I turned off the TV much of the month, and decreased my consumption of news, out of necessity. I can’t watch the images of my country doing things I so deeply hate. I do read about these things on my phone (thank heavens for notifications!) so I’m not uninformed. I’m just not losing myself in […]
Continue ReadingSo much fantastic reading in April, and no time to write it all up. That’s why this is a few days later than usual. First, I line-edited an issue of Fiction River, Spies, which is just marvelous. I had forgotten how good those stories are. You’ll see them next year, but for now, you can read a […]
Continue ReadingI’m line editing another Fiction River, so some of my reading time has been taken up with that. And I had a workshop at the end of the month, the Business Master Class, which kept us all going 24/7 (okay, there was a little sleeping in the middle of it all). So less reading time […]
Continue ReadingI spent a delightful week of the month reading stories for the Mystery Workshop that I conducted here on the Oregon Coast. The writers were truly spectacular and even the stories that missed some details were wonderful to read. I could envision them in any of the mystery markets. I can’t point out the stories […]
Continue ReadingFirst, apologies for the fact that the font changes sizes below. I have no idea why or how to fix it. I tried a bit, but life is too short. It’s a function of me writing different paragraphs at different times, importing links from other places. Sorry… April was a fascinating reading month for me. […]
Continue ReadingI had such hopes for March. We held the anthology workshop during the first week, so all of my reading that week was review. Afterwards, I had to line edit two volumes of Fiction River, so that took some of my reading time. (If you want to see all the reading I do on Fiction River, […]
Continue ReadingI spent all of February reading manuscripts for the anthology workshop at the end of the month. One of the students counting up the reading and determined we all read one-million words of unpublished fiction. (See the picture to the left, taken by Brendan Swann.) Usually when a professional writer mentions that she’s read that […]
Continue ReadingWow, when I get behind, I get behind. I ran out of time to write about books as I finished them, and figured I could do it in February. Yeah, right. With two workshops, and a bunch of deadlines, February has proven to be a nightmare of scheduling—which is why this thing barely squeezed in […]
Continue ReadingNot quite as many books, articles, or stories to recommend from my December reading as I found in my November reading, but I read just as much. One of my favorite novelists disappointed me greatly with the ending of his latest novel. He badly telegraphed a “twist,” and it came—I’m not kidding—on the very last […]
Continue ReadingI want to say nothing, but that’s not true. Traditional publishers learned a lot these past few years, and in 2014, started putting their knowledge into action. Over the next few weeks, I’ll do the traditional media thing, and provide you with my own sort of year in review. All of it will focus on […]
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