Today I’m going to revisit something I’ve written about here in the past, because it is a question that comes up often, and that is: Would I ever consider writing fiction? Well, yes, if some irresistible inner force moved me to do so. In fact, as the earliest visitors to this blog know, I have . . .
Read MoreI’d ever in a million years open a Twitter account. But I am finding it to be an awful lot of fun. I follow NPR, Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, Susan Orlean, Karen Abbott, Chris Ballard, Rebecca Skloot and an assortment of others. What’s so interesting is that the personalities of people actually do come through . . .
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Lately I’ve been going through collections of letters from the early 20th century, and once again I’m struck by how rich and detailed such letters can be, and how much they reveal about the era in which they were written and about the people who wrote them. As Samuel Johnson wrote, “In a Man’s Letters…his . . .
Read MoreSo, I’m temporarily addicted to Twitter. I never expected this. I’m going to find help. In the meantime, here are some folk–individuals and institutions–I follow who I think make worthy Twitterers: NPR Le Monde Simon Pegg Nick Frost Susan Orlean Stephen Colbert (I mean, of course) Seattle Police Department
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I’ve been asked, often, which phase of the book process I like best: The writing, or the research? I was just now musing on that question, because I have embarked on a new project and once again find myself happily engaged in the hunt for compelling bits of historical detail. That’s not to say that . . .
Read MoreSo, after about two weeks on Twitter I’ve got slightly more than 140 followers. I had to remove one, who seemed to be a female porn star, though I suppose there are worse things than being followed by a female porn star. I’ve found, actually, that Twitter is surprisingly useful. During the recent shootings in . . .
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Recently I finished the paperback tour for my latest book, In the Garden of Beasts, which took me to some 15 towns and cities, from San Diego, CA, to Portsmouth, NH. During my travels I found that one question in particular kept coming up: What advice would I give to someone just starting out as a . . .
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Erik Larson has taken the plunge and is now on Twitter: @exlarson He promises not to tell you what he has for breakfast, unless it’s something truly exceptional, like the “Ole Miss” plate at The Friendly Toast restaurant in Portsmouth, NH (cheddar toast topped with chorizo, scrambled eggs, melted cheese, and miscellaneous other ingredients). And . . .
Read MoreSo here’s what’s happening on the movie front: Both Devil in the White City and In the Garden of Beasts have been optioned, Devil by Leonardo DiCaprio, and Beasts by Tom Hanks. These things move slowly. Last week I met the screenwriter assigned to Devil, Graham Moore, who assures me he’s going to do something . . .
Read MoreYesterday, thanks to Open Road Media and BookMovement, I and two other Seattle writers, Jennie Shortridge and Garth “Racing in the Rain” Stein, participated in an hour-long chat with readers about a novel that we and numerous other writers wrote last year in six days, while on stage before a live and occasionally inebriated audience. The event–“The Novel Live,” . . .
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