Sally Wiener Grotta's Blog: Grotta.net, page 18

A poem

Last night, clocks ticked through my dreams. This morning, this poem spilled out of me.

Present Tense Tension

by Sally Wiener Grotta

A bit over a month ago, I was just finishing up what I thought was the last edit of my novel Jo Joe . All my years of writing, rewriting, submitting for critiques and edits, responding to edits/suggestions/critiques, and more rewrites were finally

Up Close & Personal: Julie Imel's Interview with Daniel Grotta

Ever wonder what inspires authors? Does Stephen King have really horrendous nightmares that he simply has to put down on paper to exorcise the horror from his mind? Did Emily Dickinson awake every morning with the song of life weaving words in her ear?

For Daniel Grotta, inspiration comes from his everyday existence flavored by the ever-present questions "What if?" "Why?" and "Why not?" Getting the stories behind the stories

What a Bitch!

by Sally Wiener Grotta

The other day, a woman described another woman to me as a bitch. Bitch is one of those words that can convey a world of ideas. But what does it really mean? And, more to the point for any writer working to create flesh and blood characters, what are the

Daniel Grotta reading "Seven From Haven" for The Philadelphia Fantastic Authors and Editors Series

Friday, Nov. 2, 2012, 7pm at Moonstone Arts Center, 108 S. 13th Street, Phila., Pa.

A great event for the Halloween week: Daniel Grotta will read from his book "Seven From Haven," a collection of gentle ghost stories with O'Henry-like sensibility, charm and humor. A book signing will follow the reading. (And, yes, if you have a copy of his renowned biography "J.R.R. Tolkien, Architect of Middle Earth," he'll sign that too.)

Copies of "Seven From Haven"

Too Soon

by Sally Wiener Grotta

Too soon
The sun rises
Before the night-long dream resolves
Before we can eek meaning out of the ether.

No sunlight please
To burn away the shadows
Flatten the contrast between
Yes/No
Is/Is not.

To soon it is over
Curtains close
Against the day's glare
And the dream is lost.

What are Words?

by Sally Wiener Grotta

What are words
If not wonder
Made flesh
Wisps of air
Made real
By their taste, texture
Dancing on the tip of our tongue
Pressing on our minds
Flowing from our fingers
Onto ink?

What are words
If not magic
Made human
Given fleshy shapes and sounds
Whispering incantations
Binding our souls to our bodies?

(For Karen)

The 99-Cent Critic

by Daniel Grotta

Yesterday's New York Times published a somewhat distressing and depressing front-page article ( The Best Book Reviews Money Can Buy ), on the booming business of fake book reviews. As many readers have long suspected, a substantial number of Amazon's glowing four- and five-star reviews of self-published works are written, not only by friends and relatives, but unscrupulous scribblers

Malleable Memory

by Sally Wiener Grotta

I often say that my sister and I had different parents. Not simply because she's a few years older, and, as I like to joke, she broke them in for me. Nor is it only because our parents were changed by their life experiences during the years from her birth to mine. It's our personal memories of our parents that can sometimes be so different from each other. Even � or especially � when we are talking about the very same event, same moment, seen and remembered

Haunting Questions

by Sally Wiener Grotta

Why?
How?
Why not?
I am haunted by questions.
So much I don't understand.

When I was a child, perhaps my questions were simpler.

Why did that boy pull my hair?
How does the moon stay in the sky?
What if I don't eat my spinach?

When my mother didn't have ready answers, she would make up stories. And I never wondered