The Conical Glass: Writers, but no drinks

Sunday, June 15, 2008

Writers, but no drinks

It has been a long time since I last wrote, but one of the advantages of having a small readership is that I am frequently able to get together with a good percentage of my readers when I go on vacation. It was great to see Jeff, Janet, Andy, and of course my parents. (I'm assuming the kIDs are too young to read blogs, and probably wouldn't be interested in mine unless I started writing about trains or merry-go-rounds.)

Gradually getting back into the San Francisco swing o'things, last night I went to Writers With Drinks at the Make-Out Room. WWD is a monthly event that brings together half a dozen writers to read from their work. I had never been before, but one of my clients, Naomi Hirahara, was scheduled to read. She lives in the L.A. area and I'd never met her before, even though we've worked together for a few years now.

Joe declined to come along, and I was worried about having to hang out in a bar by myself. As it turned out, I needn't have worried; I got there just as the event was starting, and the place was packed. Despite the "With Drinks" moniker, there's no way I could have gotten within a foot of the bar. (Too bad, since Pimm's Cup was on the specials board... I wonder if Forbidden Island will be bringing the cocktail back as a summer special this year?) The first two writers were Lisa Myers, a very funny and sexually frank comedian, and Gina de Vries, a contributor to Tough Girls 2: Down And Dirty Dyke Erotica. I'm not sure if Gina's piece was autobiographical, but it certainly sounded like it was. She was an excellent reader, really conveying the emotions of her first-person narrator. Following them was the big attraction, Armistead Maupin, a local legend and the author of the Tales of the City series. Maupin read a chapter from his new book wherein his main characters, a gay couple who sound not dissimilar to Maupin and his own partner, had a threesome with a strapping black hairdresser. Since Maupin is a huge, huge deal in San Francisco, I suspect his presence was responsible for at least a portion of the big crowd.

At this point, we were halfway in and I was a little worried because everything we'd heard so far had been extremely X-rated, and I wondered how Naomi, who writes an acclaimed mystery series about an elderly Japanese-American man who survived the bombing of Hiroshima, would fit in with this crowd. A good portion of the audience seemed to have been able to shove its way over to the bar and were hooting at the references to -- OK, this is a PG-rated blog, I'll just say sexual things. After Maupin, there was a 10-minute break and I was finally able to find Naomi and say hello. She was there with her husband and Cara Black, a local mystery author who must be the unofficial welcome wagon for every crime writer who comes to town, since she always seems to be able to make time to meet them, host them, or ferry them around SF. No wonder I run into Cara so frequently; I'm sure the out-of-towners greatly appreciate her hospitality. Naomi said she would be reading from her contribution to the Los Angeles Noir anthology, which would presumably be a bit spicier than her usual fare.

Naomi followed a poet, about which the less said, the better -- even the dude in a beret sitting by the stage didn't seem into it, and you'd think that would be right in his wheelhouse -- and read an excerpt from her story, "Number 19." It was a story of obsession, but with no explicit sex. Still, the audience was quiet while she was reading, and appreciative at the end. The final reader was Sheerly Avni, who delighted the crowd with a mini-memoir about her life as a Duran Duran fan, from her obsession with the band in junior high to her attempt to meet them backstage after a recent gig in L.A.

There's definitely something to be said about the power of a good story read aloud -- you kind of lose track of time and get wrapped up in the words, and while anyone can listen to an audio book in the car or on their MP3 player, sharing a story with an audience is a rare pleasure; the sound of over 100 people hooting with laughter over a funny incident in Maupin's tale, or clapping in appreciation when Avni namechecked Duran Duran heartthrobs John Taylor and Simon LeBon, pulls you in even further. Even if the bar remains out of reach, I'd like to check out this very San Francisco experience again.

posted by 125records @ 1:24 PM

2 Comments:

At 1:59 PM, 2fs said…

Thanks for the mention - but I happen to know you're lying, trying to play up that "San Francisco Values" thing, and in fact most of the writers' readings knowingly described the tribulations of having to replace the pistons on one's John Deere tractor, the virtues of wheat, ten different things you can do with weathered barn wood, and the complications of applying ointment to a bleeding cow's udder. Okay, that last one's a bit risque, I'll admit.

Plus, you were in West Rabbit Falls, Nebraska - not San Francisco. (Had you gone to the Senior Citizens' Ladies Auxiliary Sodality meeting in neighboring Forkpat, Nebraska, however, some of those elderly women's autobiographical erotica would have made your teeth curl.)
At 3:02 PM, yellojkt said…

I saw Maupin at the Miami Book Fair about fifteen years ago. He was doing a joint reading with Tama Jamowitz. The fans of each writer had no idea who the other author was.