I love Anton Chekhov. His sense of story rooted in character and culture has long held me spellbound, and I hold him as an unreachable ideal for what the best of short fiction can look like. He also had some terrific writing advice, probably the most famous of which was in favor of necessity in the details: “RemoveContinue reading “Setting aside Chekhov’s gun”
Tag Archives: fiction
NaNoWriMo 2015: the end is the beginning
Well, I have crossed the finish line and then some. As of today, my word count stands a little more than 57,500. Of course, as I said in my previous NaNoWriMo post, a lot of those words I’ll wind up throwing out, and I also know a lot of those words might stay but become drasticallyContinue reading “NaNoWriMo 2015: the end is the beginning”
NaNoWriMo 2015: revising without revising
It’s been a while since I’ve posted updates on my NaNoWriMo. That’s because it’s been a busy month, with a lot of side obligations I’ve been fulfilling. I judged a literary contest, I blurbed a friend’s book, I did a couple of readings, I wrote an essay a magazine solicited. It’s also been a busy month of myContinue reading “NaNoWriMo 2015: revising without revising”
Allow me to show you Where There Is Ruin
I am thrilled to announce that my fiction chapbook, Where There Is Ruin, has been accepted for publication at Red Bird Chapbooks! I’m a big fan of Red Bird’s work, and this new chapbook is especially exciting for me because I get to be part of their impressive roster of authors and poets, including my friends MatthewContinue reading “Allow me to show you Where There Is Ruin”
NaNoWriMo 2015: plot, structure, shape
I struggle with plot. In grade school, I learned that plot was just another word for story. Later, I learned a more mechanical version, that plot was the arrangement of events in a narrative. It is the order in which things happen, and it has a shape. Mostly it looks like an arc — often a sharp one, likeContinue reading “NaNoWriMo 2015: plot, structure, shape”
Against my better judgment: NaNoWriMo 2015
I don’t know quite why I’m getting myself into this, except that I don’t know what else to do. I’ve had an idea for a novel for a couple of months now, but I haven’t done anything with it because I’m still in the middle of writing a different book. When it comes to bigContinue reading “Against my better judgment: NaNoWriMo 2015”
When to break a chapter
Yesterday morning, over on my Facebook page, I got an interesting question from my first, longest-time fan (hi, Mom!). I’d been commenting on Facebook the past few days about the progress I’ve been making on my new novel and, in the space of two posts and a comment, I had declared that I’d finished a chapter after addingContinue reading “When to break a chapter”
It’s a surreal September for the Jersey Devil
The heat must have gotten to us. Because as Jersey Devil Press leaves summer behind and ushers in fall, we’ve started getting a little . . . weird. And this is Jersey Devil Press, so that’s saying something! But it’s a wistful, surreal kind of weird, with monster bees that seem perfectly peaceful, a woman aloneContinue reading “It’s a surreal September for the Jersey Devil”
Ellen Urbani celebrates Landfall at Powell’s, and a bunch of Portland writers hug each other
Last night, I attended the Portland celebration of Ellen Urbani‘s new novel, Landfall, at the Powell’s downtown. Ellen has been getting a lot of much-deserved positive attention for this beautiful, important novel (full disclosure: I blurbed it, but only because I loved it so much), so I knew the turnout would be big, and whenContinue reading “Ellen Urbani celebrates Landfall at Powell’s, and a bunch of Portland writers hug each other”
Hagridden’s birthday and the Burning River West Coast Tour
A few days ago, Hagridden turned 1 year old. It’s walking around and eating solid food and everything. (More tomorrow on Hagridden at one year old!) To celebrate, I took the novel on the road, joining Hagridden‘s older, smaller half-sibling, Box Cutters, and my sunnyoutside pressmate Christopher Bowen on his Burning River Prose and PoetryContinue reading “Hagridden’s birthday and the Burning River West Coast Tour”
Samuel Snoek-Brown 