What's Neat on the Net

Cool things on the internet:

1. The entire Harvard Classics series online. We had two bookshelves devoted to this series in our home when I was growing up. It went with the oldest sister when she got married. Now all of us can have it, without dedicating the physical space (sort of want to say to my older sister, nyah nyah na nyah nyah....)

2. Cornell University's natural sound archive--largest in the world--online. Listen to loons, wolves, rain forest ambient sound, almost any natural sound you can think of.

3. My good friend Tracy Slater recently got a book deal with Putnam for her memoir about life as an American woman married to a Japanese man, going through infertility treatments in Japan, along with all the other adjustment one has to make to live abroad. She blogs about it at The Good Shufu.

4. A great interview with poet Sarah J. Sloat, poet and expat in Germany, about chapbooks and homesickness, at Laura Madeline Wiseman's blog. I'm a big fan of Sloat's poetry, and of chapbooks, and a fellow sufferer of homesickness, so if you've an interest in any of those topics, be sure to check out the interview.

5. And from Mental Floss, a list of 17 vowel-free words (or should we say vowel-less?--I once witnessed a debate over the use of childless vs. childfree and now always think of the options and their implications) you can use in boardgames such as Scrabble and Words With Friends. Thanks to my sister Janee for alerting me to this useful list.

6. An interview with poet Eric Pankey at the Milkweed Editions blog, about his new book Trace. At the bottom of the interview is a link where you can read quite a selection of poems from the new book, out from Milkweed Editions this year. From the interviews: "I see poems as speculative spaces and, in such a place, I find myself free to be full of questions, full of doubt."

The Rain in Her Purse

A while ago, I saw on someone's blogroll (I don't recall whose) a blog entitled The Rain in My Purse. I was intrigued; I clicked; I've been following the blog of Sarah J. Sloat intermittently ever since. Her short posts are quirky and inventive and startling.

I haven't checked in recently, but did yesterday to find that Sarah J. Sloat has a new chapbook coming out from Hyacinth Girl Press, entitled Homebodies. I am ordering one as soon as I get word from the publishers about how to handle overseas postage, since it isn't clear from the website, even though Sloat herself lives overseas.

She also has an earlier chapbook out from Dancing Girl Press, called Excuse Me While I Wring This Long Swim Out of My Hair. This publisher doesn't ship internationally, so my copy is sitting at a relatives' house waiting for me to fetch it or for them to send it.

If you are interested in seeing some of Sloat's work, check out these links:

"Training" at Linebreak
two poems at Literary Bohemian
"Our Lady of Busted Cutlery" at Umbrella
"Glass Stairwells" and more (scroll down) at qarrtsiluni