Another detour from my summer of African literature.

I stan for Miranda July and according to Feminist Texican, If you like Aimee Bender then you may like Miranda July.  Banking on the converse also being true, I requested Bender’s Willful Creatures from the library.   A collection of 15 stories in 3 parts, Willful Creatures is a perfect mix of reflections on life and humor.  When I first started the collection, I wasn’t getting it, the first story, “Death Watch” was too weird for me.  By the third story, “Off”, I was a fan.  My favorites in the collection:

Off
An awkwardly arrogant woman attends a party.  She has one goal for the night: to kiss 3 men (one with blond hair, one with red hair, and one with black hair).  The shenanigans that occur in her pursuit are hilarious and pitiful.

The Meeting starts:

The woman he met. He met a woman. This woman was the woman he met. She was not the woman he expected to meet or planned to meet or had carved into his head in full dress with a particular nose and eyes and lips and a very particular brain.

*sigh*  When we meet someone who is unlike the image of our perfect partner and we decide to give it a try, are we settling or being more open?  “The Meeting” is not ambivalent in its response but I’m not convinced by the answer it leans towards.

Motherfucker
This is the story of a man who literally fucks mother.  Yeah, sounds crass I know but I loved how this story developed. He travels by train from the Midwest to Los Angeles, meeting women along the way.  When he lands in L.A., he meets a mother who is also a well-known actress.  She is so good at her profession, she sometimes doesn’t know when to not act.  And this is where the magic happens, he gets her to open up in a way that has nothing to do with sex.  I absolutely loved this story!

You can read excerpts here and you can purchase Willful Creatures at
Barnes & Noble
Powell’s
IndieBound
Amazon