With the publication date rapidly approaching and a book release event in the works, we wrap up 2016 with the final “Notes On…” LTGPA. This interview was conducted via email with Catherine A. Shuler, my publicist and partner in Mind Harvest Press. Enjoy.
QUESTIONS OF CHARACTER Five years ago when I first sat down to draft my upcoming novel, I intended to do so in one fell swoop, a nonstop creative endeavor bringing to bear all my experience and purported talent. By this, my fifth longform manuscript, I felt not only eager but seasoned to prove how fully cogent and […]
I felt this humble, profound, and simple but eloquent Nobel acceptance speech written by Bob Dylan was worth sharing. He’s absolutely right—during the creative act no artist should be thinking of receiving such an honor for their work, only of the work itself. Banquet speech by Bob Dylan given by the United States Ambassador to […]
I’m late to the party on this 2015 New Yorker post, but I found it quite useful and edifying. THE MIDDLE OF THINGS: ADVICE FOR YOUNG WRITERS By Andrew Solomon The following is adapted from a speech the author gave at the Whiting Writers’ Awards on March 5th. When I had just finished my schooling and […]
In Part One we suffered through a little autobiography about the time I helped honor local pop music heroes Hootie and the Blowfish, and how that got me to thinking about who we honor with public monuments and tributes, but more importantly, why we do so, and what we’re saying with our choices.
For those of you following this blog for the last couple of years, it may seem like all-DIXIANA all the time. But before that material sees publication, let’s keep in mind that I’ll be offering up one (or more) direct lead-ins to that long-gestating novel series, with its fully realized fictional world I call Edgewater County. […]
“I’ve tried to teach my writing friends that there are two arts: number one, getting a thing done; and then, the second great art is learning how to cut it so you don’t kill it or hurt it in any way. When you start out life as a writer, you hate that job, but now […]
Not much to add this morning that many fine obits haven’t already, except to note that on a personal level, this hurts deeper than I can fully describe.
For the last month or two I realize that it has been quiet around good old Edgewater County Confidential . . . apologies. But behind the scenes, rest assured that much has been stewing and brewing and coming together: First, a glimpse of the future—the first piece of key art for LET THE GLORY PASS […]
That’s right—not only was my novel Fellow Traveler inspired by the Grateful Dead experience, but its official release in 2012 came on November 1, the Day of the Dead. That I had first seen the band on Halloween night in 1985—a night like forever, as it turns out—only made the decision to have the book […]
