1940 update.

It all happened within a week (or little more than a week).

In it's May issue, Library Journal gave 1940 a glowing, Starred Review, saying: "This tautly constructed, utterly readable book raises questions the reader must answer. Highly recommended."

The Los Angeles Times published an absolutely marvelous review by Tim Rutten that couldn't have been more positive - which has, subsequently, been picked up by everyone from the Orlando Sentinel and the Chicago Tribune to Today's Zaman (the largest English-language newspaper in Turkey). Here is what Mr. Rutten had to say about the book:

"Jay Neugeboren traverses the Hitlerian tightrope with all the skill and formal daring that have made him one of our most honored writers of literary fiction and masterful nonfiction. This new book is, at once, a beautifully realized work of imagined history, a rich and varied character study and a subtly layered novel of ideas, all wrapped in a propulsively readable story. Neugeboren is marvelous. Part of the power of this intelligently and finely wrought novel is that... thoughts and questions arise unforced from the story, as though from life itself."

To complete the trifecta, Commonweal also bestowed praise upon 1940: "Jay Neugeboren's 1940 is a taut, nuanced, beautifully written novel that captures an anxious and uncertain time in ways that a straight rendering of facts and dates could never achieve. Neugeboren casts a spell on the first page of his novel that never goes away. This memorable work of historical fiction is to be contemplated as well as savored."

That's the latest, but, as always, there is rumor abound that there is plenty more to come.

Drop Edge of Yonder update.

Because this is part of a concerted effort to more consistently update our blog and provide web-viewers with the latest information, we begin with The Drop Edge of Yonder:

The Los Angeles Times Book Review called the book "A picaresque American Book of the Dead... in the tradition of Thomas Pynchon, Joseph Heller, Kurt Vonnegut and Terry Southern."

Arthur Magazine featured a substantial and wonderful 5-page article and interview by Joe O'Brien with author Rudolph Wurlitzer that covers everything from the publication of Rudy's first novel, Nog, to his Oscar-worthy acting stints in several scripts he wrote.

Mark Athitakis says, in a review of the book in the Washington City Paper, "In his hero, Zebulon Shook, Wurlitzer has invented a funny, acerbic, hugely compelling representative of American heroism... This is that rare story that improves as it expands, not unlike another rambling picaresque, Don Quixote."

Rudy just completed a radio interview with Bookworm's Michael Silverblatt in early May in New York City. Stay tuned for air date of the interview.

Pilcrow Lit Fest: Believe it.

MAY 22 – 25 IS INDEPENDENTS’ WEEKEND AS NEW HOMEGROWN LITERARY FESTIVAL CELEBRATES CHICAGO’S INDIE SCENE

Inaugural Pilcrow Lit Fest To Highlight Very Best Small, Independent Publishers

CHICAGO, February 11— Pilcrow Lit Fest, a new literary festival named after a semi-obscure editing term, today announced its forming line-up for its debut May 22-25, 2008, in Lakeview. Designed to honor the vibrant, vital independent streak in American culture, Pilcrow Lit Fest will feature authors from small presses via literary readings, informative panels and social events.

Pilcrow Lit Fest opens on Thursday, May 22, with a launch event at The Fixx, continuing with a party at Baby Atlas on Friday night, and followed by a full day of panels, workshops and readings at various Lakeview venues. Confirmed participants so far include Jami Attenberg, who went from distributing her short stories as DIY ‘zines on the subway to mainstream success with her debut novel, The Kept Man (Riverhead Books, January 2008), cultural critics Peter Bebergal and Scott Korb (co-authors of The Faith Between Us), novelist Timothy Schaffert (Devils in the Sugar Shop, Unbridled Books), Eric Obenauf and Eliza Jane Wood, co-founders of Midwest-based Two Dollar Radio, publishers of edgy, breakout fiction including Hollywood screenwriter Rudolph Wurlitzer’s new novel, The Drop Edge of Yonder (April 1), praised by rock icon Patti Smith as “a book you watch as you read, cast the film as you reread, and create a sequel as you sleep,” plus local playwrights, poets, writers, editors and literary impresarios.

On Saturday, May 24, the evening will be dedicated to a fundraiser for the New Orleans Public Libraries, which are still recovering from Hurricane Katrina today. The event is centered on Rebuilt Books, commissioned following a national call for authors and publishers to destroy and recreate their own book as art to be auctioned as part of the evening’s fundraising efforts. NOPL director Ronald Biava will be on hand to personally accept the proceeds.

Sunday promises a joint event created in collaboration with Sunday Salon Chicago and more. Local independent, The Book Cellar, will be the official bookseller throughout the festival.

“Chicago's book lovers almost have it all,” notes Pilcrow Lit Fest founder and creative director Amy Guth, herself a debut novelist published by an independent press (Three Fallen Women, So New Media). “The city has great independent bookstores, literature and poetry reading series and the Printer's Row Book Fair, but until now we did not have a literary festival to call our own. After speaking at lit festivals in New Orleans, Omaha and Atlanta that all were so focused on community-building, I really felt like their philosophies would translate well in Chicago."

For the latest updates on events, participants and more, please visit www.PilcrowLitFest.com.

Looking Forward to 2008: The Drop Edge of Yonder

In Time Out New York's year-end wrap-up of the "Best (and Worst) of 2007" Michael Miller rates the year's best books.

Miller gives props to the greatly under-appreciated Gary Lutz, for his chapbook, Partial List of People to Bleach (Future Tense Books), and Adrian Tomine for his graphic novel, Shortcomings (Drawn & Quarterly), among other deserving titles for the year. [It is also worth noting, that I was introduced to both the Lutz and Tomine books at the Wordstock Book Festival in Portland this year.]

Of particular interest to us, is the fact that Miller mentions The Drop Edge of Yonder, novel by Rudolph Wurlitzer (forthcoming, April 2008), as an "early sign of promise" that publishers will take more chances on challenging titles in 2008.

Beneath the Pines, novel by Janet Beard

Beneath the Pines, the debut novel from Janet Beard (forthcoming, Fall 2008), has a new viral home.

At the book's website, you can read excerpts from the novel, get some great Southern recipes, and hear about the stories that inspired the story itself.

Julie Mars raves that Beneath the Pines is "a rich tale of family ties lost and rediscovered, hearts broken and mended, and secrets with the power to imprison."

Whet your appetite for this book, coming your way September 2008.

NYC baby, NYC

We just made it back from our first successful sales conference with Consortium. While in town we were fortunate enough to hang out with some really super-cool folks.


Picture: Francis Levy (and former Grove employee before he was, ahem, terminated), the man/myth Barney Rosset, and Eric.

There are more pictures for the curious in the 'Events' page at twodollarradio.com.

New Tee Shirts Now Available!

We're pleased to announce that we have added 4 - count them, 4 - new tee shirts to our catalog.

Two for the males. Two for the females.

You can view each of them at our website, here.

Each of the shirts is screen-printed by hand by the Two Dollar Radio all-star team, and sure to impress even the skeptics in the bleacher section.

Virtual Catalog Live!

The first-ever virtual catalog in the history of Two Dollar Radio is now live on our website. Be sure to check it out, here.

The tangible catalogs are pretty sweet too. They're all handmade with love and spirit from the Two Dollar Radio sweatshop and are included with any order from the Two Dollar Radio shop.

We'll also be handing them out at Portland's Wordstock Book Festival from November 10-11, at Portland's Convention Center.

Drop Edge in Murdaland #2

Issue #2 of literary magazine Murdaland was just released and it comes complete with an excerpt from The Drop Edge of Yonder entitled, Zebulon. It actually features - roughly - the first three chapters of the novel (forthcoming April 2008).

Also appearing with Rudolph Wurlitzer in Issue #2 are stories by Jayne Anne Phillips, Scott Phillips, and other non-Phillipses such as Don Carpenter and Vicki Hendricks.

Check out Murdaland's website for information on where you can pick up a copy: murdalandmagazine.com.

For more information on The Drop Edge of Yonder visit the revamped page on the Two Dollar Radio website, here: twodollarradio.com.

Time Out New York: Notes From Underground

In the latest issue of Time Out New York, Michael Miller has written a piece on "underground" book publishing in New York. He mentions Two Dollar Radio (the opening paragraph doesn't, but it's a good intro).


"These days, small publishers don’t draw enough attention to spark book-banning fervors à la Ulysses or Naked Lunch. They do not, like roving illegal loft parties, get raided by the police. But there’s still a rogue jolt of underground sensibility running through a handful of New York City’s independent purveyors of contemporary lit. What distinguishes them is the very thing that keeps them out of the spotlight: Run by people with uncompromising tastes, they put authorial freedom before profit and leave controversies to mainstream attention-mongers like Judith Regan."

"...at this point in time, the word underground is becoming an increasingly elastic category, one that’s expanding to include former big-house authors. Take relative newcomer Two Dollar Radio, the Brooklyn-based “movement” started by Eric Obenauf in 2005. So far, it has done small runs—around 1,000 copies—of books like high-rise window washer Ivor Hanson’s memoir Life on the Ledge. But in early 2008, TDR will print 5,000 copies of The Drop Edge of Yonder, the new novel by old-school counterculture chronicler Rudolph Wurlitzer, who was once published by Knopf. As mainstream presses become more gentrified, yesterday’s Random House scribes could become today’s underground staples. And that’s a good thing. We should be happy that authors like Wurlitzer, Lutz and Lemus—all of whom were at one point with major publishers—have found homes for their challenging work."

Francis Levy is an Animal!

Francis Levy, author of the forthcoming novel Erotomania: A Romance (due out from Two Dollar Radio in Summer '08), graces the pages of the Wall Street Journal online health section today, talking about his fitness regimen.


Francis is a self-professed "compulsive fitness addict," who is also a third degree black belt. "Every morning, Mr. Levy rolls out of bed, stands on his head for 30 seconds, does 20 push-ups, about 50 sit-ups and ends with a somersault down his hallway."

Read more about Erotomania - a modern take on a crazy little thing called love - in the "books" section at twodollarradio.com.

Times Literary Supplement

Michael Greenberg, in his column in the Times Literary Supplement (of London) today, calls Rudy Wurlitzer's The Drop Edge of Yonder "mesmerzing. A Western as Celine might have written one, the characters stripped down to the zero degree of their existence. A purgatory of frontier emptiness and mayhem."

Greenberg also gives considerable ink to Two Dollar Radio, calls our list of authors "impressive" and "marvel(s) at [our] idealism."

For the complete article, you have to pick up a copy of the Times Literary Supplement as it is unavailable online. (...Or sign up for a free two issue trial of their ePaper.)

Two Dollar Radio @ Wordstock!

We're super-excited to be partaking in this year's Wordstock Book Festival, in Portland on November 9 - 11, at the Oregon Convention Center.

At Wordstock, we will be debuting our two Spring 08 titles - The Drop Edge of Yonder (a novel by Rudolph Wurlitzer) and 1940 (a novel by Jay Neugeboren). Both are amazing reads, which is why we're so eager to unleash them.

More information on both of these titles can be found in our "books" section at twodollarradio.com.

You'll also be able to pick up any of our previous releases, our handmade catalogues, and tee shirts whose sale benefits literacy awareness and causes.

See you in Portland.

A New Distributor for Two Dollar Radio

We are pleased to announce that we will be changing distributors beginning January 1, 2008, to Consortium Book Sales & Distribution. This is good for us. We're happy. They presently distribute many of those publishers that we tried to emulate when initially starting out (like Serpents Tail and Akashic).

Despite the delay in our publishing schedule, there is still plenty of work for us to stay busy with. We're bidding our time - twiddling our thumbs, conceiving an imprint, getting tan, possibly purchasing our own offset printing press, catching up on some reading - till the contract kicks in.

We had a great experience in the past with out previous distributor, Biblio, a sister company of the National Book Network, and I would recommend them to anyone starting out with a small press. (bibliodistribution.com)

Drop Edge Release Date.

Contrary to our previous posting, the release date for THE DROP EDGE OF YONDER by Rudolph Wurlitzer, will not be until April 2008. We will be debuting the book at this November's Portland book festival, Wordstock (alongside our other new spring release, 1940)!

This is for a couple of reasons, which we hope to fill everyone in on very soon. Thanks for your patience.

In the meantime, if you write for a newspaper/magazine and would be interested in receiving an advance galley of the most buzz-worthy book in the history of time, write to Brian (brian@twodollarradio.com).