GRWM— We Love a List featuring Noah Sanders
Issue #6
GRWM (Get Ready With Me) is a (dare I say sexy!) segment where I'll be interviewing writers retro-style-- cute little questionnaires about what writers are wearing, listening to, snacking on, etc. We want to know what they're into and what gives them the ick. We want writing prompts based on their books. We want to know their favorite song, the worst writing advice they've ever received, and you better believe we want to know their brunch order.
It's time to stop asking writers the same boring questions and start getting REAL.
Noah Sanders is the creator/editor of the San Francisco-based reading series and arts journal, The Racket. His writing can be found in The Fabulist, The Bold Italic, Write or Die, SF Weekly, Eater and others.
We Love a List
What are 5 books that are in your tbr (to-be-read) pile?
Wandering Stars / Tommy Orange
Martyr! / Kaveh Akbar
All Friends Are Necessary / Tomas Moniz
A Visit From The Goon Squad / Jennifer Egan
There’s Always This Year / Hanif Abdurraqib
Top 3 fave restaurants in San Fran
Nopalito
Go for the tortilla chips enveloped in spicy red sauce, crema and cilantro, stay for literally anything else this kitchen puts on the table.
Nute’s
A sliver of a ramen restaurant at the end of Cortland in Bernal Heights. Cold beer, delicious karaage, tasty noodles and broth – couldn’t find a cozier spot.
Wesburger
I lived almost directly behind Wesburger in The Mission for half a decade. I can probably blame the majority of my 42-year old man-cholesterol issues on the number of smash burgers and beers I consumed during this time.
Email, text, or phone call?
Definitely text. I spent much of my formative years deeply invested in all the myriad shadows of AOL Chat. And the advent of text as a respectable means of conversating was like a ray of sunlight beaming down from the communication heavens. I will spend hours just sitting on my couch texting and texting and texting. It’s kind of a problem.
A book from high school that you loved
Cider House Rules / John Irving. I had to read a book and perform a ten-minute monologue as one of the characters from said book. I’ve always thought this is the best book Irving ever wrote (though The World According to Garp is a classic as well) and I will say, my performance as Homer Wells brought the 22 students of Mrs. Hastig’s Honor’s English class to tears.
A book from high school that you hated
I hated The Sound & The Fury so much when I read it senior year, but man, that’s just because my high school brain was too keyed in on keg parties under highway overpasses and what after dark swimming pool parking lots were the best makeout spots. Trying to focus enough to comprehend a book where a third of it is free-form, punctuation lacking, and stream-of-conscious? Not a chance.
One piece of writing from The Racket that knocked your socks off lately
We recently published a piece by a new writer – Micaela Burgess – called “Weightlifter.” In it, Burgess uses weightlifting as a means to explore her relationship with her family and the weight she’s carried in trying to hold them up and out of their pain. Lovely, sad piece of writing that just melted me right down into a gelatinous puddle.
3 pantry staples you can’t live without
Chili crisp
Chili crisp
Chili crisp
Also: tortilla chips.
Sometimes: chili crisp haphazardly dumped on a bowl of tortilla chips.
Fuck, Marry, Kill: Plot, Setting, Character
Marry: Character
Oh, gimme all the character. Let me hold the character in my loving arms and whisper that I will be with that character until my dying day. Let me celebrate buy the character gifts and cook them dinner and spend evenings on the sunlit deck with a bottle of wine and a face full of yearning.
Fuck: Plot
I’m going to get dragged into bed with a good plot and it’ll be fun until the writing doesn’t hold up and the characters don’t hold up and then I’m just going to slip out from under the sheets, quietly put my pants on and make a discreet exit.
Kill: Setting
This is hard for me. It is. I love a good setting. I love a world that pulses off the page. A place where I can imagine going and can’t wait to fall back into. But if we’re talking about sacrificing my character ride-or-die or my plot afternoon tumble, I need to drop the executioner’s act on setting. Don’t hold it against me.
Love!
🔥🔥🔥