Tag Archives: Writing

Book Review:  Tolstoy by A. N. Wilson; Part One: The Writer

This is a complex, opinionated biography of a literary genius. It is at its weakest when Wilson attempts to introduce his personal observations and impressions of Tolstoy’s life and thoughts as if they were the only possible interpretation, and at … Continue reading

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Unintended but Vivid Flashbacks

Recently my sister gave me an envelope full of memorabilia saved by my mother, who died decades ago while I was living in South Asia. Evidently she was quite a hoarder. As I perused the material, I came across class … Continue reading

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Book Review:  Being Gardner Dozois: An Interview with Michael Swanwick

Not long ago I read and reviewed a recently published book called Being Michael Swanwick by Alvaro Zinos-Amaro. It consists of a series of interviews of author Swanwick that delve into the creative process of how he came to write … Continue reading

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2023: A Personal Overview; Part Two: Some Stats

I recently finished compiling the statistics of how many original words I wrote in 2023. Every year I keep a small journal with important appointments and so on, and every day in that journal I write down my word count … Continue reading

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Book Review:  Harlan Ellison’s Watching by Harlan Ellison

I have been going through some tough times lately and enduring situations that have left me stressed and depressed. In search of reading material to lift my spirits, I picked up this volume that I’d found recently in a used … Continue reading

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The Septuagenarian as an Aspiring Artist

I suppose the first item on this essay’s agenda is to explain why I call myself an “aspiring artist” when I have numerous traditional publishing credits and have self-published thirty-five books. Perhaps at least part of the explanation lies in … Continue reading

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Triumphs in the Creative Life

Recently I wrote an essay called “Setbacks in the Creative Life.” It was a reaction to a publisher deciding to cancel an upcoming anthology to which I’d sold a story. It focused on the necessity of putting aside the many … Continue reading

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Setbacks in the Creative Life

For almost a year I have been looking forward to the December publication of an anthology with one of my stories in it. Some stories I write just for fun, but this one was particularly important to me. It fit … Continue reading

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Book Review:  At the Center of All Beauty: Solitude and the Creative Life by Fenton Johnson

A while back I became aware that there was no quick cure for my living alone and being alone much of the time. To mitigate the loneliness, I looked for some books that might give some insight on turning the … Continue reading

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Why I Self-Publish

I shouldn’t really have to write a justification of self-publishing. If readers and writers were as open-minded and magnanimous as they should be, they would realize that there are as many artistic paths as there are artists. Unfortunately, however, there … Continue reading

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