Randominotes & Reading Lists

• Two pieces on editing: An essay from Ursula K. LeGuin's editor Michael Kandel, and an interview with Michael Ondaatje's editor Ellen Seligman
• Thinking about these articles, I Googled the phrase "The Art of Editing," and I discovered a book by that title has been written by Jack Z. Sissors! Best editor name ever.
• And the Band Name of the Day: I Love You But I've Chosen Darkness
• A classic from the Onion: National Funk Congress Deadlocked on Get Up/Get Down Issue. "The bitter get up/get down battle, which has polarized the nation's funk community, is part of a long-running battle between the two factions, rooted in more than 35 years of battle over the direction in which the American people should shake it."
• I bought two songs off iTunes this weekend: "Right Back Where We Started From" by Maxine Nightingale, and "Under Pressure" by David Bowie & Queen.
• Speaking of songs with great hooks that are then stolen by vastly inferior artists, I learned the hook from Madonna's hit "Hung Up" was taken from the ABBA song "Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! (A Man After Midnight)." Though ABBA and Madonna . . . I don't know, that might be a tossup.
• I have made my fabulous pancakes twice in the last week, and tonight I fixed Blue Cheese Spaghettini.
• Writing Note of the Day: It is generally not a good idea to begin your novel in the middle of a highly stressful situation -- a battle, a tidal wave, a fight (physical or verbal), etc. -- as we readers do not know the characters enough to care about the mortal or emotional danger they're in, and as we're occupied with figuring out the action, it's difficult to get to know them well enough that we start to care.
• Like all rules for writing, now that I have laid this down, someone will prove me wrong, and I will be perfectly happy about it.
• Now reading: Fat Kid Rules the World by K. L. Going, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader by C. S. Lewis, The Game of Kings by Dorothy Dunnett (bought at the 7th Ave. street fair yesterday off R. J. Anderson's recommendation, and already proving dangerously addictive), The Odyssey by Homer, translated by Robert Fagles, Spook by Mary Roach
• Recently finished: Saint Iggy by K. L. Going, Prince Caspian by C. S. Lewis (ehh), Gaudy Night by Dorothy L. Sayers (a millionth-time reread)
• Looking forward to: Voices by Ursula K. Le Guin, Making It Up by Penelope Lively, Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson, A Presumption of Death by Jill Paton Walsh and Dorothy L. Sayers
• And listening to: Lyle Lovett, the Dixie Chicks, Ella Fitzgerald, and various Stephen Sondheim musicals (surprisingly good for running, since they're so intellectually engaging they distract from the boring activity)

Lastly, I was having coffee with a friend a week or so ago and he asked me to recommend a book for a long plane flight. My mind of course immediately went blank, so I decided to compile a list of relatively contemporary adult literary fiction I adore in case of any future emergencies. To quote a blurb for, I think, The Jane Austen Book Club: If I could eat these books, I would.

• On Beauty by Zadie Smith
• Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke -- a slow beginning, but after that brilliant and funny and character-driven and well-plotted and magical in every sense of the word
• Set This House in Order by Matt Ruff -- an amazing novel about a man with multiple personalities, who each take turn narrating the book
• Regeneration by Pat Barker -- Devastating British war novel #1
• Atonement by Ian McEwan -- Devastating British war novel #2
• The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay by Michael Chabon
• Wonder Boys by Michael Chabon
• The Time-Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
• Gilead by Marilynne Robinson
• Jim the Boy by Tony Earley -- strongly reminiscent of E. B. White; wonderful wonderful, o most wonderful wonderful
• Everything Is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer
• The Hours by Michael Cunningham
• Possession by A. S. Byatt -- my favorite grown-up book, after selected works of Jane Austen
• the Aubrey-Maturin series by Patrick O'Brian, beginning with Master and Commander -- I count reading all twenty of these in the course of 2002 as the most marvelous long-term reading experience of my life. Harry Potter is the only thing that comes close.
• If on a winter's night a traveler by Italo Calvino -- a lovely book about the pleasures of reading
• Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Enjoy!