Reading: Adrian Tomine

In the two years I lived in D.C., I never went to Politics & Prose. It always seemed too far away, not sufficiently Metro-friendly. That's not to say that I never wanted to go. But near enough to me was Second Story Books and Atticus Books (owned by Gargoyle editor Richard Peabody). I think only one of those still survives today in a bricks-and-mortar form.

Luckily, I finally made it to Politics & Prose -- lured both by a sense of having been remiss and Adrian Tomine's coincidental appearance there. I felt unnaturally hip among the young 20-somethings that lined the reading space in folding chairs. Unnaturally hip because, you know, I wasn't. Comforting fact: there were several other Asians in the room. Discomforting fact: most were, sad to say, still more hip than I was.

Tomine began his slide show by addressing the whole "Asian-American" issue; that is, how he's been criticized for not writing (drawing?) the Asian-American experience. With any interview, he counted down the minutes until the topic was brought up. And while it's an annoying question -- and in certain ways unfair -- I still can't say that it's not valid. Asian-American artists shouldn't necessarily have to be cultural ambassadors, but then we run the risk of being represented by Arthur Golden.

The other hot topic: graphic novels... the new literature? The critical drumbeat of late has been that graphic novels can and should be accorded the same weight as "serious" literature. Certain graphic novels bear this out: Maus, Persepolis, Jimmy Corrigan: The Smartest Kid on the Earth. But it's still a young genre -- both in terms of how long it's been around, as well as its demographic.

That said, Shortcomings is nonetheless a great read. And if it doesn't conform to the expectations of "Asian-American" literature (read specifically: the immigrant narrative), all the better. If I had any drawing ability, would I be doing graphic novels? Possibly. But I'm content to leave that in the hands of Adrian Tomine.

Book: "Lost in the City" by Edward P. Jones

Edward P. Jones makes Washington, D.C. sound like an awfully violent city. And while the physical violence in his debut short story collection Lost in the City (Morrow, 1992) looms large -- the drug-related shooting in "His Mother's House, the petty crime of "Young Lions" -- the more understated moments of violence have the most resonance. The romantic yearning of the single mother in "An Orange Line Train to Ballston" explodes in a moment of almost unbearable harshness onto one of her children. It's a moment that feels so true and so compelling -- violence as an almost a natural consequence of passion.

Jones excels at creating a sense of place. He evokes the city and its peculiarities effortlessly, whether speculating the flashing lights in the Metro stations or recreating 'Cleopatra's Wig Shop' seemingly from memory. Certainly, he showcases a side of D.C. which most people would consider as strange waypoints on the Metro line. Equally at ease with Anacostia, Shaw and Northwest, Jones unveils these neighborhoods with intimate knowledge. And yet, as the characters traverse from one part of the city to the next, they reveal themselves as much as the city itself. In the title story, a young woman takes a cab ride, with each avenue and street bringing forth a new memory -- a mental journey moreso than a physical one. Indeed, each story is accompanied by a grainy black-and-white photograph that helps ground the reader in the place even more.

Most of these stories are told in the limited 3rd-person. One of the two stories in the first person, "The First Day," has become anthologized widely, for good reason. It seems like a small tale -- a girl's first day of school -- but Jones adds layers (illiteracy, aspirations, wounded pride) onto the story, until the cumulative emotional effect packs a wallop. The other first-person narration, "The Store," takes a long view; whereas most of the stories here take place within the length of a day or less, "The Store" follows a young man's affiliation with a story, first as an employee, then as a nominative manager.

Jones would later win the Pulitzer Prize for his novel, The Known World, but Lost in the City takes the political center of the free world -- just a few square miles, really -- and opens up its soul, street by street.

Reading: Chip Kidd

Valentine's Day.

Is there anything more romantic than going to see a potential new boyfriend? Yes, I suppose, if said boyfriend lives up to your expectations. Chip Kidd (about whom I've rhapsodized in a previous post) visited the Library in support of his new novel, The Learners. But the audience -- young, hip -- most likely know Kidd for his comic and graphic design work. Give the man his due.

Kidd didn't give a traditional reading; instead, he opted for a PowerPoint presentation: humorous, erudite, and filled with both his successes and failures. So while displaying some of his upcoming book covers (Oliver Sacks, Augusten Buroughs), he also ran through slides of jacket designs that didn't make the cut (Fangland, early attempts at Cormac McCarthy's The Road). The latter was accompanied by a wicked Binky Urban impersonation, which only made me want to be her client even more. Not because she's a powerhouse. Because she also represents Kidd himself.

When Kidd reached to "reading" part of the presentation, his grand, theatrical style carried over: he didn't just read dialogue, he embodied the characters, especially the Norma Desmond-like Himillsy Dodd. And while this wasn't as enthralling as his impersonation of, say, Peter Lorre singing "Sugar Walls," Helen Hayes singing "Nasty," or a newborn hamster performing Hamlet, I can imagine him concocting these characters by becoming them first, testing out their voices outloud, and transcribing what comes out of his mouth.

I admit: I was feeling giddy throughout, grinning maniacally, staring at his shoes (brown, with an slash of orange on the side) and admiring his sartorial sense (vintage tweed, shirt collar hanging outside the lapels). He has much more upper-body bulk than I imagined -- his Marion Ettlinger portrait in Author Photo shows a much more trim Kidd (he laughed obligingly when I called it his "beefcake photo"; he compared himself to Stanley Kowalski). Whatever the case, he mentioned how his glasses were custom-made in London, reflecting his love of Bauhaus, and if that wasn't enough to get me swooning, I'm probably dead inside.

Not to mention Kidd is the first author I've met who signs the page edges.

Reading: Manil Suri

Matthew was particularly excited about seeing Manil Suri in person. After all, his picture, a yellowing rectangle snipped from a Texas newspaper, was magnetized to our refrigerator for years, until we finally invested in stainless steel. And there's no doubt, Suri is a striking man: thin with prominent features, salt and pepper hair, a mathematician's exacting eyes, thick lips that make you think bad thoughts when you look at them.

He read from his new novel, The Age of Shiva, the second part of a trilogy (although he preferred to call it a "tryptich," after one audience member asked why the characters from his first novel, The Death of Vishnu, weren't reprised). The audience was sparse, with a few South Asian faces sprinkled in. He seemed composed throughout, with a stately bearing, and his voice maintained a steady tone. He didn't demand attention -- he wasn't showy whatsoever -- but you could imagine him as more of a slow seducer, someone who works his way into your subconscious until you're madly in love.

Okay, maybe I'm projecting now.

Still, he had a mischievious sense of humor and promised a free DVD of an audience member who asked a "secret question." It reminded me of the old Groucho Marx TV show, You Bet Your Life, and when I asked about balancing a mathematical life and a writing life, a duck dropped from the ceiling. It was an easy question to guess, really. This makes two giveaways that I've won at Free Library readings. Time to play the lottery? Perhaps.

In the end, I got to take my picture with him, as is my custom, and he signed his photograph in my book of Marion Ettlinger portraits. I put my arm around him and could feel all the layers of air in the space between his clothes. He's a slender one, that Manil, but when you make contact, you know you want to hold on.