National Novel Writing Month

This November, the nonprofit Office of Letters and Light will host National Novel Writing Month. It's a global writing challenge for which I'll spend November (and portions of my sanity!) writing a 50,000-word book in just 30 days.

In addition to my writerly duties, I'm raising money to help the Office of Letters and Light continue to put on free creative writing programs for kids and adults in classrooms, communities, and libraries around the world.

Every dollar I raise will keep my spirits high as I write my way towards the realization of my creative dreams. More importantly, contributions will help National Novel Writing Month and its Young Writers Program build a more engaged and inspiring world.

Thank you so much for your support of my writing! Support in spirit from my fellow low-income writers is much appreciated as well.

~

Some things I'll be keeping in mind this month:

"Every word on your blog is a word not in your book." - Sherman Alexie

"You do, or you do not. There is no 'try'." - Yoda

"Our ability to achieve is proportionate to our inner will, and we never know what is possible until we experience the impossible!" - Heidi Thomson

Joyce Carol Oates Kicks Interview Butt

From the pulpit of a downtown church during the recent Boston Book Festival, keynote presenter Joyce Carol Oates read a soft, complex story of loneliness and violence. In contrast, the interview that followed was comedic and farcical. The audience gasped and laughed and nearly booed as the interviewer asked one ridiculous question after another. Oates gracefully sidestepped the too-personal ones and boldly confronted the too-simple ones.

Even though she wasn’t the greatest reader, the piece Oates read from her recent book, Sourland, was gorgeous and chilling in its emotional subtlety. Especially compared to her interviewer, who seemed to have been selected as a foil to Oates’ intelligent and nuanced speech, she presented compassionate, transcendent perceptions of the human condition. What follows are selected quotes and summaries based on notes.

Your stories have a lot of violence in them. Why do you write so much about violence?

“Writers don’t write about violence. Writers write about people.” A work of art has its own trajectory, Oates said, its own inevitable ending. She added that writers don’t think in terms of happy endings but in terms of the integrity of the piece of writing.

Have you experienced violence in your own life?

“Why is there this tendency to ask women writers this question? … It’s not like I invented violence.”

Do you believe in God?

“Do you?”

Are you a Catholic? An atheist?

“I don’t call myself anything … Calling oneself an atheist would be too aggressive … Most people have a sense of religion that honors their family and community, and they just follow that … It’s not fruitful to discuss whether I believe in God.”

Do you know when you sit down to write if you’re working on a short story or a novel?

“Of course! I wouldn’t be a good writer if I didn’t.”

Sign Language: Maine

"Tread Carefully"



"Lilliputian Landscape"



"No, It Didn't Say That"



"Neighborhood Effort"

Author's Books and Author's Jobs

I had a "driveway moment" yesterday while listening to a story on NPR about a new book in which authors reminisce about various jobs they've held and how those experiences inform their writing. "Don't quit your day job" is both the title of the book and the facetious advice that the experienced novelist gave to the interviewer, an aspiring novelist. An aspiring novelist myself, I always appreciate hearing from those who have "been there, done that," and the reference to Truman Capote's maxim Write something true (and then start lying) was a good reminder.

While searching for the link to that story on NPR's website, I found another interesting book-related story about a reader discovering an author's personal library for sale in a used bookstore. How could she tell the book belonged to a writer? Because the book's previous owner had filled it with margin notes, conversing with the printed text in a close and thoughtful interaction.

Last night I was at a party and someone asked me how, as a writer, I decide what books to buy. My criteria for buying a new book is whether I might want to read it more than once. If I'm not sure that's the case, I will borrow it from a friend or the library. Used books, however, are not always held to the same standard, which is why I have a revolving-door relationship with Cherry Picked Books and Raven. I do love the idea of an author's library going out into the world, posthumously and diffusely, through the venue of a used bookstore. The books and their conversations could stay alive that way.

Sign Language: Desire

Continuing with my collection of sign photographs inspired by Signs of Our Times, this month's theme is Desire.



"New Heart Attack" outside Hartford, CT



"Desperate to Sell" Miller Place, NY



"It Really Was" Seattle, WA



"Saving Space" Skinner State Park, South Hadley, MA

Playground Pastoral

merry-go-round circles
under the trees



swing set, push, smile,
grasping hand



merrily tossed
gentle shadows

Reading List

Arthur Schopenhauer said, "Buying books would be a good thing if one could also buy the time to read them in: but as a rule the purchase of books is mistaken for the appropriation of their contents." How true this is! So many times I have bought books (usually nonfiction books) because they "looked good" (or better yet, like something I "should read") only to have them sit primly on my bookshelves for years unopened. Every so often I gather these books and sell them to a used bookstore, where I get a credit with which to buy books I have a slightly higher chance of reading (usually novels).

Now that I have committed to buying a book a month (ideally from a small publisher), I want to follow that up by actually reading said books. So far I am halfway through July's book (Redemption in Indigo by Karen Lord) and have not opened August's (Granta's sex issue: not a book per se, but book-like enough in shape and heft), although I did get a head start when I heard its opening essay at a reading. September's book, which I just ordered, is Dear Al-Qaeda by Scott Creney (Black Ocean).

As if I didn't already have enough to read, I just subscribed to Writer's Digest (I also read Poets & Writers). The latest issue included many "top 10" lists including advice from bestselling authors. One of Sherman Alexie's tips was to "subscribe to as many literary journals as you can afford." I noted that he did not say, subscribe to as many literary journals as you can possibly read in your lifetime, because that would be a much smaller number for most of us.