'age saves you from nothing' published in edition 21 of The Diamond and the Thief by Black Rider Press

Hi y'all,

It has been a while again. A short story I wrote 'age saves you from nothing' has been published in edition 21 of 'The Diamond and the Thief'. Be sure to wander on over and check it out.

Thanks to Black Rider Press and its editor in chief Jeremy Balius for working with me on this story. It has been enlightening and a pleasure. Find them here on Facebook, so you can stay in touch with the greatness they spew upon this world.

http://blackriderpress.com/

Jack Kerouac Documentary - Lowell Blues

How to maintain your typewriter - Compliments of the Sticky institute

Having trouble understanding how to operate your old-school typewriter? The Sticky Institute has an awesome resource on their website here. If you don't know what the Sticky Institute is, this is a short blurb from their website:

'Sticky Institute is an Artist Run Initiative fusing an exhibiting and open resource working space with a non profit retail environment housed in Degraves Street Subway under Flinders Street, Melbourne.

By bypassing the conventional gallery system, Sticky redefines the notion of a retail environment as a non profit arts space dedicated to Australian and international zine culture. Zines are provided additional exposure through Sticky's presence at various art and literature festivals nationally.

Sticky's instore artist program involves open monthly arts talks, workshops, zine launches,and ongoing discussion and debate. The open resources program involves badge machines, photocopying, long armed staplers, a paper guillotine, stationary and typewriters.'

Reading of 'Winter Glass' now online

Hi All,

It has been a while again. There is news, but mostly behind the scenes and it falls away from your eyes to be shown in full glory hopefully later this year. The mind churns, just remember.

Thanks to Black Rider Press you can now download a recording of me reading Winter Glass as featured in The Diamond & the Thief  December 2010.

You can also stream it at Poetry Speaks or below.

Joran CA Monteiro – Winter Glass from The Black Rider on Vimeo.

Poem - winter glass - published in 'The Diamond and the Thief'

Hi Everyone,

A poem I am particularly proud of, 'winter glass', has been published in the December edition of one of my favourite online zines, 'The Diamond and the Thief', which is published by the Black Rider Press. 

Read the poem here (pdf download of the zine) and check my bio here.

Also check out the Black Rider's own blog here.

A great start of 2011 for me. I hope it is the same for you.

Joran

Poem published by Verity La.

Hi Everyone,


A poem I wrote, 'Roaches Dancing' has been published on Verity La., a great online lit mag. You can find the post here. Check out other posts on the site while you are at it. There is some choice poetry, great interviews and reviews, and of course fiction there.


It has already been making some whirls, with brad from Maekitso's cafe dedicating a poem to mine. 


It is a real poetry love-fest!


Now we're ready for Christmas!


Love,
Joran


P.S. Please allow me to plug my other blog: Syphilis of the Brain - it is my latest brain child (get it? Brain?) and on it I post whatever I come across on a day to day basis and whatever catches my fancy. Links to music. To films. Odd photos. Art I really like. It pretty low-brow. But low-brow is good, isnt'it? 

REVIEW: Map of the Invisible World - Tash Aw (2009)

http://www.harpercollins.com.au

Tash Aw's second novel 'Map of the Invisible world' is a great story set in Indonesia turbulent 1960s.

Two Indonesian brothers are separated when young. The older brother, Johan, is taken, from their orphanage on a remote island, to Malaysia by a rich couple, the younger, Adam, is adopted by a Dutch painter who lives in a coastal town in Indonesia. 

Adam tries to remember his brother, but he always stays out of focus, like a faceless figure in the corner of his eye, no matter how hard he tries. His upbringing by Karl, the painter, is full of love, but paradoxical. Karl wants nothing else than to be Indonesian, but his white skin in the post-colonial Indonesia of the early 1960s forbids these aspirations. It is a time of clashes between the PKI (Indonesian Communist Party) and the government and its armed forces. President Sukarno is trying to juggle these powers and keep Indonesia safe and under control. 

Johan remembers all too well and has become nihilistic, with more money than he can spend and the indifference from his adoptive father, he runs across the newly developing capital of Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur, looking for peace.

Around Adam's 13th birthday things spin out of control, when Karl is taken prisoner by the Indonesian government, accused of being a communist spy. This, of course, is a false accusation. He is taken to Jakarta and thrown in jail. Left alone Adam goes through old pictures Karl kept. He finds photos of a woman, an important friend of Karl, he figures. He decides to travel after his father to Jakarta and ask this woman for help. 

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'Map of the invisible world' is beautiful novel that weaves historically important events in the young Indonesian Republic and a personal story of two lost brothers together.  Tash Aw manages to include in the book: A meeting with Sukarno; keen insights into the political interests of the US in Indonesia; the feeling of the Indonesians during these times. You come so close to the streets of Jakarta that you can almost smell it.

This is a beautiful book and, like Light Boxes and American Rust, it is one of the best books I have read in 2010.  The only criticism I have is that, while the story-line about Johan is written well, it is never properly followed through and the novel would have stood just as well without Johan's story on the other side of the Malacca Strait. 

Let me know what you think of it.

Joran C.A. Monteiro © 2010