David Abrams's Blog, page 65

Sunday Sentence: One Summer: America, 1927 by Bill Bryson

Simply put, the best sentence(s) I’ve read this past week, presented out of context and without commentary.


Both his parents were almost wholly incapable of showing affection. Lindbergh and his mother never hugged. At bedtime, they shook hands.

One Summer: America, 1927 by Bill Bryson

“A Little Bit of Everything” in Glimmer Train Stories

I have a new short story appearing in the latest issue of Glimmer Train Stories (Spring/Summer 2016).

Yes, you can file that last statement under “Dream Come True.” I’ve long harbored hope, a small flickering flame, that one day I’d have a short story in its pages. I did have an interview with novelist Allen Morris Jones ( Last Year’s River ) way back in Issue #46 , but this marks the first time my fiction has landed at Glimmer Train. “A Little Bit of Everything” is an 850-word catalogue of circ...

Friday Freebie: Maisie at 8000 Feet by Frederick Reuss

Congratulations to Kara Shamy, winner of last week’s Friday Freebie contest: The History of Great Things by Elizabeth Crane.

This week’s book giveaway is Maisie at 8000 Feet by Frederick Reuss. Thanks to the generosity of the publisher, Unbridled Books, I have four paperback copies to give away. Keep reading for more information about the novel...

Maisie at 8000 Feet is the story of an eight-year old girl who can fly and her idyllic summer in the Pine Barrens of New Jersey that ends in a mome...

My First Time: Lawrence Coates

My First Time is a regular feature in which writers talk about virgin experiences in their writing and publishing careers, ranging from their first rejection to the moment of holding their first published book in their hands. Today’s guest is Lawrence Coates, author of five books, most recently The Goodbye House , a novel set amid the housing tracts of San Jose in the aftermath of the first dot-com bust and the attacks of 9/11, and Camp Olvido , a novella set in a labor camp in California’s Gre...

Sunday Sentence: Legends of the Fall by Jim Harrison

Simply put, the best sentence(s) I’ve read this past week, presented out of context and without commentary.


Nothing is quite so grotesque as the meeting of a child and a bullet.
Legends of the Fall by Jim Harrison

Warblers on His Eyelashes: Dead Man’s Float by Jim Harrison

Lately, I’ve thought about death. How it comes for us all. How we should learn to embrace it (but most of us never do). How we weep publicly on Twitter when a writer, in particular, falls dead. How we should stop thinking of it as a premature snap-off of an artist’s career—a cruel em dash interrupting a life—but the completion of a life’s work: a period, or—if you want to take it more gently—an ellipsis. How we all will one day just come to a complete and utter stop.

I’ve been thinking about d...

Friday Freebie: The History of Great Things by Elizabeth Crane

Congratulations to Judy Young, winner of last week’s Friday Freebie contest: Perfect Days by Raphael Montes.

This week’s book giveaway is The History of Great Things , the new novel by Elizabeth Crane. Here’s what Pamela Erens, author of Eleven Hours , had to say about the book: “Like everything Elizabeth Crane writes, The History of Great Things is wonderful fun to read-smart, insightful, and witty-but it will break your heart, too. It stares down the poignant question so many daughters want t...

Soup and Salad: RIP Jim Harrison, Emily St. John Mandel and Laura van den Berg Talk Dystopia, “Difficult” Women Puzzle Margaret Dilloway, Susan Perabo Marvels at Tobias Wolff, Ghosts Haunt Elizabeth Brundage, What Novelists Should Worry About, Jodi Paloni

On today’s menu:


1.  The death of author Jim Harrison ( The Ancient Minstrel , Legends of the Fall , etc.) a week ago touched nearly all of us in ways great and small. I was stunned but not surprised by his passing. He’d worked hard and played hard and it showed in recent photos of the 78-year-old. You could hear the Grim Reaper sharpening his scythe every time you looked at that face. Nonetheless, the passing of a legend is always a sad, regretful thing. Speaking of coulda-shoulda-wouldas,...

Soup and Salad: RIP Jim Harrison, Emily St. John Mandel and Laura van den Berg Talk Dystopia, “Difficult” Women Puzzle Margaret Dilloway, Susan Perabo Marvels at Tobias Wolff, Ghosts Haunt Elizabeth Brundage, What Novelists Should Worry About, Jodi Paloni

On today’s menu:


1.  The death of author Jim Harrison ( The Ancient Minstrel , Legends of the Fall , etc.) a week ago touched nearly all of us in ways great and small. I was stunned but not surprised by his passing. He’d worked hard and played hard and it showed in recent photos of the 78-year-old. You could hear the Grim Reaper sharpening his scythe every time you looked at that face. Nonetheless, the passing of a legend is always a sad, regretful thing. Speaking of coulda-shoulda-wouldas,...

Soup and Salad: RIP Jim Harrison, Emily St. John Mandel and Laura van den Berg Talk Dystopia, “Difficult” Women Puzzle Margaret Dilloway, Susan Perabo Marvels at Tobias Wolff, Ghosts Haunt Elizabeth Brundage, What Novelists Should Worry About, Jodi Paloni

On today’s menu:


1.  The death of author Jim Harrison ( The Ancient Minstrel , Legends of the Fall , etc.) a week ago touched nearly all of us in ways great and small. I was stunned but not surprised by his passing. He’d worked hard and played hard and it showed in recent photos of the 78-year-old. You could hear the Grim Reaper sharpening his scythe every time you looked at that face. Nonetheless, the passing of a legend is always a sad, regretful thing. Speaking of coulda-shoulda-wouldas,...