Chris Abouzeid's Blog, page 24

Friday Faves — On the Brain

by Kathy Crowley We here at BTM like to consider ourselves a thinking person’s blog – so today’s collection of news and links are about…thinking.  Here’s a question: if you had a pill that could erase a bad memory, would you take it? *** Or how about a pill that ...

A Life of Profound Uncertainty: Welcome to Writing!

  by Robin Black First things first: This is not a piece asking you to pity the poor writer her plight. No one has to be a writer. Even those people who claim that if they couldn’t write they would shrivel, raisin style, because their need to express themselves is ...

Following My Folly

  By Julie Wu Recently I played Scrabble with my son. I hadn’t played in years, but even so, as I shuffled the letter tiles on my little rack, my head filled with words of different lengths and values and ideas of where to place them on the board.  I ...

The SPONC* Method: *Systematically Processing One’s Novel Critiques

  By Nichole Bernier Having your novel workshopped by valued beta readers is a priceless experience. It’s also a dizzying one: so much input, so little processing memory. I had the good fortune to be in this position last week as my writing group discussed the draft of my second ...

Race, Identity, and Writing

“The single story creates stereotypes, and the problem with stereotypes is not that they are untrue, but that they are incomplete. They make one story become the only story. Stories matter. Many stories matter. Stories have been used to dispossess and to malign, but stories can also be used to ...

Who Are You Writing For?

  By Ann Bauer During graduate school, I taught a course called “Developmental Writing” to students who had arrived at the University unprepared. Many of them were athletes; some came from rough, inner-city homes. Earnest hardworking young men and women, they were bewildered by the vocabulary of academe. My students ...

Quotes from the Dark Side

Photo: Moonflower by iilva By Chris Abouzeid I have always admired writers who keep a journal or diary. To commit one’s thoughts and actions, hopes and dreams to paper on a daily, or at least a near daily basis, seems the height of literary sensibility. And I admire people like ...

How Authentic Is Your Teen Voice? Adult Perception of Teendom, Or Their Own?

By Judy Walters We were all once teenagers. Yet I’m always surprised when someone says she wishes she were a teenager again.  If there is one wish I have it’s never to be a teenager again. I cried nearly every day from thirteen until about eighteen. One day when I ...

Public Masturbation, Eating Oranges Slowly and Opening Doors With a Flourish: How Strong Gestures Bring Characters to Life

By Becky Tuch I don’t remember much from eighth grade English. There was Catcher in the Rye. And there was some talk about irony in literature. Also, there were many novels, the inside covers of which I used to pass notes to friends during class. My English teacher, however, I remember ...

In Trusting Hands

By Charles Garabedian “The plane. The plane,” Tattoo shouted on each episode of Fantasy Island, then rang a bell to signal the arrival of a new group of visitors to the colorful and mysterious island in the Pacific, where men and women of all ages and professions came to fulfill ...