Ohio’s Dan Chaon hits the road to Starz

Nice news from Ohio for once! Ohio adoptee  memorist and author  (and one of the best writers’ in the country today) Dan Chaon has a new gig. Dan  sent  a note  via FB and Twitter on Thursday that he’ll be working on a new  dramatic project for Starz titled Most Wanted.  The production team includes writer Chris Collins, co-producer of  Sons of Anarchy  and director Ken Fink (CSI, Oz, Homicide. Dan will serve as co-executive producer of the new series.. The show takes place in the in the Plains States in the 1970s and traces the career of fictional  prolific bank robber Nate Daniels “as he finds himself on a collision course with his family and crew as he becomes one of the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted.” My kinda show! I’ve written about Dan here, here, and here.   Dan lives in Cleveland and teaches at my old hangout, Oberlin College where he’s the Pauline M. Delaney Professor of Creative Writing and Literature   Twitter fried my account and I was forced to start a new one.  Besides tweeting The Daily Bastardette I tweet  (and retweet) about adoption issues, civil rights, freedom of the press,  the corporate state,  Depeche Mode, literature and books, plus some Continue Reading →

Dan Chaon Nominated on Goodreads

Speaking of books…. Dan Chaon, Ohio’s unofficial adoptee laureate just keeps racking up the honors, His newest collection of short stores Stay Awake: Stories, has been nominated for the 2012 Goodreads Choce Awards. in  the Horror division.  I haven’t read the book yet,but it’s described as “set in post-recession America, where dreamers, losers and troubled souls feel like ghosts in their own lives.” You don’t have to write “horror” to write horror! I’ve written about Dan before here,. here,  and .here. His 2001 collection of short stories, Among the Missing described as “a gripping account of colliding fates, the shifty nature of identity in today’s wired world and the limits of family” was a National Book Award finalist. It was also named one of the year’s best books by the American Library Association, Chicago Tribune, Boston Globe, and Entertainment Weekly and made the New York Times Notable Book List.  His first novel, You Remind Me of Me (2004), , is an adoption-related (and so much more) examination of identity, fate, and circumstance. It was named one of the best books of the year by The Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, and San Francisco Chronicle. A reviewer for the Los Angeles Times Continue Reading →

Alliance for the Study of Adoption and Culture Conference 2012: Call for Papers

The Alliance for the Study of Adoption and Culture announces: The 4th International Conference on Adoption and Culture Mapping Adoption: Histories, Geographies, Literatures, Politics March 22 – 25, 2012 The Claremont Colleges, Claremont, California Call for Proposal sFor our 2012 conference, we are expanding our concerns to include not only adoption in its many historical and cultural variations but also parallel institutions such as foster care, orphanages, and technologically-assisted reproduction, as well as various forms of forced relinquishment or family separation. We seek proposals that explore the cultural meanings and/or political locations of any of these practices, and we encourage analyses of relationships among them. We will include academic work from a wide range of scholarly disciplines and areas—literature, film and popular culture and performance studies, cultural studies, history, philosophy, sociology, anthropology, political science, law, women’s and gender studies, etc.—as well as artistic presentations of film, creative writing, graphic art, music, or productions in other media. We also encourage interdisciplinary panels, presentations, and productions.Proposals may address adoption or related practices or their representation in any way, but we especially encourage work addressing race, class, gender, nationality, and/or sexuality and sexual orientation, and/or investigations of topics such as state and institutional Continue Reading →

Congratulations Dan Chaon: Ohio’s Adoptee Laureate Racks Up Another Award!

Congratulations to Dan Chaon! Ohio’s unofficial adoptee laureate is the recipient of the 2010 Ohio State Library’s Ohioana Award in fiction for Await Your Reply: A Novel. Last year the book was named to Publisher’s Weekly Top 10 Best Books of 2009. In March, the American Library Association’s Reference and User Services Association cited it on its “best” list along with work by Margaret Atwood and Toni Morrison. Dan’s 2001 collection of short stories, Among the Missing described as “a gripping account of colliding fates, the shifty nature of identity in today’s wired world and the limits of family” was a National Book Award finalist. It was also named one of the year’s best books by the American Library Association, Chicago Tribune, Boston Globe, and Entertainment Weekly and made the New York Times Notable Book List. You Remind Me of Me (2004), Dan’s first novel, is an adoption-related (and so much more) examination of identity, fate, and circumstance. It was named one of the best books of the year by The Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, and San Francisco Chronicle. Dan, was born, adopted and reared in Sidney, Nebraska and lives in Cleveland Heights Ohio, He is the Pauline M. Delaney Continue Reading →

CONGRATULATIONS DAN CHAON!

Cleveland adoptee Dan Chaon’s latest book, Await Your Reply. “a novel of shifting identity” has been named to Publisher’s Weekly Top 10 Best Books of 2009: Await Your ReplyDan Chaon (Ballantine) Chaon was a National Book Award finalist for Among the Missing, and this gripping account of colliding fates, the shifty nature of identity in today’s wired world and the limits of family is easily as good, if not better. It’s a literary page-turner, a cunningly plotted and utterly unputdownable novel. We’ve never had the pleasure of meeting Dan, though we’ve exchanged a small handful of emails over the last 15 years. He supports fully our rights. Dan’s book, (adoptee fav) You Remind Me of Me, was named one of the best books of the year, by the Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, San Francisco Chronicle, Christian Science Monitor and Entertainment Weekly . He was the the recipient of the 2006 Academy Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Here’s three inverviews with Dan: Poets and Writers, July 19, 2004 Hot Metal Bridge, Spring 2009 Bookslut, October 2009 Support our writers!