Writing
Planet Grim: Stories
ISBN: 978-0998409221
Distributor: Ingram
In twenty-eight stories that draw blood while making you laugh, Alex Behr’s debut collection Planet Grim is a vivid, unsettling portrait of the gritty fringes of San Francisco and Portland, where complicated characters long for connection just out of reach. Behr is an idiosyncratic, unpredictable prose stylist with an edge and willingness to cut to the bone that makes her writing truly original..
"Alex Behr's Planet Grim turned me inside out. No, really, these stories of eros and ids getting loose, inner contradictions and desires crashing into each other like marbles, brutal instances of violence up against a moment of tender beauty, the people and lovers and mothers and families in this book are carved from the guts of us. What sits dead center at this hybrid of self and other is, mercifully, an unbeaten heart." —Lidia Yuknavitch, Thrust
“Alex Behr’s imagination is wild, rigorous, and totally unique. I haven’t been able to decide if her stories are comedies intercut with horror or horror stories leavened by comedy, but when they’re this entertaining, who cares?” —Tom Bissell, Creative Types
“Alex Behr’s characters are conflicted, uncertain, and pained. What’s so compelling about her fiction is how she honors that conflictedness, explores the uncertainties, and examines the pain until it reveals itself as irreducibly human and therefore a kind of grace.” —Dan DeWeese, Soft Rock Classics
“In Alex Behr’s funny poignant stories the kids are sharp, fearless, and insatiable, the parents conflicted, lustful, and tough. The meaning of family and love is an epic game nobody can win or stop playing.” —Mary Rechner, Marrying Friends
RECENT AND FORTHCOMING PROJECTS
Received an Arts3C grant from RACC to produce the short film Grief Stick, which explores the sudden illness and death of Alex’s fiancé, Chris Hartman, griefstick.com;
Grief Stick nominated for Best Documentary, Oregon Documentary Film Festival, Jan 26, 2025
PAM CUT’s Tomorrow Theater screening, Feb 20, 2025, with musical performance by Corrina Repp and poetry reading by Alex Behr
Hosted and organized “Adoption Passages: An Evening of Stories, Music, and Art,” recorded and broadcast through Open Signal
Received a Make-Learn-Build grant from RACC to support the website Altar-Altered: Sacred Objects + Adoption Stories
PUBLICATIONS
Poetry
Grief Stick chapbook, Picture Frame Press
Sweet, Like Cookie and a Walrus, Buckman Journal (forthcoming)
Barbie’s Starlight Motor Home, Sold on Etsy, Painted Bride Quarterly
Month Three, Ghost City Review
Spectacles, Kithe
I of I, anthologized in Stranged Writing: A Literary Taxonomy, Gravity of the Thing, finalist for the 2022 INDIES Book of the Year Award for Anthologies
Pacify Her and About a Girl, Gravity of the Thing
Be Like the Baby; Be Like the Man, Submission Reading Series poetry chapbook
Fiction
Planet Grim: Stories, 7.13 Books
Cold Plum Wine, co-author of chapbook, Picture Frame Press
Where the One-Eyed Man Is King, Vol. 1 Brooklyn
A Nation of Bombs, Heavy Feather Review
The Game of Stupid Poly, Vol. 1: Brooklyn
Swingers, Cleaver Magazine
The Problem Was Starting, X-R-A-Y Magazine
That’s the Way of the World, Cosmonauts Avenue
The Passenger, VoiceCatcher
My Martian Laundrette, Propeller
The Scorpion, Irreverent Fish, Ooligan Press
Personal Essays
Smith-Corona, Treat podcast
Be Like the Woman, The Rumpus
Wet, Nailed
The Punishment Log, Nailed
What Do I Get? Mutha
Napalm Picnic, Manifest-Station
Milk It: Breastfeeding as an Adoptive Mom, Mutha
Dead Souls, Manifest-Station
Raising Yu Zheng / Raising Eli, Nailed
Prelude to a Kiss, Watershed Review
Crawdad Death Adventures, Propeller
Pet Sounds, Freerange Nonfiction
Belongings, Lumina
Essay/photos diptychs, Love Letter, Love Letter, We Are Open Pop Up Gallery, Middlesbrough, UK
Looking Back Mortified: Why Would We Betray Our Younger Self? Propeller
If Found, Please Contact: Motherfucker, 20 Minutes in Portland, Portland Review
Hidden World of Girls, diary excerpts and commentary, NPR
Land of Milk and Honey: An Adopted Child Longs for—and Creates—His Own Memories, Oregon Humanities
Articles and Interviews
Matthew Dickman, Maggot Brain (issue 11)
Seymour Glass, Maggot Brain (issue 9)
Lidia Yuknavitch, Maggot Brain (issue 9)
“We Have to Create Alternative Habitats for Writers”: Lidia Yuknavitch on the future of literature and art in Oregon and beyond, Oregon Humanities
Pick Your Pleasure: Talking with Liz Asch, The Rumpus
Age of Anxiety: Create More, Fear Less, Oregon ArtsWatch
Ramiza Shamoun Koya, The Rumpus
Leland Cheuk, Propeller
Kimberly Kim Parsons, Propeller
Rob Spillman, Boneshaker: A Bicycling Almanac
Lee Ranaldo, The Best of Boneshaker: A Bicycling Almanac
Margaret Malone, Propeller
Laura Lippman, Propeller
Wendy MacNaughton, Propeller
Lee Ranaldo, Propeller
Chris Ware, Salon
Beth Lisick, Propeller
Phil Milstein, The Rumpus
Christine Shields, Propeller
Daniel Clowes, Propeller
Lance Olsen, Propeller
Jenny Forrester, Propeller
Steve Almond, Propeller
Aimee Bender and Amy Cutler, Propeller
Jack Stevenson, The Rumpus
Tom Bissell, Evil Monito
DJ Earworm: Mashup Pop’s Top Chef, Mix
Book Reviews
The Small Backs of Children by Lidia Yuknavitch, review, Bitch
Building Stories by Chris Ware, review, Propeller
Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty by Andrew Bolton et al., review, Propeller
The Dream World of Dion McGregor, review, Tin House, reprinted in Utne Reader
Events/Readings
2025 – forthcoming
PAM CUT’s Tomorrow Theater, film screening and poetry reading
Ekphrestival: A Celebration of Word and Image, Soliloquy Gallery
Hot Pockets: Readings from Rock Memoirs, Turn, Turn, Turn
PSU’s Creative Writing MFA program, film screening and poetry reading
2024–2017
Love Spell / Love Hex – Matthew Dickman chapbook release reading, Up Up Books
Lit Riff, part of Cover to Cover events, Portland Book Festival
Grief Stick Chapbook Release Party, Up Up Books
Songbook, Salon Rouge
Ekphrestival: A Celebration of Word and Image, The Writers’ Block
Cold Plum Wine chapbook reading, Up Up Books
Filament Reading, Portland State University
Come as You Are Reading, Rose City Book Pub
Hot Pockets II: Readings from Rock Bios, Turn! Turn! Turn!
Adoption Passages: An Evening of Stories, Art, and Music, Open Signal
Red House Reading
Coffee and Grief Talk, Zoom
Treat podcast live reading and music, Turn! Turn! Turn!
Expanse Poetry Reading Series, Soliloquy Gallery
Hot Pockets I: Readings from Rock Bios, Turn! Turn! Turn!
Hocus Reading, Rose City Book Pub
Stranged Writing book release party, Stackhouse Coffee Shop
Coffee Talk #5 (Zoom)
LOOP, Corporeal Writing
Propeller Reading, Rocking Frog
Filament Reading Series, IPRC
AWP Portland, Offsite Readings: Writers in the Schools Alliance, Literary Arts
Filament Reading Series, Mother Foucault’s Bookstore
Submission Poetry Reading, Chapbook Release Party, IPRC
Submission Reading Series, IPRC
Independent Bookstore Day, Annie Bloom’s Books
7.13 Books, Guerrilla Lit Reading Series, New York City
PSU MFA Alumni Reading, Portland State University
Grief Rites Foundation, Post 134
Songbook 10, Post 134
Dead Rabbits Reading Series, DTUT Bar, New York City
Spoonbill and Sugartown Bookstore, Brooklyn, NY
Broadway Books
POP-UP Reading at Wordstock, Portland Art Museum
LitCrawl PDX, Unchaste and Mutha Writers, Hotel Vintage Bar
Annie Bloom’s Bookstore
LitQuake SF, Ritual Coffee Roasters, San Francisco
LitQuake SF, Adobe Books, San Francisco
Planet Grim Book Release, Powell’s Books