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Great New Things At Gotham

Seriously, folks, here’s some stuff you need to know about.

Gotham Writers Conference 
We launch the first ever Gotham Writers Conference on October 25 and 26, in NYC. This is the place to be if you’re interested in publishing a book.

Day 1 — A peek behind the publishing curtain with five eye-opening and entertaining panels and presentations. Plus, a free happy hour.

Day 2 — Pitching roundtables. Each table will have two agents and a group of pre-selected writers with book projects. You spend the day with your table—pitching, reading pages, and discussing your work. Some of these people will land agents.  Continue reading “Great New Things At Gotham”

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Dog Day Advice

As we enter the lazy days of August, I’m going to (lazily) borrow some advice from two writers.

Ann Patchett recently published an essay in the Washington Post about how Snoopy influenced her as a writer. Not Snoopy’s actual writing, which wasn’t that stellar. (He began almost every story with: It was a dark and stormy night.) But Patchett drew inspiration from the bravado with which Snoopy approached writing, perched atop his doghouse with a typewriter, reminiscent of the bravado he displayed perched atop his doghouse as a World War I flying ace.  Continue reading “Dog Day Advice”

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Seeing Double

Lately, I’ve been into pairings. I don’t mean matching food and drink, though a glass of rosé paired with a seafood salad makes for a perfect summer meal, and for dessert I’ve always cherished the pairing of black coffee and baklava.

No, I’ve been pairing stories—following one story with something similar.

It started with the Victorian novelist Wilkie Collins. After listening to the audiobook of The Moonstone, I went straight into the same author’s The Woman in White. The former is about the disappearance of a diamond that is not only vastly valuable but its luster waxes and wanes with the phases of the moon. The latter involves untangling dastardly machinations in a family, including discovering the origin of a woman in white who wanders through London and its environs. Continue reading “Seeing Double”