Marjorie M. Liu's Blog, page 22

Datong, Part 1

I’ll post more pictures tomorrow, but the short story is this: I encountered the sublime in the Yungang Grottoes, in Datong. It was one of the most profound experiences of my life. Human hands, moved by some powerful spirit, made those Buddhas — carved them, with devotion, and breathed life into the stone.

More tomorrow.

Diving in…

There’s a village about two minutes away (and by “village”, I mean “neighborhood”) that is a bustling haven of restaurants, shops, and apartment homes. A lot of people who work at the airport live there, which means (and this is a local joke) it’s also home to the best looking men and women in all of Beijing.

One restaurant we visit once or twice a week is on the same street as a bathhouse, toilet store, market, hair salon, and a couple dress shops. And when I got off the plane yesterday, star...

The Heart of Empathy

I made it to Beijing in one piece, armed with bottles of water and a big bag of snacks. If I were an enterprising type, I would have interviewed my seatmates during the flight, written part of my novel, and contemplated the mysteries of the universe — but, instead, I used those fourteen hours to sleep, chew on pretzels, and watch Captain America. Again.

Anyway. Here, folks, is a glorious piece in the New Yorker on, well, the Hulk. And, more importantly, empathy.

…ONE OF THE ONGOING PROBLEMS OF...

Books, sanity, flight.

“Form and style is one’s voice.” – Hilton Als, on writing his novel…

Tomorrow I fly to China for two weeks, and then hustle back for work-related reasons. It’s a long flight — fourteen hours in a tube — and for the first time in a while I didn’t pack my iPad; aka, my Kindle. Which means I’m taking actual books with me on the plane. Not a bad thing at all, just a little on the heavy side.

Here are the books that I hope will keep me sane:

GRAVE MERCY by Robin Lafevers

ALL FOR YOU by Lynn Kurland

An...

Stuff. And a gem.

Things I’ve been doing to keep busy: writing, reading, going to Boston…and next Tuesday, I travel to China for a couple weeks. I’ll be back before the end of the month. I have a signing in Boston at Comicopia on May 26th. Actual times soon to follow.

I got to do this the other night: attend a gala at the American Museum of Natural History, which was held in the Milstein Hall of Ocean Life. It was an extraordinary evening, more for the amazing writers who were in attendance, than anything else....

Thank you.

And thank you again, and again. Your kindness and support have been tremendous, and I appreciate it more than I can say. It’s weird, veering from exhaustion to those moments when I forget she’s gone — and then I remember.

A dear friend just sent me this. I don’t know where it came from, so I’ve reposted in its entirely. My apologies, though the author is Karen McNeill:

A Dog’s Purpose (from a 6 year old)

Being a veterinarian, I had been called to examine a ten-year-old Irish Wolfhound named Belk...

A little star of love…

I don’t even know how to write this post. I suppose I don’t have to, but I’ve talked about Daisy so much on this blog — the “poodle” — who has been my constant companion for all these years. Daisy, who rode on motorcycles in Taiwan, walked on the Great Wall of China, sniffed the daffodils on the Charles River, and rode on my back in her little pack with so much happiness and curiosity about life at eye level with humans. She was born in Taiwan (she could speak three languages and had a Taiwan...

Little birds, big hearts.

So, for the last four years there’s a little bird named M___* who has built her nest above the front door of the house. I remember that first year very well — the house, actually, had just been built — it was our first spring inside it — and I recall that every day there seemed to be more and more moss accumulating “up there”, along with bits of grass, twigs, etc. Not being the crazy cleaning type, I just let it go. Until one day, almost without me realizing how it got there, a nest appeared....

Things to remember…

I was out by the car yesterday, taking Daisy for her afternoon “walk” (which doesn’t actually consist of much walking in the traditional sense, more like a “slow wander” — until I pick her up before she goes into the poison ivy), and while standing there I heard a strange…banging…coming from my engine. A knocking sound, really. A scuffle.

I’ve had squirrels in my car before. And mice. The mechanics at the dealership can tell you all about it. And by “in the car” I mean that they built nests in...

Room with a (tweet) view…

“I can’t comment on how others use social media. I can only speak on my own use of Twitter, which is: I had a cat, the cat died, and now the stuff I used to say to the cat all day, I tweet.” – Colson Whitehead

Or, as he also says in the same Publishers Weekly piece, social media is “a little company during the workday.”

That’s so true. Just think about the life of your average, typical writer — who sits in a room, on the couch, on the bed — pretty much in isolation — working all day long at the...