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| photo: Myles Pettengill | |
Henry Hoke is the author of the novel The Groundhog Forever (WTAW Press, April 27, 2021)--described as "a queer sequel to the movie Groundhog Day"--the story collection Genevieves and The Book of Endless Sleepovers. He co-created and directs the performance series Enter>text, a living literary journal. His memoir Sticker will be released in January 2022 by Bloomsbury's Object Lessons.
On your nightstand now:
Just Us by Claudia Rankine, I'm from Nowhere by Lindsay Lerman and the queer issue of McSweeney's, edited by Patrick Cottrell. All three are helping me process grief and rage.
Favorite book when you were a child:
The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster. Its gymnastic use of language is embedded in my DNA.
Your top five authors:
Jamaica Kincaid, Elena Ferrante, Sarah Manguso, Haruki Murakami, Tove Jansson. Each found me at a different point in my life, and saved it.
Book you've faked reading:
The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton. Bought it at the wrong time, when I didn't have the patience. Lied to my signif about having read it. Found the missing patience last year in early quarantine, had a really good time being immersed in Catton's gold rush New Zealand, then had to admit that I had lied before. Overall, a harrowing experience.
Book you're an evangelist for:
Stages by Rachel Kauder Nalebuff. This documentary assemblage of interviews with staff and residents at an end-of-life care home illuminates the often-invisible labor that surrounds dying in America, the immense devotion involved. An absolute must-read in this moment and every moment we've got coming.
Book you've bought for the cover:
The Musical Brain by César Aira. All New Directions covers are masterpiece magnets for my eyeballs. I never regret impulse-grabbing global lit in translation.
Book you hid from your parents:
Anything by Henry Hoke.
Book that changed your life:
Underneath New York by Harry Granick. It warped my sense of the place where I sat reading, and minutes after finishing, I wrote the first piece for The Book of Endless Sleepovers.
Favorite line from a book:
When they're getting in bed and Hobbes says to Calvin, "I think we dream so we don't have to be apart so long. If we're in each other's dreams, we can play together all night!" And Calvin says "Hey, yeah!" And they shake hands and Calvin says "Well, I'll see you in a few minutes, ol' buddy!" And Hobbes says, "I'll be there!"
Five books you'll never part with:
These five are never far from my writing desk, and are always in my hybrid heart when I get to work: Music for Chameleons by Truman Capote, 365 Days/365 Plays by Suzan-Lori Parks, Labyrinths by Jorge Luis Borges, The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton, Speedology: Speed on New York on Speed by Timothy "Speed" Levitch.
Book you most want to read again for the first time:
Honestly, I just want to buy and read Donna Tartt's The fuckin' Goldfinch every day like a kid jumping back on a rollercoaster.