Scott Timberg is one of the most insightful people blogging and writing today. His articles consistently provide astute looks at how culture is evolving. This latest example from Salon is no exception. I continue to urge you to follow Scott on his blog, The Misread City. The creative class is a lie The dream of [...]

Very funny, insightful, and heartfelt essay in today’s The Millions on what happens when THE BOOK, THE NOVEL does not sell and how you’ll just DIE when that happens. Not that I know anything at all about that … no … but, you know, I’ve heard tell stories. Essays Shutting the Drawer: What Happens When [...]

Damn. And I thought not hearing anything back from editors was tough. When Hunter S. Thompson Penned Rolling Stone‘s Rejection Letters If you’re going to get this kind of rejection letter it might as well be penned by Hunter S. Thompson. Rolling Stone should keep this on file to send out to other worthy rejectees. [...]

Anytime you get a review in which the reviewer says, “I could not put this book down,” it’s a good day. When that praise comes from an anthropologist and is followed with, “This book is a must read for those contemplating volunteering for a clinical trial (advice in the Afterward), and it also provides discussion [...]

…Over the next 10 years, I thought often about Mr. Criche’s six words. Whenever I felt discouraged, and this was often, it was those six words that came back to me and gave me strength. When a few instructors in college gently and not-so-gently tried to tell me I had no talent, I held Mr. Criche’s words before me like a shield. I didn’t care what anyone else thought. Mr. Criche, head of the whole damned English department at Lake Forest High, said I could be a writer. So I put my head down and trudged forward…

Richard Byrd sent me this photo of my father Wolfe in Bisbee. Perhaps mid-70s?, maybe early 80s? He’s the one in the hat, with the gun, pointing.

The painter Peter Young lent me a book by Roberto Bolaño here in Bisbee two years ago. I sat with 2666 for a month and alternately hugged it close and threw it across the room. I ended up loving the book and the writer’s controlled emotional style of writing. I discovered Don DeLillo when a guy on 2nd Avenue was selling books spread out on a blanket on the sidewalk in 1984. “People uptown love this guy!” he said when I handed over $3 for an old copy of Great Jones Street.

Dwight Garner reviews nonfiction from Bolaño called Between Parenthesis — cool title — while amazon.com has a terse page about The Angel Esmeralda, a first collection of short fiction with nine stories from DeLillo, due out in November. It’s a good day to be a person who loves to read. Enjoy Garner’s review and more information at More …

Sometimes the articles I write are just fun. Like this one for LIVESTRONG.ORG.

Overview

Tetherball is a summer mainstay of campers, revelers, outdoor enthusiasts and fans of the movie “Napolean Dynamite.” The activity of smacking a ball tethered to a string around a pole until the string wraps itself completely around the pole while another person tries to smack the ball to wrap the rope around the pole the opposite way has a cloudy history and murky origin, however…

A site called asweetlife.org, dedicated to diabetes, ran an essay of mine called Curing Diabetes: Would I Do it Again? It’s about my transplant and the fallout from it. There are some kind and interesting comments at the bottom of the piece. It’s a wonderful site I urge you to visit for more than just what I’ve written.

I write article for Livestrong.com and, eHow.com and starting today, I’ll post some of what I put out there. Just for fun. To keep in touch. To tout my brand. To flog my skills. To keep it real. OK. Enough.

Can Drinkers Lose Weight? …