Two Kinds of People
I have a murky and confusing ethnic background. I was raised by folks of English and Scottish heritage, but they were not my biological parents. My biological parents are first generation Irish on one side and a mix of English, First Nations Canadian and probably some French, on the other. Banc-de-Pêche-de-Paspébiac, where my ancestor James…
Read MoreSharing the creative journey
Yesterday I sat in a little office in Trinity Church, Princeton. It has cream walls and book shelves a sort of subdued jade, and a mullioned window looks out over the old cemetery, where the bone-grey tilting stones, more than a few graced with a Celtic cross, mark the graves of churchgoers dating back to…
Read MoreMumbai and Misfits
Sparkle Hayter is a terrific writer (the hilarious Robin Hudson murder mysteries) and comedian, who now lives in Mumbai. She has done so for a couple of years now, working in Bollywood. She seems to love living there, as she has loved living in Tokyo, The Chelsea Hotel (NYC), and in an art squat in…
Read MoreWhat to do until the publishing Messiah comes…
Ironically, a couple of days after I wrote that last blog on “How to Write a Novel,” I received a disturbing email from Publisher’s Weekly. The notice stated that the venerable Houghton Mifflin Harcourt has temporarily stopped acquiring manuscripts. This, understandably, has sent authors and agents into something of a flap. This is the house…
Read MoreHow to Write a Novel or "Wood Craft"
Students and other emerging writers often ask me, “How, precisely, do you write a novel?” I suspect they think, as perhaps I did myself once upon a time, that there exists somewhere a hermetically sealed room, guarded by hydras, in which Real Writers have placed, in a locked chest in turn submerged in a shark-infested…
Read MoreThe Invitation of the Sacred Drum
I had the marvelous experience of hearing the Soweto Gospel Choir in concert last night. I can’t imagine a more enlivening way to spend an evening, unless it might be to get up on stage to sing and dance with this amazing choir. In fact I was hard pressed to stay in my seat, as…
Read MoreMonsters and Artists
Someone reveals more than anyone wants to know. I recently read a Weekly Standard review of The World Is What It Is: the authorized biography of V.S. Naipaul, written by Patrick French. In this biography, an authorized one I remind you, Naipaul talks about beating women, being a sexual sadist and a racist. The review…
Read MoreThe scalding and the blessing
It’s been a few days since my last post, and what a busy few days it’s been! Clearly, the big news is a new president-elect here in America! And I’m quite sure there’s very little I can say about that which hasn’t already been said — although that rarely stops me from saying something anyways.…
Read MoreThis, too, shall pass
There comes a moment — often many moments — as one writes a novel, when it all seems quite hopeless. A moment when the writer desires nothing more than to emit a loud raspberry sort of noise, and fall into a swoon on the nearest soft surface. And thus, you find me. Oh, I’m still…
Read MoreBooooo….. and thank you, please!
A couple of years ago I got really grumpy about Halloween. For years I’d lived in places where Halloween wasn’t observed, and I rather missed the good old days when I’d get upwards of a hundred wee ghouls and princesses and ghosts and hobos at my door. Now, back in North America, living in the…
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