I just saw Elizabeth Stark's interview with Kate Moses see Video Interview of Kate at http://bookwritingworld.com/blog/2010/05/21/interview-with-kate-moses-2/
and was thrilled to see that she will be reading locally on:
Thursday, June 3, 7:30 p.m.
At Mrs. Dalloway's: Kate Moses reads from Cakewalk: A Memoir (Doubleday, $26).
Growing up in the 1960s and ’70s, Kate Moses was surrounded by sugar: Twinkies in the basement freezer, honey on the fried chicken, Baby Ruth bars in her father’s sock drawer. But sweetness of the more intangible variety was harder to come by. Her parents were disastrously mismatched, far too preoccupied with their mutual misery to notice its effects on their kids.
Check out Elizabeth Stark's wonderful, spellbinding interview. I am hoping to go and see Kate Moses in person this Thursday!
http://www.katemoses.com/site/
Monday, May 31, 2010
Friday, May 28, 2010
California Writers Club speaker: Kristen Caven on My Glamorous Cartooning Career
The other author I heard speak in Oakland at the California Writers Club was Kristen Caven, author of Perfectly Revolting: My Glamorous Cartooning Career
In 1990 Kristen Caven witnessed a revolt as students at Mills, one of the last remaining women’s colleges, shut down the campus to keep boys out of their classrooms. Her new memoir, Perfectly Revolting: My Glamorous Cartooning Career, includes a reprint of Inside the Mills Revolution —which won the Bay Guardian Cartoon Contest but was banned on the Mills campus—plus over 100 more of her hilarious cartoons, and a story about following her muses to womanhood.
Kristen was a wonderful speaker, full of genuine smiles and a nice sense of humor about life. I like to draw, so was fascinated to see how she made this book up with her cartoons. http://www.kristencaven.com/
In 1990 Kristen Caven witnessed a revolt as students at Mills, one of the last remaining women’s colleges, shut down the campus to keep boys out of their classrooms. Her new memoir, Perfectly Revolting: My Glamorous Cartooning Career, includes a reprint of Inside the Mills Revolution —which won the Bay Guardian Cartoon Contest but was banned on the Mills campus—plus over 100 more of her hilarious cartoons, and a story about following her muses to womanhood.
Kristen was a wonderful speaker, full of genuine smiles and a nice sense of humor about life. I like to draw, so was fascinated to see how she made this book up with her cartoons. http://www.kristencaven.com/
Tuesday, May 25, 2010
The God Patent (www.TheGodPatent.com) Ransom W. Stephens
I went to the California Writers' Club a week ago which is now held at the Main Oakland Library. I had not been for awhile, and it was such a pleasure. There were two speakers, one of whom was Ransom W. Stephens, author of The God Patent. I found him to be an engaging speaker and one who I would want to hear again if the opportunity arose. It turns out he was a student of Stephanie Moore, as I was briefly. For more information on him, here is the connection: www.facebook.com/ransom.stephens. Here is a quote he puts out: Author of The God Patent, (now in print from Numina Press) www.TheGodPatent.com
“…the first debut novel to emerge from the new paradigm of online publishing… sings of the heart and the scientific method as two parts of the same song.” –SF Chronicle
I will write about the other speaker in another blog. Also engaging!
“…the first debut novel to emerge from the new paradigm of online publishing… sings of the heart and the scientific method as two parts of the same song.” –SF Chronicle
I will write about the other speaker in another blog. Also engaging!
Saturday, May 22, 2010
Two poems by Luis Lázaro Tijerina
AN INDIAN SUMMER
FOR ANITA O’DAY
Your alluring cat eyes beckon from the dark…
A voice teasing, quick to laugh,
your sensual face still in my heart,
I see your full, red-painted lips
singing to the trees, to the gentle wind
of the romances you lived through
in promising springtime,
only to have your heart broken
in an Indian summer.
Sweeet Georggia Brown,
with your luscious flare,
Sweeet Geroggia Brown with jazzy airs!
You, beautiful jazz lady
casting your spell with your black dress
and wide brimmed hat,
my Stella by Starlight…
A Birch Tree Stands in a Field
A birch tree stands in a field,
its white bark as loose as a girl’s chemise.
All is quiet this day, as it has always been...
Nothing stirs across the river; only the sounds
of distant birds can be heard, as it has always been.
Here, rumors of war or of the laughter of a girl playing,
or someone’s dying in quicksand, is taken
as a matter of course, just like
the river flowing past the birch tree.
A birch tree stands in a field, alone and slightly proud,
like my own life...but what I once valued I have thrown
into the raging waters of the St. Lawrence River.
I think rather of the river that flows here
near the birch in the field..
Sometimes I hear again the great songs
about the 22nd Krasnodar Division who fought
with heroism in the Far-East before I was born,
before the birch tree with its exquisite white bark
singled me out as its friend
I think quietly on this day
about those who will yet die, alone,
near the birch tree.
FOR ANITA O’DAY
Your alluring cat eyes beckon from the dark…
A voice teasing, quick to laugh,
your sensual face still in my heart,
I see your full, red-painted lips
singing to the trees, to the gentle wind
of the romances you lived through
in promising springtime,
only to have your heart broken
in an Indian summer.
Sweeet Georggia Brown,
with your luscious flare,
Sweeet Geroggia Brown with jazzy airs!
You, beautiful jazz lady
casting your spell with your black dress
and wide brimmed hat,
my Stella by Starlight…
A Birch Tree Stands in a Field
A birch tree stands in a field,
its white bark as loose as a girl’s chemise.
All is quiet this day, as it has always been...
Nothing stirs across the river; only the sounds
of distant birds can be heard, as it has always been.
Here, rumors of war or of the laughter of a girl playing,
or someone’s dying in quicksand, is taken
as a matter of course, just like
the river flowing past the birch tree.
A birch tree stands in a field, alone and slightly proud,
like my own life...but what I once valued I have thrown
into the raging waters of the St. Lawrence River.
I think rather of the river that flows here
near the birch in the field..
Sometimes I hear again the great songs
about the 22nd Krasnodar Division who fought
with heroism in the Far-East before I was born,
before the birch tree with its exquisite white bark
singled me out as its friend
I think quietly on this day
about those who will yet die, alone,
near the birch tree.
Friday, May 21, 2010
Kate Moses, interviewed by Bookwritingworld.com interviewer, Elizabeth Stark
Check out this wonderful video of Kate Moses by Elizabeth Stark. If you are a writer, watching and listening to Kate talk with Elizabeth will be enlightening and fascinating and help you with your own writing process. A great interview. Enjoy!
http://bookwritingworld.com/blog/2010/05/21/interview-with-kate-moses-2/#more-508
http://bookwritingworld.com/blog/2010/05/21/interview-with-kate-moses-2/#more-508
Tuesday, May 18, 2010
Guilt! Two weeks fumbling around, not writing
Why is it that when I go to my writers' group, and I can't write my novel, poetry doesn't count? In fact, that is when and where I have written most of my poems. But that new novel is sitting there frowning, begging me to get back to it. I think I have come to that sticky place where I have put it all in order and know I need to do so much more, yet it is starting to look like a real novel. This sequel to Cellini's Revenge, is fighting with me. Should it stand alone, or should it continue on? It can be both. But the pause was really necessary. Once I got back to it, I thought, heck, this is a really good novel. And tht is what those poetry moments are allowing me to do. We all need a break.
Friday, May 14, 2010
It will last forever - poem
May 2010
Last Forever by Wendy Bartlett
If you imagine that it will
Last forever
You are so mistaken
If you see only his face
His smile, his life
As a solution
Welcome to your new problems!
A person stands not alone
But on top of his family’s history
On top of stories
Of migration, immigration, prison,
A religion fleeing persecution
A while pressure on the backs of a nation,
Like the Indian Nations
Like the holocaust survivors
Like the politically persecuted
Or like the religiously shunned
The smile shows all the teeth
Or half the teeth, or
No teeth at all
A closed mouth
And in that smile and the cock of the head
You are welcomed into his past
Which with one kiss
You are invited to hold up his story
Witness his agony in his words
Nod and cry and make a fist
And then, you are invited
To kiss his brow
Again I sit with my four writers
Before which we have
Sorted the British election
The Orinda school prejudice
The holocaust, of course,
And the pros and cons of
Black solidarity against whites
And I didn’t speak
But I was there, listening,
And wondering why don’t I talk
Why do I listen quietly?
Where is my anger, my energy?
Don’t I care about the
Blackened sea turtles in the Gulf
Or the people lining up for their
Last Louisiana fish dinner
Or the Taliban in the SUV bomb
Or Haiti
Let’s bow our heads
Their misery continues like
A familiar friend
Is my mouth just ajar
As the news and views pour
Into my head
My bowed head now
Of course, I care,
But I wonder
Were we meant, with our large brains
To process this vast weight
Of negative information
Can I please just sit back
And notice the flowers
The sunny spring day
The classical music playing?
For yes, the impoverished
Still dance with gusto
And sing and drum
And go on
Or, yes,
They do not.
Last Forever by Wendy Bartlett
If you imagine that it will
Last forever
You are so mistaken
If you see only his face
His smile, his life
As a solution
Welcome to your new problems!
A person stands not alone
But on top of his family’s history
On top of stories
Of migration, immigration, prison,
A religion fleeing persecution
A while pressure on the backs of a nation,
Like the Indian Nations
Like the holocaust survivors
Like the politically persecuted
Or like the religiously shunned
The smile shows all the teeth
Or half the teeth, or
No teeth at all
A closed mouth
And in that smile and the cock of the head
You are welcomed into his past
Which with one kiss
You are invited to hold up his story
Witness his agony in his words
Nod and cry and make a fist
And then, you are invited
To kiss his brow
Again I sit with my four writers
Before which we have
Sorted the British election
The Orinda school prejudice
The holocaust, of course,
And the pros and cons of
Black solidarity against whites
And I didn’t speak
But I was there, listening,
And wondering why don’t I talk
Why do I listen quietly?
Where is my anger, my energy?
Don’t I care about the
Blackened sea turtles in the Gulf
Or the people lining up for their
Last Louisiana fish dinner
Or the Taliban in the SUV bomb
Or Haiti
Let’s bow our heads
Their misery continues like
A familiar friend
Is my mouth just ajar
As the news and views pour
Into my head
My bowed head now
Of course, I care,
But I wonder
Were we meant, with our large brains
To process this vast weight
Of negative information
Can I please just sit back
And notice the flowers
The sunny spring day
The classical music playing?
For yes, the impoverished
Still dance with gusto
And sing and drum
And go on
Or, yes,
They do not.
Poem: Writer's Block
Writer’s Block by Wendy Bartlett
Is what I’ve got here writer’s block?
It’s quite a first, a writer’s shock.
Is my head stuck on last night’s show?
Or is it just my hands won’t go?
That lady’s shoes are clacking loud
I always wrote, I was so proud
I’m not like them, a pen to lips
Or her, those hands upon her hips
The voices at the table there
Annoy me, drink and eat, don’t stare.
The other’s write their speedy drafts
And when they read they’ll get the laughs
But here am I, my pen is stuck
My mind’s a block of solid muck
It’s New Year’s Eve and still I know
By the end of the verse
I’ll have naught to show
So here I sit, my lip is blue
Here comes that woman
With the clacking shoe
At last, a smudge across the page
Displays the heart of writer’s rage
It’s birth again, a moan, a tear
I truly want to get out of here!
I’d then let down my writing friends
Who sit here, writing stuff to send
To agents in New York and France
I know I’ll never get a chance
To publish, but you’d think I’d learn
That writing’s hope,
It’s life that burns.
A scribble starts the words to flow
Oh, girls, I’ve got a page to show.
Is what I’ve got here writer’s block?
It’s quite a first, a writer’s shock.
Is my head stuck on last night’s show?
Or is it just my hands won’t go?
That lady’s shoes are clacking loud
I always wrote, I was so proud
I’m not like them, a pen to lips
Or her, those hands upon her hips
The voices at the table there
Annoy me, drink and eat, don’t stare.
The other’s write their speedy drafts
And when they read they’ll get the laughs
But here am I, my pen is stuck
My mind’s a block of solid muck
It’s New Year’s Eve and still I know
By the end of the verse
I’ll have naught to show
So here I sit, my lip is blue
Here comes that woman
With the clacking shoe
At last, a smudge across the page
Displays the heart of writer’s rage
It’s birth again, a moan, a tear
I truly want to get out of here!
I’d then let down my writing friends
Who sit here, writing stuff to send
To agents in New York and France
I know I’ll never get a chance
To publish, but you’d think I’d learn
That writing’s hope,
It’s life that burns.
A scribble starts the words to flow
Oh, girls, I’ve got a page to show.
Thursday, May 6, 2010
Characters in Cellini's Revenge
Catherine is the main character in Cellini's Revenge: The Mystery of the Silver Cups, by Wendy Bartlett.
We meet her first in 1956 when she is blamed for murdering her husband, David. Later on we meet her in Holloway Prison where she must stay for twelve years, and then in Brattleboro for the rest of her life UNTIL she discovers DNA.
Back she goes to London to find the REAL murderer with the help of Christopher, a charming Cockney man of fifty who leads Catherine back into her past, and to the hunt for the silver cups.
reviews on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Cellinis-Revenge-Mystery-Silver-Cups/dp/1440140456/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1243560779&sr=1-2
Ebooks are the way to go for my books. Kindle or other ereaders are the new way. Older people like them because they can enlarge the print!
We meet her first in 1956 when she is blamed for murdering her husband, David. Later on we meet her in Holloway Prison where she must stay for twelve years, and then in Brattleboro for the rest of her life UNTIL she discovers DNA.
Back she goes to London to find the REAL murderer with the help of Christopher, a charming Cockney man of fifty who leads Catherine back into her past, and to the hunt for the silver cups.
reviews on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Cellinis-Revenge-Mystery-Silver-Cups/dp/1440140456/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1243560779&sr=1-2
Ebooks are the way to go for my books. Kindle or other ereaders are the new way. Older people like them because they can enlarge the print!
Monday, May 3, 2010
Voice and Elizabeth Stark's guy in the sand: (http://bookwritingsecrets.com)
I thought by now I would have understood "voice." But re-reading my lastest work, the sequel to Cellini's Revenge, I see I am still struggling like the guy in the sand in Elizabeth Stark's latest video. (http://bookwritingsecrets.com)
Elizabeth Stark was once my writing teacher. What a great teacher! I highly recommend her brilliance and insight.
But I heard she is working on "voice," just now with her new novel. It is one of the hardest things to get right, it seems to me. Who is the narrator, and can't she have a voice, and also he, and then a little bit of the other guy? No. Yes. Sometimes. I read it backwards, upside down, and out loud. I ask my teachers and writing friends. Then we vote. When I am done, I hire somebody to edit. For some reason, THEY know!
Elizabeth Stark was once my writing teacher. What a great teacher! I highly recommend her brilliance and insight.
But I heard she is working on "voice," just now with her new novel. It is one of the hardest things to get right, it seems to me. Who is the narrator, and can't she have a voice, and also he, and then a little bit of the other guy? No. Yes. Sometimes. I read it backwards, upside down, and out loud. I ask my teachers and writing friends. Then we vote. When I am done, I hire somebody to edit. For some reason, THEY know!
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