June 10, 2008
By: leslie
Category: Uncategorized
After months of being so busy in my writing career that I have not had time to read books, much less post to my sorely neglected writing and book blogs, I am pleased to start up again with E. Christopher Clarke’s collection of short stories “Those Little Bastads”. This book is currently ending its first limited printing, and signed copies are still available over on Chris’s site. I’d get them while you can, folks. I predict much writing success for this hidden talent from New Hampshire, the state that brought you Dan Brown, John Irving and other contemporary greats.
After a long drought of reading, this book was what brought me out of my “all work and no play” funk. From the first story, I was hooked, and ended up setting aside a sunny afternoon recently to read them all in one fell swoop. I had decided to jump around a bit, thinking I would skim a few stories and put the book down, so I simply opened the book and chose a story at random. The first one I picked drew me right in to the rest.
“Hacker” was my first foray into the collection. Being a computer geek and social media maven who spends her days writing about technology and the social web and helping companies navigate the marketing aspect of it all, I immediately felt like I knew the character on a personal level. This is the stereotypical basement dwelling hacker, sure, but with a twist. It particularly resonated with me as being like one person I know and the thought of him having the special talents (if you can call it that) of Ben, the story’s main character made me cringe. I immediately loved the way Chris was able to draw you into a regular story then give that little twist of the knife to make it just a bit off kilter. Perfect.
The strongest stories in the book seem to be concentrated in the middle, bracketed front and back by a cast of supporting stories. One of the more intriguing was “Sam”. At only a page in length it reminded me of Hemmingway and his six word novel concept. It told a complete story in less than time that it takes to sip my coffee. The stories take an irreverent and twisted look at everything from the absurdity of campus politics and college level creative writing to murder and mayhem. Covering every type of character from elderly ladies to the very young, the working class and the average Joe, there is something here for everyone.
If you’ve ever wondered what the quiet guy in the corner was really thinking, this book might be your answer. The stories are simple, almost like day dreams, if your day dreams tended to go horribly, horribly awry. It is the simplicity that makes them a solid book and worth a look, and it is the continuing element of surprise that will have you reading them all. I am frankly excited to read Chris’s first novel after reading this - I can’t wait to see how the way he writes translates from short form to long. You can pick up your copy here and you can read more of Chris’s work on his other web site, Geek Force Five.
Comment (1)
April 21, 2008
By: leslie
Category: All About Writing
Comment (1)
April 07, 2008
By: leslie
Category: All About Writing, Deadbeat Buyers, Dishonest Academics
I did a write up for one of my professional blogging gigs about online plagiarism. I also pointed you to some tools to fight it. Go check it out at Profy. Be sure and let me know what you think or offer your own solutions in the comments over there.
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March 30, 2008
By: leslie
Category: Deadbeat Buyers
According to recent reports around the internet, Amazon is acting very “Big Brother” ish of late when it comes to how they have chosen to handle POD books. Angela Hoy of Writers Weekly and Whispers and Warnings fame has a succinct synopsis on the issue here that i highly recommend all POD authors read in its entirety and then pass on to other POD authors.
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March 27, 2008
By: leslie
Category: Holiday Blogging
It has become something of a tradition for many blogs and web sites to play some kind of April Fool’s Day prank. I’ve never been a huge fan of April Fool’s Day on or off line. This is mainly because I am a huge lover of a good practical joke, but think April Fool’s Day brings out the amateurs in similar fashion to all the inexperienced and annoying bar hoppers who show up on St Patrick’s Day. It is also because I think that April Fool’s Day jokes shouldn’t become actual blog entries (unless you are The Onion or similar).
Why is this joke loving good time gal so against April Fool’s Day online? Partially because of credibility. What you out on the internet stays on the internet forever (Thanks, Wayback Machine!). This means that what is funny today on April Fool’s will continue to circulate 365 days a year until… These circulating practical joke articles eventually leave the context in which they were written and could come back to haunt the writer.
Not only that, some posts on April Fool’s Day have been known to cause real, serious issues online. The web works on instant gratification, and a rampant rumor based on a joke post can be hard to stop. Remember the hacker post that had so many people thinking they were in danger of having been hacked? I do - that caused issues across the Internet for weeks.
Another point is credibility. Only now are blogs and web sites gaining credibility as true sources of news and information. We are finally exiting the phase where online writing is seen as nothing more than a diary entry, with serious writers being taken seriously. I feel that April Fool’s Day posts go a long way toward undermining all the hard work it took to get there.
I’m interested to hear your theories on joke posts for April Fool’s Day. Vote in the poll below, then expand your reasons in the comments:
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March 26, 2008
By: leslie
Category: Events, blog blog
Finally, the Great Domain Move of 2008 is complete, and all sites are back and functional, including this one. I’ll be putting up several posts for you this week now that the blog is behaving again, including more in the Finding Freelance Work and Writer Pay series.
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March 26, 2008
By: leslie
Category: Authors
The site is back, and now hosted by a brand new company, along with my other sites. I have a HUGE stack of books ready to review for you, including the new Barbara Delinksi and the new Stephen King. Look for more new content coming this weekend.
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March 22, 2008
By: leslie
Category: Uncategorized
Found and removed the plug in causing the issue.
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March 12, 2008
By: leslie
Category: Uncategorized
My web host sent a notice that they will be having a planned outage for server maintenance tonight from 6pm to 3am PDT. That means this site may be down for the count during those times. Never fear, it will be back up and running as soon as they are done.
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March 12, 2008
By: leslie
Category: Uncategorized
My web host sent a notice that they will be having a planned outage for server maintenance tonight from 6pm to 3am PDT. That means this site may be down for the count during those times. Never fear, it will be back up and running as soon as they are done.
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