Writer Tamago

So, you want to be a writer, do you? Let's talk about the quality that all writers must have before all things. Before tenacity. Before skill. Before work ethic. Let's talk about patience. Where is the first place you will encounter a need for patience? With your manuscript. You will finish it, and you will [...]

I finished Who Fears Death by Nnedi Okorafor about a month ago. I was stunned. It's taken me about a month to sift through my feelings and impressions. Nnedi has graciously agreed to answer some questions about the book, and I'll post those here when they come. Here's my review. One of the interesting routes [...]

From my friend Catrina, the 50 most hated literary characters!. Notable for me: 1. I hate Humbert Humbert. There is nothing you can say to me about him that would make me like anything about him. I am happy that he doesn't expect you to like him either. 2. Rochester is exactly why I dislike [...]

I'm setting my novella in 1973, so I wanted a convenient link to Super70s.com You may ask yourself, what was happening in 1973? I was in the third grade. I had pants that looked like couch upholstery, and crepe shoes that elevated me four inches. We were negotiating a cease-fire in Viet Nam, finally, and [...]

Morale is about 0 right now. Ugly church meeting last night was ugly. Considering wearing a Christians for Christ shirt to church, just to sort of remind people about, you know, religion, which you wouldn't suppose they'd need reminding about, but there you go. And THIS, ladies and gentlemen, is supposed to be the liberal [...]

Hey everyone. Let's talk a little about shopping the book around. First of all, submitting the troll story. If you're no stranger to Writer Tamago, you know I am an advocate for Query Tracker. So far, I've sent out twenty queries to agents, and one query to a publisher. The responses have begun to come [...]

It has been a busy week in my brain. I finished the troll novel, and then fell into a week which included Bryon's parent teachers conferences (doing the errands for 2, instead of one, on my end), my penultimate nightclass, and the grammar retreat. Ugh. Added to that, I had dinner with my pastor on [...]

I'll be up at Kidlitcon this weekend. It's a one-day gathering of children's books authors and bloggers in the Twin Cities. Regrettably, I won't get to see the Merry Fates Reading tonight, as I'll be winging my way north after work, but tomorrow, think it'll be a good day of meeting new people, seeing some [...]

I hadn't planned to post today, but what do you do when someone is this perceptive? Timmel Duchamp gets to the heart of Elizabeth Moon's sustained invitation to Wiscon Timmi's capacity to reason rationally gives me shivers every time she does it. Intellectually yours, Catherine

So, I received this ARC of Factotum because I've talked of my love of D.M. Cornish's stories here. Before, this set of stories on half-continent was called The Monster Blood Tattoo, but I have to admit that the arc is better named The Foundling's Tale, as at its core, it is and ever will be [...]