Given the times and events it seems worth popping an extract in from my non-fiction book for upper primary students. War Hmmnn? YES to ‘that the world would be better if we only had peace’ Who'd have thought there would be people who say NO to peace? From a debating point of view, it’s certainly … Continue reading Extract from: The Big Fat YES Debate[s]
Tag: writing
The reader as passenger
I am reading Dan O’Brien’s excellent The Contract Surgeon and making the odd note as I go along. Not in the book, I should add (it is not mine) but in a notepad. On page 23 this rather excellent little cameo is made by a female character – ‘an old woman’ who is tending a … Continue reading The reader as passenger
Malleable: a new look
On his way out, Myron takes the photo of the cat...
Plagued
Released new novella on Amazon.
Plagued
On the way to work Tory, if she’s on the tram as she is this morning, has taken to opening The Montage, to which she’s subscribed. For nearly three months now the opening page has been simply filled with the virus. The first thing you see, most days, are New Selaw, UK, C.S. and world figures. Cases, deaths. New Selaw figures have been more or less flat since the end of March but the world numbers are very worrying. She also has noticed, lately, a small, worrying, and persistent upswing in Victoria, looking, she decides, more with David’s virologist’s eyes than hers, because he’s written about how second waves come with mild inclines that then go suddenly crazy. She’s tired already and doesn’t want an upsurge, wishes she could unsee it. The tram rattles on past the Gardens stop. She wonders if she’ll ever stop for a quiet walk before work again. It feels like that all belongs to pre-virus Tory, not her, not this new and lacquered one... '
Stephen J Kimber – why I write
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08XFVWYBX Why does anyone write? 'Tis a lonely, often bruising affair, sometimes filled with self loathing. Then again, it lets you inhabit myriad worlds, most of them perhaps better (though, you fear, lacking depth) than the one we've somehow found ourselves in. The Literary Hub notes 33 writers on why they write; surprise, surprise - … Continue reading Stephen J Kimber – why I write
To keep politics out, or not?
Should a writer avoid the topical, particularly the political, given that it dates work or that politics and the topical is considered by many to be as dull as dishwater. Take TRUMP. (Please take him and put him away somewhere dark and silent.) Given that he is at the forefront of our world's conscious, it … Continue reading To keep politics out, or not?
The new book
According to Kindle Direct Publishing I can embed a preview into a web site, so let's see if it works now: https://read.amazon.com.au/kp/card?asin=B072WKC3QK&preview=inline&linkCode=kpe&ref_=cm_sw_r_kb_dp_QnGuzb4ZCKYNW
Sendak on the artistic process
Interesting take on the artistic process by Maurice Sendak, the author/illustrator of Where the wild things are, among other texts: "This dual apperception [of self as adult and child] does break down occasionally. That usually happens when my work is going badly. I get a sour feeling about books in general and my own in … Continue reading Sendak on the artistic process
The zoo speaks
An excerpt from the novel called Kidnapping Douglas Adams - a kind of homage: Tralfamadore is not so much planet as spectacle. Its whole landscape has become, indeed, the universe’s zoo; where planet begins and zoo entertainment ends cannot be unravelled. The place where Felix had put them down (un-intercepted, much to Douglas’s surprise) was … Continue reading The zoo speaks
Inkstained fingers 