Interview Roundup: 1-2-3-4, I Love the Marine Corps

• The new issue of Old Town Review includes an interview with Nathaniel Fick, a young Marine Corps veteran who was sent to Afghanistan and Iraq almost immediately after completing his training for the Recon Battalion. His memoir, One Bullet Away, comes out later this fall. I got a copy at BookExpo; I have read it, and it is the best memoir I've read in at least a year.

• There's also a new issue of Ruminator out, and it has soundbites from Fran Lebowitz, including the story of how she wound up on Law and Order:

  "I auditioned to be a regular judge on the show, not an arraignment judge. I knew as I was doing it that I was failing my audition. Every actor tells you that at that point you just say 'Thank you,' and leave. But I didn't. The second I finished, I said 'Look, I know I failed my audition. But the reason that I failed it is because I’m not an actor. This is too big a part for me--give me the part of the arraignment judge, which is just a couple lines. I would be excellent at that because I'm very judgmental. I also make snap judgments, so I'm perfect.' They were kind of dumbfounded.  Luckily, they thought this was so hilarious, they gave me the part."

• From B.E.E. & Me, the latest manifestation of Jaime Clarke's Bret Easton Ellis thing, comes a link to this long interview that started in 1996 and ended nearly two years later.