I just realized that I had not posted this on Live Journal...

Many of you know I spent much of the spring and summer writing, and it's finally time to announce why! A new book!!! And it’s coming next Spring!

A few years ago, my writer friend and editor extraordinaire Stephen Segal edited GEEK WISDOM: The Sacred Teachings of Nerd Culture. I loved ( Read more... )

While I was revising my second book, The Supper Club (update on that soon), I spent a lot of time last year reading and writing short stories and poetry. I wasn't quite ready to delve into the next novel, and I wanted to sharpen some skills and exercise writerly muscles I hadn't used in a while, so I wrote poems and short stories, flash fiction and ( Read more... )

With the busy Words & Wheels weekend in LaCrosse, I didn’t get the chance to blog properly about the Chicago Classics reading.

Happy to be a part the celebration of Chicago literature, I read along with 20 local writers at Lincoln Hall (what used to be the Three Penny Theater back when I was a student at DePaul). It was a diverse and talented group ( Read more... )

This week is my father’s birthday. (Mnohaya Lita, Tato.)

When I was a child, my father was a policeman who decided to run for alderman to make a change in our neighborhood. He lost that election but later ran for Illinois Senate, and against the odds, he won. Family and friends spent hours going door to door, handing out fliers, working on a truly ( Read more... )

Tonight is Ukrainian Christmas Eve, Sviat Vechir (Holy Night). Like the Greek Orthodox and many Eastern Rite Catholics, many Ukrainians families will be gathering together at their baba’s or mama’s or aunt’s houses to eat some variation of the traditional twelve dishes and sing Ukrainian carols.


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I am determined to get this blog entry written before the end of 2010, and so here goes.

Philadelphia was a wonderful whirlwind. The reading at Moonstone Arts Center (aka Robin’s Books) was a small but enthusiastic audience. It was also broadcast live, so my kids got a chance to see their mama on the computer, which was a thrill for them back at ( Read more... )

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NewPages Blog recently listed an entry about the editorials in Conclave: A Journal of Character and American Short Fiction:

Some Notes on Character

“I ran across a couple of great editorials in the most recent issues of American Short Fiction and Conclave. Both speak the the nature of character in writing as well as, for Conclave, in photography. ( Read more... )

NewPages Blog recently listed an entry about the editorials in Conclave: A Journal of Character and American Short Fiction:

Some Notes on Character

“I ran across a couple of great editorials in the most recent issues of American Short Fiction and Conclave. Both speak the the nature of character in writing as well as, for Conclave, in photography. ( Read more... )