Did you know that 350 or so people stomping on the ground sounds like rain? It really does!And with this rain, we are introducing our conference faculty. Except that no one is coming in the door. Good thing Kim is wearing sensible shoes so she can run back and invite them in.And now, she is... Continue Reading →
A limerick for the ages
Peg Kehret sent this along, and it seemed like a fine way to celebrate National Poetry Month. A new class of antidepressants Is targeted at adolescents. They lose track of time, Of meter, of rhyme, I mean, it's like really sad.
Hahahahaha!
Dana Sullivan's latest ponders the most irritating question we hear from people who have no idea how great kids' books are these days. Zing!
Sex and the single writer
The Rejectionist has a very funny send-up of the romance advice in Cosmo and how it might apply to your pursuit of an agent:At Cosmo's Fun Fearless Males the Booker Awards, Mario Lopez Hilary Mantel confessed, "I'm not really working on trying to find Ms. Right an agent. I'm kind of working on being Mr.... Continue Reading →
Do you have a signature cliche?
My agent looked at a manuscript recently and said, "You like the word [DELETED FOR THE SAKE OF MY PRIDE]."There's a funny article on the Guardian.com about this very topic. Read it here.Then, try pasting your document into Wordle.net. Especially for shorter works, it can make your crutch words leap out at you swiftly and... Continue Reading →
The day jobs of famous writers
Check out this amusing chart (and why is it that the one woman is paid a puny fraction of what the men made?):See the big version of the whole thing at Lapham's Quarterly.
Happy National Grammar Day
I thought you writers might like some of the National Grammar Day highlights: a video by Grammar Girl and a funny bit of grammar noir by a former Baltimore Sun copy editor, John McIntyre.You'll find these things on the Society for the Promotion of Good Grammar blog.
He had me at “undead folks … after our brains”
Adding the zombie cat? Even better. Check out Stix & Bones, a new comic by our colleague Darrell Toland.
Why is Tina Fey in the Chinook Update?
Because she's Tina Fey. Hush up and watch. (Oh, but I kid. She says something funny about confidence being 10 percent hard work and 90 percent delusion, and it seemed like a useful thing to keep in mind.)
The best book ever
Wow, it's like someone has put a secret camera in my office and is recording my methods of working. Weird that they're calling me "Lev," though.