Category Archives: Howling at the moon

by Laurel Leigh | June 13, 2012 · 9:24 am

Dammed if he does . . .

Dear Writers:

“Reading Alex Kuo is best done twice.” — Robert Wallace

With characters on opposite sides of the Pacific, Alex Kuo’s The Man Who Dammed the Yangtze may have some of its readers on opposite sides of its equations.

Published last year by Haven Books, if one chases the various reviews of this mathematical novel with doppelganger protagonists—some love it, some damn it!—it was laughingly mentioned to me by the man behind the math that a comment thread starts to emerge:

What does the math have to do with it?, or, I didn’t get the math. Continue reading →

4 Comments

Filed under Howling at the moon, What I'm Reading Right Now

Tagged as Alex Kuo, Centrum, China, mathematical fiction, Port Townsend's Writer's Conference, The Man Who Dammed the Yangtze, Yangtze River

by Jilanne Hoffmann | June 12, 2012 · 1:48 pm

A Banner Week for Women Writers – or Not?

Did anyone notice that the June 5th email list of The New York Review of Books online featured pieces written by no less than SEVEN women? out of TEN authors.

A blinding 70%!!!

If you’ve heard about the presumed big splash the VIDA Count made (scroll down their Website to view the damning PPT charts), regarding the dearth of women writers in major media outlets and literary venues, one can only hope that this is more than an anomaly.

But if you compare the online version with its paper counterpart, the June 21st issue, the picture doesn’t look as rosy. The paper edition features a paltry THREE women in a sea of TWENTY men.

Only 13%!!!!!

Now, dear reader, is the NYRB trying to hoodwink us? Do they think that they can appease the women who read online while catering to the old male guard who read the paper edition?

WHAT, I ask, WHAT is going on here?

Any ideas?

7 Comments

Filed under Howling at the moon, Rants

Tagged as discrimination, male bias, New York Review of Books, VIDA, women writers

by Laurel Leigh | May 19, 2012 · 7:57 pm

Coffee Shop Writer

Dear Writers,

Why do we write in coffee shops?

We come, us collective writers, expending time, probably gas, cash for high-priced drinks. We set up our tools of trade at little tables with uncomfortable chairs. We cringe when other patrons talk too loudly, laugh too loudly, or, god forbid!, talk to us. We peck away at our tablets under the too-dim/too-bright lights in the too-hot/too-cold room. I don’t really think I write better to “Pink Moon.” Continue reading →

8 Comments

Filed under Howling at the moon, Notes from the coffee shop

Tagged as chai, coffee shop, writing

by Wes Pierce | May 4, 2012 · 2:39 pm

Beware of any Book With the Word ‘Club’ in the Title

Write what you know. We have all heard this useless advice. To some, ‘useless’ might seem like too strong a word. And yet I say it again. Useless.

Telling people to write what they know is useless because when one gets right down to it, the real trick isn’t writing what you know. Continue reading →

7 Comments

Filed under Howling at the moon

Tagged as books with the word ‘club’ in the title, Leonard Michaels, Sigmund Freud, the HBO show ‘Girls’

by Jilanne Hoffmann | May 2, 2012 · 4:04 pm

Moonshine

Well, folks, get ready to HOWL! Beware your lover’s canines, and write through the wildness. My apologies to Allen Ginsberg.

2 Comments

Filed under Howling at the moon

Tagged as moon, NASA, perigee

by Jilanne Hoffmann | April 17, 2012 · 11:13 am

Burning Buildings

These images speak to the need for looking at the usual in an unusual way. With writing, it’s finding a word, a phrase that upends the norm. That keeps you looking–or thinking. From The Tiger’s Wife by Tea Obreht, for example: “He had a thin voice, and a doughy face that looked like it had been forcibly stuffed up into his hat…” Keeps us reading. And in the case of this post I’ve re-blogged, keeps us looking. These images haunt and howl.

Red Nails and Teacups

I hated Chemistry at school. Seeing things fizz (peanut in a bunsen burner, a chunk of liver in hydrochloric acid) was the only thing that piqued my interest long enough for me to raise my head from it’s horizontal station on top of my textbooks – even then, the theory and equations either side what ever our hapless teacher was combusting made me twitchy with frustration – and with the exception of clipping safety tongs to the Head of Science’s lab coat, I spent most of my science department hours paralysed with boredom. Still, some of those demonstrations at the front of the class must have remained buried in my head, because Australian artist Jennifer Mehigan‘s work, reminded me , amongst other things, of the multicoloured flashes you get if you through pure sodium in a flame (a point: I have both tried this over my gas stove unintentionally…

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by Laurel Leigh | April 11, 2012 · 10:30 am

Four of Everything!

I love the idea of four! Four elements in nature, the four humors of old, four score and seven years ago, my doggie has four legs.When developing a piece of writing, a writer might consider four aspects that come into play, at the onset or eventually.

Audience – Who is the audience for the material?
Concept – What is the vision of the piece, its message?
Form – How is the message of the piece presented? As a poem, in novel form? Furthermore, within the larger categories of form, what specific genre and styles are used?
Format – If published or presented, what is the packaging? Hard-cover printed book, e-book, online post, etc.

from http://www.particleadventure.org
/fundamental.html

A writer may decide the first aspect to which she relates is concept, asking herself what is the truth she’s seeking and message she’s delivering in creating a piece. For an editor, or from a publisher’s standpoint, the paramount question is, practically, about audience. Who’s going to buy the thing so we can all get paid? Continue reading →

3 Comments

Filed under Howling at the moon

Tagged as audience, editing, four elements, publishing, writing craft

by Laurel Leigh | March 21, 2012 · 1:39 pm

Writing as Calculus by Jilanne Hoffmann

Here’s a wonderful post, actually a follow-up post to Jill’s trials with her son and his school writing assignment.

Spotted Writing Stunts

Dear Friends,

The other day I walked into a coffee shop wearing a T-shirt I bought a in Port Townsend on a self-designed writing retreat. The barista read my shirt, said, “I don’t get it.”

“Instead of hiring someone to do it for me,” I said.

“Okay, but is that bad?” she wanted to know. Continue reading →