Benjamin Roesch

Author: Benjamin

  • Post #92: This Will Only Hurt a Lot

    I got a very polite rejection yesterday from The Florida Review. They apologized for the delay in responding, contextualized the long wait around some editorial and personal changes, yadda yadda yadda, told me they’d found my story “Unsayable Things” engaging, but that it didn’t meet their editorial needs at this…

  • Post #91: One Man Book Club (Pride and Prejudice), Concluded

    Sincere apologies for taking so long to conclude this inaugural edition of One Man Book Club, Pride and Prejudice. If you’ve been waiting and grown tired of waiting, blame me, not my intern Zane Kai. Zane has been all over me like bubbles on beer to talk about the last…

  • Post #90: Control

    I can’t deny I’ve thought about that moment many times. December 8th, 1980. John Lennon had just come back from the recording studio, had just emerged from his limo and was walking through the arched doorway of the Dakota building, an arm full of cassettes, when Mark David Chapman emerged…

  • Post #89: AWP, by the Numbers

    Two weekends ago I ventured to Boston for the AWP (Association of Writers and Writing Programs) Conference. I’ve decided to break my experience down for you by the numbers. Number of times my wife told me I’d regret not going to AWP before I finally decided to miss work even…

  • Post #88: The Next Big Thing

    The Next Big Thing is a self-interview project where writers with projects in the works or books coming out answer ten questions about what they’re working on, then tag other writers. I’m thrilled to be participating. Many hugs and hurrahs to my dear friend, and fellow Bread Loaf alum, Kara…

  • Post #87: You See!

    So, you know how last entry I was talking about that new magazine Kindling Quarterly and about perceptions of men and fatherhood and how they’re represented and perpetuated in the culture and how it all kind of pisses me off? This morning, I took my kids to the dentist. We…

  • Post #86: Kindling Quarterly

    As a father of two young boys (4 1/2 year old Felix and 2 1/2 year old Leo) I pay a lot more attention than I used to to how fathers are portrayed in our culture. And, for the most part, at least from where I’m sitting, the portrayals suck…

  • Post #85: One Man Book Club, Continued

    My intern, Zane Kai, has been anxious to talk to me some more about Pride and Prejudice, which, as you know, I’m reading as an endeavor I’m describing as a One Man Book Club. In case you’ve forgotten, I’m reading P&P because it just celebrated the 200th anniversary of its…

  • Post #84: Sorry Stand-Ins

    Dear Charles, I don’t know about you, but I haven’t been writing much. And when I have, it’s been in marked avoidance of my novel, Returning, which winks at me from its home on my hard drive like a growing tumor. Though I write a good deal of short fiction,…

  • Post #83: Kat Edmonson, a worthy infatuation

    I’ve been infatuated the past months with Kat Edmonson and her scrumptious (Yeah, I said scrumptious. Screw you. Listen to it. That’s the right adjective) new album “Way Down Low.” It’s been one of those great can’t-stop-listening to it experiences that comes along a few times a year, when you…