Thoughts
I write a lot. Essays. Articles. Blog posts. All of them sharing what I’m thinking about. Maybe you think about these things, too.
Meet Me at the Mall?
I’ve always been fascinated with abandoned human structures, but as I mentioned, I’ve never seen any that rose and fell within my own lifetime as completely as malls, and so I find myself drawn to photographs and videos of these gargantuan empty places once echoing with so much life.
Truth (and Action!) Through Storytelling
Mr Bates vs the Post Office: The Real Story is a four-part miniseries chronicling sub-postmaster Alan Bates’s legal battle against the Post Office, which had falsely accused him and some 3,500 others of defrauding the UK’s postal service.
Something Scary in Time for Halloween!
When placed around a word or phrase as in these examples, they’re called “scare quotes” ... and, man, are they scary!
Can Fiction Make a Difference?
One of the joys of reading is the opportunity to live alongside someone else for a time. Hear their thoughts. Be affected by their questions. Wonder why they did one thing and not another. And it’s nearly impossible to do that while still hating them as part of a group.
The Mills Are Closing
We can regret some changes and applaud others; but they’re going to happen, with or without our approval, whether or not we’re prepared for them.
Art is on My Mind...
When I was wondering what context to give my protagonist Sydney’s next set of adventures, it occurred to me that I hadn’t yet explored the world of art.
The Story's The Thing
I’m always talking about how the stories we tell and the stories we read or hear or view both reflect and shape who we are. Usually I’m talking about enlightenment—learning something about ourselves, delving into issues such as pain or love or agency. But sometimes, the stories teach us facts.
Writer's Block as Liminal Space
Something caused us to stop writing—out of ideas, out of time, out of flow, out of inspiration—and we’re finding it difficult to re-enter the zone, to reconnect with the love.
Is Technology Leaving Readers Behind?
As writers, one of our obligations, I think, is to be the vehicle that enables readers to ask these questions in a safe fictional space. Raising the questions in fiction doesn’t make them any less real, or any less urgent, or any less difficult, but it serves the same function as fairytales and horror stories, the option of experiencing fears without also experiencing immediate and life-threatening danger.
Is It Real? Is It a Forgery? Does Anyone Even Know?
I’ve been immersed in the world of high-end art forgeries, and as usual am following every rabbit down every hole in sight. Some of the most high-profile art forgers went on to become celebrities in their own right, with plenty of contemporary collectors still willing to knowingly pay thousands for counterfeits.
And the World Echoes with His Absence
Along with Tolkien and Lewis and another of my favorites, G.K. Chesterton, Buchener’s work affirmed that faith and doubt live alongside each other; that you cannot have the one without the other.
When Lives and Literature Are Inconsistent
How do we regard artists whose contributions are significant, and yet whose public views on other people are questionable at best and scathingly horrible at worst?
How Stories Stay With Us …. Sometimes Forever
It reminds me in my own writing to allow for that glimmer of hope, to show that evil needs to be confronted and that goodness can prevail.
Wait, You’re Doing WHAT?
You locked the door to your house carefully when you went out. You come home after dark and find the door mysteriously cracked open and darkness within. What do you do?
Why Read Stories?
How can you develop empathy? Read stories! Stories—whether fiction or nonfiction—invite you into someone else’s life. They allow you to feel pain and sorrow, joy and transformation; to love deeply and hate just as deeply; to achieve and to fail.
How to Build a ”Better Époque”
Hemingway was confident his work would get done by accepting past disappointment and knowing punitive self-judgments were unlikely to get his book written any faster or better.
Cleaning Out Those Nooks and Crannies
We have so much to do, on so many levels, but one of our goals as people of letters must be to search all the nooks and crannies of our language, the places where racist imagery lies in wait, the unexpected moments of truth.
Why I’m Jealous of Visual Artists
So, yeah—I’m jealous of visual artists. But more importantly, I’m in awe of them. And deeply grateful that we can watch them work… and be ourselves elevated in the process.
Liminality and a New Horizon... Just Ahead
Think of not knowing what life is and then finding out: a book suddenly learning how to read; a rock jutting out into the sea suddenly knowing the thump and splatter of the waves, the taste of salt.