Project Bookshelf: Brendon Blair

Reading and I have a complicated situationship that takes place somewhere between “stray cat in my complex” to “car I can’t shovel out of the snow so I sit inside it and beg for cleansing warmth.” “Browsing books we wouldn’t buy” while browsing Walmart as a child, and “finding books for free in bins and estate sales” as an adult. I think many of us tend to flip through anything for a low price, and I hunger for those easy-priced words.

If there’s one gift I love receiving from the world, it is knowledge. In my collection, you’ll find a ton of somewhat-ominous-to-read books ranging from Work in the 21st Century, an Introduction to Industrial and Organizational Psychology to a wider collection of College Writers’ publications. You know about those creative writing/english literature textbooks? Well, it turns out they have tons of short stories. Hundreds of them. This is what I’ve found to be the best way to collect short stories, more so than printing them out and binding them together (this takes up a crazy amount of space). No, I cannot always recommend it. Maybe.

I am glad to share the wider phenomenon of keeping my books stored just wherever they can fit as I collect. I will one day have that wooden bookshelf, but I have a nice little caddy that keeps many of my current reads. You can probably tell that I’ve often reread anything that comes my way, and unfortunately, I’m missing my beloved Warriors series from when I was a little boy.

If you want some serious recommendations, I can’t point you anywhere else but the library. My favorite place! My local library keeps stocks of monthly magazines as well– what a way to keep in touch with what is going on outside my little life. I can’t get enough of seeing what kinds of recipes (this is a godsend for the functions) or styles are considered popular, and I am always on the hunt to see what’s trendy so I can gossip or find a dupe. Book clubs, new additions, and staring at cookbooks in a library aisle, pretending I will remember each recipe are all part of my day-to-day life now.

If you’re as obsessed with finding new material as I am, I can’t recommend Bitter Medicine by Mia Tsai enough for a warm, immersive magic fantasy. Cookbooks such as Cook This Book: Techniques That Teach and Recipes To Repeat by Molly Baz, or The Everlasting Meal Cookbook: Leftovers A-Z by Tamar Adler. Red Doc> by Anne Carson for sure. Anything by Octavia Butler gets me excited, and I’ve been crazy about wanting to collect electrifying graphic novels such as The Adventure Zone series by Clint, Justin, Griffin, and Travis Mcelroy. Quite honestly, I wish more story-styled podcasts would get turned into books to devour. Maybe then I will learn another absorption method of sweet, sweet knowledge and fun.

Brendon Blair is an Appalachia-borne writer born and bred on trailer living and warm Mexican cuisine. Having a dual major in Psychology and English from the University of Tennessee Knoxville, Brendon enjoys intertwining the experiences of queer and fostered people in poetry and prose. They also hold an administrative assistantship at the Office of Science and Technology Information in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. When not writing or working, Brendon enjoys playing strategy games, and dreams of owning a cat to call Eggs Benedict.