Advanced Praise for High Before Homeroom:

“I love this book.  Doug Schaffer – sixteen years old and in an almost-constant state of arousal, as only a sixteen-year-old boy can be – is everything you’d hope for in a narrator: disarmingly honest and irreverent and affable and funny – very funny.  Maya Sloan is a mad scientist of a novelist, filling her Petri dish with the cells of J. D. Salinger, William Burroughs, and Mark Twain, but ultimately this novel is her own glorious creation: a smart and wholly original take on what it means to yearn, in all its manifestations, in the 21^st century.”

–John McNally, author of After the Workshop

“Searing one moment, laugh-out-loud funny the next, Maya Sloan’s High Before Homeroom is an honest, surprising, and dazzling debut.”

–Davy Rothbart, author of FOUND Magazine, The Lone Surfer of Montana, Kansas, and frequent contributor to This American Life

“Maya Sloan’s characters could be deemed purely comic if they weren’t so realistic, tender if they weren’t so jaded, and heartwarming if their lives weren’t so heart-wrenching. All of which makes this a darkly compelling –possibly controversial — coming-of-age novel. High Before Homeroom is a wild debut from a brilliant new novelist.”

– Julianna Baggott, author of The Miss America Family and co-author of Which Brings Me to You

“Funny, poignant, and profane, this energetic coming-of-age novel about a young outsider who takes a radical path to coolness marks Maya Sloan as an engaging new young novelist to watch.”

–Rilla Askew, author of Fire in Beulah and Harpsong, winner of the 2009 Academy Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters

“Here’s a confession: I like Doug Schaffer more than I ever liked his idol Dean Moriarty, and I had much more fun reading Maya Sloan’s High Before Homeroom than I ever had reading its literary progenitor, On the Road.”

-Ayelet Waldman, author of Red Hook Road and Bad Mother

No matter how profane it may seem at times, High Before Homeroom, like Youth in Revolt, is ultimately a charming take on one nerd’s coming of age.  In this assured debut, Maya Sloan clears the gender barrier, giving us the hapless Doug Schaffer, sixteen and obsessed with sex, love and Kerouac.

–Stewart O’Nan, author of Snow Angels and The Speed Queen

Katie Arnoldi:

My beloved Katie’s new book comes out on May 13th!  I’ve read it, and you gotta read it too…she’s pretty damn fearless, and will write the stuff no one else has the guts to write.

Here’s her new book trailer!

read an excerpt

Steve Sanders:

My good friend Steve Sanders (I’ve known him since middle school) will be attending the PHD program in Creative Writing at the University of Texas in Houston…there aren’t very many of these programs, and they are really competitive, but I’m not surprised at all…he’s an amazing writer…I feel lucky to call him my friend!

I’m proud of you, Steve!

PS  Oh, yeah, and he’s an Okie!!!!  Don’t worry, even in Texas you’ll still be a Sooner, Steve!

Here’s an excerpt of his writing (don’t be mad, Steve, I can’t help it…and I love this story!)…more to follow when he gets his damn website finished!

The Trigger Finger

We’re ready to roll when we steal the liquor from my mother’s house.  My step-father is an alcoholic and mom has chronic fatigue syndrome so it’ll be Tuesday before she notices and by then Mark will assume he drank it all.  In the car, there is me, that is Tim, and my girlfriend Nicole.  She and I, we’ve been together almost a year, since the week before two-a-days.  In August, she intends to leave for Emory, and I intend for that not to happen.  But at this moment that’s not my concern.  Tonight my focus is Will and giving him the proper sendoff since tomorrow Will leaves for Parris Island.  He’s headed for harsh places and, let us accept the possibility, a harsh fate.

In the backseat are Ritesh Gandhi and a girl named Renee.  I’ve asked Gandhi to find a girl, any girl, for Will to have a shot at tonight.  He’s the son of a surgeon and he gets more pussy than Derek Jeter.  He’s my oldest friend and I wouldn’t trust him with so much as my laundry, but he’s good for coming through on things like this.

Sy Hoahwah:

My kickass Comanche friend (and, if you count a three day relationship, my former boyfriend…well, it was pretty clear within three days that we were better as friends), the gifted poet Sy Hoahwah, has a book out from West End Press…I, for one, am not surprised in the slightest.  His poetry always blew my mind.  Raw, real…and he tells the truth…  it isn’t always a truth that is comfortable to hear, his stuff is riveting and beautiful.

Sy’s Website

Ouija Board Blues

Dear Philadelphia Hyatt Regency,

I sincerely apologize for the illegal removal of said “display” chocolate bunny from your lovely Easter Buffet dessert cart. But, as you will see, the bunny was used for the sake of art.*

Best,

Maya Sloan, filmmaker

PS  I thoroghly enjoyed the roast beef carving station.

* and by “art”, I mean I this footage is shot in black and white.

The Spring 2010, 25th anniversary issue of Boulevard is now avaliable!

With a special music theme, the issue features writers and editors from THE NEW YORKER, SPIN,
ROLLING STONE and JAZZ TIMES.

Other contributors in this issue include award-winning writers such as Albert Goldbarth, Billy Collins, David Kirby, Carl Phillips, David Lehman, Alice Hoffman, Stephen Dixon, Floyd Skloot, Madison Smartt Bell and Marvin Bell. (…and this chick no one has ever heard of named Maya Sloan…and she’s completely thrilled!  Thank you, Richard Burgin!)

PS  The story, “Agape” is about the hardcore fundamentalist youth movement, specifically Christian rock groupies (yeah, they really exist…I’ve actually met them!)…the best part was making up some of those freaky Christian rock lyrics.

Excerpt from Agape:

Page 1:

The day of Pastor Rick’s appointment as head of the Youth Action Group of the Blood of the Lamb First Baptist Church in Duncan, Oklahoma, he looked at us for a long time before he spoke.  The first thing Tiff and I noticed was that he was handsome, and the second thing was the edge of a tattoo peeking from the sleeve of his crisp, button-up shirt.  That was enough to get our attention.  Pastor Rick cleared his throat.  He said, “I have been a sinner and a heathen.  I have ingested mind-altering substances.  I have fornicated with many women.  I have been to jail.  I have hurt other people, hurt myself, and most of all, hurt the Lord with my irresponsible, selfish, misguided actions.  But Jesus never stopped loving me.  He saw it in his ever-loving heart to save me, to call me to the ministry.  He brought me Alicia Jo, my angel, the light of my life.  But mostly, he brought me all the way from Tulsa, gave me this opportunity to lead you guys.  And what I want to know is this.”  He smiled at us.  “What do ya’ll want to talk about?”  Then Robert, the rebel of the group, the guy who wore a Jim Morrison t-shirt on our youth group camping trip, said, his voice low and his eyes focused on the pea-green shag carpet of the Bible study meeting room, “Sex.”

“Okay,” said Pastor Rick.  “Then let’s get to it.”

Excerpt from page 15:

We were so close I could touch the stage.  Our bodies were smushed into the bodies of people next to us, and the lights were so hot I could feel the beads of sweat on my forehead.  Then the lights flickered and I gripped Tiff’s hand and the speakers screeched.  Suddenly Bradley Ranchuck strode across the stage.  He stopped right above me, still as a statue, his guitar hanging by a strap and his arms spread wide to us as if he was Jesus on the cross. Then the music exploded, loud and throbbing.  Bradley whipped his hair across his face, stepped forward, and said, “We are all here for one reason.”  The crowd screamed.  “We are all here for one man.  And his name is Jesus Christ.” The crowd roared and pushed into me from both sides and the back, and Bradley opened his mouth and let free that first note – that perfect, pure, Godly note.  Then he sang:

Raise me up, Jesus
Higher than I could ever go
‘Cause I’m unworthy
With all those things I know
All those things I know
All those things I shouldn’t a done
That touch that burned me deep
You are God’s one and only son
Jesus
Salve this cut that never heals

“Sing with me,” he said, and we raised our arms and all our voices lifted together with the chorus:

I won’t go down with those demons
No way,
I won’t go down with those demons
‘cause I’ve been saved
I won’t go down
I won’t go down
I won’t go down