A diligent researcher has recently unearthed some original working titles for books that were later published under more familiar titles. This person, who has chosen to remain anonymous, revealed only that he or she was inspired by an episode of Seinfeld. Here is the exact passage quoted in the introduction to the list of titles:
Read the rest of this entry »Jerry: Hey, you know what? I read the most unbelievable thing about Tolstoy the other day. Did you know the original title for War and Peace was War—What Is It Good For?
Elaine: Ha ha.
Jerry: No, no.. I’m not kidding, Elaine, it’s true. His mistress didn’t like the title and insisted he change it to War and Peace.
Here’s the third question that helps us understand how readers and writers connect. Earlier we looked at the connecting power of humor and laughter, as well as a common concern by readers and writers for characters in pain.
Now we come to poison and dying, and at a time like this I wish I were a mystery writer. Agatha Christie loved to kick off her mysteries with a good old-fashioned poisoning. Her 80 mystery novels have sold about four billion copies in 45 languages. They say that everybody loves a good mystery, and apparently everybody also loves a good poisoning.
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J.D. Salinger, best known for writing a sensationally popular and critically acclaimed novel over 50 years ago, and for never having appeared on Oprah or The Tonight Show, or pretty much anywhere else outside of Cornish, New Hampshire, after he ran from his celebrity, died last week at the age of 91.
This news has been rattling around in my head in the five days since he left us (this time for good).
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After writing this week about killer cliches, and then about a character whose great obsession is the disturbing preposition in the phrase “in Maui,” I was going to plunge once more into the dark seas of murky language. But then the Hawaii weather turned crisp and clear, I began listening to the words of some of my favorite Christmas music, and I decided not to take the plunge.
Instead I took out “A Child’s Christmas in Wales” and surrendered to the magical words of Dylan Thomas. I don’t want to talk about this classic, I just want to experience it, again.
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Ideally the following words would be spoken. You would close your eyes, turn off the voices in your head, and just listen as the words are read to you.
In the Company of Strangers, Michelle Cruz Skinner’s new collection of short stories from Bamboo Ridge Press, is set to launch on Tuesday, November 17 (6:30 p.m. reception and book signing; 7:00 p.m. book launch and reading by Michelle; Luke Lecture Hall, Wo International Center, Punahou School; free and open to the public).
R. Zamora Linmark, author of Prime Time Apparitions and The Evolution of a Sigh, describes the book this way:
Read the rest of this entry »“Sixteen deceptively simple stories comprise Michelle Cruz Skinner’s much-anticipated follow-up to Balikbayan and Mango Seasons, many of them about Filipinos tongue-tied and alienated in the motherland, or scattered across the map of heartaches and homesickness in the company of strangers called countrymen, family, lovers. A book of quiet gems definitely worth the wait.”
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