Let me start by saying I grew up reading Roald Dahl’s ‘Charlie and the Chocolate Factory’ and ‘James and the Giant Peach’ but I was way too old for kids books by the time he wrote ‘Matilda.’ And, since I usually avoid kids movies — and even avoided them as a kid — I went to see ‘Matilda’ on Broadway without any preconceived notions of the story. I went because I love musicals and ‘Matilda’ got rave reviews. It was a great experience. I even shed a few tears at the end. Why? ‘Matilda’ reminded me of being a little
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Seeing Stories Everywhere
I was having a rough day, so I gave myself an afternoon of ‘art therapy’ in the form of a visit to the Neue Galerie* uptown. I was headed to the Kandinsky show. Perhaps it was the perfect match between mood and artist, but Kandinsky got my head spinning is great directions.erie Operating on the theory that art speaks for itself — or at least it should — I’ve found that it’s best for me to avoid audio tours and sometimes I don’t even read the titles until I’ve already spent some serious time just looking. That’s what I did
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Anticipation!
Anticipation is a useful experience in fiction. Setting up the protagonist to expect a particular outcome and then undermining that expectation is golden in drama and comedy, too. Think of the hero all ready for his end of WWII Times Square style kiss, coming home to find another kind of welcoming committee or the anticipation of a heavenly first sip of expensive wine — when the bottle turns out to be bad vinegar. There are plenty of good surprises too and some characters anticipate the worst-case scenario only to be taken aback by good news. But a constant state of
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Bear Legs in Pumps
Proofreading is important, but I’ve given up on perfection. When a dear friend and proofreader found BEAR legs instead of BARE legs in the manuscript for THE STRANGE CASE OF DR. HYDE AND HER FRIENDS I laughed until I cried. Having found obvious typos, missing words and the wrong homonym in all too many professionally proofed books, I no longer expect — or aim — for perfection. But I do want to avoid howlers like BEAR for BARE when describing the heroine of a romantic suspense novella dressing for an important appointment. Since the second proofreader missed this one, while
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Risk & Reward & Risk Again…
On New Year’s Day I attended a “writer’s salon.” It was my first and it was inspiring and terrifying. I read the opening pages of my novel-in-progress out loud to a group of strangers (the only one I knew was the hostess) and they seemed to like it. Their questions were insightful and their warm response encouraged me to go on with the draft. Writing fiction doesn’t scare me, but sharing it does. I was completely and utterly terrified and didn’t really relax until I’d read my contribution. Later, as the others read opening scenes of plays, a brilliant &
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Whispers and Sounds from Another Room
A very peculiar scraping and scratching sound startled me the other day. At first I was horrified — could it be mice? (I’m irrationally afraid of rodents.) My cat was listening too — ears on alert and eyes wide. But he was NOT prowling around in an effort to find the source of the sound. That was my job. The sound seemed to move around the exposed brick wall between my apartment and the elevator. I checked under the sofa and behind the dresser and, as the cat went back to cleaning his paws, I determined that it was not
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Hairy Beasts!
HAIR! Hair is often among the first descriptors. Second only to tall or short, in physical descriptions of a character. This is true in the realm of people as well MONSTERS. The hairy beast, the hairless alien and everything in-between, inhabit all varieties of genre fiction. I always laugh at this line from Warren Zevon’s fabulous song WEREWOLF OF LONDON: I saw a werewolf drinkin’ a pina colada at Trader Vic’s, his hair was perfect. It paints a vivid picture of a creature who is both a “hairy gent” and beast with a scary appetite for more than Chinese food
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MONSTERS have Taken Over the Blog!
Monsters — or maybe ghosts — have taken possession of this blog! I’m in the middle of a major blog renovation, an “extreme make-over” with free fiction, lots of visuals and pages of all-new content in the works. In the meantime, the blog is a construction site. Old posts are “haunting” the premises, showing up in the RSS feeds of followers. Images have disappeared and re-appeared. Once recent post is MIA. Did a ghost eat it? It’s gone…. I have to wonder if it’s hovering in the distance and may return. Like most construction projects, the new site is behind
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