Feathers Like Leather

One of troubador/flaneur Chris Leo’s claims to fame is that he holds the highest score on the rigorous New York City Tour Guide Exam. He’s done a lot of walking in his days. Over the past decade, dividing his time between Manhattan and Cupra Marittima, Italy, the walking has amounted to a gamut of lyric texts reflecting his follies and diversions along the way in an apropos hodgepodge of formats. From his novels White Pigeons and 57 Octaves, which come with accompanying music and drawings, to his polylingual children’s book Coomoococklemungmung, illustrated by Buenos Aires-based artist Francesca Massai, to albums with his word-burdened bands The Van Pelt, The Lapse and Vague Angels, the delivery is always the same: cat’s paw on a very big mouse. Leo’s fourth book, Feathers Like Leather, is a collection of short stories, poems and etymologies, each a raw and urgent account of his life abroad–even in his own hometown. From obsessive language dissection to personal sexual questionings, Leo lends a relentless charm to his writing that emanates from the page as if it’s being sung.