Literary Whoopie
By Anonymous in Arts & Entertainment on Dec 16, 2005 7:05PM
Ever hear of a pumpkin whoopie pie? Neither had we, until we got a note in the mail from Land Grant College Review editor Richard Benjamin, who describes the apparent treats as "cream cheese frosting between pumpkin cookies." He'll be bringing some with him tomorrow for the first-ever Chicago release party of the LGCR at Estelle's--and giving them away for free! We have to say, we're both intrigued and a little bit skeptical. Pumpkin confections, if done properly, can be a delight - spicy, creamy, sweet; overwhelming and dull if not.
Similar risks apply to literary magazines, but having perused the most recent issues of the biannual short fiction mag Land Grant College Review, our expectations for the whoopie pies are skyrocketing. Working seventy hours a week leaves us a little slow in the detection of subtle humor, so we didn't get the joke at first, but we love the plucky spirit expressed in their name, a riff on the staid, intimidating lit journal establishment. This is serious fiction that doesn't take itself too seriously. Even better for our time constraints and short attention span, the pieces range from short-short to nowhere-near-a-novella-thank-god.
The latest publication, issue number three, features eerie prints by Marilyn Holsing created specifically for the publication, and we especially enjoyed "We Found Ourselves in Toronto" by Brock Clarke. It's a meditative piece of fiction on the nature of imagination, writing, and fiction itself, without mentioning all of that stuffy nonsense: characters appear, disappear, morph, and acquire wisps of histories at each other's will and confusion reigns until we begin to surmise that this is a story in flux and the characters are perhaps all the same person and, yeah, we're surely not doing it justice, but it's brilliant. Can we take a nap now?
Check out LGCR tomorrow night at Estelle's and get your free pumpkin whoopie pies, 2-buck draft beers, and smartypants cred.
Land Grant College Review No. 3 Release Party
Saturday, December 17th, 2005 @ 8pm
Estelle's
2013 W. North Avenue