Run, River (1963). Among the better debut novels I have read, and probably indebted to it are the slimmer, slicker ones: thinking Virgin Suicides or Less than Zero.

Look Homeward, Angel (1929). An unbelievably scathing family portrait to have come out of the south. Funny to feel scandalized by it at a distance of 100 years. Frequently just said 'wow' at the page, the prose. Interesting to consider as a forerunner of today's autofiction.

Pylon (1935). Faulkner’s first after prohibition, a return to New Orleans. Everybody's hammered, flying airplanes. Stuff of his youth, which you'd think would be backlooking or nostalgic, but he seemed very drunk writing this, struggling with it. Lesser work—maybe my favorite ending of his yet.

Read Denis Johnson’s second, Fiskadoro (1985). Left field of his first’s Arizona heroin and bank robbing, Key West after the bomb. A millenarian, cargo cult situation. Questing for relics: books and clarinets. Poetry in the breakdown of language. What happens when the world ends and you don’t die?

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