"Possessions" in The Baltimore City Paper

I have a short fiction piece, "Possessions," in the Baltimore City Paper's Special Fiction Issue, curated by award-winning author and fellow Baltimorean Susan Muaddi-Daraj. It's a great issue, full of some of our greatest working writers and poets.

"And you will insist that I take your regrets, that you shouldn't have been so critical, so quick to anger, so jealous and controlling. That you wish you had appreciated me more, that you hadn't cheated. You will press them on me when I leave, like a missionary tract or a Jehovah's Witness pamphlet. You will hope I examine them later, in some moment of reflection, and convert back to your way of thinking."

To read more, go here.

Review of From Here in Baltimore City Paper

A new review of From Here posted today in the Baltimore City Paper:

It’s the sort of witty, on-point observation that populates all of the short stories in “From Here,” which depict a huge range of characters and situations, all of them inspecting the ideas of dislocation, belonging, and the meaning of home from a different angle. While the perspectives vary, they’re all told through the lens of Michalski’s sharp eye for detail and beautiful prose. 

And this:

It culminates with a beautiful, devastating finish, the sort that left me rereading the last paragraph over and over with my breath hitched in my chest. 

Thanks, Anna March and the City Paper, for such an insightful piece. You can read the whole review here.

The Tide King makes 2013 Top Ten Fiction at Baltimore City Paper

The Tide King made the 2013 Top Ten Fiction at Baltimore City Paper. So thrilled and honored to be included with Rachel Kushner, Karen Russell, George Saunders, and Laura van den Berg:

5. Tide King, by Jen Michalski (Black Lawrence Press) Michalski joined the big leagues with this stupendous novel whose magical realism is heavy on the realism as she follows her characters through war, love, and a cross-country country-music tour. Gorgeous. We’re lucky to have Michalski before the rest of the world discovers her. But they will.

The Tide King Voted "Best Fiction," Baltimore City Paper's Best of Baltimore 2013

This was very nice to wake up to:

Jen Michalski’s The Tide King is not only the best local book we’ve read this year, it is one of the best books we’ve read, period. Its magical realism emphasizes the realism while the mystical elements allow Michalski to take a long view of her characters, whom she casts as “gods who live in hell.”

Thanks, City Paper, for making The Tide King a "Best of 2013." You can read all the winners here.

8/21/13: Review of The Tide King in The Baltimore City Paper

Photo: Rebecca
 Lord

This is one of those reviews that you read over and over when you feel like a complete failure and will never get anything right. Thanks, Baynard Woods, for this little slice of happiness:

The story is as old as the Epic of Gilgamesh, which also features an herb of immortality, and, in this gorgeous novel, Jen Michalski tells it as well as anyone ever has.

To read more, go here.

Upcoming readings, week of 4/21/13

I have been reading so much my tongue is on fire! Last week I was so thrilled to read a passage from one of my favorite books, My Antonia, during a pre-party at Atomic Books for World Book Day, which is tomorrow! My Antonia, along with The House on Mango Street and others, have been chosen to be distributed this year by givers to lucky recipients. The Baltimore City Paper did a little pre-writeup about the event here.

Unfortunately, I will not be be participating in World Book Day tomorrow  because I will be reading from Could You Be With Her Now at the Barnes & Noble, Baltimore, Johns Hopkins store. The reading is at 7 pm if you're interested in coming out! In addition to reading, I'll be talking a little bit about how I got to this point, my involvement in Baltimore's amazing literary community, and will also take questions! For more information, Hopkins has a public announcement here.

After getting back from Ohio yesterday (where I participated in a great reading with Scott McClanahan, Aubrey Hirsch, and Jason Jordan), I  stopped by the WYPR studios today to record an excerpt from my forthcoming debut novel The Tide King, for The Signal. The book will drop on May 14th, and the excerpt should air around then, too. Stay tuned!

4/15/13: City Paper Write-up of My Reading at CityLit Festival

Reading at CityLit Festival, April 13, 2012, Baltimore

The Baltimore City Paper did a nice write-up of my reading at the CityLit Festival on Saturday. What a nice surprise to see, and even nicer to read (I think I have found my publicists for The Tide King!)

"Michalski’s recent col­lec­tion of novel­las (which I review here), also released this year, bring remark­ably dif­fer­ent voices to the page, and yet, the rhyth­mic con­trol and pre­ci­sion of the lan­guage and the sweep­ing and yet inti­mate plot of this pre­view of Tide King are even more assured and virtuosic–and also more nat­ural and less labored. It’s likely that this book will finally make Michal­ski known to the wider world–in a big way. Seri­ously, if I weren’t entirely averse to all attempts to pre­dict the future, I would say this book will be huge. But there’s no account­ing for people’s tastes, so I will say instead, with some cer­tainty, that it will be important."

To read more, go here.

4/11/13: 10th Annual CityLit Festival

The 10th Annual CityLit Festival in this Saturday, April 13th in Baltimore. George Saunders is the headline (yowsers!). Other readers include Leigh Newman, Tim Wendel, Terese Svoboda, Elisabeth Dahl, and myself (I'll be reading an excerpt from the soon-to-be released The Tide King).

In conjunction, Baltimore City Paper ran a nice piece yesterday about the CityLit Project's 10 years with the CityLit Festival (and also its myriad other accomplishments under Founder Gregg Willhelm, such as programming at the Baltimore Book Festival, CityLit Press, and the Baltimore Writers Conference). You can read it here.

"Baltimore has always been a collaborative place, but I think what CityLit, along with people like Jen Michalski and Michael Kimball (of 510 Reading Series) and [CP contributors ] Deb Rudacille and John Barry with the New Mercury series made sure that the literary arts are part of the mix."

Could You Be With Her Now received a nice review today from Baynard Woods and the Baltimore City Paper:

The two very different styles in Could You Be With Her Now, not only make the case for the novella as a form, but also for Michalski as a wise writer and a master stylist.

To read more, go here.

Making the Rounds

We had a couple of nice PR pieces for The Lit Show this week. First, on Tuesday we sat down with Tom Hall for WYPR's Maryland Morning. The podcast should be up shortly.

The City Paper also ran a nice piece, interviewing me and Betsy:

“When you think of Canton and Fells Point, you think of drinking and sports,” Michalski, who lives near Greektown, says. She also wanted to cast a wider net than does your average literary reading. “There are a lot of readings series in the city now, and they’re all great,” she says. “But there’s still a swath of people you see in other places that never come to the readings.”

The semiannual Lit Show, which launches at the Creative Alliance on March 22, is an attempt to change that. It will mimic the form of a classic late-night talk show, with Michalski and fellow fiction writer Betsy Boyd as co-hosts. Interviews with guests will alternate with readings, fast-paced repartee, music by a guest band as well as the house band (Howard Markman’s Palookaville), and “stupid human tricks”—in this first show, for instance, one guest will sing an Appalachian death ballad and accompany himself on wine glasses. The show will feature author Cathy Alter; Aaron Henkin of WYPR-FM’s The Signal; comedian, writer, and City Paper contributor Jim Meyer; musical guest Height With Friends; and a mystery guest.

Finally, we made number 2 on b Magazine's weekly "10 Spot." You can read a PDF copy of the issue here.

Bad Ass Glow Pens

I'm excited to again be a judge for the 13th annual Fiction and Poetry Contest run by The Baltimore City Paper. I had so much fun in 2008 reading work, and I hope the entries this year will be just as badass.

You know who you are? You are a badass. And I know you submitted your badass work before November 11th so I will get to read it. If not, send it to jmww; we're still reading for the winter issue!

You know who I am? I am a glow face. And badass Sean Lovelace can run circles around my poke-slow jogging self. A 1:24:10 half-marathon, Sean? Can I smell your shoes?