October writing links

Hello, reader. Here’s a little tidbit for you: I’m a mad documenter of the past. This, no doubt, has something to do with having two historians for parents. I grew up knowing words like “archive” at a very young age. Anyway, I’m always trying to preserve moments in time. For example, October.
I thought I’d share [...]

I’m committed now.

Well, I did it. I’ve signed up to try National Novel Writing Month again. I was waffling, but there was some peer pressure — all the cool kids are doing it! — and here I am signing up to crank out 50,000 words in 30 days.
No big deal. Yeeah.
I had been tossing around the idea [...]

There’s a pug in the produce aisle, and not nearly enough caffeine in my system.

Certain events should not be paired. For example: 1. Being awakened when there’s a 4 on the clock should not, under any circumstances, be combined with 2. Running out of coffee and having to substitute decaf just to make one measly cup.
Maybe I should rephrase that. Certain events should not take place, period. For example, [...]

linked stories

I’ve become enamored of (obsessed with?) linked stories/novels-in-stories/fractured narratives. This is what happens: Every time I read a novel-in-stories or a collection of linked stories (where is line, when do linked stories become a novel-in-stories? Is there a line?) I am so wowed by the form, and then I think about it constantly, wonder what [...]

E is for everything, everything, everything

We spend a lot of time in cars. We drive to the mall, we drive to school. We drive each other home from school, from field hockey practice, from parties, from 7-11. We make out with boys in cars parked in houseless cul-de-sacs. Always there is music. In the summer we open the windows, let [...]

The top 50 MFA programs…

The November/December issue of Poets & Writers includes the magazine’s 2010 rankings of the top 50 MFA programs. There’s a longish article accompanying the list, which mostly details the methodology used for creating the rankings, and the ways in which this list differs from the last ranking of MFA programs done by U.S. News and [...]

Michael Chabon and altered writing routines

I used to wake up around 7am, grope my way downstairs, fumble with the light switch, and immediately set a kettle on the stove for coffee. I am not a morning person. I use a French press to make coffee, which arguably is not a non-morning-person’s coffee-making routine. (It requires a bit of patience for [...]

clarity

Today I opened one of two short stories I have been working on for some time. (Ahem, two years.) I haven’t touched the story since May, and the months away brought, as they always do, clarity. For example: in various places in the story I’ve abruptly switched point of view, and I didn’t even realize [...]

D is for dog bite

It was the day before Christmas, and my mom and I were driving down the rural road away from our house to run some last-minute Christmas errand. I was 10, or maybe 11. We passed the tilled remains of that year’s corn crop and paddocks full of horses whose coats had grown thick and furry [...]

C is for crème brûlée

A few years ago, as an editor at a San Francisco newspaper, I had the assignment of interviewing local chefs for a Q&A feature we ran twice a month. The target chef for my column was one who presided over a trendy, high-end restaurant.
Aside from the fact that I had not previously done any food [...]