The chir of nighttime insects and the wide dark blue of the moonlight sky over the Texas Hill Country is not nearly as pleasant as a long, late-night conversation with my brother on our parents’ back deck. (Oops! I missed last week’s “small stone”! But I forgive myself, because I was preparing to fly acrossContinue reading “Small stone, Vol 2, #10”
Author Archives: Samuel Snoek-Brown
Last chance: make me work!
Next week, my popular culture conference begins, which means this is your last chance to overwork a teacher: go to my PCA/ACA schedule under the Teaching tab and use the polls to assign me homework! Next week: reporting from the conference! 🙂
A Writer’s Notebook: life study / character notes
This is a true story. For now. The taxi driver’s name was Muhammad. He is from Pakistan. He has warm, kind eyes, something between hazel and blue in the dim passing light of the street lamps on the highway. A faint downturn at the outer edges, where his dark olive skin creases in fans fromContinue reading “A Writer’s Notebook: life study / character notes”
Photo blog 50
Rima the Arab Girl
Maybe you like personal narratives and insightful, meaningful memoirs. Or maybe you like political editorials. Or maybe you’re just a concerned citizen of the world who wants to stay informed but is sick of the same old news cycle, the same cold, indifferent data used to sell advertising. Maybe you just love really, really goodContinue reading “Rima the Arab Girl”
A Writer’s Notebook: Mapping a story
This past Tuesday, I visited Zayed University to speak to an education class studying youth literature and preparing to write young adult stories of their own. (I’ll write a fuller post on this experience later this weekend.) We talked about books they were reading and how they might begin to write their own stories. TheContinue reading “A Writer’s Notebook: Mapping a story”
Photo blog 49
“Ma’salama.” Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, 2 April 2011. One of the first things I did when I arrived in the UAE more than two years ago was to visit the Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque. People here like to throw around the superlatives — largest pearl sold at auction, tallest building,Continue reading “Photo blog 49”
Small stone, Vol. 2, #9
An afternoon on the couch, back flat and knees bent, the dry pulpy scent of paper and ink, the rich texture of a world unfolding in fine brushstrokes of words.
A Writer’s Notebook: “Bridge the Gap”
I’ve done photo stories before (here, here, and here), but this one is a little different: this one involves two photos. I’ll explain more below, but just so you know up front why I’m using two pictures, the idea here is to get from the picture on the left to the picture on the rightContinue reading “A Writer’s Notebook: “Bridge the Gap””
Teaching, teaching, and more teaching
I have so much to say on these topics that I’m actually bursting (ew?), which is why I’m not going to write more about them just yet — too many things to say, not yet enough distance or coherence with which to say them all. But I’ve had teaching on a brain a lot latelyContinue reading “Teaching, teaching, and more teaching”
Samuel Snoek-Brown 