Bette Adriaanse is a Dutch writer also known as Bette A. Along with authoring two novels, she’s co-authored with musician Brian Eno a non-fiction work on art and its impact on human experience that was published just last year. Now she’s back with Slow Stories, a collection of short works available today in hardcover. This book is also part of another collaboration with Eno, a white vinyl album in a gatefold jacket featuring two sidelong stories from the book read by Bette A. These readings are complemented by ambient music played by Eno.
Along with the book and record, there are 20cm x 20cm original paintings on canvas boards by Bette A. and Eno, each one unique and each one numbered and signed by the artists. This bundle is limited to just 444 copies, with no digital release of the two album tracks in the works. Soon to be highly sought after, 2 Slow Stories is assembled and issued by Unnamed Press. The artist’s proceeds go to their charities, The Heroines! Movement, co-founded by Bette A., and Earth Percent, co-founded by Eno.
Bette A.’s prior novels are Rus Like Everyone Else, published in 2015, and What’s Mine, published in 2023. The book co-authored with Brian Eno is What Art Does: An Unfinished Theory. Both novels were published by Unnamed Press, an independent house that focuses on global literature by underrepresented voices. The book authored with Eno was published by Faber & Faber.
Slow Stories will be widely available as a standalone hardcover book. It collects 16 works that have been in development across two decades. Bette A. offers that these stories were rewritten from memory and became shorter. Her style is indeed spare, leaving the impression of dispensing with what’s unneeded while dishing vivid descriptive sparks.
The 2 Slow Stories collaboration expands two of the book’s works, “The Endless House” and “The Other Village.” The stated overriding thrust of this project is slowness, a concept made clear by the book’s very title. But as Bette A. reads across these two sides of vinyl, there is also a sense of tranquility that is considerably enhanced by the rising and falling unperturbed flow of Eno’s ambience.
If relaxed and indeed almost meditative, there is a sustained brightness in these two pieces that reinforces the combined level of engagement in their creation. In its very nature, 2 Slow Stories won’t be for everybody, but fans of both artists’ work will be rewarded by the vigor of this project.
GRADED ON A CURVE:
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