Michael Scott Monje Jr.'s Blog, page 8

Chapter 28: It Was Written... (Imaginary Friends)

Imaginary Friends is a serial novel. New chapters go up every Friday(ish) (professional demands are causing sliding deadlines right now). If you're new to it, you can catch up by starting from the Introduction or the first chapter.

If you're impatient to read more about Clay Dillon, click on the cover for it (on the right, about midway down the page) for ordering information for Nothing is Right, the prequel to this story.

Editorial Note: My apologies for falling o...

Welcoming Emma (Changes at Emma's Hope Book)

I meant to write this post almost two weeks ago, but the same demands and conditions that have been pushing back my ability to write Imaginary Friends have also been in the way of my officially welcoming Emma Zurcher-Long to the world of blogging.

If you read me, you probably already know a little about Emma, because her mother Ariane Zurcher has been writing at Emma's Hope Book for years, amplifying the range of autistic voices and grappling with her own understanding of how to best support a...

Chapter 27: Autocyborgography (Imaginary Friends)

Imaginary Friends is a serial novel. New chapters go up every Friday(ish) (professional demands are causing sliding deadlines right now). If you're new to it, you can catch up by starting from the Introduction or the first chapter.

If you're impatient to read more about Clay Dillon, click on the cover for it (on the right, about midway down the page) for ordering information for Nothing is Right, the prequel to this story.

Editorial Note: My apologies for falling off-sc...

Chapter 26: The Coming of the Storm (Imaginary Friends)

Imaginary Friends is a serial novel. New chapters go up every Friday(ish) (professional demands are causing sliding deadlines right now). If you're new to it, you can catch up by starting from the Introduction or the first chapter.

If you're impatient to read more about Clay Dillon, click on the cover for it (on the right, about midway down the page) for ordering information for Nothing is Right, the prequel to this story.

It was mid-December, just before Christmas Brea...

Chapter 25: Real Friendships in Imaginary Castles (Imaginary Friends)

Imaginary Friends is a serial novel. New chapters go up every Friday(ish) (professional demands are causing sliding deadlines right now). If you're new to it, you can catch up by starting from the Introduction or the first chapter.

If you're impatient to read more about Clay Dillon, click on the cover for it (on the right, about midway down the page) for ordering information for Nothing is Right, the prequel to this story.

Clay never did learn what had happened to Hilla...

Chapter 24: You Really Are A Dick (Imaginary Friends)

Imaginary Friends is a serial novel. New chapters go up every Friday(ish) (professional demands are causing sliding deadlines right now). If you're new to it, you can catch up by starting from the Introduction or the first chapter.

If you're impatient to read more about Clay Dillon, check out the Books page for ordering information for Nothing is Right, the prequel to this story.

Grandma Bayleigh’s breakfast treats were just the beginning of the changes around the...

Chapter 23: Breakfast With Bayleigh (Imaginary Friends)

Imaginary Friends is a serial novel. New chapters go up every Friday(ish) (professional demands are causing sliding deadlines right now). If you're new to it, you can catch up by starting from the Introduction or the first chapter.

If you're impatient to read more about Clay Dillon, check out the Books page for ordering information for Nothing is Right, the prequel to this story.

It was only an hour or so after breakfast when Grandpa Harry came to take the boys awa...

Chapter 22: Secrets, Silence, and the Coming of Baby Sis (Imaginary Friends)

Imaginary Friends is a serial novel. New chapters go up every Friday(ish) (professional demands are causing sliding deadlines right now). If you're new to it, you can catch up by starting from the Introduction or the first chapter.

If you're impatient to read more about Clay Dillon, check out the Books page for ordering information for Nothing is Right, the prequel to this story.

Kitty Dillon did not lose her baby after Clay headbutted her. She stayed in bed for th...

On Writing Activist Fiction (An #Amwriting Polemic)

This piece started to come together for me because of a post I saw on a friend's Facebook feed, about how characters who argue for bigoted, insensitive, or just problematic things pull them out of a story, and how they occasionally have to set aside a book because of such moments in the story. I have a lot of feelings about this, because I have had those moments with television shows and books. At the same time, though, I can name plenty of instances where I saw a character arguing quite genu...

Revisiting Naked Lunch

A couple of years ago, just after I published Nothing is Right, I wrote a post about Naked Lunch and the way that it helped to shape my outlook as a writer. At the time, I was still wrestling with some of my own perceptions of myself, and while the main focus in the post is a good one, it's a bit less precise than I'd like it to be, and it also uses some language that I've come to accept is problematic.

This year, as I work through Imaginary Friends, I've been re-reading some of the literature...