Hangovers Archives - Page 34 of 53

Wednesday Hangovers

2 Comments / Hangovers / By Gwenda / February 28, 2007

Weird specialized dictionaries. (Via Brutal Women.)
Justine has been reading manga and has a recommendation.
Colleen has a fabulous entry on life and death and Margo Rabb’s new novel Cures for Heartbreak. See also: Jen Robinson’s recommendation for same.
A lecture by Jeff VanderMeer on fantasy at the Odyssey Workshop is now available as a podcast.
The divine Ysabeau Wilce on fashionable vs. chic. I just discovered Ysabeau’s blog last week and encourage you to bookmark away.
Norton Award-nominated Maureen Johnson on how to be a a writer in 10 easy steps.
Fuse on the children’s literature/Lost connection.
Jeff has a dispatch from his friend George Kaplan, who’s already headed down to Atlanta for AWP. I’m heading out tomorrow morning, where I will join Pinky and my peeps at the trendy Day’s Inn, all of us having eschewed luxurious digs for free parking and wireless a few miles away. Something tells me you’ll still see us at your fancy hotel bar. I’m on a panel Saturday morning (opposite Kelly, natch), but I imagine I’ll also be findable around the Small Beer Press table quite a bit, so say hi. I’ll update as I can.

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Sunday Hangovers

1 Comment / Hangovers / By Gwenda / February 25, 2007

Gavin reports that a stage production of Kelly’s brilliant short story "The Girl Detective" has just opened in NYC, and Richard Larson reports back that it’s very, very good. This is another of those times I wished we lived in the City.
Betsy at Fusenumber8 says that Laini Taylor’s Faeries of Dreamdark – Blackbringer is the children’s fantasy novel to read this year. (I say it’s Flora Segunda, but I’ve added this one to the list.)
Midori Snyder has a great entry on Ukiyo-e flash animation, complete with a topical scrotum reference.
Chris McLaren has an excellent poem: "Horse Girls" by Tammy Armstrong.
Joe Schrieber on trade paperbacks, hardcovers, and staying alive as a writer. (I, for my own part, am way more likely to buy a TPB, especially if the book’s by a writer I haven’t read before — the cost is a factor, but I also just prefer the portability, without the sacrifice to print size a mass market makes. But I like mass markets too.) Anyway: buy Joe’s books. The first one was a fun, dark pageturner and the next one sounds even better.
I’m near blind after an afternoon of revision that felt almost like starting over; time to uncork a bottle and await the pre-shows. Dress therapy!

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Thursday Hangovers

1 Comment / Hangovers / By Gwenda / February 22, 2007

The Million Writers Award is looking for judges. (Thanks for the heads up to the one and only Rick Bowes, who won the award last year with his amazing story "There’s a Hole in the City.")
Jay Tomio reviews The Orphan’s Tales: In the Night Garden and interviews Catherynne Valente: "The conventional wisdom is that style should be transparent: a window through which the reader views the world of the novel. I don’t believe that—or at least I don’t believe it for me. I believe in thick red curtains and a frosted pane, I believe in the house around the window, I believe in woodworking with flair on the sash. I believe the world means more if you have to throw yourself through broken glass to earn your way in. I believe in style that draws blood." Needless to say, I thought this book was wonderful.
Max offers his impressions of The New Yorker’s fiction selections from last year.
Literaticat interviews Cynthia Leitich Smith.
The New York Review of Books reprint series is having a half-off sale. (Via Fusenumber8.)
Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast has a co-review of Laura Schlitz’s A Drowned Maiden’s Hair, which I loved loved loved to pieces.
My Vermont College classmate Gene Brenek–who’s an amazing illustrator and writer–is interviewed over at Cynsations today. Yay!
Leila delivers a scrotumtastic T-shirt and all is happiness.

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Tuesday Hangovers

Hangovers / By Gwenda / February 20, 2007

Night Shade Books SALE-A-RAMA through midnight tonight; half off with a minimum of four books (coupon code: NSB773). I suggest nabbing Jon Armstrong’s Grey, a little Kage Baker, Lord Dunsany’s club tales, M. John Harrison’s The Course of the Heart, Gwyneth Jones’s Bold as Love, Tricia Sullivan’s Maul, and, well, I could keep going. Check it out if you have some bucks laying around.
People imitating Dan Brown? Say it ain’t so!
The Office: A Spec Script by David Mamet (by Julia Ward) at McSweeney’s. (Via Rarely Likable.)
It turns out, ‘youth literature is filled with scrotums.’ Someone get Colbert on this, stat.

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Friday Hangovers (Updated)

4 Comments / Hangovers / By Gwenda / February 16, 2007

The Guardian profiles several writers’ writing rooms; they’re all quite beautiful. (Via Richard Larson.) I have desk envy.
Fusenumber8 revisits the controversy over the appearance of the word scrotum in the latest Newbery winner, The Higher Power of Lucky, and librarians refusing to stock it. For shame.
Terri Windling offers further thoughts on art as a gift and reinterpreting myth, jumping off Lethem’s essay in Harper’s. I ordered the Lewis Hyde book immediately.
Glass eye story! (My favorite! Quick, I’ll tell you one: At one ICFA banquet, we were hiding Kelly‘s glass eye — not that she wore, that she owned — in various people’s food and Andy almost ate it. Or maybe he was just pretending not to notice. Hilarity ensued.) (Via Jenny D, who comfortingly has all the same weird obsessions as me.)
Jenny Vorwaller’s exquisite collection of jewelry inspired by The Secret Garden. (Via Lauren.)
J.L. Bell on the wonderfulness of Jonathan Stroud’s Ptolemy’s Gate, following its Cybils win. I’ve had these books for awhile, but now intend to finally get around to reading them.
Poem: Otherwise by Jane Kenyon. (Via Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast.)
UPDATE: In honor of The Higher Power of Lucky controversy, Jo Knowles asks for your scrotum poems over at her LJ, or post your own.

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Wednesday Hangovers

5 Comments / Hangovers / By Gwenda / February 14, 2007

Happy Valentine’s if you observe it, and if you don’t: here’s to you anyway. And a special shout-out to my valentr sweetie-pies because y’all are wonderful. For my well-documented feelings on this holiday of doom, see this ancient–er, 2005–post at the first incarnation of S&S.
There’s a new ZZ Packer short story–the unfortunately titled "Pita Delicious"–in last weekend’s WashPost Magazine.
Two accounts of a recent Phillip Pullman talk on narrative: Scholar’s Blog and Niall Harrison.
Tony Schlesinger on spiral staircases. (Via Jenny D.)
A Maltese Falcon goes missing; look for a dame without a heart. (Via Pinky.)
Nancy Pearl recommends one of my all-time favorite travel books, Redmond O’Hanlon’s In Trouble Again: A Journey Between the Orinoco and the Amazon. This reminds me that I never read Trawler.
Colleen recommends a worthy cause to send books to in New Orleans. Send, send, send.
Leila recommends my current advisor Tim Wynne-Jones’ new novel Rex Zero and the End of the World, which has been getting starred reviews all over the joint. (I guess I’ll have to wait until next semester to read it, sadly, because there’s something the tiniest bit awkward about annotating a book and turning it into the author for grading.)
And while I’m on the subject of new books by Vermont College faculty members, Tantalize by Cynthia Leitich Smith is now in fine bookstores everywhere (thanks to the lovely Carrie Jones for the reminder). I read it all the way back in August, when I vowed to do a more substantial post about it. I find I don’t have the time, so I’ll just point to what I said then: Simply put: FABULOUS. So good and dark. Best ending I’ve read in ages, and nicely feminist as well. If it reminds me of anything, perhaps a bit of Robin McKinley’s Sunshine, but with the focus and directness of the best YA.
The Spring 2007 nominees for the LitBlog Co-op have been announced, and they include (drumroll) Alan DeNiro’s Skinny Dipping in the Lake of the Dead, and two other very worthy titles. Color me excited in advance of the discussion. (p.s. My crystal ball predicts some interesting things will happen at the LBC this year. Really.)

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Monday Hangovers

Hangovers / By Gwenda / February 12, 2007

Lunar eclipse on Saturday, March 3. (Via Cecil.)
Deila Sherman on writers reading their work to an audience, and the dangers and opportunities therein.
Ed reviews China Mieville’s Un Lun Dun in the LA Times and is disappointed. I haven’t made it around to reading this one yet, but I’m still looking forward to it.
Jeff VanderMeer on setting goals (and other things as well).
Justine asks Maureen Dowd to step outside … and get whacked in the head with some actual chick lit before she writes a foolish column about it.
Anthony Bourdain expresses his opinions on some Food Network personalities (I was going for understated; it’s hilarious). And he likes Alton Brown, so it’s okay, you can go read it. (Via Max.)
ESP lab at Princeton closing down. (Via Jenny D.)
Chance hates on The Last Unicorn and kicks off a great discussion on books that disappointed.
Bennett Madison needs your blonde jokes. As a blonde, I can say that I’ve never actually heard a funny one, so this could be a serious situation. Get over there, stat.