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Category Archives: Writing
Something to Show for Each Year
I am frequently asked why I bother writing my various books. I don’t have a huge audience to satisfy like Stephen King or J. K. Rowling. In my case, my books sell sporadically and I don’t know there is a … Continue reading
Posted in Art, Literature, Writing
Tagged Ani DiFranco, Bob Dylan, Coming Home to Newfoundland, For a Breath I Tarry, J. K. Rowling, Multiple Personality Disorder, Not Quite Dark, Roger Zelazny, Stephen King
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Textual Reality and the Phenomenological World
Although my friend’s daughter asked me one time if the story I had just told her was a “true story,” most people acknowledge—however reluctantly in the case of Harry Potter fans—that the characters in the stories they read are fictional. … Continue reading
Posted in Culture, Literary Theory, Literature, Media, Writing
Tagged Harry Potter, Helen of Troy, Hogwarts, Hunger Games, Linda Hutcheon, Marshall McLuhan, Phenomenology, Racist Jesus, reality, The Appearance of Solidity, twilight, Wolfgang Iser, writerly text
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Working on the Birth and Death of Planeville
I have spent the last few months—when I can spare a moment from teaching and marking—working on my novel about the now extinct village of Planeville. In some ways this project has been more difficult than others, perhaps because although … Continue reading
Posted in Ancient Peoples, History, Writing
Tagged New Brunswick, Planeville, Planeville: The Birth and Death of a Village, Writing
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Neal Stephenson’s Snow Crash
Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson My rating: 4 of 5 stars View all my reviews
Posted in Culture, Post-Apocalyptic, Singularity, Writing
Tagged Neal Stephenson, Snow Crash
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The Origin of Planeville
The settlers of Planeville pulled a living from the south facing slope by planting apples trees on the bank, floated spruce and fir down the river to Jewet’s mill so the lumber could be sold in town, and scraped gardens … Continue reading
Fifty Shades and a Silo of the Publishing Industry
The so-called vanity press has changed little in the public imagination until very recently. Traditionally, paying to have your book published was seen as synonymous with junk novels and sentimental and self-indulgent poetry. The only route to acceptance by the … Continue reading
Posted in Art, Culture, Editing, Literature, Social Media, Writing
Tagged Amazon, Beth Reekles, E. L. James, eBook, Erika Leonard, fan fiction, fifty shades of grey, Gulliver’s Travels, Henry David Thoreau, Hugh Howey, James Redfield, Jonathan Swift, Kindle, Lisa Genova, Penguin, Random House, Self-publishing, Silo Series, Still Alice, The Celestine Prophecy, The Kissing Booth, twilight, Warner Books, Wool
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How We Write the Future
Whenever I think of writing about the future, I always remember those early writers of science fiction beginning in the forties and extending into the seventies, Heinlein and Asimov among them, who thought we’d be smoking in spacesuits, and that … Continue reading
Posted in Culture, Literature, Singularity, Writing
Tagged Electric Ant, Flight to Forever, H. G. Wells, Men Like Gods, Philip K. Dick, Poul Anderson
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Writing is a Poor Person’s Art
Writing is the poor person’s art, just like soccer is the poor person’s sport. All you need to play soccer is a will, for a ball can be made out of torn nylon stockings, my friends from Chile tell me, … Continue reading
Posted in Art, Culture, Literature, Solitude, Writing
Tagged blogging, meditation, quills, reader's digest, Writing
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An Authorial Dream of Wealth and Success
Perhaps because my latest book, Not Quite Dark: A Post-Apocalyptic Adoption Story is doing well in terms of sales, I had a strange dream about being a popular writer the other night. I dreamed that Obama had unwittingly endorsed my … Continue reading
Posted in Art, Literature, Mars, Post-Apocalyptic, Writing
Tagged Not Quite Dark, Obama, Surviving the Apocalypse, Thailand, Writing
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Killing Kids in Books and Film
Perhaps because I teach courses about apocalyptic literature, and I’m an avid fan of end of the world stories, I have read and watched enough of the genre that I’ve noted a significant, if not disturbing trend. This is a … Continue reading
Posted in Literature, Post-Apocalyptic, Teaching, Writing
Tagged Blood and Gore, Children of Men, Cormac McCarthy, Dale Pendell, Dystopia, End of the world, Eternity Road, Frank Darabont, Gratuitous Violence in the Media, Jack McDevitt, Killing Children, Lord of the Flies, Not Quite Dark, Resident Evil, Surviving the Apocalypse, The Great Bay Chronicles of the Collapse, The Road, The Walking Dead, William Golding, Working After the Collapse
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