Uncategorized Archive
The Myth of the Literary Cowboy, Part 2: Make Me a Cowboy
Last time on Myth of the Literary Cowboy, our hero was developed from the English knight as a post-Civil War appeal to nationalism, and my husband discovered I withheld pie a few years ago. While the cowboy is inspired by the knight, however, he is his own man, one
I Can Haz Earnestness?!: Anthropomorphism, Irony and Two New-ish Books By Well-Known Authors Named David
Animals: so hot right now. OK, but first, full disclosure: I am a dog person. I volunteer at the Humane Society. I socialize with people I met at the dog park…outside of the dog park. I’m always finding dried beef liver in my pockets (note: dried beef liver rehydrates
The Modern Bookstore: An Interview with St. Mark’s BookShop Co-Owners Bob Contant and Terry McCoy
I remember the first time I went to St. Mark’s Bookshop. I had just skipped out of an orientation session my first week of freshman year at NYU, and decided to explore the area by myself. It was the first time I was walking New York’s vibrant streets alone,
Episodia 1.3: The Heart Is a Lonely Zombie
I never thought I’d say this, but I love me some zombies. Allow me to count the ways: their appetite for live flesh, their disintegrating jowls, their nobody’s-home-stares. Luckily for me, we just might be living in the age of the zombie renaissance. The undead have been pop culture
From the Slush Pile: Don’t Leave Me Hanging
Monday morning, two days post-AWP, your 2013 Boston Tote Bag filled with literary swag: postcards, pins, temporary tattoos, and journals. You have a renewed energy. Yes, this is the year. You will submit—over and over again if necessary—and you will get published. For those of you who have never been
Roundup: Marketing Your Writing
In our Roundups segment, we’re looking back at all the great posts since the blog started in 2009. We explore posts from our archives as well as other top literary magazines, centered on a certain theme to help you jump-start your week. This week we have posts on submitting
Writing is Like Cooking
As someone who has outlined two novels, and then written two totally different books than the ones I’d so carefully plotted, I can testify that simply writing down the journey of characters from point a to point b is not the same thing as storytelling—just as tossing the ingredients
Marbles
Marbles: Mania, Depression, Michelangelo, & Me Ellen Forney Gotham Books, November 2012 241 pages $20.00 Genre: Graphic Memoir Concerning: Cartoonist Ellen Forney’s confrontation with her bipolar disorder diagnosis And: what it means for her identity as an artist And: what it means for her creativity and her livelihood Compelling
The Fictional Suburbs
I hadn’t really thought that much about it until a friend—a non-writer friend, for what that might be worth, a musician—pointed it out. I was wrapping up my first year as a PhD student and had invited some folks over for drinks. This friend glanced down at some of
Bend Reality with Thought Experiments
As fiction’s equivalent of messy chemistry experiments, thought experiments play with ideas until they explode. Most commonly found in—you’ve guessed it—speculative and science fiction, thought experiments explore imaginative possibilities in situations unconstrained by reality. Whole civilizations can rise and fall within a novel while an experiment simmers in the