Sarah Kanning

So. The bad news is that the second act is a mess, and my first reader alerted me to the fact that my story actually starts with a scene well into the first act. Last night at writers’ group was the first time I’d touched the manuscript in more than a week because I’d been [...]

[Read more →]

A friend asked if I’d seen this op-ed by David Alpaugh in the Chronicle of Higher Ed. I responded to her directly, then figured, why waste a good rant? (Thanks for the nudge, Gretchen.)
Yes I did see this, and it ticked me off because it’s insipid. “There’s too much poetry! The good stuff gets lost! [...]

[Read more →]

This afternoon I heard more hand-wringing from yet another commentator (this one an author, Eric Weiner, on NPR) about the demise of paper books and the rise of electronic editions. Here’s an excerpt:
I’m confident that I’ll still get my fair share from each e-book sold. But as an author, I’m not after your money. Well, [...]

[Read more →]

Is it Tuesday already? Right-o. Here’s a book I’ve kept handy for several years now: Negotiating with the Dead: A Writer on Writing by Margaret Atwood (Cambridge UP, 2002), based on a series of lectures she gave at Cambridge on the process of writing and her ideas about identity and the writer.

Part memoir, part literary [...]

[Read more →]

…I may be willing to use this food item to sustain life. Perhaps.

These things come in various sized blocks; pictured is part of an 1800 calorie block, which is enough to feed one person for one day. They also come in 2400 and 3600 blocks, the idea being a handy block of shelf-stable food you [...]

[Read more →]