What's New?: November 2008 Archives

My stomach is still full of turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing, and the other usual Thanksgiving Day treats. And I have to leave in a few minutes to go eat lunch. I've been reading Complications: A Surgeon's Notes on an Imperfect Science. The book is extremely well written and interesting.

I'll post a review of it on here as soon as I'm done.

I'll be very busy (and happy) this next week: finishing an article for Signature, presenting papers on historical linguistics and city-as-text narrative, reading my short story The Lexicon of the Sword at the Moon City Invitational at Missouri State, interviewing Brian Kiteley for Ask the Writer, and, finally, working on a nonfiction narrative book proposal.

To everyone who might stumble on this brief note: Happy Thanksgiving!

I've been working nonstop since last week on four or five different projects. Some for school, some not. In any case, I haven't had a chance to post on the blog, so I thought I'd update readers on what's new. I can't post all of the stuff I'm doing here (I don't want to spoil any surprises) but, since you're on a need-to-know basis, I'll tell you what you need to know.

• The Read Well Store - Whenever I can I add books and authors to this Amazon-affiliate bookstore. For example, I just added some books by Brian Kiteley (under A Writer's Toolbox). The Denver University professor will answer questions for Ask the Writer soon, so be sure to look for that, too. And, if you're going to be buying books for Christmas presents, please consider buying them through our store to support the site.
  

• Ask the Writer with Brian Shawver, Part 1 - A few months ago I did a sit-down interview with Brian Shawver, author of Aftermath and The Cuban Prospect. I haven't had time to transcribe our talk, which was long and involved, but I will probably type up the first part over Christmas. Be sure to look for it then. Brian's novel Aftermath already appears under the ATW section of the Read Well Amazon Store.
  
  
• Ask the Writers, Coming Soon - Besides the interviews with Mr. Shawver and Mr. Kiteley, I have several more ideas for author Q & As. Be sure to keep an eye on the RSS feed this holiday season.
  
  
• Midnight Writing - I'm announcing a new series on my site based on writing exercises. The recurring series will feature creative ways to find story in your own fiction and nonfiction. Best of all, readers will be able to write along. Many of the exercises will come from Brian Kiteley's The 3 A.M. Epiphany.
  

Do you enjoy the posts on Write Well? The tips, essays, and, perhaps most importantly, the interviews on Ask the Writer? Did you happen to catch the interviews with Dennis Lehane, Kevin Brockmeier, and Benjamin Percy, among others?

Did it make you want to read their books?

And if you could give back -- at no cost or hassle to yourself -- would you?

I'm pleased to announce the Read Well Amazon-affiliate bookstore. It's just like Amazon, except a small percentage of the money you spend goes back to support the efforts of Write Well.

The prices are the same. It has the same hassle-free navigation as Amazon, the "We also recommend..." links, the customer and starred reviews, the ultra-secure shopping cart, check-out, and shipping. You can see the search box on the right -- an exact duplicate, isn't it?

You even use the same user name and password that you use on Amazon.

As a bonus, though, we've tailored the Read Well store to our site. For example, the opening page is populated by authors who answered questions on Ask the Writer. You can buy Dennis Lehane's Gone, Baby, Gone, Ben Percy's Refresh, Refresh, and Kevin Brockmeier's The Brief History of the Dead, along with all the other books and movies featured on those pages (be sure to click over at the bottom of the page, so you can see all of the section).

The second link, A Writer's Toolbox (again, pictured on the right) features all the best books on fiction technique, especially the ones referenced in posts on this site -- John Gardner's On Becoming a Novelist, Francine Prose's Reading Like A Writer, and Betsy Lerner's The Forest for the Trees. It also includes, on the second page, a link to the textbook Missouri State's Creative Writing faculty uses when we teach English 215: Introduction to Short Story Writing (this, of course, would be Writing Fiction: A Guide to Narrative Craft, 7th Ed. by Janet Burroway and Elizabeth Stuckey-French).