A Common Pornography: A Memoir

it has vastly improved and become more accessible—no more 300-copy print runs! Bob Gaulke’s humorous book on teaching English in Japan, Embrace Your Insignificance, is released.

I meet a young man named Riley Michael Parker at Powell’s and give him some book recommendations. A couple of months later, he gives me a short manuscript that blindsides me. I quickly halt everything else to turn it into a chapbook (Our Beloved 26th) .

2009: Oakland writer and artist Chelsea Martin releases Everything Was Fine Until Whatever, our second paperback in a year. It becomes the fastest-selling paperback we’ve ever done.

To learn more about Kevin’s micropress, go to www.futuretensebooks.com.

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About the Author

Kevin Sampsell has been the publisher of Future Tense Books since 1990. His own books include the short story collections Beautiful Blemish and Creamy Bullets. In 2009, he edited the anthology Portland Noir. He works for Powell’s Books and lives in Portland, Oregon.

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Early Praise for A Common Pornography by Kevin Sampsell

“This is a heartbreaking and magnificent book. I love its mosaic structure—a portrait of a family and a young man created out of jewel-like fragments of memory. In its depiction of small-town American life—the ennui and despair and beauty—I am reminded of Denis Johnson’s Jesus’ Son. This is the kind of book where you want to thank the author for helping you feel less alone with being alive.”

—Jonathan Ames, author of Wake Up, Sir! and The Double Life Is Twice as Good

“For beauty, honesty, sheer weirdness, and a haunting evocation of place, Kevin Sampsell is my favorite Oregon writer. Ken Kesey, Chuck Palahniuk—make some room on the shelf.”

—Sean Wilsey, author of Oh the Glory of It All

“Embarrassing and honest, heartbreaking and hilarious. A Common Pornography is a great memoir from one of the Northwest’s best writers.”

—Willy Vlautin, author of Northline and The Motel Life

“Memory and truth are jagged things, and Kevin Sampsell’s memoir-in-vignettes expresses this forcefully. With grit and candor, he marches us through the heartbreak, horniness, and confusion of a West coast boy becoming a man.”

—Robin Romm, author of The Mercy Papers

“Kevin Sampsell’s stories are brief incantations, uppercuts to the gut, prose poems given over to the bloodiest realms of the self. It’s all here: the emotional squalor, the sweet bite of loneliness. Make no mistake: Sampsell can write like hell.”

—Steve Almond, author of Candyfreak and My Life in Heavy Metal

Also by Kevin Sampsell

Creamy Bullets

Beautiful Blemish

How to Lose Your Mind with the Lights On

The Insomniac Reader (editor)

Portland Noir (editor)

Copyright

This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

P.S.™ is a trademark of HarperCollins Publishers.

A COMMON PORNOGRAPHY. Copyright © 2010 by Kevin Sampsell. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.

EPub Edition © December 2009 ISBN: 978-0-06-196611-8

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About the Publisher

Australia

HarperCollins Publishers (Australia) Pty. Ltd.

25 Ryde Road (PO Box 321)

Pymble, NSW 2073, Australia

http://www.harpercollinsebooks.com.au