MFA graduation advice

I was reading the May/Summer edition of The Writer’s Chronicle (the magazine of the Association of Writers and Writing Programs) the other afternoon and it includes an article called “The Words and the Bees: Advice for Graduating MFA Students in Writing,” by D.W. Fenza (who’s the executive director of the above-mentioned association). Even though I [...]

Missing Boston

I have mixed feelings about leaving Boston. There are things about being here that I like. Of course, when I’m here I am always missing something about San Francisco. And when I am in San Francisco there are things (fewer things, but things all the same) that I miss about being in Boston.
People are fickle. [...]

contradictions

Yesterday, in the span of about two hours:
1) I went to the gym. While I was there I spied a stray Elle magazine and flipped through it while I was on the elliptical trainer. It happened to be the “green” issue, and so there were a lot of articles about organic fabrics and cosmetics and [...]

April showers

With just one class left to attend and much of the contents of my apartment packed or sold, I feel as though I am biding time until May. I’ve been socializing a lot, attending parties, saying goodbye to various classmates. None of it has been very emotional so far. Frankly, I just want to get [...]

in search of rejections

I sent off a chapter from my book to three lit magazines today. On a whim, I also sent out a short story I wrote a while ago but came across recently in my packing. It didn’t seem that bad, so while I was researching literary journals and sending things, I sent that out, too.
Sometime [...]

Trashy post

There is definitely, definitely not enough sleep occurring in my world. Between staying up too late to watch “Winter Sonata” and drinking too much coffee, sleep has been frustratingly elusive. And, in a way, stupidly elusive. I mean, I’m done with my classwork and I should be relaxed and sleeping til noon every day. Ha! [...]

Winter Sonata

I am totally hooked on a Korean drama called “Winter Sonata” that’s running on AZN right now. It’s actually a few years old and apparently was mega-popular in both Korea and Japan. It’s a sappy, sad love story that is totally predictable and still, I can’t help watching it. The storyline of this show is [...]

Gay Talese memoir

Gay Talese, one of the writers at the forefront of the “new journalism” of the 1960s, has finally finished his memoir, A Writer’s Life, after 14 years. There’s an article in today’s New York Times about Talese and his quirky, often extreme writing habits. He is apparently incredibly meticulous and a notorious tinkerer. (Hey, my [...]

the old-fashioned way

I’ve talked to two published authors in the past week and both of them said they turn to writing out their books longhand when they get stuck. Not just a few paragraphs either. One said he was able to write the last 3 or 4 chapters of his most recent book this way, when typing [...]

Easter

I haven’t really celebrated Easter in years — a combination of religious indifference and distance from family, I guess. I can’t remember the last time I had, or was invited to, an Easter dinner. I can’t say that I miss it so much.
But yesterday I joined some friends and their kids for the Easter egg [...]