Five Quite Recent Provocations Langdon gasped. If he’d deciphered the symbols correctly, Jesus had married Joan of Arc at Stonehenge! If not, it was a recipe for meatloaf. — Dan Vinci’s Nunferno (@Nunferno) May 24, 2013 Provocation One: Man Booker Irrational? When the American novelist Lydia Davis was given the £60,000 Man Booker International this [...]

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I awoke from a nightmare last weekend and did the sensible thing. I got up and showered off the flop sweat, crawled back in with the ToolMaster, and poked him in the shoulder — firmly, since he was the cause of my distress. “Hey,” he said with a fair degree of irritation. Then something must [...]

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Do you go to conferences? Boy, I do. One of the greatest aspects of conference-going is meeting people you might have known only on the ether, putting a face to the avatar. Here, for example, is author Chuck Wendig, whom I’ve met several times at conferences. Both of us normally have some traveling to do, to [...]

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Of the long-term, previously stable writing communities in which I’m involved, guess how many have suffered through some sort of meltdown in the past few months. (By “meltdown” I mean disagreements which became personal, broadly eroded trust and collegiality, and judging by early signs, from which some communities might not fully recover.) If you went [...]

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Convenience comes at the cost of a grave loss: that of the book as a symbol, as an artifact of learning, poise, wisdom and moral fortitude. While this loss may seem trivial, a simple matter of changing times and customs, the symbols we are losing permeate society and have long been shaping the fortunes of [...]

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You’ve heard about the horse-meat scandal in Europe. How people who purchase meatballs, and meat pies cannot be sure what animal species they’ll be consuming, or if they’re consuming a species at all? Well the next edition of the Writer Inboxed, WU’s bimonthly newsletter, coming out later this week, bears one striking similarity. Our guest [...]

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First there were difficulties securing a vehicle, then foot tendinitis, then unprotected chest met deck edge, leading to multiple rib fractures. (At which time my mantra became Go pain killers! Yay for modern pharmacology!) Between one thing and another, it seemed like life was conspiring to keep me from fitness-dancing. When I restarted this January, [...]

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Question: What do you get when you put two high-energy writers in an interview and shake? Answer: A delightful entry in February’s upcoming newsletter, out tomorrow, in which Lydia Netzer, author of Shine, Shine, Shine, a NYT Notable Book, answers WU contributor Sarah Callender‘s questions. Here’s a sample of their dynamic in this month’s Writer [...]

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For some time now, WU has been struggling with a challenge. It’s a good problem to have, and a symptom of the success Therese and Kathleen have worked hard to earn, but wearisome nonetheless. Quite simply, WU receives far more applications for guest-blog posts than it can possibly accommodate. This is where I come in. [...]

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  I don’t necessarily agree with everything I say. – Marshall McLuhan   I’ve been putting together some thoughts recently on our collective readership. Not us when we read. Not our delegation here of Unboxed Writers. And not even the wider community of writers, local and offshore, national and intergalactic, the diaspora-digital, and where it [...]

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Whether you’re ready to renounce slackerdom, or simply hope to increase your writing production, you’re probably contemplating what you want to get out of 2013. With this post, I hope to set you up for success. Begin with a step recommended by psychologists, coaches, and efficiency experts. Draft goals with teeth by using the SMART format. [...]

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The next issue of the Writer Unboxed newsletter — the Writer Inboxed — goes live tomorrow. (Sign-up here.) Here’s what we’ve got planned for you this month: Special guest Jon Clinch talks about a book that changed his life. Jon is an award-winning writer and a teacher. His first novel, Finn, which relates the backstory of [...]

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