(le) poisson rouge
158 Bleecker St.
Friday, March 8, $12-$15, 7:30
www.lepoissonrouge.com
www.indigestmag.com
“The sign in the Sweet Apple kitchen declared it a nut-free zone, and every September somebody, almost always a dad, cracked the usual stupid joke,” begins “The Climber Room,” the first of thirteen stories in Sam Lipsyte’s new collection, The Fun Parts (FSG, March 5, 2013, $24). “The gag, Laura, the school director, told Tovah, would either mock the school’s concern for potentially lethal legumes or else suggest that despite the sign’s assurance, not everyone at Sweet Apple could boast of sanity.” Indeed, throughout his career, native New Yorker Lipsyte has featured many characters whose sanity could be debated, in such seriocomic books as The Subject Steve, The Ask, and Home Land. Lipsyte, who teaches creative writing at Columbia, once appeared in an infomercial for an exercise machine, is the son of sportswriter and young adult novelist Robert Lipsyte, and was the screaming frontman for the punk band Dungbeetle, takes a razor-sharp, cynical, and very funny knife to the foibles of modern-day America in his always entertaining writing. The bounds of sanity will be tested at (le) poisson rouge on March 8 at the official launch of The Fun Parts, which should consist of many fun parts itself as Lipsyte is joined by former New York Press columnist Mike Doughty, leader of the 1990s band Soul Coughing and author of the rock-and-roll memoir The Book of Drugs. Doughty will perform a live set, then sit down for a conversation with Lipsyte moderated by humorist Dave Hill, author of Tasteful Nudes . . . and Other Misguided Attempts at Personal Growth and Validation. Clearly, when you put these three men together, just about anything can happen, and probably will.