Writer Tamago

In an epic saga like the Mahabharata, two mythical families destroying each other is certainly a major event, and it is no exception here. Krishna decides that he will give his armies to the Kauravas, but he himself will help the Pandavas. Krishna is Vishnu, the king of the gods incarnate, so it's probably a [...]

Another two hours of work on the troll book. I'm twenty-seven out of sixty-three scenes through the new outline. Relentlessly, I will work my way through the new structure with fewer characters and then I will go through with texturing. I'm finding that after about two hours, I need a break. I *can* come back [...]

Who are your influences as a writer? On the way back from World Fantasy, one of the books I polished off was Ray Bradbury's The Martian Chronicles. We're doing a bunch of old books next year for our book group, and it's giving me a chance to read some books that I read as a [...]

Go buy Booklife by Jeff VanderMeer. Buy it as soon as you can. I'll be the first to admit that there are better books written about private booklife, or the art of being a writer. Laura Mixon gave a terrific lecture at Viable Paradise, about feeding the beast that I wish I could share with [...]

So, for the first time today, a writer asked me for some help. Shannon was curious about how you found out the reputation of small presses. Of course, I advised him the long way around: Look at the site, check Predators and Editors, ask authors who'd published at 'em what their experiences were, and so [...]

If you've been reading Writer Tamago, you'll realize that I have a bit of an offbeat sense of humor. Take one part broad humor, lace it with dry wit, add in Iowa colloquialism and a PhD's worth of irony, and you have...me. I write like this sometimes, as Hulk Hercules will attest when it comes [...]

Day One of TrollNoWriMo was all about planes. Day Two, however, has been all about organization. Now I know. Ten chapters. I know which characters to whack, which of the written scenes to revise, and which new scenes I have to write. I'll spend tomorrow and Thursday working on current scenes. Then we'll start adding [...]

First of all, let's put up the super fun link to Chris Cornell's pictures. It was great to see him and Sean again, and to expand our knowledge of VPers past. Our t-shirt is the best one. I'm just sayin'. So, I'm back, and for the first time in like, four days, I'm not sleep [...]