Boo! Book Pages Shrinking

My local paper, the venerable Cleveland Plain Dealer, sliced a significant chunk of its book review space this summer. And we'll probably never see it again. Groan.

Yeah, I know the newspaper biz is reportedly (ha! there's irony!) dying. But the book pages appeal to readers and papers really, really need readers, right?

The cut is likely to result in one, or maybe two or three fewer reviews each week. All of the reviews are likely to be shorter.

If you care, let the editors know that you miss the space.

Yay, Newspapers!

I just read that the Washington Post, New York Post, and the Daily News are planning to consolidate some operations to save costs - particularly in distribution. And I'm thrilled! It sounds like a very logical step, and one that could loosen up a bit of $$$ that should be allocated to paying writers. You know, the people who provide the content? Yeah, them.

We need them thar writers, folks. If we want to know what's going on in the world, we really need 'em.

Oh, leave Mr. Colfer alone!

Eoin Colfer, middle-school teacher turned best-selling author, has droves of critics - which I find perfectly absurd. He's a fine writer; of course he's not perfect.

It annoys me to no end to see how writers get picked apart almost to the extent that presidential candidates do. Is it not enough to have an overall grasp of the language, be able to connect with millions through mere words, imagine (and describe) a world that doesn't exist, create rich, full-bodied characters, and tell a gripping story in under 400 pages? How 'bout six of 'em (in one series) or sixteen?

Apparently, it's not enough.

As I'm preparing to review a book, I try to do a fairly broad analysis of existing criticism on the author and his/her works. So I've done with Mr. Colfer, and found many - most! - reviewers all but gloss over the main points (here's a gifted storyteller with a fabulous imagination, good-to-great writing skills, and a terrific sense of humor) to put (right up front, in the lead paragraphs sometimes!) little digs like "Colfer writes B-movie dialog" or "characters speak in cliches," or "not as action-packed as the first book."

Oh, give me a break.

I love Jane Austen's work, folks, but even Jane didn't always write up to Jane's standards. She delivered damn fine books, though. Not perfect, but good enough.

As my favorite boss liked to say, "Sometimes good enough is good enough."

I say, great writers have to know when good enough is good enough, or we (the reading public) will never get our hands on great books, or even good ones.

So leave Mr. Colfer alone! He's great! Enough.

Picture Writing

When most writers think "picture writing" they think of a lot of things - techniques, mostly, of penning descriptive language; some think of the oodles of "tricks" they've learned (and probably forgotten) in some class or workshop or seminar somewhere.

But when I stumbled upon (not using that cool but time-sucking website, by the way) i heart photograph by fellow blogger Laurel Ptak I thought, now that's really picture writing! Each of the images really do convey a thousand words.

Cool.

Have a look!

Minding My Ps and Qs and Little Else

I know I'm lucky to be a writer who has a full time job writing. I know, I know. But any job bites into one's "other" writing. Sigh.

I could turn this blog into a diatribe about glaring gaffs (the misplaced and just plain unnecessary apostrophes, for starters) but that seems rather disingenuous when I'm doing very little writing myself.

So let's agree to ignore most of those "little" errors we see - you know, the ones that highlight the offending writers' abject and utter disregard for proper language and sometimes call into question his or her very moral fiber - ahem, I said, ignore them whenever possible, but never, ever grow sloppy in our own writing. Or typing.

Flop.

(That was me falling off my high horse.)

Happy reading, whatever it is, and if you're writing at all, for heaven's sake, be happy!

Punctuation Points

You know why punctuation is such a thorn in our sides? (Besides the fact that it seems to be engulfed in an arbitrary set of really picky rules, I mean.) This is why: when you get it right, no one (except your English teacher) notices, and when you get it wrong, people point it out.

OK, not a lot of people. Mostly, people like me. But (stomping my foot) it matters!

For example....Christmas cards. (I know it's a bit disingenuous to critique holiday greetings, but goodness - such a broad target!)

Folks, "Merry Christmas from The Smith's" is wrong. The Smiths are the Smiths. Putting in an apostrophe is fine if you're referring to the Smiths' dog, but if you refer to the Smith's dog, I'm going to have to assume you mean the BLACKsmith's canine. Get it? If the dog belongs to the Smith family, also known as the Smiths, it's the Smiths' dog. Ergo, it's the Smiths' greetings. And I'm sure they were merrier than this...

Proofreading - still not a computer's job

I've been reading a lot of government publications this week, and even though my eyes glazed over long ago, I had to stop and laugh at the "wise variety of legal issues" that one of the documents cited.

I realize some may see having a proofreader on the government payroll as a waste, but folks, if that little gem slipped in the document, don't you wonder what else may have been overlooked?

I do.