Author Archives: writedrunkandeditsober

The Most Beautiful Things

Posted on September 23, 2012 by writedrunkandeditsober

The Most Beautiful Things

“Remember that the most beautiful things in the world are the most useless; peacocks and lilies for instance.” – John Steinbeck

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Posted in John Steinbeck, lilies, peacocks, Quotes, writing | Comments Off on The Most Beautiful Things

Read “Birnam Wood” by T. Coraghessan Boyle

Posted on September 21, 2012 by writedrunkandeditsober

My aunt learned to read tarot cards in college as a party trick. Now, every New Years when she comes to visit, she’ll pull out her stack of cards from their purple velvet pouch, shuffle them between her long-nailed hands, … Continue reading → Continue reading →

Posted in Authors, Birnam Wood, Literature, Macbeth, New Yorker, Read Drunk; Analyze Sober, reading, story, T. Coraghessan Boyle, tarot cards, writing | Comments Off on Read “Birnam Wood” by T. Coraghessan Boyle

Read Drunk; Analyze Sober

Posted on September 12, 2012 by writedrunkandeditsober

It’s time to declare the new age of the short story. It’s time to laud the concise. It’s time to realize that in this day and age of blogs and online journals and YouTube videos, print media—books and newspapers, especially—are … Continue reading → Continue reading →

Posted in Amazon Kindle, Black Box, Canada, Jennifer Egan, Literature, New York Times, New Yorker, reviews, Richard Ford, Short story, Twitter, writing | Comments Off on Read Drunk; Analyze Sober

Fresh Meat for Turtles

Posted on September 11, 2012 by writedrunkandeditsober

Koi don’t go for worms, and they’re not suckers for bait, either. People don’t fish koi because they’re bottom feeders—fish who spend their time nibbling algae from green-fuzzed rocks—and the koi wouldn’t be tempted by the likes of a flashing … Continue reading → Continue reading →

Posted in books, Creative Writing, Grandad, Houston, koi, Vanderbilt University, World War II, writing | Comments Off on Fresh Meat for Turtles

Paying for Online Book Reviews | Is It Wrong?

Posted on August 27, 2012 by writedrunkandeditsober

Reblogged from Peter Galen Massey's Book Blog: In Sunday’s New York Times Business section, David Streitfeld reports on self-published authors paying for reviews of their books on the internet. The article focuses on Todd Rutherford and his now-defunct company, GettingBookReviews.com, … Continue reading → Continue reading →

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The Roadkill Cure to Writer’s Block

Posted on August 11, 2012 by writedrunkandeditsober

“If the artist starts evaluating himself, it’s an enormous block, isn’t it?” – Philip Guston, painter Before you go on a tangent today, criticizing your writing (as well as your personality, your life, and the dog with scruffy ears you … Continue reading → Continue reading →

Posted in Artists, Life, Philip Guston, Quotes, roadkill, taxidermy, writer's block, writing | Comments Off on The Roadkill Cure to Writer’s Block

The World Must Be All Fucked Up

Posted on July 24, 2012 by writedrunkandeditsober

“The world must be all fucked up,” he said then, “When men travel first class and literature goes as freight.” – Gabriel García Márquez And with the packing of the books, you know we’ve come to the end of the … Continue reading → Continue reading →

Posted in Authors, books, Gabriel García Márquez, Quotes | Comments Off on The World Must Be All Fucked Up

On Writing Bad Fiction

Posted on July 11, 2012 by writedrunkandeditsober

I just wrote a  bad story. A 26-page disaster of a story, to be specific. Now that I’ve come to the end of it, now that it’s all been punched out—I’ve come to realize that the whole thing is one … Continue reading → Continue reading →

Posted in 10 000 hours, Authors, fiction, Life, Literature, Malcolm Gladwell, Outliers, practice, story, writing | Comments Off on On Writing Bad Fiction

The Good Life, Whatever It Is and Wherever It Happens to Be

Posted on July 10, 2012 by writedrunkandeditsober

“Let us toast to animal pleasures, to escapism, to rain on the roof and instant coffee, to unemployment insurance and library cards, to absinthe and good-hearted landlords, to music and warm bodies and contraceptives… and to the ‘good life’, whatever … Continue reading → Continue reading →

Posted in Authors, ernest hemingway, Florida, Hunter S. Thompson, Key West, Life, Literature, Miami Beach, Pub crawl, Quotes, travel, vacation | Comments Off on The Good Life, Whatever It Is and Wherever It Happens to Be

I Sent Out 126 Rejection Letters Today

Posted on July 3, 2012 by writedrunkandeditsober

Believe me, it wasn’t easy. I plowed through only one-and-a-half of three stacks of submissions, logging out short stories, essays, and poetry. As I worked, I read through cover letters, paged through submissions,and scanned through the editors’ comments, thinking: dang, … Continue reading → Continue reading →

Posted in Life, Literature, publishing, rejection letters, submissions, Writer, writing | Comments Off on I Sent Out 126 Rejection Letters Today

If It’s the Right Kind of Small

Posted on July 1, 2012 by writedrunkandeditsober

I unearthed the following post, long buried and forgotten, in the deep recesses of my computer. The post arrives here today from a few years back, when I had just started a short-lived blog called “Love in the Time of … Continue reading → Continue reading →

Posted in college, Life, tea | Comments Off on If It’s the Right Kind of Small

Hunter S. Thompson, American Legend

Posted on June 27, 2012 by writedrunkandeditsober

Last weekend while I was in Austin, I met Alan Rinzler, the man who published and worked with Hunter S. Thompson, Toni Morrison, Tom Robbins, and Bob Dylan, among others. He told me that Hunter S. Thompson was a crazy … Continue reading → Continue reading →

Posted in Alan Rinzler, Authors, books, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, Great Gatsby, Hunter S. Thompson, infinite possibility, Letterman, Literature, writing | Comments Off on Hunter S. Thompson, American Legend