Columns

Internet Archive Is NOT Like Your Library

May 29th, 2023

Image: Pixabay Because internet people get all hot about this and then go into a rage where they make terrible points, usually using the wrong form of “its,” let’s start this column at the end, then go back and fill in the rest.

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Mystery Loves Company

May 24th, 2023

A few years ago, as I was on a Blue Line train on my way to the loop in Chicago, I was reading Tade Thompson’s Rosewater (Apex, 2016) and listening to Hole’s Celebrity Skin (DGC, 1998). At the exact moment that I read the phrase “all dressed in white” on page 57 of Rosewater, Courtney Love sang the same phrase in my ears on the song “Use Once & Destroy.” 

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Meet the 2022 Bram Stoker Awards® Poetry Nominees

May 22nd, 2023

Once again the Bram Stoker Awards® have served up five incredible new collections for poetry readers and lovers of dark prose to enjoy. Here we look at each collection in turn, with quotes from the poets on what they hope readers learn from their poetry.

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The Disappointing Over-Simplification of Anne Rice’s The Mayfair Witches

May 18th, 2023

If you were a teenage girl in the 90s, you were either a Vampire Girl, a Witch Girl, a Horse Girl, or you were popular. Suffice it to say, I’ve been wanting an adaptation of Anne Rice’s Lives of the Mayfair Witches trilogy since before I had a driver’s license. But even as a 90s weirdo tween, I still understood that the book was so long the story would be unadaptable. 

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On Readability: The Joy Of Reading Plays Part 2

May 15th, 2023

images: Yale University Press / Methuen Drama Recently I had the first eight pages of a play I’ve been working on read aloud by actors at the Inkwell Theatre’s monthly virtual Playwrights Night. The first chunk of this work features a lot of stage direction up front, including a significant amount of “stage business” (wordless actions performed by actors onstage).

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Writer’s Block And The New Writer: What My 11-Year-Old Daughter Learned At Authorcon 2

May 12th, 2023

Writing, like any other skill or talent, can be a family affair: The Bronte sisters; David & Amy Sedaris; hell, the majority of Stephen King’s family (his wife Tabitha, his sons Owen and Joe).   I write about slashers and people being transformed into carnivorous lakes. My daughter, about to turn 12 and referred to as The Bug in all public forums, seems to be following in my footsteps—she’s in the middle of writing about attacking zombie pickles and a variation of Grimm’s Fairy Tales.  

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Thoughts From a Short Story Contest Judge

May 10th, 2023

Header illustration by Raúl Gil for Reedsy I’ve been helping judge the Reedsy Prompts contest since 2020. In this weekly short story contest, we supply five loosely themed prompts, and writers must base their stories on one of those five. Winners earn $250 and the chance to be featured in Reedsy’s anthology, Prompted.

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Batman, BatGod, Batinstitution: How and Why Batman Changes

May 5th, 2023

image source: Unsplash If we take care of ourselves, get our steps in, maybe eat the occasional vegetable, we might live to see Batman’s 100th birthday in a decade or so. The Batman we celebrate in 2039 might not look anything like the Batman we know today, though. Because the Batman we know today isn’t a whole lot like the Batman of 1939.

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The Most Dynamic Siblings in Literature

May 3rd, 2023

When Wednesday Addams declared that her brother was only hers to torment, older siblings the world over nodded in understanding. Even when we actually like them, no one can crawl under your skin quite like a brother or sister. But they can also be the best friend you never knew you needed. And nothing makes for better fiction than a character who pushes the protagonist in both good and bad ways. We wanted to highlight the full range of siblings, from rivalry to love. Here are the most dynamic siblings in literature, ranked best to worst.

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Storyville: What We Can Learn From Reading Bad Fiction

April 28th, 2023

Quite often in my classes, and my own studies, the way I teach, the way I learn and grow is from studying stories that I think are amazing. Whether it’s a genre I like or a particular style or just the fine execution of story with a powerful voice, if a story gets a high rating from me (say in the 8-10/10 range) then I revisit it, study it closer, and try to see what it can do for MY writing. It might have great setting, an original plot or story, a unique twist on a classic monster or trope, or a lyrical voice that proves to be immersive.

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