Tag Archives: The Water Will Hold You

Coming Out of Traction

First, a few announcements this first Friday in June: Summer writing classes at the Grotto are now open for enrollment.  I’m excited about teaching a weekend workshop in August, on using existing models to craft short fiction.  Check out all … Continue reading

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Will Write for Food

A guy I knew in grad school used to wear a T-shirt with those four words on the front.  Every time he wore it, the rest of us gave knowing chuckles.  The statement aptly captured two assumptions of student life:  … Continue reading

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On Deadline

I’m on deadline. I’ve written that before, many times,  for the most part about a self-imposed deadline. Even this blog, which I try to keep posting to every-other-Friday, is a voluntary act.  As much as I hope that some of … Continue reading

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Only Connect

I’m in a scattershot mood this morning, so today’s post will be rather scattershot. First, I’d like to give a shout-out to three colleagues with recently published books: Lana Dalberg, BIRTHING GOD Judith Newton, TASTING HOME Monica Wesolowska, HOLDING SILVAN … Continue reading

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Get A Job

I’ve worked as a stained-glass artist, a translator, a marine biologist, and an archeologist. Or, rather, my characters have.  One of the most direct ways into inhabiting character and discovering details that lift a story beyond “mere” narrative has always … Continue reading

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Branding

Yesterday over lunch at the Grotto, where I’m subletting office space, another writer (also finishing up her novel) and I got on the topic of branding.  You know, the “author brand.”  I resisted the first time I heard the phrase, … Continue reading

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Rediscovering Rilke

this post is a slightly edited version of a post that appeared on August 20, 2012, on the Good Letters blog In college, I took a yearlong class on Western Civilization.  Certain images stand out: reading Oedipus Rex on the … Continue reading

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It’s Only A Dream

When I was in third grade, my class took a field trip to Kirby Cove, a small rocky beach just west of the north side of the Golden Gate Bridge.  To get there, we had to walk—or in my case, … Continue reading

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Out of the Faith Closet

When I started blogging, a little more than a year ago, I did so as an exploration of social media as a tool to reach my readers, to “build my brand” as a writer.  I was curious about (and a … Continue reading

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Playtime

I read with interest Gina Gionfriddo’s article in last Sunday’s New York Times about her new play’s “inadvertent homage” to Wendy Wasserstein’s Heidi Chronicles.  Gionfriddo’s play Rapture, Blister, Burn—which opened this week at Playwrights Horizons, the same theater where Heidi … Continue reading

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