Here’s the Beef on Stakes
“What’s at stake here?” Sooner or later every fiction writer fields this question. Often the challenge appears as a single word – STAKES? – scrawled on a novel chapter or short story draft, plus or minus a coffee cup ring,…
Category: Fiction
Making Lemonade: Turning Bad Juju into Good Writing
Bad juju comes to most of us, and sometimes it comes all at once and sometimes it is a staccato of bad news, one thing, another thing, another thing, another. My response to trouble used to be assume professional stance at…
That Name Rings a Bell
Like a lot of writers, I have a little notebook where I jot down stuff that pops into my head. Sometimes it’s an idea or phrase. Sometimes it’s nothing more than a single word. For instance, the last note I…
An Interview with Jonathan Papernick, Author of The Book of Stone
Jonathan Papernick’s debut novel, The Book of Stone, transports us to pre-9/11 Brooklyn to follow the course of Matthew Stone, a mentally unstable young man who loses a father and enters of a world of religious extremism. According to Dara…
Friday Feast: Books to Read This Summer (Or Whenever)
Ah, summer. The perfect season to eat soft serve, stretch out on the beach or lake shore, and read good books. Or you could sit inside the house in air conditioning and draw the blinds. Or sit in your favorite…
Read and Reread
“For all I know, writing comes out of a superior devotion to reading.” Eudora Welty, On Writing I just did something I haven’t done in years. I read two novels in the span of two weeks. Joy! I fussed and…