Unlike Norman Mailer, Hunter S. Thompson and other pioneers of literary journalism, Didion did not become a character in her own stories. A pale wisp of a woman (90 pounds on a 5-foot-2-inch frame), with drab hair and wide-set eyes often hidden behind aviator glasses, she was by her own description “shy to the […]
Joan Didion dies; writer chronicled culture with cool detachment – Los Angeles Times Read More »
Related Post: Best Books Lists I Whether you’re celebrating the shortest (in the northern hemisphere) or the longest (southern hemisphere) day of the year, here’s the final installment of lists rounding up the best books of 2021. Goodreads Choice Awards: Best Books of 2021 This is the landing page for the Goodreads Choice Awards, chosen
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Plotter, Pantser, Scribbler, Scribe Can we get rid of the “plotter vs. pantser” binary already? In light of last month’s quotations around NaNoWriMo, this piece seems like the logical introduction for the weekly links list. What If We’ve Been Misunderstanding Monsters? A history of how literary monsters have changed over the centuries. “Post-Enlightenment, literary monsters
“When I’m not at my computer I’m reading almost constantly in my recliner with a gooseneck lamp angled over my shoulder. I’m a diligent underliner and I take notes in the margins almost constantly. This is as true with the books I read for research as it is for the fiction I savor and enjoy
Quotation from Anne Rice’s Final Interview Read More »
Just as Christmas lights seem to go up earlier every year, so does the appearance of annual best books lists. This year they started showing up even before Halloween. B&N Best of the Year: Crime Fiction Edition From Barnes & Noble, via Novel Suspects. Best Books 2021 This page is the portal into Publishers Weekly’s
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S.A. Cosby on the Conversation Around Policing in America—And Why It Needs to Change S.A. Cosby describes the event, when he was 16, that taught him “this man who had barely graduated from high school, who still came to football games and hit on the cheerleaders, who expected and received free coffee and donuts at
Top 10 Christmas crime stories This list is from last year, but I came across it too late to include it in any of my holiday posts back then. So let’s enjoy it this year. 10 December eBook Deals for Quiet Nights by the Fire December eBook deals from Simon & Schuster. 33 Best Christmas
What I Learned About My Writing By Seeing Only The Punctuation I’ve saved this piece until after NaNoWriMo so as not to distract you from the all-important task of writing. But once you’ve completed that draft of your novel, take a look at this article (which I find fascinating) and see if it can help
This month we start with the classic novella Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton. 1. I never think of Edith Wharton without also thinking about her friend and correspondent Henry James. A prominent figure in Ethan Frome is a broken pickle dish that symbolizes the broken lives of the characters. Henry James also wrote a novel
6 Degrees of Separation: A Convoluted Journey Read More »
Related Posts: Quotation: Are You a Plotter or a Pantser? Quotation: Are You a Plotter or a Pantser (Again)? Quotation: On Outlining a Novel I thought I had finished this topic during NaNoWriMo (November), but I just found this quotation that provides a nice resolution to the question. When asked “Do you outline your novels?”
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