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Fast Machine
Elizabeth Ellen







Release Date: February 14, 2012
ISBN 978-0-9749541-7-7
$11.95 US / 4-1/4" x 7" / 380 pages

 

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Dan Wickett once described a Mary Miller story as "a slightly less gritty Elizabeth Ellen story." We're not sure what that means, but it sounds kind of cool. We like the word gritty. And we're obviously huge fans of Mary Miller and her stories. And grit. The stories in Fast Machine come in three sizes: flash, regular, and too-long-for-journal-publication. Some were previously published. Some are brand-spanking new. One is called "Period Sex," for Barry Graham/Kendra Grant Malone. There are slightly more than four hundred pages. There are no acknowledgements (i.e. no three-page thank you to everyone she met at every writers' colony). Zero epigraphs. There are repeated themes: driving, smoking, teenagers, drinking, escape, the Midwest, masturbation, self-loathing and blood. We hope some of you will like it. It's okay to hate it though, too. 

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Fast Machine’s excellence is a sure thing. Ellen’s writing is amazing. I am a closet fan of everything she writes from essays to poetry to short fiction and it will be nice to have some of her writing, old and new, collected in one book. The best thing about Ellen’s writing is that it has big brass balls. There is seemingly nothing she won’t write about but more than the fearlessness is how Ellen writes about anything. She is willing to go there over and over and over but she does so really, really well. If you’re not familiar with Ellen’s work, start with “The Last American Woman,” and “bulldyke” and “What Was Meant.” You’ll see what I mean.
– Roxane Gay (The Rumpus, "Resolved, A Year of Great(er) Expectations")




A Brief Bio by Elizabeth Ellen from colin quinn quit twitter prod. on Vimeo.