Remembering My Sister Irma

Irma taught me how to do the Twist in the kitchen of our house on Satsop Street in Shelton.

She used to sunbathe on the roof of that house with Annemarie by climbing out their bedroom window.

Irma once tried to force me to eat artichokes when I was a child but finally relented.

I believe she was the first person I ever played tennis with, at Kneeland Park in Shelton (though it could have been Annemarie).

When I was in grade school, she tried to tame my hair with Dippity-do.

I also remember her teasing her hair and waxing her upper lip.

In 1967, Irma played “Little Bit o’ Soul” by the Music Explosion over and over on her portable stereo. 

She bought me my first fish sandwich at the A&W on Mountain View—it was a revelation!

She was the only person I ever knew who owned a sunlamp—so she could work on her tan during  Washington winters when we were growing up.

Irma drove me and my brother Harold all the way to Seattle to see our first concert—The Monkees—though she did not attend.

She introduced me to the pleasures of tomato, onion, and black pepper on an open-faced sandwich. 

And she was the one who got me hooked on tacos—though it was bound to happen anyway.

Irma also loved German deli meats, cheeses, hard rolls, and above all pickles.

She drank Coca-Cola in the morning.

She once put a nail in a glass of Coke and left it overnight because someone told her Coke would dissolve the nail. It did not.

Irma seemed to walk as fast as most people run.

She continued to call me Freddy, my childhood nickname, long after I switched to Al (short for Alfred). I kind of liked it, though. It reminded me of who I was.

“Genuinely pleasing”

“This bird’s eye view of a life makes for a genuinely pleasing reading experience.” 

—Kirkus Reviews

Me and Not Me is a mix of memories and imaginings that chronicle the experiences—real and not real—of a novelist, friend, lover, husband, traveler, fool, and masked conjurer called Al.

Through stories, anecdotes, observations, fantasies, dreams, poems, and other thoughts, the narrator creates an intimate picture of life beyond the merely factual.

Join Al, Annie, and a diverse cast of characters as their lives intertwine in scenarios that reveal more than what happened … or didn’t actually.

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Tight, Simple, and Elegant Prose

In Combustible, we get to enjoy everything there is to love about Al Riske’s work. Tight, simple and elegant prose that cuts to the heart of the story (and its deeper essence). Friendships stretched and tested with the development of a new dynamic. Lives on the brink of transformation. Real people trying to make sense of their lives.

Pages that fly before you.

An ending you never could expect.

I loved this book.

— Greg Bardsley, author of Cash Out

Coming of age ...

"Combustible is a wonderful story ... The author did a great job of bringing each character to life ... I recommend this book to anyone who is looking for a light read with a satisfying plot and interesting characters." 

— Kristi Elizabeth, San Francisco Book Review

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Imagery

Barefoot girl in a backless dress

Streetlights on wet pavement

The shadow of a small plane flickers

across the contours of the grassy shoreline

Long-haired boys and short-haired girls

A blue Adirondack chair by itself on the lawn

Wind-blown palms  through mosquito netting

Red flowers on a black background

The smell of chlorine and Coppertone

A big-breasted blonde in a black bikini

Passenger jet streaking over black hills in a twilight sky

A white blouse with black buttons

Red sweater in a black-and-white world

Eyelashes wasted on a boy

Cliche curtains ruffled by a lacy breeze

Three in One

This three-in-one volume, now available on Amazon, contains the following novels by yours truly:

Sabrina's Window 
On a chilly morning in Taos, New Mexico, a 17-year-old paperboy breaks the window of a 31-year-old hair stylist — an accident that marks the beginning of an instant, inexplicable bond between them. In the course of one high-desert summer, Joshua and Sabrina share confidences, intercede in each other’s love lives, go on a date that scandalizes the town, and confront questions of fidelity, desire, and the nature of love. 

The Possibility of Snow 
This story traces a once promising friendship between college roommates in New England. Steve is eccentric, slightly paranoid, and too perceptive for his own good. He knows the difference between what people say and what they do. Neil is reflective, sincere, and not as together as he seems. There’s not much he’s sure of anymore. They know each other very well and understand each other not at all. 

Then We’d Be Happy 
In this Silicon Valley tale, lower middle-class friends try to fashion futures out of whatever opportunities they can find. Opportunities to make money. Opportunities to be together. Opportunities that fall apart. Opportunities that must be put back together, no matter what.

Dylan at Work

More Blood, More Tracks is a revelation.

The limited edition boxed set invites us to  follow the evolution of a masterpiece — Blood on the Tracks — from the first tracks Dylan recorded with just his guitar and harmonica in New York to those he laid down with a rollicking band in Minneapolis three months later.

The six discs in this remarkable collection include, in chronological order, all 87 takes that have survived (82 from New York and five from Minneapolis).

Along the way we get to witness the many ways in which Dylan experimented with the pacing and phrasing of each song — the results often brilliant but in different ways.

The New York sessions ended in what everyone thought was a finished album — indeed copies were circulated to reviewers — but Dylan was having second thoughts. Rightly so, as it turned out. The five tracks from Minneapolis, essentially recorded live in the studio at the end of 1974, boost the energy level of the whole enterprise.

Without them, Blood on the Tracks would still be a great album, but not the masterpiece it became. 

The delay also gave Dylan time to further refine his lyrics. Consider, for example, "If You See Her, Say Hello."

In New York, he sings: "I knew it had to be that way. It was written in the cards. But the bitter taste still lingers on. It all came down so hard."

On the final version, he sings: "Whatever makes her happy, I won't stand in the way, though the bitter taste still lingers on from the night I tried to make her stay."

Much better, right?

Rave on, James Frey

I was hoping that Katerina would mark a return to form for James Frey, whose books had, in my estimation, gone steadily downhill since A Million Little Pieces. I started reading and I thought it was, wasn't, was, wasn't, was.

As I turned the pages, the narrator's bad-boy bravado quickly wore thin. Likewise his distain for ordinary workaday life and his burn-it-down posturing. Through it all, his insecurity and self-loathing came shining through. He couldn't hide it and didn't try.

Even as he worshiped excess, intensity, and passion, he yearned for peace. His grandiose ambitions belied his longing for domestic bliss.

Of course Katerina, a novel named for a woman, is at its core a love story. Both Frey and his narrator (who he pointedly intertwines) are romantics. But then so am I, and it's the love story that makes the book, despite its many glaring faults, worth reading.

I both loved and hated it.

End of an Era

Sadly, Luminis Books is no more. The publisher of "Meaningful Books that Entertain" has closed up shop. This was the outfit that brought you Precarious, Sabrina's Window, The Possibility of Snow, and Then We'd Be Happy. It was, I think, a bold and noble venture, and I will always be grateful to Luminis for making my writing available to readers across the country and beyond.

The we in Tumbleweed

Photo by Leland Zaitz

To the girl born with a pack on her back:

Entwine your pulled-up roots with mine

We'll turn ourselves into a tumbleweed

And ride the wind wherever it takes us

My (One) Time as a Foreign Correspondent

Found this dispatch among some old papers in my office at home ... published in my college newspaper back in January of 1976.

Middle East contrast: faith breads violence 

BY AL RISKE

JERUSALEM - Everyone was silent when Dr. Gordon Frazee’s “New Testament Land Seminar” drove to Portland Airport, Jan. 7. We were like reservoirs waiting to receive the flow. Besides, it was 5 a.m. and no one is talkative at that hour.

Our bird’s-eye view of the continental United States is mostly undercast. Clouds or snow, all we is white. The Minnesota farmland looks like a white quilt; cities look more like maps than the real thing—those black-and-white things on gas station walls.

We fly out of New York without seeing anything outside of Kennedy Airport. Six hours later, the sun poking its Kilroy nose over the Atlantic horizon means we’re nearing London. I’d like to come back when I can see more than the airport lounge.

The first I see of the Promised Land is a stand of cypress trees on the plains of Israel’s only airport, Ben Gurion. From there, our tour group boards a bus for the hour and a half drive to Jerusalem. The driver is introduced as “Moses.” Dan Rasmussen pipes up, “Okay, Moses, let’s see you part traffic.” And so it begins.

Night blankets the city and we bed down at the Eyal Hotel without much idea where we are, having been shuffled from airport to airport to bus. In the morning I walk into Zion Square with the feeling I could hop in a VW and drive to McMinnville. The weather is Southern California.

Alex, the tour guide, leads his disciples through the Old City. Everything looks older than it is, made of desert-colored stone. Rebuilding is underway around every corner of the narrow streets. Alex says the new is being blended with the old. What can be restored, will be. New buildings combine modern touches with the basic style of the past. (“There is some religious symbolism in there somewhere,” says one of the students.)

Jerusalem looks war torn. All kinds of buildings, from banks to hospitals, are bullet-riddled, fallen bricks clutter the street, here and there green-clad men carry machine guns. At various gates, our bags are checked. Put it all together and the visitor can see why the Jewish idea of heaven is “Shalom” or peace.

At the end of the day, tour members have a hard time listing all the places visited. Some stand out. At the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, we see the traditional site of Christ’s burial. Dan Rasmussen says it can’t be the real site—not enough headroom. “Imagine Jesus rising from the dead,” he says, “and bumping his head.”

Alex is careful to point out that no one can be sure of exact locations, only approximate ones. Even then, some are based on misinformation. “But religiously it makes little difference,” says the young Jew with the English accent. “It’s a symbol.”

In a land rich with religious history and symbolism, the seminar students can hardly assimilate all the information. Even so, some time is left for “personal exploration and discovery,” as the itinerary puts it. The time is spent wisely … shopping at the Arab markets. Or not so wisely, depending on your skill at bartering.

Packing souvenirs in her backpack, Debbie Watson pulls out a beautiful, patterned brown scarf. 

“Where did you get that?” asks Dave Massey, thinking of getting one as a gift.

“Nordstrom’s in Portland,” she laughs.

All Systems Go

Update from today’s followup with my cardiologist: All systems go. Coffee in the morning? OK. Beer or wine with dinner? OK. Yoga tonight? Yes. In short, life is returning to normal.

What a Weekend

I woke up at 5 a.m. Friday with what felt to me like maybe heartburn. Never had that, though. Pain got bad enough that I nearly threw up. 

Went to ER around 7. EKG ... chest X-ray ... blood work ... everything looked normal. But by then the pain was coming in waves. I could feel it coming on, intensifying, then vanishing. All in the absence of any doctor or nurse in the room at the time. 

 Finally a nurse and then a doctor saw what I was going through. But they still could not be sure: was it cardio or gastro? 

My body didn’t respond to morphine or nitro. It should have. But everyone is different. Lucky for me someone decided to try a drug usually prescribed for anxiety. No more pain. 

Subsequent blood tests began to show more and more of an enzyme associated with heart attacks. So they admitted me to the hospital for overnight observation. 

Imaging test the next day showed several severe blockages, and the doctor was ready with stents—four in all—which he immediately inserted, going up through my wrist to my heart. 

Took a long time, though, and I was getting claustrophobic toward the end. 

So glad it’s over now. Back home, feeling very good. Very blessed. 

Could use a beer, though that may not go well with all my new medications.

Ubiquitous

Great cappuccino at Caffe Nero, the Italian Coffee Co., which, it turns out, has locations all over London — like Starbucks in the States.  Served in real cups, with saucers, by the way.

Then a long stroll along Piccadilly with the wind nipping at our noses. Love all the old brick buildings. It's still early so nothing much is open. But there's lots of traffic — both cars and people.

The highlight of our walk is the garden outside St. James's Church (where there is another Caffe Nero).

Walking in Mayfair

London. Bitter cold. No rain, though.

It's been 14 hours since we left our home in Sunnyvale. More, now that we've ordered room service: pizza, beer, a banana-raspberry smoothie, and chocolate peanut cake.

We're staying at the Sheraton Grand Park Lane Hotel. Tiny room. No view. I've turned up the heat but nothing is happening.

Finally we go out where it is much colder and walk around snapping pics of double-decker buses and red phone boxes plastered with pictures of half-naked girls advertising their services.

Once we get off Piccadilly, we notice nifty little places to eat. Lots of them. Places we should have gone for dinner and will tomorrow.

In fact, we plan to go back to a cute little Italian place, a corner cafe, for due cappuccini in the morning.

No Matter What

When Characters Come Alive

I had more fun writing Then We'd Be Happy than anything I've done before. The characters came alive for me and now seem like real friends. They are energetic, funny, insightful, and face life's challenges with the same confusion and frustration we all feel. They have their faults, as you will see, but I can't help loving them all.

Refreshingly Unorthodox

The first review of my new novel, Then We'd Be Happy, is outstanding:

“A refreshingly unorthodox tale of the challenges facing modern, lower-middle-class 20-somethings.” 
— Kirkus Reviews

Preorder now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, or IndieBound.

A Voice We Won't Hear Again

Dan, Sandra, Me, and Joanne

Sandra touched people.

If you were talking to her, she might reach over and touch your arm to let you know she got your joke or felt your pain.

You could open up to her.

She was warm and tenderhearted.

Also stubborn and fiery.

She cared about fairness. She cared about people who needed a second chance. Like she did. Like we all do.

She made mistakes but learned from them and did her best not to repeat them. She learned to stand up for herself, though sometimes her courage failed her.

She hated being taken advantage of or stolen from. There was no need for that. All you had to do was ask.

She let you know she loved you in spite of your faults. Maybe even because of them.

She liked to drink and gamble, dance and sing.

I loved her voice. Not just the singing. The way she talked. It was a sweet voice that suited her perfectly.

I won’t hear that voice again.

But I will hold Sandra in my heart forever.

Fasten Your Seatbelt

Greg Bardsley's new novel is a madcap race against time and conflicting priorities in California's go-go Silicon Valley—a raucous parody of the valley's twisted family and corporate values.

I'm telling you, this guy has style. And a wicked imagination. And nobody has more fun with a story than Greg does.