March 2006
« Previous Month
Next Month »
It really undermines the whole experience with the reader because in part when you write nonfiction you get the reader to first base by the fact that you’re extensively talking from your own experience. And that’s where it has an advantage over fiction. Fiction has to work harder to get the reader. So, in my essays, which tend to be comedic, I really stuck to the stories. I might enhance the dialogue or maybe sometimes I give myself a thought that maybe I didn’t have at that moment. But he (Frey) made a whole change of event.
by
Angela Stubbs
Steve Almond: Where things got more difficult was in revision, figuring out how to critique each other's sections. We had some real humdinger arguments as Julianna can tell you. That's really how we had to stretch: we couldn't just be the God of our own little universe, or take our marbles and go home. We had to work with each other.
by
Stephanie Merchant
In the absence of all other creature comforts, food done right can be a mood-altering, sensual, nearly orgasmic source of succor. Clearly, some take the sex/food connection more literally than others; for example, Splosh magazine is dedicated to WAMmers (Wet-And-Messy), who get off on covering and being covered with edibles like custard, cake batter, fruit cocktail, and even baked beans. With The Sex Life of Food as inspiration, I’ve gathered an orgiastic collection of food-related titles capable of satisfying even the most passionate of appetites.
by
Melissa Fischer
“Afghanistan, because of its volatility, remoteness, ruggedness, and all sorts of other complexities that come with over two decades of war, is an incredibly hard place to penetrate. That leads to most of the problems with how the media or, the publishing world in general, deals with Afghanistan. Most reporters are not able to go out and get the story in a place like Afghanistan so this leads to a lack of material to work with -- as opposed to a place like Iran, where interest has resulted in a huge rise of books about the country.”
by
Colleen Mondor
"Granted, it’s no forty days-forty nights xeric trial, but it’s temptation I fight nonetheless. Suburban-Virginia counterparts to desert-dwelling demons whisper in my ear about just how sated I would feel if only... if only I would indulge. If only I would let myself write about Breaking the Spell in author Daniel Dennett’s style. The pull of the sneer! The intoxication of intellectual certainty! The lure of the dismissive and the condescending!"
by
Barbara J. King
"We have many Holocaust memoirs: we know all these hideous details; we’ve seen the most horrible film clips -- about what happened, how people looked. Most of it is unfathomable, but we know it. I don’t mean to suggest that this diminishes those memoirs in any way -- but it’s a story that’s known. I’m not a witness. I’m not going to repeat this story or try to repeat it. I didn’t want to create another narrative."
by
Jessica Myers Schecter
The Game sends out a very mixed message to wannabe PUAs (Pick-Up Artists): You’ll get laid a lot, but you may try to commit suicide like Mystery, lose your job, or like Strauss almost alienate the love of your life. Not to mention herpes!
by
Jennifer Shahade
