Skye Papers is an imaginative, episodic group portrait of a transatlantic art scene spearheaded by people of color-and of the fraught, dystopian reality of increasing state surveillance. In fluid and unrelenting prose, Jamika Ajalon's debut novel explores youth, poetry, and what it means to come terms with queerness. They live a glorious, subterranean existence in 1990s London: making multimedia art, throwing drug-fueled parties, and eking out a living by busking in Tube stations, until their existence is jeopardized by the rise of CCTV and policing. The three recognize each other as kindred spirits-Black, punk, whimsical, revolutionary-and fall in together, leading Skye on an unlikely adventure across the Atlantic. Twentysomething and restless, Skye flits between cities and stagnant relationships until she meets Scottie, a disarming and disheveled British traveler, and Pieces, an enigmatic artist living in New York. SKYE PAPERS by Jamika Ajalon A portrait of young Black artists in the 1990s London underground, whose existence is threatened by the rise of state surveillance. She turns an investigative eye to the genre that’s nurtured her entire career-memoir-and considers the extent to which art preys on life. But in the process of excavating and documenting these lives, Michelle Tea also reveals herself in unexpected and heartbreaking ways.ĭelivered with her signature honesty and dark humor, Tea blurs the line between telling other people’s stories and her own. Rife with never-ending fights and failures, theirs are the stories we too often try to forget. The razor-sharp but damaged Valerie Solanas, a doomed lesbian biker gang, recovering alcoholics, and teenagers barely surviving at an ice creamery: these are some of the larger-than-life,yet all-too-human figures, populating America’s fringes. Winner of the PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay Her particular genius makes the hardest truths and sorrows an irresistible joy to read.”- Melissa Febos, author of Abandon Me Michelle Tea is riotously, wickedly funny, with an uncommon knack for naming the more hideous and complex parts of being human. In 2003, Michelle founded RADAR Productions, a literary non-profit that oversees queer-centric projects.ĪGAINST MEMOIR BY MICHELLE TEA “I gobbled up these essays. She is the creator of the Sister Spit all-girl open mic and 1997-1999 national tour.
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In addition to being the fabulous curator of AMETHYST EDITIONS, Michelle Tea is the author of numerous books, including Rent Girl, Valencia, and How to Grow Up. But as she tries to make queer love and art without succumbing to self-destructive vice, the boundaries between storytelling and everyday living begin to blur, and Michelle wonders how much she'll have to compromise her artistic process if she's going to properly ride out doomsday. While living in an abandoned bookstore, dating Matt Dillon, and keeping an eye on the encroaching apocalypse, Michelle begins a new novel, a sprawling and meta-textual exploration to complement her promises of maturity and responsibility.
But soon it's officially announced that the world will end in one year, and life in the sprawling metropolis becomes increasingly weird.
It's 1999-and Michelle's world is ending.ĭesperate to quell her addiction to drugs, disastrous romance, and nineties San Francisco, Michelle heads south for LA. BLACK WAVE by Michelle Tea "An apocalyptic fantasia." -New York Times