Literary Lift Off

On Saturday, February 24th, my second novel Talking to the Moon was officially launched. Whew! It was a wonderful experience! Thanks to everyone for showing up and giving support. Here's some pics.

Literary Podcast

I did my first ever podcast. It was with playwright Prince Gomolvilas (left). I dig the artist always known as Prince, but he's like an annoying little brother who knows how to get on your nerves. Did I sound defensive in the interview?

Anyway you can download the podcast through itunes or simply click: http://bamboonation.mypodcast.com/

Literary Book Tour

Book tours are a funny thing. Some authors will be put on a huge tour, taking them to cities on both coasts and parts in between. Others will be lucky to do an interview with their company newsletter. I proudly sent in my photo to be considered for the "Employee News" section of my company newsletter, thank you very much. Among announcements of employee birthdays and newly born babies, I'll get a mention that my second novel is published!

However, I'll also be having a spectacular tour of...Los Angeles. Cities that I'll be flying into include Los Feliz (Skylight Books on 2/24), East Los Angeles (Cal-state LA on 2/28), Pasadena (Vroman's on 3/2), and West Hollwyood (Booksoup on 3/3).

Yippee!

Literary Encounter: Amiri Baraka

When I was a freshman in college, there were two plays that I'd studied that left on indelible impression on me. The first was Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf by Edward Albee and the second was Dutchman by Amiri Baraka (aka Leroi Jones). Tonight I had the pleasure of introducing the influential and controversial Amiri Baraka at an event at Skylight. He was amazing. He talked about being a "Revoluntionary Optimist." He encouraged people to read, read, read. He said that when we read, we learn to protect ourselves from people who may want to hurt us. If someone says, you can't do that. I can point to a book and say, Yes, I can--it says so right here in this chapter.

Literary Pub. Date

The "Pub. Date" is the date when a book is officially out. Even though my novel has been available for the past six weeks or so (it needs those weeks to wind its way into bookstores across the country), today is when I can say my novel is actually published. I'm not an author with a second book coming out. Today, I'm an author with two books out.

I think my baby looks pretty good!

Literary Satisfaction

I FINALLY saw a live production of Edward Albee's Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? It's one of my favorite plays and I'd been waiting for almost twenty years! It was pretty fantastic. Kathleen Turner (right) could "bray" with the best of them. (I didn't care too much for the movie with Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton.)

I went with my friend Joseph and we talked about the myth of Woolfe. The big one is the idea that the leads George and Martha were originally written as a vulgar gay couple. I'd read an article with Edward Albee who said that was untrue. He claimed the myth was created by heterosexuals who refused to believe that a straight couple can destroy each other like that. (Uh, with fifty percent of of marriages ending in divorce, I think destruction is conceivable)

Literary Out

Whevever I read someone's age in a magazine, I generally add five more years to it. In some cases, I knew the person in the article and thought: I know he's not THAT young. Then I go on to wonder: what's wrong with the age he's in now?

I've also written profiles about people and was researching a woman who'd been the same age in three different articles in three different years. I silently laughed about it.

Well, karma has a way of biting me in the ass.

In the March issue of Out magazines, there's a cool article on me. Through no fault of my own, they got my age wrong. They made me five years younger! There it was in black and white: Noel Alumit, 34. And you know what? I LOVED it. I'm not going to rush to the editor and tell him to print a retraction.

I know people who know me will roll their eyes when they read the article and wonder why I lied. I would never lie, but if someone else wants to do it for me, why quibble?

Literary Filming

I've seen two movies based on novels: Children of Men by PD James and Notes of a Scandal by Zoe Heller. I thoroughly enjoyed both, which actually surprised me. I guess I'm used to thinking that movies based on books usually stink. Then I realised that these two movies were made by the British. I wondered: do the British have better respect for the novel and carefully translate it better to the screen?