A BREAK FROM NOVEL READING
9/4/14 – A BREAK FROM READING NOVELS – BAD MISTAKE!
I have to take long breaks between writing novels. This summer, though, I went a month without reading one. Don’t let me do that again. (Continue Reading)
Tag Archives: terra ziporyn snider
BECOMING A POET IN MID-LIFE: PETER M. GORDON
1/4/14 – BECOMING A POET IN MID-LIFE: PETER M. GORDON, POET
For anyone who views a writing career as an impossible dream, poet Peter M. Gordon is an inspiration. After a 30-year career in creative work that has included theatre directing, writing, teaching, and television programming, Peter reinvented himself as a poet after the age of 50 – and very successfully so. (Continue Reading)
SLOGGING THROUGH THE CLASSICS
12/4/13 – SLOGGING THROUGH THE CLASSICS
I spent high school immersed in Victorian novels. My purse contained four typed 9×11 sheets listing classic works that every “college-bound” student should read, and every year I dutifully read and crossed more of them off. I defended these books vociferously for their timeless ideas, eschewing more contemporary writing, most of which, I was sure, had only ephemeral value. Though I was writing fiction of my own even back then – and certainly wanted people to read it – my goal was to write something timeless, and I thought my greatest guide to doing so would come from reading other timeless works. (Continue Reading)
DISCUSSABILITY: THE KEY TO GOOD BOOK CLUB BOOKS
9/4/13 – DISCUSSABILITY: THE KEY TO A GOOD BOOK CLUB BOOK
Book clubs are often maligned as places where people do just about everything except discuss books. But when I asked members of my own book club for reading recommendations, they confirmed what I had always suspected: book clubs not only discuss books, but “discussability” trumps literary merit. (Continue Reading)
THE BOOKS I MISSED READING LAST YEAR
9/1/13 – THE BOOKS I MISSED READING LAST YEAR
I’ve been so submerged in the process of writing a new novel that I’ve missed pretty much every one of my monthly book club meetings over the past year—and, alas, many of the books that went with them. When I finally came up for air, I found myself gasping for fresh reading material, and I figured the ladies of my longstanding book club could rescue me. (Continue Reading)