, you know, eat and sleep) was that she had a very open and honest attitude towards fiction and writing. Lacking any pretensions, she works a day job as an online advertising writer, including a weekly column on celebrity homes and modeling. Although writing under a penname, she is quite open about her experience as a “conventional� ad writer and even encourages that type of work for others aspiring to be writers. She takes on a load of about 10,000 words per week, no mean feat, and talks in depth about how the rigorous schedule hones the basics of writing craft, essential to anyone who pursues “experimental� work.
This dynamic between these two realms of writing, the conventional and the experimental is what makes Gray’s work such a delight to read. Although her novel is splintered into 100+ flash fiction pieces, they are woven with a specific intricacy that forms a beautiful gestalt between them, each one riding upon the tone that is established previously as well as forming connections between the characters, which she keeps consistent throughout the stories. She expresses her thoughts through a variety of different mediums of writing: stream of consciousness, dialogue, description and second person musings on life. Her conventionality is apparent in the themes and the character’s feelings, quite down to earth and charming, but she presents them in fun and idiosyncratic ways. The perfect example of this mixture comes through in a single paragraph page, placed within various vignettes of everyday encounters and stresses: "One day, everyone stopped over-thinking. We started thinking just as much as we should, and not any more than necessary. There were no more misunderstandings whatsoever...Trivial errors of speech or judgment were just as important as items on the breakfast menu: you chose waffles and I chose eggs and it was a god damn miracle." Simply beautiful.
Then comes little bits of oddity and strangeness that because of the frank, open emotionality of flashes like the one previous, it enlivens the alternate strange and oblique flashes with a profound depth: "Olivia dreams that her body becomes pliable enough that she can stretch very thin and cover most of the rooms of the house. Her body is so thin that the bones are clearly visible, and the veins stretch, and the blood has more distance to travel and as a result, the edges of her body are very cold. Reginald opens the front door, removes his shoes, and takes only one step before recoiling in horror at the chilly mass that is Olivia’s body, stretched and waiting. In her dreams, she controls every aspect of her life�. I found this flash to be so moving, I had to stop and let it all soak in for awhile. It made me think of the desperation with which we often try to control our surroundings and how it pulls us apart in our desire to be the author of every event around us. Maybe that’s fairly understood to you from reading it, but this flash in particular broke up the style enough from the flashes before, that it through me off. It made the impact of the story that much more mysterious and powerful. Plus the simplicity of the writing was such a breath of fresh air from what I had been currently reading, Mr. Pynchon, who takes upwards of a thousand words and a glut of scientific jargon to contrive a moment of profound depth, that Amelia Gray accomplishes with minimalist panache.
There’s a continuing thread of two men stuck inside a pitch-black box and they can’t get out. It’s this type of quirky ways of expressing normal emotions (claustrophobia and the entrapment of everyday life) that gives the everyday struggle a new sheen. And this is what I’ve been trying to convey about her use of experimental writing in this review. There was no limit to how she expressed herself, yet you are never left in confusing obscurity because she is quite conventional in what she expresses. Through doing so, Amelia Gray has made a huge fan out of me. I can’t wait for her next artistic venture, and somewhat hope that it isn’t necessarily in the stylistic direction of Threats.
For now, I’ll leave you with this bit of off-beat beauty: "Why does the rain make us feel so romantic and strange? Maybe it's the fact that we are unnatural spectators of it, from inside our homes, and it is a reminder that we have the power to live our whole lives like this, if we choose. It's not the smell of fertile ground kicked up by raindrops, or the slick leaves, or the way we must amplify our voices to be heard over this larger presence. It's the power of the rooftop that makes us want to fuck under it."
I was first introduced to Amelia Gray’s work through her novel debut Threats and my experience with that book was a bit shaky. Although, I ended up giving it four stars and a positive review at first, after it had stewed in my mind a bit, I fell a bit out of love with the book. I think this may have to do with the fact that what impressed me initially struck me as contrivance later. The book insisted upon this dark and depressive tone that was constantly in your face with its weirdness, yet it failed to fully convince me of its reality. The book fell short of its intentions. This resulted in scenes of various oddities without much substance to support them. The phrase “weird for the sake of being weird� has floated around on a couple reviews and threads of the novel.
So I had largely pushed Ms. Gray’s writing aside for the time being and focused on other interests and projects. That was until I found this reading that she gave of her books AM/PM and Museum of the Weird: . Along with her readings was a talk dedicated towards the merits and practices of experimental writing. What I found was not the dark brooding MFA-type writer, as I had unfairly classified her as before, but instead a quirky, fun and genuine person that her earlier work gives evidence of within the equally off-beat and delightful words of the flash fiction. What I enjoyed the most about her talk (besides the fact that she talks about aspirations to read Infinite Jest in a single sitting because “novels should be read in one sitting� and almost succeeding if not for needing to like, you know, eat and sleep) was that she had a very open and honest attitude towards fiction and writing. Lacking any pretensions, she works a day job as an online advertising writer, including a weekly column on celebrity homes and modeling. Although writing under a penname, she is quite open about her experience as a “conventional� ad writer and even encourages that type of work for others aspiring to be writers. She takes on a load of about 10,000 words per week, no mean feat, and talks in depth about how the rigorous schedule hones the basics of writing craft, essential to anyone who pursues “experimental� work.
This dynamic between these two realms of writing, the conventional and the experimental is what makes Gray’s work such a delight to read. Although her novel is splintered into 100+ flash fiction pieces, they are woven with a specific intricacy that forms a beautiful gestalt between them, each one riding upon the tone that is established previously as well as forming connections between the characters, which she keeps consistent throughout the stories. She expresses her thoughts through a variety of different mediums of writing: stream of consciousness, dialogue, description and second person musings on life. Her conventionality is apparent in the themes and the character’s feelings, quite down to earth and charming, but she presents them in fun and idiosyncratic ways. The perfect example of this mixture comes through in a single paragraph page, placed within various vignettes of everyday encounters and stresses: "One day, everyone stopped over-thinking. We started thinking just as much as we should, and not any more than necessary. There were no more misunderstandings whatsoever...Trivial errors of speech or judgment were just as important as items on the breakfast menu: you chose waffles and I chose eggs and it was a god damn miracle." Simply beautiful.
Then comes little bits of oddity and strangeness that because of the frank, open emotionality of flashes like the one previous, it enlivens the alternate strange and oblique flashes with a profound depth: "Olivia dreams that her body becomes pliable enough that she can stretch very thin and cover most of the rooms of the house. Her body is so thin that the bones are clearly visible, and the veins stretch, and the blood has more distance to travel and as a result, the edges of her body are very cold. Reginald opens the front door, removes his shoes, and takes only one step before recoiling in horror at the chilly mass that is Olivia’s body, stretched and waiting. In her dreams, she controls every aspect of her life�. I found this flash to be so moving, I had to stop and let it all soak in for awhile. It made me think of the desperation with which we often try to control our surroundings and how it pulls us apart in our desire to be the author of every event around us. Maybe that’s fairly understood to you from reading it, but this flash in particular broke up the style enough from the flashes before, that it through me off. It made the impact of the story that much more mysterious and powerful. Plus the simplicity of the writing was such a breath of fresh air from what I had been currently reading, Mr. Pynchon, who takes upwards of a thousand words and a glut of scientific jargon to contrive a moment of profound depth, that Amelia Gray accomplishes with minimalist panache.
There’s a continuing thread of two men stuck inside a pitch-black box and they can’t get out. It’s this type of quirky ways of expressing normal emotions (claustrophobia and the entrapment of everyday life) that gives the everyday struggle a new sheen. And this is what I’ve been trying to convey about her use of experimental writing in this review. There was no limit to how she expressed herself, yet you are never left in confusing obscurity because she is quite conventional in what she expresses. Through doing so, Amelia Gray has made a huge fan out of me. I can’t wait for her next artistic venture, and somewhat hope that it isn’t necessarily in the stylistic direction of Threats.
For now, I’ll leave you with this bit of off-beat beauty: "Why does the rain make us feel so romantic and strange? Maybe it's the fact that we are unnatural spectators of it, from inside our homes, and it is a reminder that we have the power to live our whole lives like this, if we choose. It's not the smell of fertile ground kicked up by raindrops, or the slick leaves, or the way we must amplify our voices to be heard over this larger presence. It's the power of the rooftop that makes us want to fuck under it."
October 26, 2011
I loved this. LOVED.
"One day, everyone stopped over-thinking. We started thinking just as much as we should, and not any more than necessary. There were no more misunderstandings whatsoever...Trivial errors of speech or judgment were just as important as items on the breakfast menu: you chose waffles and I chose eggs and it was a god damn miracle."
Can that day be today? Please? Life would be so much... simpler.
"One day, everyone stopped over-thinking. We started thinking just as much as we should, and not any more than necessary. There were no more misunderstandings whatsoever...Trivial errors of speech or judgment were just as important as items on the breakfast menu: you chose waffles and I chose eggs and it was a god damn miracle."
Can that day be today? Please? Life would be so much... simpler.
May 26, 2009
"Just because you made it warm doesn't make it yours: A lesson for felines."
Hear that Mooncheese? That's a rule for you.
This book looks like flash fiction, and that's a shame because I think it may turn off some people who would enjoy this book. Rather it's just a bunch of short kind of interconnected little episodes from a recurring group of peoples' lives. From the banal to the outright absurd; to I guess what would be harsh rules for cats followed by a cats argument for why they should have ownership over something they have made warm with their body and cozy with their claws.
Like, Dear Everybody there is a fleeting beautiful heartbreaking feel to much of this book. I'd say that it almost borders on whimsical, but whimsy like flash fiction has too many bad connotations attached to it. Or maybe I could describe this as a non-punk Cometbus, in the way that these stories almost make you want to go out and get your heart broken just because it sounds so much better than anything that is happening in your life right now.
I really should go back and read this again, but take notes of who the characters are, who they appear with in stories, and if they consistently appear in the AM or the PM stories. I have a feeling that there is an interesting structural thing going on that I didn't catch while reading it. Or maybe there is nothing to the AM/PM thing, just a way of breaking up one story from the other.
AM:107
"One day, everyone stopped over-thinking. We started thinking just as much as we should, and not anymore than necessary. There were no more misunderstandings whatsoever. Minor disagreements were forgotten, not turned into proof of larger things. Trivial errors of speech or judgment were just as important as items on the breakfast menu: you chose waffles and I chose eggs and it was a goddamn miracle."
Hear that Mooncheese? That's a rule for you.
This book looks like flash fiction, and that's a shame because I think it may turn off some people who would enjoy this book. Rather it's just a bunch of short kind of interconnected little episodes from a recurring group of peoples' lives. From the banal to the outright absurd; to I guess what would be harsh rules for cats followed by a cats argument for why they should have ownership over something they have made warm with their body and cozy with their claws.
Like, Dear Everybody there is a fleeting beautiful heartbreaking feel to much of this book. I'd say that it almost borders on whimsical, but whimsy like flash fiction has too many bad connotations attached to it. Or maybe I could describe this as a non-punk Cometbus, in the way that these stories almost make you want to go out and get your heart broken just because it sounds so much better than anything that is happening in your life right now.
I really should go back and read this again, but take notes of who the characters are, who they appear with in stories, and if they consistently appear in the AM or the PM stories. I have a feeling that there is an interesting structural thing going on that I didn't catch while reading it. Or maybe there is nothing to the AM/PM thing, just a way of breaking up one story from the other.
AM:107
"One day, everyone stopped over-thinking. We started thinking just as much as we should, and not anymore than necessary. There were no more misunderstandings whatsoever. Minor disagreements were forgotten, not turned into proof of larger things. Trivial errors of speech or judgment were just as important as items on the breakfast menu: you chose waffles and I chose eggs and it was a goddamn miracle."
March 19, 2010
So, I stopped reading for awhile. Not sure why. I couldn't even make it through a magazine, let alone a whole damn book. And the weird thing is that I didn't miss it, except in this abstract, intellectual way. When I did finally get around to missing reading for real, it was like I'd forgotten how to slice a tomato. I'd pick up a book, turn it over and over, and look for some sort of way in.
And then I quit angsting all over myself and read a damn book. It was this one.
For not having read anything in several months, AM/PM was a good re-entry read with its tiny vignettes that play up the horror and ordinariness of interconnected little lives. On their own, the stories are little nuggets of half-truths forgotten from the beginning. As a collection, the stories are solid in the way an apartment building is solid. You may only see glimpses of 3B, but you weave together 3B's life from applying heavy imagination to window peeks and random comings and goings. And by forming those pictures of the neighbors, you get a feeling for the building as a whole.
Four stars instead of five, because the book seemed born more from cleverness than passion. More of a "project" than an obsession, if you know what I mean. But definitely interesting, definitely clever, and definitely well done. And I am definitely, definitely having a Rain Man moment.
And then I quit angsting all over myself and read a damn book. It was this one.
For not having read anything in several months, AM/PM was a good re-entry read with its tiny vignettes that play up the horror and ordinariness of interconnected little lives. On their own, the stories are little nuggets of half-truths forgotten from the beginning. As a collection, the stories are solid in the way an apartment building is solid. You may only see glimpses of 3B, but you weave together 3B's life from applying heavy imagination to window peeks and random comings and goings. And by forming those pictures of the neighbors, you get a feeling for the building as a whole.
Four stars instead of five, because the book seemed born more from cleverness than passion. More of a "project" than an obsession, if you know what I mean. But definitely interesting, definitely clever, and definitely well done. And I am definitely, definitely having a Rain Man moment.
April 11, 2017
Flash fiction, in general leaves me somewhat unmoved unless extraordinary acts of suggestion and economy are effected so as to generate a much larger world than can be contained on a single page. (I could treat these as poetry, instead, but I'm also a terrible poetry reader). So while some of these pieces do create such a key sense of greater story surrounding, many do not, coming off more as exercises in textual economy. Many of the stories could be extended by their interconnection, but that almost feels like an afterthought -- the characters remain props, even after repeated appearances, suggesting that they might actually be interchangeable, or for recurring roles to have been assigned only after composition. Again, there are a few glittering counterexamples and pithy call-backs, but for the most part these live or die alone, finely crafted fragments in search of a context.
August 25, 2022
Remember Choose Your Own Adventure? Those books were the shit. is an all likelihood the reason why I ran around for like a week in fourth grade telling everyone I was, well, an alien. I was a weird kid back then. Anyway, I've read AM/PM three times now and still can't come up with a way to review it, so how's about this. I present you with a number of opening lines from my abandoned reviews, and you imagine how those reviews would play out! And we're doing this "Choose Your Own Adventure"-style (kind of because, y'know, we're choosing just starts instead of full paths, but what do you think I'm going to do, create hundreds of different webpages you can choose to link to? I don't have that kind of time), because, again, those books were the shit. Here we go.
For "The Twitter-feed version of Kafka's parables," turn to page 5. (There is no page 5. Use your imagination.)
For "Let's set aside, just for a moment, the deeper emotions and tonal complexities behind Amelia Gray's stories of cats, John Mayer concert t-shirts, and people trapped in boxes, and focus on how amazing it is that someone wrote a collection of microstories about cats, John Mayer concert t-shirts, and people trapped in boxes," turn to page 86.
For "When does John Mayer not suck? When Amelia Gray writes stories about his concert t-shirts," turn to page 22.
For "You'll laugh, you'll ponder the deep existential voids Gray hints at, you'll wait for explosions that don't actually come, you'll laugh some more," turn to page 4,211. This is one of those really long Choose Your Own Adventure books.
For "'A book by Amelia Gray,'" or, have all our categories for books finally met the one that confounded them?", also turn to page 5, but start reading about 2/3rds of the way down the page, with the sentence that begins "And lo, then Ulenforth's sword revealed itself to be a goat in clever disguise."
For "Somebody tell me why David Lynch, the common point of reference for Gray, just doesn't seem right to me," turn to page 899.
For "When the conventional rules for writing fiction and the rules of AM/PM come into collision, the rules of AM/PM always win," turn to page 998.
For "'Well it would appear we are trapped in a review of AM/PM, as written by a perhaps over-earnest Amelia Gray fan,'" simply read the book as you would any other.
For "When we talk about the heavy hitters of today's literary climate, we have to bring Amelia Gray up," turn to the page where I get a job writing vague but boldly phrased book reviews.
For "Words I want to try and review this book without using: 'surrealist,' 'microfiction,' 'dark-humored,' 'wacky,' 'hipster,' 'experimental,'" turn to page 206.
For "Deadpan diary of a society devolving into ridiculousness," turn to page 10.
For answers to any of your burning questions regarding ethics, equality, sexuality, religion, happiness, etc., please set down this hypothetical Choose Your Own Adventure book and read another one.
Happy adventuring!
For "The Twitter-feed version of Kafka's parables," turn to page 5. (There is no page 5. Use your imagination.)
For "Let's set aside, just for a moment, the deeper emotions and tonal complexities behind Amelia Gray's stories of cats, John Mayer concert t-shirts, and people trapped in boxes, and focus on how amazing it is that someone wrote a collection of microstories about cats, John Mayer concert t-shirts, and people trapped in boxes," turn to page 86.
For "When does John Mayer not suck? When Amelia Gray writes stories about his concert t-shirts," turn to page 22.
For "You'll laugh, you'll ponder the deep existential voids Gray hints at, you'll wait for explosions that don't actually come, you'll laugh some more," turn to page 4,211. This is one of those really long Choose Your Own Adventure books.
For "'A book by Amelia Gray,'" or, have all our categories for books finally met the one that confounded them?", also turn to page 5, but start reading about 2/3rds of the way down the page, with the sentence that begins "And lo, then Ulenforth's sword revealed itself to be a goat in clever disguise."
For "Somebody tell me why David Lynch, the common point of reference for Gray, just doesn't seem right to me," turn to page 899.
For "When the conventional rules for writing fiction and the rules of AM/PM come into collision, the rules of AM/PM always win," turn to page 998.
For "'Well it would appear we are trapped in a review of AM/PM, as written by a perhaps over-earnest Amelia Gray fan,'" simply read the book as you would any other.
For "When we talk about the heavy hitters of today's literary climate, we have to bring Amelia Gray up," turn to the page where I get a job writing vague but boldly phrased book reviews.
For "Words I want to try and review this book without using: 'surrealist,' 'microfiction,' 'dark-humored,' 'wacky,' 'hipster,' 'experimental,'" turn to page 206.
For "Deadpan diary of a society devolving into ridiculousness," turn to page 10.
For answers to any of your burning questions regarding ethics, equality, sexuality, religion, happiness, etc., please set down this hypothetical Choose Your Own Adventure book and read another one.
Happy adventuring!
February 17, 2021
AM/PM is a short collection of odd little vignettes. as the book goes on, we gain some insight into the connections among characters (and i sure do love books with a large cast of interconnected characters). but for the most part, we flow through these moments without context.
it'd be easy to finish this book in one sitting, but i enjoyed savoring it a few pages at a time. i tried not to worry much about whether i "got" each piece, or about how they would all come together. some vignettes resonate more than others, and that's okay. most of them are very beautiful, clever, and meaningful.
â–� â–� â–�
â–� â–� â–�
it'd be easy to finish this book in one sitting, but i enjoyed savoring it a few pages at a time. i tried not to worry much about whether i "got" each piece, or about how they would all come together. some vignettes resonate more than others, and that's okay. most of them are very beautiful, clever, and meaningful.
â–� â–� â–�
AM: 69
Why does the rain make us feel so romantic and strange? Maybe it's the fact that we are unnatural spectators of it, from inside our homes, and it is a reminder that we have the power to live our whole lives like this, if we choose. It's not the smell of fertile ground kicked up by raindrops, or the slick leaves, or the way we must amplify our voices to be heard over this larger presence. It's the power of the rooftop that makes us want to fuck under it.
â–� â–� â–�
July 15, 2013
Fragments of life in modern times, falling in and out of love.
32:PM was my favorite becasue I'm still heart broken over love that broke even though I thought it to be unbreakable, so it goes. Listing to some Sliver Jews CD's, I'm not hip enough for vinyl and it takes a lot for me to join the modern world go out to bar or catch a show, I'd rather stay in like a hermit and just read all night, maybe watch a baseball on cable yes I own a T.V., how out of vogue of me. Pain works on a sliding scale opening line to "Candy Jail", from the Sliver Jews.
32:PM was my favorite becasue I'm still heart broken over love that broke even though I thought it to be unbreakable, so it goes. Listing to some Sliver Jews CD's, I'm not hip enough for vinyl and it takes a lot for me to join the modern world go out to bar or catch a show, I'd rather stay in like a hermit and just read all night, maybe watch a baseball on cable yes I own a T.V., how out of vogue of me. Pain works on a sliding scale opening line to "Candy Jail", from the Sliver Jews.
February 1, 2010
Amelia Gray makes every word count. There is no filler. It's writing on a strict diet and she packs dessert into every single sentence, paragraph, page. I want to eat her words and can't wait to read more from her. She gives the word short a whole new meaning and for this reason alone this book is a must read.
May 12, 2016
So far, this book reminds me of a great piece of advice I was given by author Steve Tomasula. While my shorter writing (a page or less) is "nice," my longer writing (about 3 pages) has more significance and does double-duty in meaning. This is how I feel about AM/PM. While the stories are "nice," the pieces from The Museum of the Weird are still pestering me; I can't get the suitcase boyfriend or the frozen fish wife out of my head. Hell, I wonder what they're doing today. Did the wife become fish food? Is the suitcase guy growing his own breed of antibiotics in there??
*Written at a later date*
The pieces slowly come together in this short book, as the characters are repeated, usually in the same setting, giving new ideas and advice to friends, take notice of smaller details, like trees and the velvet that lines the walls of a box
*Written at a later date*
The pieces slowly come together in this short book, as the characters are repeated, usually in the same setting, giving new ideas and advice to friends, take notice of smaller details, like trees and the velvet that lines the walls of a box
Read
October 15, 2012Pretty fun to read, although I am reminded of something I JUST READ for a class by Charles Baxter where he is talking about a similar-styled story by Lydia Davis called "Disagreement," which with the other stories in that collection (and much like the stories collected in AM/PM) are "not so much developmental as permutational; they do not advance on a line so much as spin on a point, and report on what is glimpsed from that particular point before turning to a different angle on the same point... what she often produces is a report on a world in which insights are flattened by the exasperated monochromatic voice into minimal observations that are then contested by other observations, reported in exactly the same manner."
This also acutely describes the stories in AM/PM.
But he also goes on to say "There is probably a limit to how many of these stories can be absorbed on their own terms before some readerly failure-to-respond kicks in" and I felt that way after reading a slew of these stories. Also it took me way too long to realize the same characters were reappearing over and over again, so any "character development" was mostly lost on me.
AM:21
Andre’s problem with women was that he was analytical and they were always, always emotional. Women made fun of him for measuring out salt and spices when he cooked. Even the ones who never cooked would criticize him, leaning against the doorway of the kitchen as if they knew they shouldn’t trespass but teasing him anyway. At the movies they smacked him with popcorn buckets for commenting on an incongruous detail while they were building up the stamina to cry. None of it made sense to Andrew. He was very loving, and concerned, and simply knew where to place sadness and fear and anger, so that it could be accessed with great efficiency when necessary.
“It’s just you and me, house,� Andrew said.
The house was not so sure.
This also acutely describes the stories in AM/PM.
But he also goes on to say "There is probably a limit to how many of these stories can be absorbed on their own terms before some readerly failure-to-respond kicks in" and I felt that way after reading a slew of these stories. Also it took me way too long to realize the same characters were reappearing over and over again, so any "character development" was mostly lost on me.
AM:21
Andre’s problem with women was that he was analytical and they were always, always emotional. Women made fun of him for measuring out salt and spices when he cooked. Even the ones who never cooked would criticize him, leaning against the doorway of the kitchen as if they knew they shouldn’t trespass but teasing him anyway. At the movies they smacked him with popcorn buckets for commenting on an incongruous detail while they were building up the stamina to cry. None of it made sense to Andrew. He was very loving, and concerned, and simply knew where to place sadness and fear and anger, so that it could be accessed with great efficiency when necessary.
“It’s just you and me, house,� Andrew said.
The house was not so sure.
October 17, 2022
This is a jewel :)
December 22, 2012
Between the moments of brilliance and my sense that this doesn't quite cohere, this book averages 4 stars. As when I read poetry, I found many small moments that I stopped to savor, laughing aloud at some of them. As a collection of short separate works this is quite good, but I find myself wishing for stronger connections between the pieces.
January 4, 2013
I wanted to love it for a lot of reasons but I felt like I just didn't get it. I loved the idea of the book - stories told in very very short snippets, chapters consisting of only paragraphs. Brief glimpses. A few of them did resonate. Most of them left me wondering if maybe it would all tie together and make sense at the end.
It didn't. At least not for me.
It didn't. At least not for me.
May 19, 2017
A strange book of flash fiction which is beautifully written with a wonderfully surreal atmosphere and a superb juxtaposition of humor and tenderness.
July 15, 2013
Il favoloso mondo di Amelia #1: La descrizione di un attimo
Non molto tempo fa DeLillo ha scritto che “la vera vita si svolge quando siamo solo, quando pensiamo, persi nei ricordi, oniricamente autocoscienti, nei momenti submicroscopici.� Insomma, quello che facciamo quando lavoriamo, studiamo, usciamo a fare la spesa, quando tossiamo, prendiamo un caffè al bar o ci nascondiamo dietro una battuta tinta di ironia, è la vita appesantita e nascosta dalle interferenze del mondo esterno che la rendono inautentica e falsata. DeLillo ha scritto anche che quella vita vera “non è riducibile a parole dette o scritte.� Ebbene su questo DeLillo si sbagliava, perché Amelia Gray quella vita vera e ostinatamente reale è riuscita a comprimerla e a diluirla nella manciata di parole scritte contenute nelle 120 pagine di Am/Pm
La cosa buffa è che Am/Pm nasce quasi per caso: a quanto pare Amelia Gray non l’ha scritto pensando a un testo da pubblicare, ma solo come una specie di strano esercizio di propedeutica narrativa da fare due volte al giorno, mattina e sera (da cui il titolo). A un certo punto si è trovata 120 micro-storie o flash-fiction divise tra 23 personaggi che un’illuminata casa editrice di Chicago—la Featherproof—ha avuto la buona idea e il buon gusto di pubblicarlo.
Flash-fiction, quindi. Un genere che qua in Italia, dove una volta c’erano Calvino e Pavese e ora è pieno di scribacchini abilissimi a dilungarsi in lungaggini spesso inutilmente pretenziose, è pressoché sconosciuto, preterintenzionalmente impraticato e per questo tragicamente inesistente. In realtà flash-fiction è un termine nuovo che indica un genere in realtà antico. Antico quanto le favole di Esopo e di Fedro o il romanzo sperimentale cinese del XIV secolo, e che in tempi più vicini ai nostri, è stato rispolverato e variamente rinnovato dall’Hemingway di In Our Time e del famigerato “romanzo di sei parole�, dal Calvino de Le città invisibili, da Carver e molto del prescindibile carver-ame degli anni �80 e dalle più recenti sperimentazioni ai confini della narrativa della superba Lydia Davis . Si tratta di racconti brevissimi, con una lunghezza che può variare dal minimo di una frase a un massimo dei tre quarti di pagina, o, se si vogliono usare unità di misura più familiari ai linguaggio dell’attualità virtuale, da un minimo di un tweet di Twitter a un massimo di un post su Facebook, dagli stringenti e stringati 420 caratteri delle prose brevissime pubblicate dalla eLit Magazine Short, Fast and Deadly al tetto massimo delle 1000 parole fissato dalla più generosa SmokeLong Quarterly. Insomma: si tratta comunque di tagliare fino al midollo, escludere l’escludibile e anche qualcosa in più e riuscire comunque a condensare un senso e una compiutezza nelle poche parole che restano.
La particolarità di Am/Pm è che i suoi micro-racconti sono concatenati, raccontano e descrivono attimi di vita di personaggi ricorrenti e variamente rimescolati: Hazel e Tess, Carla, Carla e Andrew, Charles da solo, Charles e Terrence che insieme vivono dentro una scatola che sembra quella del gatto di Schrödinger, June, Tess da sola, Martha ed Emily, Andrew, Reginald, Olivia, di nuovo Charles però insieme a Doreen, e così via, tutti immersi in un mondo sospeso tra la realtà più prosaica (le istruzioni per pulire un divano—AM: 65), momenti onirici (discussioni con un gatto�34: PM, Oliva che sogna di diventare flessibile fino a riempire tutta la casa 30: PM) e la ricerca di una simbologia per i rapporti interpersonali (AM: 21; AM:27) o di un sentimento amoroso (AM: 39; AM: 101; AM: 119). E se l’espediente di strizzare le strutture narrative di quello che altrimenti sarebbe un romanzo lungo e compiuto in un grappolo di racconti monadici era già stato tentato da Tama Janowitz (Slaves of New York) e da Elissa Schappell (Use Me e Blueprint for Building Better Girls), Amelia Gray è probabilmente la prima che ha cercato ed è riuscita a farlo con delle flash-fiction. Il risultato è un libro che si legge in un mezzo pomeriggio e che resta appiccicato alle sinapsi per delle settimane, se si cerca di leggere il non scritto tra le pagine per ricostruire il tessuto narrativo, invisibile ma latente, che tiene insieme questi 120 frammenti.
È per questo che di certo per alcuni questo libro non sarebbe così lungo se non avesse voluto essere così breve. Questo accadrà alle menti analitiche cresciute unendo i puntini e annerendo gli spazi dei giochi della Settimana Enigmistica, a chi è cresciuto nell’abitudine di voler capire tutto e a chi in un libro sente il bisogno di una narrazione e ne sente la mancanza quando non la trova. Ma il senso, e soprattutto il fascino di questo libro risiedono nella rapidità con la quale si riesce a leggerlo lentamente. È un testo, cioè, che va letto tutt’intero, ma sorseggiandolo, e spezzarlo sarebbe come ascoltare i Sechs Kleine Klavierstücke di Schönberg una battuta alla volta, o guardare 21 grammi o qualunque altro film di Inãrritu dieci minuti al giorno. Perché, come la stesa Amelia ha detto in un’occasione, “i romanzi vanno letti in una sola seduta,�1 seguendo probabilmente il consiglio di E. A Poe nella sua Philosphy of Composition a riguardo dell’inopportunità di lasciare che le faccende del mondo interferiscano con e distruggano l’effetto dato dall’unità di impressione necessaria per vivere un testo scritto [ (ed è quello che ha cercato di fare con Infinite Jest non riuscendoci solo per il bisogno di fare cose tipo andare al supermercato, vivere, dormire, mangiare ].
L’effetto, più che quello di un Pollock, che esibisce la sua bellezza nel percorso mentale necessario a ricostruire l’intenzionalità che ha creato delle macchie necessarie sotto le mentite spoglie di un caso, è quella di un quadro di Rothko che tenta di arrivare alla “espressione semplice del pensiero complesso�: si rimane abbagliati da un fascio di colori che mai saranno tanto luminosi in tutto il resto della nostra vita, ma se si tenta poi di scomporli e analizzarli, si perde irrimediabilmente e irrecuperabilmente quel momento di gioia furtiva che era stata donata da due semplici colori giustapposti su una tela. Ecco, Am/Pm è come un quadro di Rothko, fatto di emozioni base e piccoli dettagli semplici e nitidissimi, descrive momenti normali, piani, quasi banali, ma resi in modo da assumere una lieve coloritura surreale ed epifanica; sono frammenti leggeri ma mai superficiali, come voleva Calvino, e sempre come voleva Calvino, sono rapidi, esatti e visibili e raggiungono così quell’efficacia che solo la buona letteratura sa raggiungere perché sa definire e pilotare il modo in cui vuol esser letta. Ecco, il giusto modo di leggere Am/Pm ce lo suggerisce, forse inconsapevolmente, la stessa Amelia:
One day, everyone stopped over-thinking. We started thinking as much as we should, and not any more than necessary. There were no more misunderstanding whatsoever. Minor disagreements were forgotten, not turned into proof of larger thing. Trivial errors of speech or judgment were just as important as items on the breakfast menu: you chose waffles and I chose eggs and it was a god damn miracle.
e a noi non resta che lasciarci ammaliare, sedurre, illuminare e travolgere dall’intreccio di questi 120 frammenti, usarli per vedere un mondo fantastico eppur quotidiano, bizzarro anche se alle volte tragico, irreale. Impalpabile e sussurrato senza essere astratto. Concreto ma immaginifico. Leggero e profondo. A god damn miracle.
Non molto tempo fa DeLillo ha scritto che “la vera vita si svolge quando siamo solo, quando pensiamo, persi nei ricordi, oniricamente autocoscienti, nei momenti submicroscopici.� Insomma, quello che facciamo quando lavoriamo, studiamo, usciamo a fare la spesa, quando tossiamo, prendiamo un caffè al bar o ci nascondiamo dietro una battuta tinta di ironia, è la vita appesantita e nascosta dalle interferenze del mondo esterno che la rendono inautentica e falsata. DeLillo ha scritto anche che quella vita vera “non è riducibile a parole dette o scritte.� Ebbene su questo DeLillo si sbagliava, perché Amelia Gray quella vita vera e ostinatamente reale è riuscita a comprimerla e a diluirla nella manciata di parole scritte contenute nelle 120 pagine di Am/Pm
La cosa buffa è che Am/Pm nasce quasi per caso: a quanto pare Amelia Gray non l’ha scritto pensando a un testo da pubblicare, ma solo come una specie di strano esercizio di propedeutica narrativa da fare due volte al giorno, mattina e sera (da cui il titolo). A un certo punto si è trovata 120 micro-storie o flash-fiction divise tra 23 personaggi che un’illuminata casa editrice di Chicago—la Featherproof—ha avuto la buona idea e il buon gusto di pubblicarlo.
Flash-fiction, quindi. Un genere che qua in Italia, dove una volta c’erano Calvino e Pavese e ora è pieno di scribacchini abilissimi a dilungarsi in lungaggini spesso inutilmente pretenziose, è pressoché sconosciuto, preterintenzionalmente impraticato e per questo tragicamente inesistente. In realtà flash-fiction è un termine nuovo che indica un genere in realtà antico. Antico quanto le favole di Esopo e di Fedro o il romanzo sperimentale cinese del XIV secolo, e che in tempi più vicini ai nostri, è stato rispolverato e variamente rinnovato dall’Hemingway di In Our Time e del famigerato “romanzo di sei parole�, dal Calvino de Le città invisibili, da Carver e molto del prescindibile carver-ame degli anni �80 e dalle più recenti sperimentazioni ai confini della narrativa della superba Lydia Davis . Si tratta di racconti brevissimi, con una lunghezza che può variare dal minimo di una frase a un massimo dei tre quarti di pagina, o, se si vogliono usare unità di misura più familiari ai linguaggio dell’attualità virtuale, da un minimo di un tweet di Twitter a un massimo di un post su Facebook, dagli stringenti e stringati 420 caratteri delle prose brevissime pubblicate dalla eLit Magazine Short, Fast and Deadly al tetto massimo delle 1000 parole fissato dalla più generosa SmokeLong Quarterly. Insomma: si tratta comunque di tagliare fino al midollo, escludere l’escludibile e anche qualcosa in più e riuscire comunque a condensare un senso e una compiutezza nelle poche parole che restano.
La particolarità di Am/Pm è che i suoi micro-racconti sono concatenati, raccontano e descrivono attimi di vita di personaggi ricorrenti e variamente rimescolati: Hazel e Tess, Carla, Carla e Andrew, Charles da solo, Charles e Terrence che insieme vivono dentro una scatola che sembra quella del gatto di Schrödinger, June, Tess da sola, Martha ed Emily, Andrew, Reginald, Olivia, di nuovo Charles però insieme a Doreen, e così via, tutti immersi in un mondo sospeso tra la realtà più prosaica (le istruzioni per pulire un divano—AM: 65), momenti onirici (discussioni con un gatto�34: PM, Oliva che sogna di diventare flessibile fino a riempire tutta la casa 30: PM) e la ricerca di una simbologia per i rapporti interpersonali (AM: 21; AM:27) o di un sentimento amoroso (AM: 39; AM: 101; AM: 119). E se l’espediente di strizzare le strutture narrative di quello che altrimenti sarebbe un romanzo lungo e compiuto in un grappolo di racconti monadici era già stato tentato da Tama Janowitz (Slaves of New York) e da Elissa Schappell (Use Me e Blueprint for Building Better Girls), Amelia Gray è probabilmente la prima che ha cercato ed è riuscita a farlo con delle flash-fiction. Il risultato è un libro che si legge in un mezzo pomeriggio e che resta appiccicato alle sinapsi per delle settimane, se si cerca di leggere il non scritto tra le pagine per ricostruire il tessuto narrativo, invisibile ma latente, che tiene insieme questi 120 frammenti.
È per questo che di certo per alcuni questo libro non sarebbe così lungo se non avesse voluto essere così breve. Questo accadrà alle menti analitiche cresciute unendo i puntini e annerendo gli spazi dei giochi della Settimana Enigmistica, a chi è cresciuto nell’abitudine di voler capire tutto e a chi in un libro sente il bisogno di una narrazione e ne sente la mancanza quando non la trova. Ma il senso, e soprattutto il fascino di questo libro risiedono nella rapidità con la quale si riesce a leggerlo lentamente. È un testo, cioè, che va letto tutt’intero, ma sorseggiandolo, e spezzarlo sarebbe come ascoltare i Sechs Kleine Klavierstücke di Schönberg una battuta alla volta, o guardare 21 grammi o qualunque altro film di Inãrritu dieci minuti al giorno. Perché, come la stesa Amelia ha detto in un’occasione, “i romanzi vanno letti in una sola seduta,�1 seguendo probabilmente il consiglio di E. A Poe nella sua Philosphy of Composition a riguardo dell’inopportunità di lasciare che le faccende del mondo interferiscano con e distruggano l’effetto dato dall’unità di impressione necessaria per vivere un testo scritto [ (ed è quello che ha cercato di fare con Infinite Jest non riuscendoci solo per il bisogno di fare cose tipo andare al supermercato, vivere, dormire, mangiare ].
L’effetto, più che quello di un Pollock, che esibisce la sua bellezza nel percorso mentale necessario a ricostruire l’intenzionalità che ha creato delle macchie necessarie sotto le mentite spoglie di un caso, è quella di un quadro di Rothko che tenta di arrivare alla “espressione semplice del pensiero complesso�: si rimane abbagliati da un fascio di colori che mai saranno tanto luminosi in tutto il resto della nostra vita, ma se si tenta poi di scomporli e analizzarli, si perde irrimediabilmente e irrecuperabilmente quel momento di gioia furtiva che era stata donata da due semplici colori giustapposti su una tela. Ecco, Am/Pm è come un quadro di Rothko, fatto di emozioni base e piccoli dettagli semplici e nitidissimi, descrive momenti normali, piani, quasi banali, ma resi in modo da assumere una lieve coloritura surreale ed epifanica; sono frammenti leggeri ma mai superficiali, come voleva Calvino, e sempre come voleva Calvino, sono rapidi, esatti e visibili e raggiungono così quell’efficacia che solo la buona letteratura sa raggiungere perché sa definire e pilotare il modo in cui vuol esser letta. Ecco, il giusto modo di leggere Am/Pm ce lo suggerisce, forse inconsapevolmente, la stessa Amelia:
One day, everyone stopped over-thinking. We started thinking as much as we should, and not any more than necessary. There were no more misunderstanding whatsoever. Minor disagreements were forgotten, not turned into proof of larger thing. Trivial errors of speech or judgment were just as important as items on the breakfast menu: you chose waffles and I chose eggs and it was a god damn miracle.
e a noi non resta che lasciarci ammaliare, sedurre, illuminare e travolgere dall’intreccio di questi 120 frammenti, usarli per vedere un mondo fantastico eppur quotidiano, bizzarro anche se alle volte tragico, irreale. Impalpabile e sussurrato senza essere astratto. Concreto ma immaginifico. Leggero e profondo. A god damn miracle.
September 12, 2023
I was once a book review editor for NANO Fiction, and I'm a lifelong fan of short short fiction (not a typo, also known as micro-fiction, flash fiction, sudden fiction, etc.), so it's no surprise that I enjoyed this collection immensely. I've read Gray before, the Museum of the Weird, which was great stuff, and there's more to enjoy in AM/PM. While each story can be enjoyed on its own (most are only a paragraph long or shorter, barely taking up half a page), the collection affords Gray the opportunity to have some fun with allowing the pieces to interrelate to each other in subtle and unobtrusive ways. Character names are repeated, though the characters themselves are not necessary the same people from piece to piece. A few conceits are revisited with some meaningful variations when looked at in sequence. At the end, though, it's fun to have a volume that I can pick up and read a couple of stories as I wait for my computer to boot up, or while I mute the commercials of a television show. This is must read.
January 22, 2009
If anything's going to save the characters in Amelia Gray's debut from their troubled romances, their social improprieties, or their hands turning into claws, it's a John Mayer concert tee. In AM/PM, Gray's flash-fiction collection, impish humor is on full display. Tour through the lives of 23 characters across 120 stories full of lizard tails, Schrödinger boxes and volcano love. Follow June, who wakes up one morning covered in seeds; Leonard, who falls in love with a chaise lounge; and Andrew, who talks to his house in times of crisis. An intermittent love story as seen through a darkly comic lens, Gray mixes poetry and prose, humor and hubris to create a truly original piece of fiction.
March 23, 2009
These are very-short-stories. It's my first time reading a book of pieces so short, and it was kind of chancy. The characters names got "the person whose name is _______" halos around them. I started keeping general score between the am pages (left) and the pm pages (right). PM won the first half, am won the second. A few of them hit me as aimless observations, but most had more to them. Good for reading in between things, and first thing after waking up.
May 21, 2009
I give this book 4.2 stars, perhaps 5... perhaps one. not really it is a very good book. I feel the same as liz prince. It should be left next to a pillow and periodically a random story should be read.
it is not quite as touching as liz prince, but it has something else going for it... I don't know what that is.
it is not quite as touching as liz prince, but it has something else going for it... I don't know what that is.
November 15, 2009
Looking forward to reading as it's my first foray into Flash Fiction!
And, as I had thought, it was excellent. May need to pick it up and re-read later as I am not sure how, or if I should, interpret them. Reading this made me realize how smart some people are...makes me a bit jealous!
And, as I had thought, it was excellent. May need to pick it up and re-read later as I am not sure how, or if I should, interpret them. Reading this made me realize how smart some people are...makes me a bit jealous!
May 27, 2009
An interesting hit and miss collection by this young Texas writer. It's all flash fiction and somehow it's connected but I had a hard time figuring out how. Still, some fun stuff when it works.
August 30, 2016
A charming and quick read- 120 short stories all lasting one page or less. Gray writes with earnestness, humor, and a unique tone. This is a voice that I have been searching for!
March 16, 2012
i feel that if i was smarter i would have liked this more....
August 17, 2017
Such wonderfully delicious slice-of-life stories! ......I could instantly relate to them!
Displaying 1 - 30 of 145 reviews
Can't find what you're looking for?
Get help and learn more about the design.