Because it is commencement season and because I teach seniors, the things they are told has been on my mind lately. The funny thing is, I don't remember what the speakers said at either my husband's commencement in 1978 or mine in 1979, although I do remember who they were: Doris Kearns Goodwin, a Colby grad whose biography of Lyndon Johnson had ( Read more... )

"Make Good Art"

Neil Gaiman
Commencement Address 
University of Arts, 2012

Neil Gaiman says so much that is good in this commencement address that if you haven't seen it, I urge you to do so. Now.

You'll have to visit the link, because I can't embed it, but that's okay. You have to watch this. The Whole Thing. I'll wait.

Done?

Made of awesome, right? Not ( Read more... )

It's in the air this year. Neil Gaiman's wish for his readers this year was to hope that we would make mistakes. It included this line:
Whatever it is you're scared of doing, Do it.

It reminded me so much of a bit from Eddie Izzard's second show, "Unrepeatable," in which he talks about going toward your fears. "I’ve looked at fear in a big way, ( Read more... )

Monday afternoon I finally finished the latest round of revisions on StT.

This time the pants fit, thanks to a great critique partner at the March Novel Writing Retreat. Laurie Miller made a suggestion that allowed me to cut the extra-large pants down to size--StT is finally under 300 pages. What I have now looks a lot like Katherine Hepburn:


( Read more... )

The pants are still baggy, but at the moment that's okay because...

The universe smiled.This afternoon's cup of Yogi Tea ginger was brewed from a bag whose tag read: "Be proud of who you are." That captures my main characters perfectly.

That was before I finished outlining!

The result: 

• One problem in chronology identified (whew!) and fix laid out.
• ( Read more... )

I finished eluper 's splendid Seth Baumgartner's Love Manifesto earlier this week, but needed to wait until I had time to do it justice. This novel is a great one for YA readers and YA writers. I'm so glad I picked up a copy at the writer's conference at Mt. Snow--I'm even more glad Eric autographed it for me. This is one I'll treasure for all kinds of ( Read more... )

I've been writing, but what I haven't been doing is subbing. In part that's because during the semester, when I'm not teaching and meeting any other deadlines, what time I have I want to devote to getting words on the page. And since the semester has ended, I've been working hard to get the "Timeless Craft, Timely Skills" conference pulled together ( Read more... )

Ok, I'm too old to count as a raving fan girl,
but I would like to note for the record that Mr. Neil Gaiman said

"Me. My dog. My house. My grey streak which is really kind of cool."

(post for today (May 28), 4th photo down). (Emphasis mine, mine, mine)

Grey streaks are, in fact, cool. They're a sign of life lived, of experience.

Yeah, I've got one--two ( Read more... )

1. 700 words added to the current project today and the total 1300 words polished. It's not fiction, the love of my heart, but it comes close, because it's a feature on composting, which got me thinking about summer and being in the garden, and good food, and the food-soil cycle, and all the people I interviewed who were so enthusiastic about the ( Read more... )

I admit it, I'm a grammar nerd and a punctuation geek. This stuff matters to me. Not more than plot, or character, or dialogue, but it's up there. It's why I offer to do stuff like secretly proofread my Town Report so that later I, and those like me, won't have to grimace through 's-plurals and commas following some, but not all, introductory ( Read more... )