Archives for Reading and Writing

I’ve been scribbling some notes for a YA story set in Washington, D.C.–not the D.C. of power and political theater but the city I know as a resident. When I say “scribbling” I really mean scribbling, with a pen, in an actual notebook (a “legendary” notebook, of all things). It’s too early to say whether… Continue reading »

What makes a story you loved as a kid stick in your mind years and decades after you encountered it? That question animates Laura Miller’s The Magician’s Book, which I’m reading now. Miller, a writer and critic for Salon, revisits her childhood passion for C.S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia and tries to sort out what… Continue reading »

So I’m reading Michael Slater’s new biography of Charles Dickens. (It has very, very small print, but that’s neither here nor there for the purposes of this post. It is a little trying on the eyes, though.) Slater focuses on Dickens as a working writer. The guy worked, then worked some more, then did some… Continue reading »

The Collagist is a new online magazine published by Dzanc Books and edited by the writer Matt Bell. I have a flash-fiction threesome (“Twenty Questions,” “It’s Me,” “It’s You”) in the Decmeber issue. Please take a look if you have a chance. You can also read an interview with me here. It feels good to… Continue reading »

Much of the advice one hears about writing falls into what, for lack of a more inspired term, I’ll call the man-up category. As in: Just do it! Believe in your book! Persevere! Embrace your creativity! I’m all for confidence, although it’s not always in great supply in my life. I do believe that perseverance–which… Continue reading »