In Praise of Light Reading

A publicist of whom I'm very fond sent me a get-well package containing a beautiful bottle of white wine and a copy of a novel she's representing. Her lovely note begins, "Curl up with your cat and this book."

How sweet and considerate! How...FRUSTRATING!

Why? Here, let me count the ways:

1) First and worst of all, given that this is my third concussion--or is it the fourth? my memory's a bit hazy for some reason--I was forbidden any alcohol for six months. (I am much obliged to Miss Snark for her generous offer to have an extra pail of gin in my honor. Check out the especially terrific posts and comments on her blog today.)

2) No curling up for me, thanks to a broken right arm and two bottom ribs.

3) I have to keep my right arm--and myself with it--horizontal as much as possible. Sitting-up time is saved for the computer and meals. So I do almost all my reading lying flat on my back in bed or on the rented electric-powered La-Z-Boy recliner (assuming I can pry Boy Wonder off the latter).

4) Max (see About Me at top) "curls up" by draping his 13-lb self on my chest and nestling his head under my chin, making reading--and sometimes breathing--impossible. Then I usually also have to reach down with my good hand to pet jealous Jenny the dog, who isn't allowed on the furniture.

5) My right hand isn't functioning, so when Max is draped elsewhere, I have to hold up and keep a book open with my left hand alone.

6) The novel the publicist sent is in hardcover, 747 pages, and weighs 2-1/2 POUNDS. I could hardly hold it up closed for a few seconds; forget holding it up open for many hours. Whereas The Great Gatsby is in paperback, 180 pages, and weighs 5-7/8 OUNCES. Guess which book I read yesterday? (More about that in another post.)

I really wanted to read Them by Francine du Plessix Gray, but at almost 2 lbs in hardcover, with 530 pp set in fussy, hard-to-read Centaur MT, I gave up in exhaustion on page 26.

Today I'm reading a year-old ARC of Rattled by Debra Galant, 243 pp, 10-5/8 oz. (Love that new kitchen scale!) The blurb by Tom Perrotta reads: "Debra Galant does for the McMansions of New Jersey what Carl Hiaasen did for the swamps of Florida." I'm only on page 15 and loving it already. And damn if Galant isn't a ringer for Carrie Fisher.

More Lightweight Books to Take to Bed, or Anywhere:

• The Vanishing Point by Mary Sharratt. Trade paper historical fiction that absolutely won't put you to sleep.
• When All Is Said and Done by Robert Hill. Hardcover, 220 pp, only 12 oz, and absolutely brilliant! More later.
• Coupon Girl by Becky Motew. Super-light mass market & a total hoot. Don't be fooled by chick-y cover; Darling Husband, who favors Hiaasen & Mob capers, thought it was a gas too.
• Around The Next Corner by Elizabeth Wrenn. Trade paper "women's fiction." Don't gag: It's funny, profound & poignant--with an adorable puppy too!
• I'd Hate Myself in the Morning by Ring Lardner Jr. Hardcover, 224 pp; also in even lighter pb. Memoir of the blacklisted, Academy Award-winning screenwriter, with many creepy parallels to today's political situation

Quotes for the Day (and all time)

"If today you can take a thing like evolution and make it a crime to teach in the public schools, tomorrow you can make it a crime to teach it in the private schools and next year you can make it a crime to teach it to the hustings or in the church. At the next session you may ban books and the newspapers... Ignorance and fanaticism are ever busy and need feeding. Always feeding and gloating for more. Today it is the public school teachers; tomorrow the private. The next day the preachers and the lecturers, the magazines, the books, the newspapers. After a while, Your Honor, it is the setting of man against man and creed against creed until with flying banners and beating drums we are marching backward to the glorious ages of the sixteenth century when bigots lighted fagots to burn the men who dared to bring any intelligence and enlightenment and culture to the human mind."
--Clarence Darrow, Tennessee vs. John Scopes, 1925

"The net effect of Clarence Darrow's great speech yesterday seemed to be precisely the same as if he had bawled it up a rainspout in the interior of Afghanistan."
--H. L. Mencken, "THE MONKEY TRIAL": A Reporter's Account


For more great quotes: Marta Randall, Quotations about Writing and life and etc

Why It's Called a "Deadline"

On the front page of today's Denver Post, there's the sad tale of the death of artist Luis Jimenez, who was killed by a falling portion of his massive sculpture of a mustang that had been commissioned by Denver International Airport more than 13 years ago. Jimenez had missed four deadlines--most recently on May 31--and according to the DP, "In 2004, a mediator had to intervene when the artist refused the city's request to refund its money and allow someone else to finish the job." I imagine there are editors who have fantasized (or will now) about similar fates for authors of long-overdue manuscripts.

In other art news...If like me and Darling Husband, you gag at the icky-poo world depicted in the images manufactured by Thomas Kinkade, "Painter of Light" you MUST see these hilarious creations at Something Awful (again, thanks to the Boy Wonder). My favorite is on its own page, "so as not to infect any other images."

Tempest in a Teacup

Thanks to Galleycat ("Real Book Critic Wags Finger at Online Upstarts") for calling attention to the snit over a June 8 post on Critical Mass, the National Book Critics Circle blog, questioning the reliability of lit bloggers who (gasp!) have permalinks to booksellers. Reminds me of the old Henry Kissinger quote: "University politics are vicious precisely because the stakes are so small." They're even smaller in book reviewing, trust me on this.

I was compelled to leave a comment in support of the bloggers, even though I'm an NBCC member and have no commercial links here or on my writings & reviews website.

It's a Two-Fisted, Right-Handed World

This winter, I read David Wolman's A LEFT-HAND TURN AROUND THE WORLD: Chasing the Mystery and Meaning of All Things Southpaw because I had invited him to be on my "Travel with a Twist" panel at the Virginia Festival of the Book. The book is fascinating, funny and densely packed with medical and scientific research--and best read when the mind is sharp and focused (i.e., not at bedtime). But truth be told, I read it somewhat as a curiosity. I'm very much right-handed, so most of what Wolman wrote about didn't apply to me.

And then I broke my right arm.

For the past six weeks, I have been exclusively left-handed, and may be so for quite a while longer. Suddenly the world is different: Doors open on the wrong side, and are too heavy. (And what's with having a turn handle on the door of a multi-stall public bathroom? I couldn't get out of the ladies' room at Whole Foods without inside help.) Even if I was recovered from the concussion enough to drive now, I couldn't turn the ignition key or shift gears.

I can't use my front teeth, so Zip-loc bags were impossible to open till the Boy Wonder used his blazing intellect and E.T.-like fingers to figure out how. (It still ain't easy, and no way if the bag is at all greasy.) But forget about opening a new bottle of vitamins, with its layers of safety features; or a 1/2 gallon tub of Dreyers ice cream (my fave); or a childproof medicine container; or a new plastic bag of cheese with one of those sliding seals; or a wide-mouth jar; or a can of food; or or or...

However, I've become a one-handed typing ace, thanks to long fingers and a smallish laptop keyboard. (My handwriting is nothing to brag about, though. On a good day, it looks like that of an 8-year-old; on a bad day, a 98-year-old.) It hurts my arm to bend way over, so when I drop something and the picker-upper gadget isn't handy, I use my toes, which are also long (thanks, Mom!). I amazed and impressed Darling Husband by picking up a jar top and placing it in his hand--twice. I can also use my toes to work the turn controls on our little floor fans.

As Wolman explains in his book, the left hand-right brain/right hand-left brain stuff of popular culture is mostly hooey. However, there are differences in brain activity between people who are predominantly right- or left-handed. Beyond being scrambled by the concussion and then painkillers*, I wonder how my brain has changed?

*I'm off 'em now, thank dog, and--go figure!--am thinking more clearly, much less dizzy and much steadier on my feet. Every Rx for Neurontin should come with a free cane.

The Genuine Article

This morning, the Boy Wonder told me that one of the forums at Something Awful is happily abuzz over some footage of Mr. Rogers vs. Senator Pastore, described thusly:

In 1969 the US Senate had a hearing on funding the newly developed Corporation for Public Broadcasting. The proposed endowment was $20 million, but President Nixon wanted it cut in half because of the spending going on in the Vietnam War. This is a video clip of the exchange between Mr. Rogers and Senator Pastore, head of the hearing. Senator Pastore starts out very abrasive and by the time Mr. Rogers is done talking, Senator Pastore's inner child has heard Mr. Rogers and agreed with him. Enjoy.

Even more moving is a 1997 Esquire feature by Tom Junod, Can You Say ... Hero? This passage brought tears to my eyes:

And so, once upon a time, Fred Rogers took off his jacket and put on a sweater his mother had made him, a cardigan with a zipper. Then he took off his shoes and put on a pair of navy-blue canvas boating sneakers. He did the same thing the next day, and then the next…until he had done the same things, those things, 865 times, at the beginning of 865 television programs, over a span of thirty-one years. The first time I met Mister Rogers, he told me a story of how deeply his simple gestures had been felt, and received. He had just come back from visiting Koko, the gorilla who has learned—or who has been taught—American Sign Language. Koko watches television. Koko watches Mister Rogers' Neighborhood, and when Mister Rogers, in his sweater and sneakers, entered the place where she lives, Koko immediately folded him in her long, black arms, as though he were a child, and then … "She took my shoes off, Tom," Mister Rogers said.

This is in praise of all the genuine people, not least of whom was my husband's aunt Vivian, whose funeral was this morning. I wish that I was whole enough to attend.

Music to Get Cut By

One of the most emailed articles at NYTimes.com today is While in Surgery, Do You Prefer Abba or Verdi? Funny they should ask, because yesterday I had 3 root canals, courtesy of my equestrian fiasco on May 1.

The only drugs I'm resistant to are injectable oral anesthetics, so Dr V, who has a traveling knock-out practice, came to the endodontist's to do the honors.

"OK, now we're going to give you some happy gas!" he announced, and the tech stuck a foam-rubber hose contraption over my nose, which (1) itched, (2) hurt the broken bone, (3) smelled stuffy and (4) was difficult to breathe through.

No matter how little happy gas I was actually inhaling, I found it hilarious that the song toodling throughout the office as Dr V prepared me for the IV was "Girls Just Want to Have Fun." I said as much, and he and the tech found it funny too. What I didn't find so funny was all the agony and expense this girl has been going through just because she wanted to have fun on horseback.

At least my mouth isn't hurting much worse now than before. And Dreyer's (aka Edy's) Real Strawberry ice cream is a very tasty and effective analgesic.

You Stab My Back, I'll Stab Yours...

At a National Book Critics Circle program a few years ago, I asked the bow-tied panelist from the NYT Book Review why they had authors review books by their competitors. While exaggeratedly rolling and fluttering his eyes, he stated in condescending uber-George Plimpton tones distinctly at odds with his African-American looks, "Oh, we NEVER do that at The Times."

"Bushwah!" I thought, having recently read a smackdown in the Times of a first novel by the author of a similarly themed novel that just happened to be coming out that very same week.

And now we have John Dean of Watergate fame reviewing Mark "Deep Throat" Felt's memoir in the NYT. (See Rush & Mulloy piece in the June 9 NY Daily News & coauthor John D. O'Connor's letter to the NYTBR with reply from Dean.) Double bushwah!

What's next: Reviews of true crime novels by the criminals? Oh wait...we sort of have that already with the Dean review. Maybe some of the Bushies (Karl Rove? Dick Cheney?) could review books on global warming, or on the oil crisis, or on the rise of Christian conservatism. And Rumsfeld could review the next "Iraq is a mess" tome.

When I was reviewing for the Washington Post not so long ago, I had to sign a contract stating that I had no personal or professional relationship with the author of the book, didn't share an agent or publisher, nor had the author reviewed my work. And there are tales about a NY book review editor so strict, he/she (I forgot which), wouldn't assign a review if the reviewer had so much as shared an elevator ride with the author.

Oh brave new world...

And DON'T get me started on how few reviews are by women, or of books by women--even though women comprise more than 50% of the population and buy 80% of the books. The WashPost is just as guilty as the NY Times in this regard. Men generally review "serious" nonfiction (even when authored by females), while women get fiction, lite nonfiction and, of course, children's and YA. The pink collar thrives and is chafing more than ever.

Origins of Ancient Myth Revealed!

For years, there has been much earnest--and sometimes irate--talk in writers' circles as to the merits of including a self-addressed stamped envelope when submitting a manuscript to a literary agent or editor. Some writers insist that including a SASE is a tacit hint to the agent/editor to reject the work; no SASE means that the author has confidence it will be accepted. Whereas to agents such as Miss Snark and Kristin Nelson, no SASE means that the manuscript will most likely end up in the recycling bin.

Many people have wondered how and when the no-SASE myth began. Well, today I cracked the mystery! As frequently happens with great discoveries, I stumbled upon this one unawares. In my current state of painful inactivity, I've been avoiding all news except of the book biz--and have cut way back even on that--instead only reading novels and memoirs. (No creepy or violent movies, either. Hence I turned off "Pulp Fiction" midway through & switched to "The Fabulous Baker Boys.")

So this morning I started reading the very entertaining 2000 memoir I'D HATE MYSELF IN THE MORNING by the late Ring Lardner Jr. ("M*A*S*H"), the last surviving member of the HUAC "Hollywood Ten," with a sobering introduction by Victor Navasky. And look what I found:

In 1924, when F. Scott Fitzgerald sold Max Perkins of Charles Scribner's Sons on the idea of a collection of Ring Lardner short stories, Dad... accepted Scott's title, How to Write Short Stories. Instead of a serious introduction, though, he wrote: "A good many young writers make the mistake of enclosing a stamped, self-addressed envelope big enough for the manuscript to come back in. This is too much of a temptation to the editor. Personally I have found it a good scheme to not even sign my name to the story, and when I have got it sealed up in its envelope and stamped and addressed, I take it to some town where I don't live and mail it from there. The editor has no idea who wrote the story, so how can he send it back? He is in a quandary."

There Goes the Neighborhood!

I may not be able to drive--in fact I'm on my back for at least a week so that the nerves in my right arm heal properly--but in 3 weeks I'll be able to totter just 5 doors down to The Tattered Cover, one of the best bookstores in the U.S. All those times I interviewed owner Joyce Meskis and fiction buyer Margaret Maupin on the phone for Publishers Weekly years ago, little did I know that one day we'd be neighbors.

As reported today in Galleycat and Shelf Awareness, the Rocky Mountain News and Denver Post were all over the story this weekend. Amazingly, the old location will be open for business as usual on 6/24 and the new one will open on 6/26, with the ENTIRE MOVE occurring on 6/25. There will be an army of staff assisted by many volunteers, who started offering their services as soon as word got out. Shows how strongly people feel about their bookstore.

Also moving in, though not right away, will be a record store, movie theatre with real food
(!) and a folklore center. I'll hardly need to drive (or ride) anywhere. Which may be just as well, as we who park on the street have been nervously eyeing the progress of the new parking structure on the next block, which doesn't even have elevators in yet.

The Importance of Horticultural Nomenclature

I was in the examining room of Dr S, my most excellent osteopath, where he was going over the X-ray and lab reports from my hospital stay. First he asked me about my broken arm, then ribs, nose, rest of face and mouth.

Then: "How's your bush?

"My WHAT?" I was sure I had misheard.

"Your bush. How's your bush?"

I couldn't believe my ears. I'd never heard anything remotely vulgar from Dr S, a soft-spoken teddy bear whose receptionist wife was seated just steps outside the door. Besides, even if he was being crude, I was uninjured below the waist, so he had no reason to inquire about my nether regions.

"YOU WANT TO KNOW HOW MY BUSH IS DOING?" I was fairly spluttering.

Pause.

"Yeah, you know--that little plant I brought you in the hospital."

I must have looked stunned. He added, "I didn't mean that bush!"

"Well, I was sort of wondering..." I said. "Anyway, it's a topiary ivy, not a bush!"

"OK, whatever," he said. "But wasn't it cute?"

We laughed so hard I thought I'd split my upper lip again.

It's Alive!

That "it" would be me, of course. For a few days, I looked a lot more like an it than a she (though I quickly learned to look in the mirror as seldom as possible). Actually, what I most looked like was an actor in a horror movie that won an Oscar for best makeup. I had no idea that one could get eye bags that puff out a half-inch. Live and learn...

For the record, I fell off a horse named Gomez while trotting without stirrups. I'd done such an exercise many times before, though never on Gomez, whom I was riding for only the 2nd time. Guess I should have spoken French (hey, it worked for Morticia); instead I lost my balance and pitched off to the right, smashing my body onto the hard ground and the side of my face against a metal-pipe fencepost. [Edit: He threw me. Hard. I couldn't have gotten such extensive injuries otherwise.] I remember starting to fall and thinking, Oh s**t! I'm going to hit that metal fence! And then the next thing I knew I was hearing loud helicopter sounds (Wow! Just like in "Apocalypse Now"!) but couldn't see anything because my eyes were bloodied shut. (Regional trivia: in Colorado, it's called "Flight for Life," not "Med-Evac"; and rubbernecking drivers by traffic accidents are called "curiosity stoppers.") Fortunately for me, also taking riding lessons at the same time were a physician and an emergency room nurse, so I was expertly attended to from the minute I hit the ground.

I was in the MTU ("multiple trauma unit" but to me it was Empty you!) at Swedish Medical Center for a week--the longest I'd ever been in a hospital. I have quite an impressive set of injuries, if I do say so myself: concussion (and that was with my wearing a strong, well-padded helmet); broken right humerus, 2 floating ribs, nose, right eyebrow, maxillary sinuses, hard palate; loosened top front tooth that will probably need root canal; rearranged bite that may require braces (Sigh...I'd already done braces in my mid-20s!)

My G.P. commented the other day, "Well, you're going to have quite the social life getting all this taken care of!" Indeed, but it's no comparison to the one I'm giving up for the next 2 months: BookExpo in DC next week (SOB!), biz trip to NY and Book Promotion 101 workshop in LA in June.

Still, things could have been So Much Worse. I'm extremely grateful and happy to be alive, relatively well and unlikely to need any major surgery. Plus, my nose, which always tilted to the right (and which I had indeed broken when I fell in March), now lines up more plumb in the center of my face. Call it a benefit of Impromptu Equestrian Rhinoplasty.

Fun multi-culti hospital event:
On May 5, with each meal tray I received a little red card in the shape of a sombrero that read, "Happy Cinco de Mayo from your Swedish volunteers!" Sure made my blenderized eggs and Jell-o go down easier.

Most important of all:
My most heartfelt thanks for all the messages of concern and healing wishes. They mean the world to me.

She Lived With Her Boots Off

Here's an update on Bella:

She's made great progress during the week, but has a long way to go. Still don't know if she'll have surgery -- there's a possibility it won't be necessary. And she comes home tomorrow night. Expected recovery time is 8-10 weeks. Despite the breaks, bruises and a concussion, she is in good spirits most of the time, has sharp thinking (except sometimes from pain meds) and her sense of humor.

She's been at Swedish Medical Center, and we've been very pleased with the staff there. This is true: on one shift yesterday her nurse's name was Madonna and the tech's name wasBritney (not sure of spelling). No sign of Guy Ritchie or Kevin Federline, however.

Eric

What do Bella and Madonna have in Common?

This is Bella's "Darling Husband" writing (and I can't express how much I love being referred to that way!)...

Bella suffered a fall (but she doesn't suffer fools) while horse-riding yesterday. She'll be fine, but has several broken bones and bruises. She's in hospital, is cogent and dictating "to-do" items, one of which was to post this message. Surgery is still a question mark, so I don't know how long she'll be in -- probably several days to a week, and then plenty of time at home.

What do Bella and Madonna have in common? Did you think I was referring to Madonna's spill last year from a horse, resulting in broken bones? No, it's that they're both beautiful and look younger than their years.

Eric

When a Publicist Works Too Hard...

Sometimes all you can do is shake your head in disbelief. I offer the "Snark Attack!" in Lloyd Grove's column in today's NY Daily News:

Tonight's the second night of Passover - so it's hard to believe that even the most hapless publicist would send out a press release offering up Bill Downs, "one of the world's foremost experts on diet and nutrition," to discuss "the unspoken dark side" of the Seder: "Flatulence, irritable bowels, heartburn ... are common Passover conditions," Downs' flack explains. "Instead of reflecting on the Jewish people's exodus from Egypt, we end up struggling to contain the exodus of gas." Sadly, I have been assured that this release is not a hoax.

Who Let the Jews Out?

That's the musical question posed in the hilarious animated Passover greeting on the website for Sam Apple's equally hilarious--and poignant--book, SCHLEPPING THROUGH THE ALPS: My Search for Austria's Jewish Past with Its Last Wandering Shepherd.

Apple was on my "Travel with a Twist" panel last month at the VaBook Festival. I bought the hardcover as a birthday present for Darling Husband last year. It's now out in paperback.

Cogito Zero Sum

If for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction, then there's someone out there who's been inordinately healthy the past couple of months. Because I have been inordinately unhealthy. Since early February, I have had pneumonia, shingles, an upper respiratory infection and, as of yesterday evening, the stomach flu. (It came on while I was putting the finishing touches on our Passover dinner. I had one sip of wine and a mini-bite of matzoh before going to bed.) Also, between the shingles and infection I fell and apparently cracked the bone at the bridge of my nose.

This being Passover, all I can say is DAYENU*!!!

The only bright side to all this (relatively speaking) is that, thanks to the Levaquin I took for the URI plus the flu, I've lost 10 lbs in the past 10 days. I do not, however, recommend this as a weight-loss method.

Edit: It was food poisoning, not flu. It's going to be a long time before I get my lunch again from the self-serve bar at the supermarket. At least I got a $30 gift card for my pains. The manager said he was sorry for "any inconvenience." I told him that this was way more than inconvenient.

*ENOUGH

The cup half-full

From Publishers Marketplace Deal Lunch:

Cathy Bueti's BREASTLESS IN THE CITY, a young woman's journey through diagnosis, treatments, dating and surviving breast cancer, to Larry Chilnick at Cleveland Clinic Press, by Coleen O'Shea of Allen O'Shea Literary Agency.

If we're going to reference a TV show in a book about breast cancer, I have an infinitely better title:

THE YOUNG AND THE BREASTLESS

Remember you saw it here first, folks.

Stringing words together is hard

For those who think that anyone can write a short story, let me point you to the entries in Miss Snark's writing contest. The rules (see her April 2 post) were simple: 500 words max; extra points for using a list of 6 words & 5 phrases. Miss Snark apparently was overcome by the number of responses: 100+ in less than 24 hours. Though I think if she'd kept her head out of the gin pail, she'd have seen that her legions of adoring fans (her blog has had more than a half-million visitors since last July) would leap to the challenge. And quite a challenge it is, as you can see from the varying quality of the entries, which Miss Snark posted unedited. (Reminder: Spell check doesn't catch homonyms.) Fortunately, there are few clinkers. Some of the stories are stunningly imaginative and several are laugh-out-loud funny. Darling Husband and I shared a half-hour of domestic bliss yesterday evening, during which he prepared his famous Tofu Surprise while I read him some of my favorites.

VaBook III - More Fabu Fotos

From dinner on Saturday with a much smaller crew (6 instead of 13) at Southern Culture...

(right) Victor Navasky of The Nation and writer Deirdra McAfee.

(below) Mr. GalleyCat himself.









Earlier in the day, writer Digby Diehl and I snuck off to Keswick Hall, an Orient Express property, for a blissfully serene High Tea amongst The Quality Set (gotta love the screaming red UVa Cavalier-printed pants and not-quite-matching yellow golf sweater sported by one of the guests). Here we are, stuffed on scones and all sorts of other goodies.










It's not much, but we call it home...(I wish!)

VaBook Festival II - Fab Fotos

Ron Hogan of GalleyCat wasn't the only person wielding a camera in Charlottesville last weekend. Here are some pix I brought home in my trusty Canon PowerShot.

From dinner on Friday over "comfort food with a twist" at Escafe...

(below) Novelist Melanie Lynne Hauser.




(right) Novelist Masha Hamilton and Robert Gray of Fresh Eyes Now.




(left) YA author Sharon Baldacci regales novelists Daniela Kuper and Judi Hendricks with a funny story.



(right) Novelist Leora Skolkin-Smith.




(below) Novelist Lynn Isenberg and David Kipen, author & NEA Literature Director.

VaBook Festival I

Well, I needn't have obsessed about that closeup (or maybe someone at CSPAN read the post below), as BookTV didn't show up to tape my "Journalism Then & Now" panel last Saturday--though they interviewed panelist Victor Navasky earlier in the day. Unfortunately, Margo Jefferson of the NYT was ill and couldn't attend, but Digby Diehl, Stephen Farnsworth and Navasky held down the fort with panache and passion.

Farnsworth observed that TV news these days focuses more on car chases, celebrities and the weather than on important events and issues. And he's obviously right, as there were maybe 50 in the audience, whereas an earlier panel on weather in the same venue had a crowd of 200+ spilling out the doors. What Mark Twain noted is still true, though: "Everyone talks about the weather, but no one does anything about it."

During the Q&A session, someone asked about the "liberal bias" of public television. Farnsworth quickly flipped through his book, THE MEDIATED PRESIDENCY, and cited statistics showing that coverage on "The News Hour" was no more positive for Clinton than Bush. (I just love a man--or woman--with facts at his fingertips!) In essence, the media aren't any more "liberal" now; it's public perception that has changed. And as we know, perception almost always trumps reality.

"It's the Writing, Stupid"

That was my response to a question from an aspiring writer at my "From Manuscript to Cash Register" panel on Saturday at the VaBook Festival. As I explained to her, I in no way meant to demean her intelligence. However, like far too many wannabes, she was focusing on extraneous details rather than on what matters most: her writing. In her case, she was obsessing over cover art, illustrations and a marketing plan. Others--and you can see them in droves at Miss Snark's and Kristin Nelson's blogs, and elsewhere--waste countless bytes fretting over whether query letters should be in Times Roman or Courier, or if an agent will be put off by extra stamps on an envelope because postage rates went up. (I wish I was making this up!)

As I said to the 200-odd people in the audience--many of them studiously taking notes--whether you're a reviewer (as I am); or an agent, editor, publisher or bookseller, as were the panelists*, every time you crack open a galley or manuscript you want to be entranced by the writing; the rest is just gravy. Make us cry, make us laugh, thrill us, scare us--but make us fall in love with your writing.


*Simon Lipskar, Writers House agent; Starling Lawrence, editor-in-chief, WW Norton; Catharine Lynch, assoc. publisher, Putnam/Riverhead; and Robert Gray, Fresh Eyes Now.

I'm Ready for My Closeup--Just Don't Get Too Close

Fortunately my nose-to-the-windowsill incident last Sunday didn't result in a black eye (or two)--though the doctor did say to Darling Husband, "When are you going to stop beating your wife?" The doctor told me to use Liquid Bandage on the cut--another of the great inventions of the 20th century, along with penicillin, oil-filled electric radiators and rope caulk. But I do have this prominent (to me, anyway) scab on the bridge of my nose and I discovered yesterday that Liquid Bandage is not very compatible with cover stick. The Show Must Go On, though; I'm just hoping that the Book TV cameraman won't be zooming in for any super-tight shots at today's "Journalism Then & Now" panel at the VaBook Fesival. I just checked the Book TV schedule and, unlike in previous years, they're not running any events live. Hmmpf!

Don't hold the phone!

Date: Wed., March 22 -- though it could be any day in the current century.

Location: Airport ladies' room, Charlotte, NC -- though it could be any city in the U.S.

Heard from the next stall: Tinkle tinkle, Ring ring, tinkle tinkle, ring..."Hello?...Oh hi, Linda! How are you?...I'm fine, I'm in the ladies' room at the airport. I'm peeing [tittering laughter]. As soon as I'm done, I'm going to get my baggage and go home...Yeah, I'll call you when I get there...OK, bye."

Please, could we all agree (the sooner the better) that:
1) Just because you can use the phone everywhere doesn't mean you should use it in the can.
2) Some activities should remain private.

Hey, Kids: Let's Play Spot the Allusion!

Coming soon to the small screen, a new animated series being produced by National Geographic:

Aimed at kids ages 6-11, "Iggy Arbuckle" follows the misadventures of a hiking, climbing, singing, thrill-seeking "nature-freak" pig and his faithful sidekick Jiggers, a high-spirited, fast-talking, industrious beaver. Together, the pair enjoy (and sometimes barely survive) incredible escapades in the Kookamunga wilderness as they brave hot, sticky swamps, tropical rain forests, off-kilter critters, eccentric wildlife and other natural phenomena that are anything but natural. (2005 press release)

Now, let's see...Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle (photo above) was a silent-screen comedian whose thrill-seeking misadventures included a drunken party over Labor Day 1921 that culminated in the death of starlet Virginia Rappe. Arbuckle was arrested and tried--3 times!--for her death. He was ultimately exonerated, but his career tanked and he died in 1933, just after filming a comeback role in the Vitaphone short, "In the Dough."

As my anonymous correspondent noted: "No jiggers there; Fatty likely drank straight from the bottle." Therefore, in light of this history, I suggest that Jiggers the beaver be renamed.

How about Ginny? No...wait...

Ooh, I've got it! Here's one that today's groovy kids will really dig: Rapper!

Should've Stayed in Bed

I woke up at 6:30 this morning (not on purpose; I was exhausted from cleaning house for the first time in 6 weeks and had gone to bed early). My slippers were across the room, and as I shuffled around in the gloom trying to get them on, I lost my balance. I grabbed hold of Darling Husband's little wooden desk chair, and for a split second thought I was OK. But no, the chair toppled over and I pitched forward, smacking the bridge of my nose on the windowsill. ("What nice big windows," I exclaimed when I first viewed the house. "And look how low the sills are!") Next I heard breaking glass: the top of my head had smashed into the window pane.

"Wha-wha-what's going on," Darling Husband asked groggily. (He'd gone to a concert and hadn't gotten to bed till 1 a.m.) I told him and he bounded over to inspect the damage--with slippers on, as he always has his by the bed.

Fortunately, we have long, thick curtains, so I didn't hit bare wood; or worse, glass. Still, I had an almost half-inch gash on the bony peak of my nose. (Good thing I wasn't wearing my glasses; also that they're wire-rimmed, so the bridge sits above the cut instead of on it.) Ten minutes later, instead of sipping tea and reading the Sunday paper, I was back in bed with a Band-aid on my nose and an ice pack on my face, while Darling Husband picked up glass inside and out.

So now I have a sore nose and a roaring headache. I'm fervently praying that I don't end up with black eyes, as I'm moderating four panels at the Virginia Festival of the Book next weekend, one of which is going to be taped by Book TV. In the meantime, I might be investing in some pancake makeup--or a veil.

Moral: Keep your slippers by your bedside and never get up any earlier than you have to.

In the Mood for Chinese?

I laughed so hard I nearly cried when I read the menu and commentary at Rahoi.com, by an American living in China. Here's a taste:

black bowel and cowboy leg? Add candlelight and you have yourself a date.

Thanks to Susan Ito at ReadingWritingLiving!

And the prize for misleading headline goes to...

OK, how would you interpret the banner hed below? It topped a half-page ad for Volvo in today's Denver Post (just below a review of "V for Vendetta").

Swedish Automaker Linked

to Nation's Overpopulation

If your mind runs along the same elevated track as mine, you immediately start thinking of passionate couples taking advantage of the Volvo wagon's roomy interior. (Darling Husband's response when I showed him the ad: "People really like to fuck in their cars.") And then you think, "Hey, wait a minute! Sweden isn't overpopulated!"

And then you read this inane and ungrammatical pseudo-reportage:

IRVINE, Ca. -- With people living longer than ever and the US population continuing to climb at alarming rates [I agree; there are way too many mountaineers], some experts are pointing to Swedish automaker, Volvo, and their obsession with safety as a root cause of this trend.

Translation: Too many people is a bad thing, and Volvo is responsible for the badness. Therefore...you should drive an unsafe car in order to trim the surplus population. Call it "vehicular eugenics."

WHAT??!!!

That's what I shrieked when I got to the paragraph below, in a WWD story headlined “Borrowed Memories.” Seems that former London fashion writer Emily Davies signed a $900K (!) deal with Simon & Schuster for her memoir, How to Wear Black: Adventures on Fashion’s Front Line, pitched as “a cross between The Devil Wears Prada and How to Lose Friends and Alienate People.” Problem is, WWD discovered that none of the several fashionistas cited in Davies' proposal have any recollection of meeting her. Further, her quotes from those encounters appear to have been lifted from “The Glamour Girl’s Guide to Life,” a 1998 New York Times article by Monique P. Yazigi.

Davies, who reportedly departed The Times of London last year amid an inquiry into her expenses, responded to WWD’s questions with a statement defending her actions in the proposal. Saying it was “not intended for public consumption,” Davies claimed, in effect, that it was easier for her to give prospective publishers the flavor of her memoir by appropriating other writers’ words than by relying on her own memories. “The first thing I did when I began putting together my proposal…was to dig out a mass of notes, cuttings and stories I had assembled over the years.…Although I used these notes in the proposal, there would be no question of my using any unoriginal material in my finished book.”

As the Brits would say: Pull the other leg; it's got bells on it.

Sunday Philosophy Club*, U.S. chapter

Plato & Aristotle, "The School of Athens" by Raphael [see edit at bottom]

From an LA Times story headlined "Murderer Tells Jury of Gang's Strength," about the trial of prison gang leader Clifford Smith:

Wearing prison scrubs and an eye patch that he slipped on and off during questioning, Smith described how the Aryan Brotherhood empowered a three-man commission to oversee drug running and killings in prisons nationwide and developed a reading list for prospective members, including writings of Plato, Nietzsche and Machiavelli.

The good news: Prisoners are reading the classics!

*apologies to Alexander McCall Smith

Edit: Hey, wait a minute! After having studied "The School of Athens" in art history a gazillion years ago and seeing it any number of times since, I just noticed that Raphael made a howling error: There were no bound books in Plato & Aristotle's day. They had scrolls.

Famous Last Words

Max Yasgur's farm, Bethel, NY

We replaced our ancient, buzzing stereo speakers this past weekend. To celebrate, Darling Husband went digging deep into his massive vinyl collection, and at my behest unearthed the Sha Na Na album, "Rock and Roll Is Here to Stay!"

In addition to endearingly naive profiles of the band members (Rich Joffe "will major in both English and Goverment"; Alan Cooper "has conducted Jewish high holiday services in a Miami old age home"), the album sports a double-page collage of New York Times articles about rock 'n' roll and the Woodstock festival.

One clip, headlined "Farmer with Soul: Max Yasgur," features the following passage, which resonates eerily:

His red barn, fronting on Route 17B, with its long line of parked cars, displays a big sign reading "Free Water." He put up this sign when he heard that some residents were selling water to the youngsters at the festival.

He slammed a work-hardened fist down on the table and demanded of some friends:

"How can anyone ask for money for water?"

Call Me Alceste

Courtyard in Pézenas, France, one-time home of playwright Molière; taken by yours truly last summer (sigh...)

Here's why I don't critique unpublished work, especially by fledgling writers.

From Molière's "Le Misanthrope":

Oronte: ...as you are a man of brilliant parts, and to inaugurate our charming amity, I come to read you a sonnet which I made a little while ago, and to find out whether it be good enough for publicity.

Alceste: I am not fit, sir, to decide such a matter. You will therefore excuse me.

Oronte: Why so?

Alceste: I have the failing of being a little more sincere in those things than is necessary.

Lifted from a comment on "Will You Read My Novel?" at Miss Snark, the Literary Agent. In a related vein, see If I Let My Fire Go Out, How Can I Warm My Neighbor? at MJ Rose's blog, Buzz, Balls & Hype.

Evelyn Waugh Would Be So Happy!

Once again, life has spectacularly imitated art. The Loved One has come true to life...er, death...thanks to the enterpreneurship of a company that is launching cremains into space. First customer: James Doohan, better known as Scottie on "Star Trek." Read more on Slate: Cremate Me Up, Scottie!



And yeah, I know that Waugh hated the movie (one of my favorites--and not just because it's the one that broke the blacklist for my father), but Liberace as a coffin salesman is just too delicious to resist. Unfortunately, I couldn't find any images of Paul Williams as the rocket-loving kid who (ahem) launches the idea for space "burial."

Coming Soon: What Color Is Your Kaffiyeh?

Here in Denver, we get national opinion columns--and sometimes news--a day late. So in today's Denver Post, there was Thomas Friedman's piece about Hamas from yesterday's New York Times, changed (I wonder why?) from "The Weapon of Democracy" to "A Weapon Called Democracy."

The last paragraph really got me thinking...once I'd stopped laughing:

...the West Bank AFP reporter told me that when he went into the main bookstore in Ramallah the other day and asked what was selling, the owner said he'd noticed Hamas people buying Dale Carnegie books on management.

I would have thought Hamas operatives would be reading Sun Tzu or Macchiavelli if they wanted to branch out. (Darling Child thought they'd be reading "How to Succeed in Terrorism Without Really Trying.") But...Dale Carnegie?

Maybe there's hope for peace yet. I don't think How to Win Friends & Influence People recommends blowing yourself up, or annihilating your next-door neighbors, or both. And once Hamas's doors are open to Dale Carnegie, who knows what will follow? The possibilities are endless (and hilarious): Og Mandino...The Purpose-Driven Life (oh wait, they've got that one down)...First, Break All the Rules (oops; did that too). Ooh, ooh! This one's perfect, though it does center on a--gasp!--woman: The Five Dysfunctions of a Team: A Leadership Fable.

To Hell with Susan Sontag

Illness isn't metaphor; it's a literal time suck and annoyance. It's Day 8 of pneumonia, and I'm at that obnoxious stage where I'm well enough to be bored with everything (myself most especially), but not well enough to actually do anything, other than spend an inordinate amount of time online.

Great places to kill time today--and learn something in the process:

• Guest blogger Ally Carter shares invaluable tips in "An Author Looks at Publicists" at Pub Rants.
• "Slushkiller" by the incomparable Teresa Nielsen Hayden at Making Light. Marvelous dissection of rejection letters and the sometimes crazy responses from their recipients.
• "Being Able to Write" by K.G. Schneider at Free Range Librarian. Great tips from writers.

My favorite Cheney shooting joke, from "Jimmy Kimmel Live":

You know what they say, if Dick Cheney comes out of his hole and shoots an old man in the face, 6 more weeks of winter.

Happy Valentine's Day! (GRRR...)

Laugh for Saturday

I'm weak from a laughing/coughing fit after reading today's post, "The Last Word on Manuscript Formatting...Ever" at Miss Snark. As she observed, it is truly a Comic SmackDown.

Less amusing, but most helpful and informative (and non-pseudonymous!), are agents Kristin Nelson at Pub Rants and Jennifer Jackson at Et in arcaedia, ego.

Per Jackson, I finally did my homework, with help from Wikipedia:

"Et in Arcadia ego" is a Latin phrase that most famously appears as the title of two paintings by Nicolas Poussin 1594–1665) They are pastoral paintings depicting idealized shepherds from classical antiquity, clustering around an austere tomb. The more famous second version of the subject, measuring 122 by 85 cm, is in the Louvre, Paris, and also goes under the name "Les bergers d'Arcadie" ("The Arcadian Shepherds"). It has been highly influential in the history of art, and more recently has been associated with the pseudohistory of the Priory of Sion popularised in the books Holy Blood, Holy Grail and The Da Vinci Code.

The phrase is a memento mori, which is usually interpreted to mean "I am also in Arcadia" or "I am even in Arcadia", as if spoken by personified Death. However, Poussin's biographer Andre Felibien interpreted it to mean that "the person buried in this tomb has lived in Arcad..(ia)"; in other words, that they too once enjoyed the pleasures of life on earth. The former interpretation is generally considered to be more likely. Either way, the sentiment was meant to set up an ironic contrast by casting the shadow of death over the usual idle merriment that the nymphs and swains of ancient Arcadia were thought to embody....The phrase is used as the title of the first act in Evelyn Waugh's novel Brideshead Revisited. It is also the title of the second major story arc of Grant Morrison's esoteric comic book series The Invisibles, which incorporates Poussin's painting, and appears as an inscription on a gun in Cormac McCarthy's novel Blood Meridian.

Hmm...I must have snoozed through that lecture during Art History. I remember the shepherds but not much else. (Hey, it was an 8 a.m. class. Or maybe it was right after lunch. Anyway, it was dark in there.)

Not Tonight, Dear...I Have a Headache

Seen at our local Walgreen's:


The contraceptives are actually located on an aisle facing the baby-care products. On one side, there's Boudreaux's Butt Paste*; on the other, ribbed condoms. A woman's (or man's) Right to Choose was never more starkly illustrated.


*[edit] Louisiana diaper-rash ointment

No Blurb Woes Here!

The below is just in from NM Kelby, author of Whale Season, who's going to be on my "Plotting Your Career" panel at the VaBook Festival next month.

Just wanted to let you know that my first official contest is here...I will now NEVER win the Nobel Prize.

If you want to spread the word (or enter!!) here's what you need to know: Free books! Hawaiian shirts! A funereal BBQ!

In short...big fun and all you have to do is to provide a silly blurb.

For more details: click.

Warning: The bar is set pretty high, as there are hilarious quotes from Kelby's in-laws and fishmonger on the press release for Whale Season--which, as it says in the subtitle, is indeed a "really good story." And perfect for the sickbed, as I discovered.

A Weak Nod to Irony

One of my main reasons for moving to Denver was its dry, mold-free climate. No more swollen sinuses and nasty allergy problems for me and my Darling Child. So he's been down & out with flu and "malaise" for most of the past 3 weeks and yesterday I was diagnosed with pneumonia. Ha [cough] ha.

The Absolute End of the Sixties Counterculture

As reported in the New York Observer, Jann Wenner, head of Wenner Media, is considering opening a Rolling Stone Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas. Rolling Stone, for those too high or too young to remember, published Hunter S. Thompson's seminal piece of Gonzo journalism, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. Good thing Thompson's remains were shot out of a cannon, or else he'd be spinning in his grave like a...roulette wheel.

And speaking of Thompson--whose works , as I recently discovered, are unaccountably shelved under "Sociology" at Denver's Tattered Cover--how many memoirs can we read about him? (And how the hell many "close friends" can such an ornery iconoclast have had, anyway?) In addition to the reminscences in the tribute issue of Rolling Stone, whose stellar quality underlined how far the magazine has fallen since its glory days, we have:

1. GONZO: HUNTER THOMPSON, AN ORAL HISTORY by Corey Seymour (Wenner Books, April '06). Evidently the "official" Rolling Stone biography; Seymour was one of the prime movers of the tribute issue. Per Amazon: "Legions of friends, co-conspirators, neighbors, editors, and drinking buddies tell the story -- as only now it can be told -- of the late, legendary writer’s greatest creation: his own mythic life."
2. WHO KILLED HUNTER THOMPSON by Warren Hinckle (Last Gasp, June '06). Again per Amazon: "A look at the life of Hunter through the eyes of his close friends and peers."
3. THE KITCHEN READINGS: HUNTER THOMPSON IN WOODY CREEK. Per a book deal reported by Publishers Marketplace in Dec '05, written by "Hunter Thompson's two closest friends," Sheriff Bob Braudis and Michael Cleverly, "a gathering of tales from over a 30-year period emanating from the kitchen at Thompson's Owl Farm compound," to be published by Harper Entertainment, date unspecified.
4. AMERICAN DREAMER: THE LIFE AND DEATH OF HUNTER THOMPSON. Per Publishers Marketplace in March '05: "Journalism professor and author William McKeen's part tribute, part literary analysis, part oral history, part biography from someone who has been a Thompson acquaintance, watcher and 'scholar' for 35 years." To be published by Norton, date unspecified.

My money's on the Seymour book because it'll be the first one out of the gate, plus have the Wenner marketing and publicity clout behind it. But the book I'm really waiting for--and not just because I hope it has pictures--is Fear & Loathing illustrator Ralph Steadman's memoir of his 30-year working relationship with Thompson. It's coming out in the UK from Heinemann in October. Surely some US publisher will pick it up; in fact, should have already. What gives?

While Not Watching the Big Game...

My original plans for today included going to a Super Bowl party at the fabu mountain home of Darling Husband's boss. But flu (caught from Darling Child, who has since recovered) intervened, and now I'm home alone on the couch. With laptop on and the TV off, thank you very much, as I honestly couldn't care less about football. Plus I have a wicked headache, in addition to the raspy throat and runny nose. DH is recording the game, so I'll just watch the musical performances & commercials later. (The Rolling Stones at half-time?! I'm still trying to get my mind around that...)

Now is the perfect time to catch up with correspondence; better yet if it's the foreign kind. And voilá! What should be in my Inbox but an email from a cousin in England and one from Canadian author Kenneth J. Harvey, with a link to an amusing piece he wrote in reference to the Frey fracas, "The facts. Don't give me the facts," which ran in The Times (London) and Toronto Star. Harvey satirically argues that too much fact in Banville’s THE SEA raises questions about its authenticity as fiction. Then he goes on to say:

In keeping with these principles, should not an author of fiction be fictional himself? Why should a writer who spends his life claiming that what he creates is entirely invented, be allowed to use his own name or live in a real house?

Hmm...I believe this perfectly describes the fictional fictionalist JT LeRoy.

And on a related subject, why isn't there a greater fracas in the media about Nasdijj the "Navahoax," whose lies (and literary thefts) were far more egregious than Frey's? I'm guessing it's because Nasdijj wasn't on Oprah; never mind that he received a PEN award, among others. Media credo: If an author falls in the forest and nobody saw it on Oprah, then it didn't make a sound.

Edit: Darling Husband phoned me at half-time, so I watched the Rolling Stones. The sound was lousy, but as usual, they put on quite a show. Their spindly black-clad figures were quite a striking contrast to the padded, beefy (porky!) football players. Mick sure is lithe & limber for a 60-year-old (ooh, those pelvic whirls & thrusts!) and Charlie Watts is tight & buff too. Wonder how the footballers will look at their age? [SHUDDER...]

Are You Sorry?

If so, you're probably a woman. Norah Vincent, author of Self-Made Man : One Woman's Journey into Manhood and Back, was interviewed on "The Colbert Report" last week, and one of her comments really struck home. Colbert asked her whether she had discovered any difference in the way men and women speak. Yes, she said, women apologize all the time: "I'm sorry I'm here. I'm sorry for existing." For example, when ordering at a restaurant, a woman will say, "I'm sorry, but would it be possible for me to have...?" Whereas a man will just sit back and say, "I'll have the steak."

A woman I work with is constantly apologizing. One day I got fed up and said, "You have to stop apologizing so much!" Her response: "I'm sorry!" (We both laughed, but she actually meant it.) Another woman we work with is a big apologizer too. They could cut their meeting time in half if they'd cut out "I'm sorry." Whenever I hear them speaking to each other, I'm always tempted to count who apologizes more.

Not that I'm much better. I constantly catch myself apologizing needlessly. I'm sorry, but I was brought up that way. My mother is sorry too. Is yours? Are you?

Preston Sturges Would Be So Happy

Remember Trudy Kockenlocker and Ignatz Ratskiwatski in "The Miracle of Morgan's Creek"? Or John D. Hackensacker III (aka "Snoodles") in "The Palm Beach Story?" Well, art is a fine thing, but once again it pales when compared to real life.

Consider Denver, my new home. I am waiting breathlessly for a newspaper headline announcing a meeting between the mayor of Our Fair City and the new offensive coordinator for the Broncos. Perhaps they'd engage in an informal sports contest, say, of the kind favored on college campuses throughout the Golden West.

I can see it now: "Hickenlooper and Heimerdinger in Hacky Sack Fracas."

If only...

End Those Blurb Woes

Every writer cringes at the prospect of soliciting blurbs for their magnum opus. It's embarrassing, demeaning, [insert adjective here]. Well, cringe no longer! John Warner, author of FONDLING YOUR MUSE: Infallible Advice from a Published Author to the Writerly Aspirant, has devised the perfect solution: the Blurb-O-Matic. Just type in your book's title, then click "Create a Blurb" and--presto!--you have the perfect laudatory phrase. Book Promotion 101 is "fuzzy and radiant." I'm so proud.

The Worst Lying Writer of Them All

I've read about the transgressions of James Frey, JT LeRoy and Nasdijj till I thought my eyeballs would drop out. Interesting and thought-provoking as all the commentary is, their misdeeds make little difference to me personally as I'd never read anything they've written. But there is one writer whose lies have affected me right where I live, and I am shocked and appalled that the media has completely ignored this burgeoning scandal.

I am referring, of course, to the person who wrote the assembly instructions for the Target Mission Wall Hook (DPCI #249-06-0660) in oak finish -- now mysteriously "out of stock" -- which I put together yesterday.

Right on the front page, it says, "All you will need is a phillips screwdriver." STEP 1 then directs: "Drill 1/4" hole in drywall and press plastic anchor fully into hole." [Ahem!] Even if one uses the shaft of the screwdriver to make a hole--as I did, since my drill bits are at the bottom of a moving box somewhere--one needs a hammer to pound the screwdriver into the wall. And I have never yet been able to "press" a plastic anchor into a wall except with a hammer. Especially a plaster wall, as mine is.

So, all you need is a phillips screwdriver--and a drill and a hammer.

STEP 1 continues: "Using Phillip head screwdriver to tighten screw (C) into the hole from upper step."

So, all you need is a phillips screwdriver, a drill and a hammer--and a proofreader.

STEP 2 directs: "Hang wall hook to the screw from Step 1."

Very simple -- except that if one were to follow these directions exactly, the unit would be hanging sideways, as there are TWO (2) hooks on its back, exactly 29" apart.

So, all you need is a phillips screwdriver, a drill, a hammer, a proofreader--and a tape measure and a level.

Incidentally, the Mission Wall Hook unit looks lovely in my front entry, especially near the Mission Bench I put together earlier. The air there, however, is still blue with the epithets I unleashed when I discovered that (1) the bench bottom was split (I patched it w/ plywood) and (2) two of the camscrew holes didn't line up (I took out the screw).

I'm waiting for the New York Times to follow up -- or at least the Denver Post.

Whose Story Is It? II

Woke up ridiculously early this morning--in part because our room is ridiculously cold & the comforter was all on Darling Husband's side of the bed. Couldn't get back to sleep, so I finished reading the ARC of a riveting memoir that reads like a novel. In fact, it is by a novelist. He describes in minute detail a tumultuous affair he had in the early 1960s with a woman who was pregnant (not by him) and how he helped her give the baby girl up for adoption. Decades later, the daughter tracks him down, assuming he was her father, and asks for help finding her mother. He gets back in touch with Mom, whom he gives a pseudonym, but describes her background, very public career and looks in minute detail. Mom doesn't want to see the daughter; in fact won't even acknowledge that she is indeed her mother, despite their striking resemblance. Basically Mom comes off as a hypocritical, manipulative, selfish bitch--the more so when it turns out that she lied to the author about her relationship with the guy who knocked her up.

Mom is very protective of her privacy. Her husband knows about the adoption but her kids don't. She complains that the author portrayed her poorly in his novels and tries to get him to promise that he won't write about her and the adoption, which he refuses to do, claiming that it's his story too. Fair enough.

BUT...

Within 10 minutes, using just two short phrases from a newspaper quote about Mom, I discovered her real name, which contains an anagram of the pseudonym. Just to be sure it was her, I searched Google Image. Bingo! Gotta give the author kudos for physical description--though he neglected to point out Mom's amazing resemblance to Geena Davis. (However, he did mention that Daughter's new husband looks like Benicio Del Toro.)

SO...
Whose story is it? Is the author right to have outed Mom? Despite her odious behavior, should he have omitted some details in order to keep her identity secret?

Woody Allen Was Right

It's true: 80% (or was it 90%?) of life is just showing up. I had a reservation for the Dave Barry lunch sponsored by the Denver Press Club. I was running late, had a million things to do around the house (we're still all over boxes) had to call various contractors (the heat isn't working right--Grr! Brr!), web site to update, workshop to plan for & publicize, etc. I was going to cancel, but thought, What the hell? The house can be cold a little longer, and at least I'll be warm at the lunch.

So I went. Got there 15 minutes late and only heard 10 minutes of Barry, who had to dart out for an interview. But sitting at my table were the director of a local literacy program and the manager of The Rock Bottom Remainders (the band with Barry, Amy Tan & other bestselling writers), who it turns out I'd met at a BookExpo party a couple of years ago. We got to talking, swapped cards and info, and wound up being among the last people to leave.

Moral: Be there.

Life Intrudes Yet Again

Woke up this morning all fired up to:
1) Continue unpacking & organizing my office.
2) Prepare for my Book Promotion 101 workshop in LA on Saturday.

First I took my Aussie-Golden mix out for a nice long walk in a wildish section of park along Cherry Creek, where there's no one to snarl at you about leash laws. It was warm (50s), sunny, not too windy for a change--a perfect Denver day. Got back home even more fired up to Get Things Accomplished.

But first I had to feed myself and dog. Gave her a bowl of chow and she dove right in. Then I heard jingling (license) & flapping (floppy ears). OK, so she had a tickle in her ear. More jingling & flapping a few seconds later. Must be quite a tickle, I thought. A few more seconds go by. Jingle/flap. A few more seconds. Jingle/flap. Over and over.

I look in her ears. Oh no, here we go again...

New to-do list:
1) Search piled-up boxes in hallway, bathroom & basement for doggie ear wash & antibacterial goo.
2) Corner dog, wash ears, insert goo.
3) Prepare for workshop.

Advice from the Trenches II

This just in from Quang X. Pham, author of A SENSE OF DUTY: My Father, My American Journey (Ballantine Books, 2005), who attended the same Book Promotion 101 session as Kathryn Jordan (see post below).

Quang X. Pham writes:

I went through a media training session with Kim-from-LA [she & colleague Bill Applebaum presented at the workshop] and that really helped with my appearances on NBC, Tavis Smiley Show on PBS, C-SPAN BookTV, NPR and many other regional radio and television interviews. Have energy, be passionate, lose the frog in your throat, don't blab forever...

My wife threw a launch party for 200 attendees (including media) on April 12, 2005, the day my father-son memoir went on sale. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.

My first printing was 15,000 and the book went into a second printing six weeks after publication. My publicist sent galleys and books along with pitches. I sent out another 100 at my cost, resulting in a dozen reviews and interviews in niche publications and newsletters (and Amazon.com). After the first three weeks (unless you're James Frey), authors are on their own!

Niche venues, like Kathryn Jordan said, are much more productive than chain bookstores. Service organizations, friends of libraries and colleges worked the best for me. THEY HAVE BUILT-IN MAILING LISTS.

Advice from the Trenches

The below is just in from two-time Book Promotion 101 alum Kathryn Jordan, author of HOT WATER (Berkley), a novel about a Minnesota housewife who sneaks away for a weekend at a Southern California spa with a rented red Lamborghini and a male escort. I usually can't abide "women's" and romance novels, but this one had me rapt. It's not too often you get a book with hot sex, humor AND a philosophical discussion of Hannah Arendt.

Kathryn Jordan writes:
A year ago I hadn't heard of a launch party, but when Lynn Isenberg (THE FUNERAL PLANNER, MY LIFE UNCOVERED) told about hers at the workshop, my mind got busy. Next week, I will speak and read excerpts at Two Bunch Palms to an audience standing within yards of where the scenes took place. How amazing. [Sure wish I could be there! --B]

'Til last Friday, I didn't know what the print run was. My editor, Leona Nevler, passed away in Dec., and my publicist moved to Simon & Schuster on Jan. 6th (3 days after the book release). Talk about feeling abandoned! Then my new editor called: the print run was 13,000! Pretty darn good for a first novel, and she indicated they're expecting a second printing before long. You said if an author generates enough interest it could make the publisher increase the print run. I don't know for sure, but maybe that's what happened.

Here's my advice:

1. Find a niche market, if possible. My publishers were delighted with the spa resort tour idea.
2. Use the internet - Follow every lead, however small. I took part in a conference call with retreat coaches (found online browsing spa resorts) and several events came from that, including the Hot Licks BBQ & Saloon in Bisbee, AZ (who woulda thought?) which is planning special sexy drinks, a sexy fashion show and belly dancers! An event at La Posada Resort in Santa Fe also came from the call, because I decided to go to a retreat at Ojo Caliente. Only about 20 women will be there, but boy did it pay off. A Borders signing in Santa Fe, and a couple things in Albuquerque too.
3. Use each success to get more. I used the fact that the book is set at Two Bunch Palms to get local spa resorts to support my booth in the Palm Springs Book Fest (way before the book came out) and to interest other spas in events. I used La Costa (one of the first to book) to get more. I used the signings in Vegas... Well, you get the idea.
4. Do not let disappointments stop you. There were spa resorts who decided Hot Water wasn't "appropriate" for them. (They'll be sorry!) Sometimes the same day I'd get a rejection, then pick up another venue.
5. Send lots of galleys and advance copies, join whatever networking groups fit, word-of-mouth, word-of-mouth, word-of-mouth. My continual requests for more galleys--which ran out so they made bound manuscripts--must've registered on the publisher. I've given away maybe 40 copies from my author supply, but women are passing them around. Even some who said "inappropriate" are giving it to friends to read in the closet.
6. Think outside the box - My "Hot Water House Party" idea (like lingerie or Tupperware, but with me & the book) is actually working. 6 scheduled so far.
7. Be gracious. What people want is to connect with you on a personal level. They want to touch your experience as a writer. I've actually made friends with many women, talking or emailing about issues in the book, about writing, about events, etc.
8. Practice. Keep it short.
9. And finally, the bottom line of Book Promotion 101: WRITE A GOOD BOOK. With an edge, if possible.

Build a Better Website

Through my Book Promotion 101 work and as a program organizer for the Virginia Festival of the Book, I look at an awful lot of authors' websites. And too many of them are indeed awful--amateurish, poorly organized, with vital information hard to find or nonexistent.

Here is what every website should have:

1) An experienced designer! You get what you pay for (but don't overpay either). A good designer can set up your site so that you can edit the content yourself. Your website is your public face to the world. Make it crisp, sharp and professional-looking. As a friend of mine in ad sales once told me, "Presentation is everything."

2) A good proofreader & copy editor! (Not you. The more eyes checking it, the better.)

3) URL should be [yourname.com]. If you must use [booktitle.com], it should lead to [yourname.com].

4) An image of your current book on the first screen of the home page with title, publisher, publication date, purchasing information & blurbs.

5) Separate pages for Author Bio, Press/Reviews, Events, Contact, Book Excerpt, Other Works.

6) MAKE IT EASY TO REACH YOU! Contact page must have your email address (you can encrypt it and/or set up a separate Yahoo/Hotmail/Gmail/etc account just for website mail); contact info for your publicist (her name, title, email & phone #).

7) Bio page should have a good, clear, recognizable picture of you, with a high-resolution (at least 300dpi) PROFESSIONAL headshot that journalists & event organizers can download. This means: No blurry snapshots on vacation or in front of a bookcase. No pix of you with pets/kids/spouse/partner.

8) Meta tags on (at least) your home page with your name, book title & key words. For example: Charles Dickens, Oliver Twist, orphan, orphans, orphanage, pickpockets, gangs, Fagin, London, 19th century.

9) No flash animation on home page (takes too long to download & watch). But if you must have animation, have a "Skip flash" button.

10) No automatic sound (annoying/embarrassing for office workers). Offer sound as an option (for example: see website for Becky Motew, author of the upcoming COUPON GIRL.)

Here is a nearly perfect author website:
LOVE WALKED IN by Marisa de los Santos. My only quibbles are that she doesn't have a URL for her name & no meta tags, so a Google search for her name didn't lead to the site.

OK, I'm really back

Happy New Year! After 3 weeks in a hotel suite, I and my family, including dog & cat, are ensconced amidst scores of boxes in a charming (read: drafty & spottily heated) Victorian house in Denver. And after countless hours of frustration & umpteen calls to Qwest (Motto: "Pay no attention to our salespeople or website"), I'm finally able to send email again. No one else in the house can, though, till I work up my fortitude to call Qwest about why the wireless router isn't routing. Ah technology...

I'm back...more or less

Sometimes life interferes with blogging. When I last posted, I was living in Charlottesville, VA, and had just put my house on the market. Eight days ago, I moved to Denver--or rather to a hotel in suburban Denver, and then yesterday to a hotel in downtown Denver. (Sooner or later I'll have a real home again, but that's another story.)

Between dealing with the selling realtor & the buying realtor, fixing up & clearing out one house (including disposing of some 500 books), negotiating to buy another, contacting schools here & there, hassling with United Airlines over pet transportation (GRR!), coordinating my panels for next year's VaBook Festival, etc...well, let's just say that blogging fell by the wayside. So did reading other people's blogs. In fact, so did any online activity that didn't directly pertain to Real Daily Life.

As a way of dipping my toe back into the blogging waters, let me point you to the ever-entertaining Miss Snark, the Literary Agent, who wisely observes in a post entitled, "Money can't buy love...and a few other things either":

And remember, throwing lots of money at a publicity campaign is often not as effective as you think it will be. You can BUY advertising and marketing support. You can buy a publicist's time, but you cannot buy publicity. You can generate it, you can support it, but you cannot buy it.

Strong Women on the Road

Novelists Judith Ryan Hendricks (THE BAKER'S APPRENTICE, Wm. Morrow), Daniela Kuper (HUNGER AND THIRST, St. Martin's) and Masha Hamilton (THE DISTANCE BETWEEN US, Unbridled Books) have joined forces to do a traveling road show, "Strong Women Characters: In Fiction. In Person." They're currently touring Colorado and New Mexico, organized by publicist extraordinaire Caitlin Hamilton Summie. (See press release and tour schedule.)

Hendricks sends this dispatch from the front lines:

Strong Women Tour - Part One
Our hotel room looks like a sorority house on Sunday morning. There are shoes—Masha’s cross trainers, Daniela’s black loafers, my cowboy boots. Sweaters and dresses draped over chairs, cosmetics and vitamins litter the bathroom vanity, damp towels on the floor.

We all tell each other, “I really don’t live like this—normally.”

But I think we’ve all been wanting to. Live like this, I mean. We are a sorority. The three laptops plugged into various outlets tell the tale—a sorority of writers. Three midlife women—a war journalist, a bread baker and an advertising CEO who made abrupt exits off the smooth blacktop of known careers onto the potholed gravel road of fiction writing.

It’s not an unknown story. A lot of writers have come from other places. What makes this group startling is the way we have banded and bonded together for this trip…The Strong Women in Fiction Tour, our publicist calls it, for lack of a better description. The irony for me is that on my solo book tour just prior to this, I felt anything but strong. There were too many long drives through rain and traffic that moved by inches to speak to groups of three and four readers, sign some stock and then drive back to my parents’ house in yet more rain and traffic. Alone.

By the time I got to Lizzie’s house in Denver I felt exhausted and beaten, in a way I’ve rarely felt. Elizabeth Eads is an old friend of Daniela’s and she has insisted we stay with her for the Denver leg of our tour. Her house, with its warm wooden floors, comfortable furniture and folk art, is the kind of place that you pull up around you like a blanket rather than walk into. As is Lizzie herself—a tall, lanky beauty with curly hair that I would kill for, a contagious laugh, and a penchant for saying “Oh, shut up,” in an Arkansas twangy voice whenever we try to thank her for anything.

I immediately relaxed in her presence, like butter coming to room temperature. But then Daniela arrived, loaded down with groceries and wine, and Masha, straight off the plane from New York, and Lizzie was roasting chickens, steaming wild rice and the rest of us were cleaning tiny crisp asparagus and washing red leaf lettuce and setting the table. We talked as if we were cousins who hadn’t seen each other in years, not strangers who had only been together once before for a few hours on a panel in Tempe, AZ. That is to say, all we had to do was catch up. We had no need to explain ourselves to each other, tell where we were coming from. Somehow we knew.

Lost & Found in the City of the Dead

1920s graves, Edmonton Cemetery, North London.

Tonight begins Yom Kippur, the day of atonement and remembrance of the dead. So it's about time that I finally recount my August visit to Edmonton Cemetery in London. As I wrote in the July 29 post kicking off my Fabulous Yiddisher Britisher Tour, I and long-lost Stander cousins Dan and father Howard went to Edmonton but were denied entrance. The helpful person who told me the cemetery closes at 4:00 pm on summer Fridays neglected to mention that the gates are locked at 3:00 pm. So we left in defeat, after I snapped a retaliatory photo (see 7/29 post).

I went back by myself the following Tuesday at 1:00. Thanks to the databases on JewishGen.org, I knew where three long-ago kin were buried, and figured I'd find others on my own by looking at each and every grave as I had in Margate. But after walking back and forth through maybe 20 rows of tightly packed graves in Q section nearest the entrance (the sections go A-Z, with dozens of rows in each), I realized that I had to rethink my strategy.


At the entrance of Edmonton Cemetery, with the
caretaker's cottage on left & section Q on right.

So I trudged the 1/4 mile or so to the office, where there was a group of men in jeans and T-shirts huddled about. I thought maybe I'd interrupted some frum religious ritual, but on closer inspection they turned out to be playing a mid-day game of poker. I asked the caretaker, a freckled and sandy-haired bloke with a classic Nawf Lunnen accent, whether there was a map to the graves. No, just a plan of the various sections. I left my heavy bag in his care and traipsed back out into the blazing sun (yes, London does get hot & sunny) with just my camera, notebook & pen. This time I decided to look for the graves I knew about, then go through sections T-Z, which weren't yet in the JewishGen database.


Wall near office, Edmonton Cemetery. Ladies' sign is
in Yiddish: "Fuhr froyin." For detail of large sign over
fountain, see August post "Signs of the Times: London."

I threaded my way through the claustrophobic K section (see photo at top), dodging leaning headstones while also trying not to step on the graves; an impossible task, as they're maybe six inches apart. Eventually I found the grave of Harris & Jane Stander, who died respectively in 1940 and 1921. I knew they had a son, Benjamin--named for Jane's father, I deduced from the headstone inscription--and wondered why there was no mention of him. Then I righted the tablet at the foot of the grave that had been knocked over so long ago that there was a thick layer of soil under it, embedded in which were lead letters that had fallen off the stone. (Many of the gravestones had letters stuck onto them, instead of carved inscriptions. Must have been cheaper; definitely less durable.) It was a memorial for Benjamin from his sisters; he was killed in action in 1915, age 22. Poor boy; I wondered whether anyone alive besides myself knew he had existed. The grave had obviously not been visited in decades.


Grave of Harris (Zvi) & Jane (Simchah)
Stander, and memorial for son Benjamin.

Let this be a virtual memorial candle to Benjamin Stander and all the forgotten dead wherever--and whoever--they may be.

What Are You Doing?

Thanks to a reader's comments on the inestimable Miss Snark, the literary agent's blog, I found some fantastic essays on writing and publishing by author Jennifer Crusie. (Yeah, so she writes romances. Get over it.) One of the best is It's All About You: The First Step in Finding an Agent. Even (and especially) for writers who already have agents, Crusie's advice is spot-on. She emphasizes looking at one's whole career, not just this one book--something I've been increasingly honing in on in my Book Promotion 101 workshops. She asks:

[W]here do you see your publishing career in a year? If you interviewed an agent now, could you tell her what you want her to do for you beyond “sell my book”? Do you know what editors you'd like to work with, can you pitch the kind of books you need to write, do you know how long you need to have between books, can you tell her how you feel about starting in midlist? Can you tell her where you'd like to be in five years, the improvements in money and contract terms you want to have by then, the kind of things you want to have happen over the next five years to make those improvement feasible? Do you know where you want to be in ten years, the kind of career and life you're aiming for?

Read the whole essay, and then check out the rest of Crusie's website. It's an object lesson in how to do a perfect author site.

Rolling Stones Report

Here's what you don't want to see part-way through a Rolling Stones concert: An empty stage being minutely examined by three bomb-sniffing dogs and their policeman handlers. But I get ahead of myself...

Turns out there was no activity bus for Darling Child on Thursday (I was too tired to write this up yesterday) because every school bus in town was being used to ferry people from outlying parking lots to Scott Stadium at UVa. We parked at a 500-space garage about a mile away, which by 5:45 was almost full (showtime was 7pm), and joined a couple dozen other clever people for takeout at Foods of All Nations, a local gourmet supermarket. (BTW, you haven't lived till you've had their chocolate-dipped almond macaroons.)

At 6:30 or so we joined the throngs heading to Scott Stadium, and at 7:00, when opening act Trey Anastasio began, we were shuffling up a ramp toward our seats at the bottom tier of the nosebleed section. (I joked that we'd be singing "Nearer My God to Thee.") I'm no Phish fan and Anastasio's band left me cold. Evidently most of the ticketholders felt similarly, as the stadium was maybe 1/3 full. Anastasio's best number was the Beatles' "I Am the Walrus," but even that lacked much vitality. Sure wish we'd had the Black-Eyed Peas, who are opening for the Stones elsewhere. The band was off the stage by 7:30, to deservedly tepid applause.

At a few minutes before 9:00, by which time the stadium was full, the Stones came on with a bang--literally--with "Start It Up." A five-story (!) structure at the back of the stage shot off flames and fireworks from both ends of its swooping wings (the jumbo video screen was in the center). I could feel the heat from 120+ yards away. Yowzah!

Next came "Only Rock 'n' Roll," then "Shattered," "Ruby Tuesday," and a song from their new album. Interestingly, the videography for the latter was in black & white, while the rest were in color, so the new song looked "old." (I might have missed a couple songs in there.) Then Jagger got out an acoustic guitar and harmonica and said, "We don't get to play this one very often," and brought the house down with "Sweet Virginia." The crowd, including Your Humble Correspondent, all sang along, and went wild when the video screen showed a young woman in the audience with a "Sweet Virginia is for Stones Lovers" t-shirt. Much to my surprise, Darling Spouse--he of the 700+ record album collection & encyclopedic knowledge of popular music--had never heard "Sweet Virginia" before & was astonished that practically everyone there (especially YHC) knew it. It just goes to show: You think you know someone and then...

It hardly seems possible, but Jagger then brought the house down even more with a tribute to Ray Charles, complete with b&w pix of Charles on the Jumbotron, singing "Nighttime Is the Right Time" with the female backup singer. Besides her amazing voice, she provided a good deal of visual excitement, as her jiggling embonpoint threatened to overflow the cups of her low-cut vest. But the levees held and there was no wardrobe malfunction.

After that, Jagger started introducing the band and was just turning to Keith Richards when he abruptly left the stage, then a couple of minutes later reappeared to say that he was very sorry, but there was a"technical problem" not of their making & they had to stop the show. He stressed that this was not planned and they'd be back in about 10 minutes. Next thing we knew, the stadium lights were all on, the Jumbotron was off, and the stage (including the few hundred seats in the 5-story structure) & first 20 rows of the field seats were cleared out. Hmm, that's weird, I thought. Weirder still was when I saw the policemen and dogs. I and some other bystanders figured (correctly, as we learned from the news next day) that someone had phoned in a bomb threat. Ugh. I uneasily recalled that a friend had joked that if a bomb went off in Scott Stadium that night, half the teenagers in Charlottesville would be orphaned. Suddenly it didn't seem so funny, especially with my own teenager right there.

The "10 minutes" stretched to an hour, towards the end of which the audience passed the time by doing multiple stadium waves. All those pale arms (I think there were more African Americans on stage--5?--than in the stands) looked like coral fronds in an undersea current. Finally, the Stones came back at 10:30, appropriately with "Miss You," then launched into "Honky Tonk Women," which brought on the rain that had been threatening for the past two days, though fortunately not very heavily. The humidity had been something like 110%--we were sweating just sitting still, and that was up where there was a breeze. Earlier Jagger had observed that it was "a sultry Southern night." I'll say! (We're still desperately awaiting fall weather. Please send some this way!)

To cut a long story short, the Stones rocked out with many of their golden oldies: "Midnight Rambler" (great visuals in sync with the music); "Sympathy for the Devil," which had the audience singing "woo woo" long before Jagger chimed in; "Get Off of My Cloud," "Paint It Black" (Jagger seemed off-key on that one). There were one or two new tunes in there, then a grand finale of "Jumpin' Jack Flash." The encores were "You Can't Always Get What You Want," with the female singer's powerful operatic soprano, and "Satisfaction." By then it was after midnight and despite the late hour, there was another spectacular jet of flames followed by a bunch of loud, bright white fireworks. I'm sure they were appreciated by every dog, cat and baby in the neighborhood.

We didn't get home till 1:20 a.m. (we'd originally estimated we'd be back by 11:30. Ha!) and not 10 minutes later the rain came down in torrents, which didn't let up till this afternoon. I imagined Jagger looking in his hotel-room mirror, saying "Après moi le déluge."

In conclusion: You can make all the jokes you want about "geezer rock," but the Stones still have It. And Charlie Watts makes every other drummer look as though he's working too hard. Also, our drought is officially over.

TJ* Would Not Be Amused...Or Would He?

The Rolling Stones are playing in UVa's Scott Stadium tonight and they're the biggest thing from Britain to hit Charlottesville since...well, probably since the Redcoats stormed the town in 17-whatever. (I guess all those lectures at Monticello didn't stick.)

There is no other news here in Charlottesville, VA. Seriously. Except that Darling Child's activity bus from school is late and his Doting Parents are anxiously waiting to start up the flivver and join the throngs looking to park near the stadium (i.e., within a mile).

Full concert report tomorrow.


*That's Mr. Jefferson to you.