From the Pen of Tucker McCann

I’ve written about what makes a great line of prose come alive for me here, and we’ve shared examples from famous authors here, here, here, here and here.

In keeping with these two posts, however, I’d like to do something a little different today and throw the spotlight on a writer you’ve never read before, our own Tucker McCann. Here are ten excerpts to give you a flavor of his style. All emphasis is mine:

"But, I’ve always been doomed with the conviction that any amount of washing, if done in a public restroom, actually results in greater contamination, so I gave up."

 "The first time I set foot on foreign soil, a resplendent Mediterranean dusk slowly burned over the rooftops of Barcelona, or at least that’s how I would have written about it then."

 "The next morning I sat waiting underground in the oil-soaked dimness of the subway station while the sweet aroma of tobacco swirled into the soot-covered roof of the tunnel. I was bored, and still thinking of Marsé, and how he had blindsided me with his damn literary award. I was in a daze of regret when the train arrived in a mechanical chorus and swept me away in a subway car that smelled of stale urine."

 "… watching vagabonds fight at the foot of the cathedral, below the glare of a compassionate stone Jesus."

 "Los Angeles smoked and slept, smoked and slept."

 "He went to the mirror and saw an imperfect poem of tears running from his eyes."

 "There was nothing heroic in what I did next, but I did it all the same, as if it were heroic."

 "I detected the circumcised voices of newsmen and talk show hosts cut short as the channels swung from one to another. I could hear the traffic from time to time on Thousand Oaks Boulevard, but inevitably the flow of cars would cease, and I’d be left to my silence and trepidation." 

"Confident that the little bastard would not open the door, I taped the Declaration at navel height to accommodate him in his disability."

 "The sensations- he didn’t know what else to call them‐ from that month still ran deep in the channels of his memory. The smells, the confidence, the flow of ideas, the breeze along avenues, the ease of movement. He felt a knot of guilt when he thought of those full and pregnant days against the backdrop of his malnourished present."