As an alternative to the debate currently taking place on Twitter, and elsewhere, over popular vs. literary fiction and what’s for chicks and what’s for dicks and so forth, I wanted to bring your attention to a couple of books I recently read and enjoyed that I might not have picked up if not for the fact that I follow their authors on Twitter. See, hack comics? It’s good for more than giving narcissists a platform from which to talk about their lunches or whatever hack comics think people use it for!

1. And The Heart Says Whatever, by Emily Gould. You may know Gould as a former employee of Gawker or for a New York Times Magazine story she wrote about the effects of exposing oneself to criticism from the public at large, via the internet. I didn’t read Gawker during her tenure and I still haven’t read that story (though I sure have read a lot ABOUT it), but I read her Tumblr and was interested in her professional/personal experiences as a web writer because…you know. And even though the details of my biography are different from hers (I had already been married six months before I started a webzine, which is what they were called then, and my personal and professional lives have been intertwined basically that entire time), there are so many epiphanies about what you need to do to protect your own sanity that no one can tell you; you just have to get to them on your own. Reading her memoir was hard for me at some points because my wish to step into the book and give her the benefit of my wisdom as an elder stateswoman of the internet made me feel maternal, for God’s sake, and am I really that much older than she is? I am. Anyway, I know from her Twitter feed that she’s having a fun summer so she doesn’t need me anyway. And the book is great: her style reminds me of Margaret Atwood’s early short stories. Get it.

2. The Book Of Right And Wrong, by Matt Debenham. Though I haven’t met Matt, I have had lunch with his fantastic wife Caissie St. Onge a number of times and; I would have bought his book out of Twitter loyalty to them both. So I was, for real, unprepared for how great this book is. As a short-story fan, I am always looking for recommendations, but (sorry, Matt) pre-Twitter I didn’t know about him at all. Why aren’t Matt Debenham’s short stories in The New Yorker?! I would put this volume up against anything by Alice Munro; Matt’s stories are truthful and devastating and the book’s only fault is how quickly it ends. If you don’t buy this book you are doing yourself a disservice.

3. Going In Circles by Pamela Ribon. Now, I believe this young lady is a screenwriter who…just kidding. Obviously I know Pam: we’ve been naked together in semi-public so many times that I may know her better in some ways than her mother does. (I’m sorry that the podcast we recorded in Hawaii last year, featuring the scandalous story of the time we accidentally booked a three-way naked mud sauna with Dave, is no longer online…because that shit is gold.) I know you can’t take my endorsement entirely seriously because Pam is my dear friend, but I absolutely adored Going In Circles. While her first two novels were also sad and funny and great, Circles is an artistic leap forward that, as her friend, I was so excited and proud to read. The subject matter — divorce — is some of her toughest yet, and she dramatizes it without a whiff of soapiness or melodrama. I understand if you can’t take my word for it, so fortunately, you can take Oprah’s. Pam has spent the summer travelling around the country supporting the book and meeting other derby girls (it’s about divorce AND roller derby), so you should follow her on Twitter to make sure you know when she’s coming to your town. And you should have read the book by the time she gets there.

I’m not going to claim it’s as brilliant a notion as “Gay Expendables,” which found Joe and me on Twitter recasting the movie (surprise! Jason Statham’s in both versions). But I had this idea that The Expendables is basically the same movie as The Women. I know you haven’t seen either movie — and you shouldn’t; they’re both terrible — but trust me.

I pitched it to Jessica Grose at Slate.com‘s Double X blog, and she did a fantastic edit on my ramblings. You should read it.

From Reddit (by way of The Daily What).

Curious as to what that Double Rainbow video guy’s been up to since he turned into a meme? UPDATE!

Pam and one of her ex-co-workers were on Twitter earlier, discussing this tweet from Yosemitebear62 himself. Pam’s ex-colleague said he’s been in L.A. having “tons of meetings.” And I was like, “NA meetings, I hope.” Apparently not!

So anyway, if you’ll excuse me, I need to turn on the video camera, eat a pound of magic mushrooms, and narrate what I can see through my window. SEE YOU TOMORROW WHEN I’M FAMOUS AND RICH!

Is this sexy? That unnatural hand position on the tie? That looks like kitty paws, and that the model’s about to lick them and smooth back her hair or something?

It is? Really? Fine.

Because I know you were waiting! Just kidding, you weren’t, but here are my thoughts anyway.

I really loved it — I don’t think I have been as impressed and, really, gripped by a sci-fi movie since The Matrix. And though I realize that this is around the time that the backlash to the past week’s backlash is supposed to kick in, I’m not trying to rehabilitate Inception for those who didn’t find it lived up to the hype; more and more frequently, I feel like there are pop-cultural products that we all feel the need to take sides on, as though a movie or a TV show were a sports team or something — before Inception, it was Lost — and so even though I liked Inception a lot, I’m not going to sit here and call the people who didn’t “haters” or anything. Is there anything more pointless than getting into an opinion fight? No. This weekend, though, I’ve been reading some of the issues people have had with the movie, and wanted to respond — but, again, not to try to change anyone’s mind, because why would I? (Warning: spoilers!)

1. The love story wasn’t convincing. Wasn’t that sort of the point? When Dom and Mal meet again, at the end, and she tries once more to persuade him to join her in what she’s convinced is reality, he tells her (and reminds us) that she’s not his wife: she’s just a projection of his own subconscious, and even he can’t recreate the real Mal in all her complexity. We arguably haven’t seen the “real” Mal at any point in the story — she’s been dead since before the events of the film take place (with the exception of the scene when Dom tells Ariadne the story of Mal’s suicide, but as to whether or not even THAT is real, see point #3, below) — so in order for Dom to be able to focus sufficiently to do this one last job and get back to his children, he needs to accept that Mal is truly gone, that the version of her still reviving his guilt over her suicide isn’t really “her” at all. So if we in the audience feel that their relationship, as portrayed, seems kind of off, I feel like that’s because we in the audience are arriving at the same conclusion Dom finally does.

2. The characters spend too much time explaining the rules of this world. (That’s also in Will Leitch’s review, linked above.) I have to say, after all those seasons of Lost that, in the end, pretty much added up to a variation of “IT WAS ALL A DREAM,” I appreciated that the Nolans had thought through their conceit and realized it was important for the audience to get it. You know how, in the Lost episode “Across The Sea” (the one with the Jacob/Man In Black origin story), Mother says that each question will just lead to more questions, and what a cop-out that was? Of course that is true of any kind of story — there’s always another “why?” But personally, I didn’t feel with Inception that the Nolans had just arbitrarily decided to tell us some aspects of how shared dreaming and coyly hold others back, which I think Carlton Cuse and Damon Lindelof did on Lost, kind of a lot. For me, Inception did what was required to establish its internal logic, so that as the film went on, I felt like the story conformed to that logic.

3. Wasn’t the entire story a dream? This is going to seem like a cop-out given point #2, but this is the very question I thought overlaid the whole movie and made it more artistically compelling than just a sci-fi genre film: a lot of the observations Inception characters make about dreams are also true of movies themselves. For example, when Dom tells Ariadne that, in a dream, you can never remember how you got to wherever you are — that elision (necessarily) occurs in movies, too. Or when Mal tries to make her point that Dom’s “reality” isn’t actually real by pointing out to him the preposterousness of his being chased around the world by shadowy figures — is it any more ridiculous a premise than that of…well, Salt? In Inception, the Nolans invent some kind of briefcase device so that the characters can engage in shared dreaming — but isn’t film itself the device by which all of us in the audience engage in a kind of shared dreaming? OR DID I JUST BLOW YOUR MIND?

As I mentioned, I have wrapped up my time at Sling, and had been looking forward to being forced to take some time out from the workforce while I waited for the arrival of my green card (without which I would be legally prohibited from doing any paid work for any entity in any country in the known universe — yes, even Canada, where I remain a citizen). But then our green cards came on Monday — so my official hiatus was not quite the shortest it could possibly be (the green cards could have arrived on Friday or Saturday), but just about. And though, consciously, I am not in the biggest hurry to become a productive member of society again, it seems as though my subconscious is pretty anxious about my not having enough to do.

Evidence #1: Tuesday night, I dreamed that I was back at Sling. It was one of those dreams that’s realistic in its banality: I was running an editorial meeting revolving around the actual work that would actually be taking place had I still been employed there this week. And I was pretty far along in my spiel before I remembered that I wasn’t supposed to be there, though I woke up before awkwardly taking my leave. Everyone was pretty polite in going along with my delusions of ongoing authority over them.

Evidence #2: Last night, my dream found me on the set of House just as the day’s shooting was wrapping up, and running into Hugh Laurie, who in my dream was a friendly but not especially close acquaintance. He’d heard that I’d quit and, as I walked him to his car, offered me some advice as to my next career move — none of which I remember, of course. What I do remember is that Dream Laurie parks his car a surprisingly long distance from the set. Oh, and even in my dream I had the presence of mind to congratulate him on his recent Emmy nomination, fortunately — proof that he clearly didn’t need me to return the career-advice favour.

4:10:30 PM Tara Ariano: http://notesfromahack.blogspot.com/2010/07/why-miami-is-exciting-choice-sports.html
4:11:38 PM Will Edmondson: who is this person
4:11:42 PM Tara Ariano: He’s a writer.
4:11:45 PM Will Edmondson: he’s a moron
4:11:53 PM Tara Ariano: I’M GOING TO MISS THIS!
4:12:07 PM Will Edmondson: the super team is going to KILL the NBA!
4:12:14 PM Will Edmondson: all the star power is going to be condensed on ONE team
4:12:19 PM Will Edmondson: its completely counter intuitive
4:12:24 PM Tara Ariano: I know, right?
4:12:30 PM Will Edmondson: do you want to watch the NBA, or do you want to watch the Miami Heat
4:12:35 PM Tara Ariano: Totally!
4:12:46 PM Will Edmondson: it’s going to be the equivalent of the Harlem Globetrotters
4:12:49 PM Tara Ariano: I know!
4:13:00 PM Will Edmondson: you don’t know, but I’m explaining to you why this person is an idiot.
4:13:08 PM Tara Ariano: hee. I believe you.

[In case you somehow missed it, the lovely and talented Pamela Ribon wrote an essay based on her excellent new novel, Going In Circles, which was featured today on Oprah.com. Obviously, now that it's been shared on Facebook and Twitter over 1000 times (and counting!), the next step is for Pam to appear on Oprah. I think that'll go a LITTLE something...like this.]

Oprah: You all know about Eat, Pray, Love, right?

Audience: WOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Oprah: Well, my guest today has written a novel she jokingly terms Eat, Cry, Shove.

Audience: [laughter]

Oprah: The book is Going In Circles, and an essay she wrote for Oprah.com just straight-up TOOK OFF, so here to tell us about her life on the roller derby circuit and her alter ego May Q. HOLLAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA: please welcome Pamela RIBOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOON!

Audience: [goes nuts]

[PAM walks out to the stage; OPRAH grips both her hands and shakes them excitedly. They sit.]

Oprah: So Pamela, in your essay you wrote that roller derby is the fastest growing women’s sport in the country, and you know, I like to find out these things at the same time as my audience, so: what is roller derby?

Pam: It’s a fast-paced game played on an oval track, where jammers try to skate past as many members of the opposing team as possible, without getting blocked, and earn points based on the number of girls they pass.

Oprah: And now, why is it called “roller” derby?

Pam: Oh — uh, because you play on roller skates.

Oprah: On WHAT? [mugs to AUDIENCE]

Pam: On roller skates, the four-wheeled ones like they used to have at roller rinks?

Oprah: And so you’re expected to play a sport while rolling around on WHEELS?

Pam: Sure; it just adds to the challenge, like playing ice hockey on blades.

Oprah: Never heard of it. So now, you write that your roller derby teammates got you through a difficult time in your life, and I’ve gotta say, there are some times in my life when I think I leaned more on Gayle than on Steadman!

Pam: [nervous laughter]

Oprah: So your book is really about girl power, right? GIRL POOOOOOOOOOOOWER!

Audience: WOOOOOOOOOOO!

Pam: Uh, sure, you definitely do see a lot of displays of raw power on the track, when you’re skating as hard as you can and one girl can just take you down.

Oprah: That doesn’t sound very ladylike.

Pam: [looks quizzical]

Oprah: [looks stern]

Pam: Ladylike, maybe not. But that’s how the game is played, and you could never respect another player if she went easy on you.

Oprah: If any girl tried to knock me down I would just have my good friend John Travolta buzz her house in his jet all day and night until she went insane from lack of sleep.

Pam: Derby might not be the sport for you, Oprah.

Oprah: MAY Q. HOLLAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!

Audience: WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Fin.

Like most normal people (right?), I continue to have school-themed anxiety dreams, well past my graduation. I never had the one where you show up naked, but I’ve certainly had the one where you have to write the final exam for a class you haven’t taken. Way more frequent for me, for whatever reason, is the one where it’s not even time for the exam yet when I belatedly realize I’ve been registered for a class that I mysteriously have not been attending. (The real irony that this should still be part of my dream life thirteen years after I was last enrolled in any kind of school is that, throughout my undergrad education, my dad was the university registrar, so that if that had somehow actually ever happened, he probably could have taken care of it for me.)

Lately, though, I’ve noticed a new kind of anxiety dream recurring. I’ll be going about the weird business of my dream, whatever it may be, when I realize it’s afternoon on a weekday and I forgot to go to work. The rest of the dream then turns into me trying to think up plausible reasons I can email to my actual, real-life boss and my actual, real-life reports for why I just straight-up blew off work that day. Last night, it was that my dream-husband, actual Larry David, had fallen out of bed and struck his head on the floor with sufficient force to break the skin of his poor old bald pate, so I had to take him to the hospital. What made that a pretty good excuse is that all of that had occurred in my dream, except the part where I took Larry to get his injury checked out by a medical professional. Even in my own dreams, I’m a crappy wife!

Anyway: if my subconscious is anxious about work (which is happening now) rather than school (which, as I mentioned, I haven’t attended since the Pleistocene Era), maybe this means I’m finally growing up? Don’t tell me if it’s not.