New Gold City

We've been reading a great deal lately about the issue of gender preference in the publishing world. More than anything, the proclamation a few years back that Jonathan Franzen had written the new Great American Novel (complete with JonnieFranz's appearance on the cover of Time magazine) really upset a lot of people. Probably the most cogent questioning of this issue came in the form of an essay by Gabriel Brownstein at The Millions comparing Franzen and his book Freedom to Allegra Goodman and her book The Cookbook Collector . Read this excellent piece here . There's been a good amount of hand wringing on this topic too for years -- mostly by women. I think they have a point. It's not clear to me what is going on in the media world with the need to anoint a book as the next great American novel. Partly, I suppose, arguments against novels have been a mainstream occupation of contrarians and critics now for decades.  Anytime a big, sweeping book like Freedom or Don D...

I recently received two reader reviews on stories of mine available at Amazon's Kindle Store. Both reviewers were rather unhappy. That's fine. I know that fiction, like most everything else, is a matter of taste. Not everyone is going to like everything they encounter in life -- from movies to food to music. The experience of bad (sad?) reviews got me thinking about the Indie Author Experience and how different it is from the status quo, old school legacy publisher experience. As an indie writer I can edit and change my stories in a matter of a few hours and have them re-posted by the next day. Writers beholden to old school publishing houses (even small independent ones) are locked into their published content -- even electronically -- for a very long time. The process of bringing a novel or memoir or whatever to publication requires the extended efforts of many different people (a team, really) over a year to eighteen months...or more. Once a product is deemed complete, it g...

And they also threw this in my face, they said, Anyway, you know good and well It would be beyond the will of God And the grace of a king. - Jimi Hendrix, “1983…(A Merman I Should Turn to Be)” Beyond the Will of God is a mystery coming out in Summer 2012. It ain't your run of the mill whodunit, though. Somehow everyone forgot all those conspiracy theories and weird coincidences that kept popping up in the late Sixties and all through the Seventies. More than anything, the music of folks like Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, The Doors, and The Allman Brothers (even The Beatles and Elvis if you were paying attention) spoke to something deep and wild in each of us. Do you remember? Beyond the Will of God brings you back to that place, and offers a great deal of whacky ideas and provocative characters all related to a series of murders that take place in central Missouri during the heat of summer when the insects are buzzing and the air is thick with possibility once again. Here's how...

I've been experimenting with the pricing of my Kindle stories this past month. My book of short stories ( Trying to Care ) is currently for sale through the Kindle Publishing Direct system. The collection is written for people interested in questions of marital fidelity, mature love, and caring for family members at many stages of life. The title story is about a guy who watches his mother on closed-circuit video instead of visiting her at her senior housing complex. There's a story about a husband who thinks his wife murdered the family pet; another about weirdness taking care of the neighbor's house; and then others about love and quitting cigarettes, visiting a mom in high rise housing, and a Pakistani father and son working at a gas station on 9/11. Each of the six stories can be purchased separately for $0.99 just like a basic song on iTunes. Originally, I'd intended to make just four stories available separately. If you wanted all six you could by the book for $2....

I'm a strong proponent of digital reading. I also believe that when folks talk about healing our economy, the key is for consumers to step up and consume. There is no question in my mind that part of the gentle plus side of the growing economy of 2012 is the development of the digital reading/electronic tablet/iPad markets. It is likely that you saw Apple's phenomenal sales figure of 3 million new iPads sold in the past week. Do you know as well that studies are now indicating that roughly one-third of American households now has at least on electronic reader/tablet? Digital reading is more than just here. It is a dominant new experience for all of us. The arguments against e-reading or the notion that this is just a bubble (ie, those of us reading nuts are on spending sprees but will be satiated soon) are specious. In five years most college students will be doing all of their reading with iPads. In ten years all students from age 5 - 85 will do 95% of their work on iPads (or...

There's a lot of talk about Great American Writers these days. Jonathan Franzen got branded with a version of that moniker (Great American Novelist) a number of years ago when he published The Corrections (and then made the Oprah Follies). Freedom , his latest, still gives the dude buzz 2 years after it came out (and gave him a chance to make nice with Big O). I've read as much of both books as I possibly can, and I'm sorry: Franzen is a great writer, a monster writer in fact, if you will let me invent such a term. Both novels are gargantuan stories about what it means to live in America here in the future. But there are many more profound and touching books out there that the press, Oprah, and Time Magazine don't seem to be aware of. My favorite writer over the past decade has been Anthony Doerr. I read his book of short stories, Memory Wall , back in early 2011 and was blown away. It's out in paperback now. You should read it. See a short video here where he tal...

Trying to Care , a collection of six short stories about love, family, confusion, parenting and mid-life romance, has just been published at Amazon.com's Kindle Book Store. These stories are not intended to provide answers to the reader. They are intended to give perspective and strange insight into love in these post-modern times. "I Could Pity You" starts the collection off with a wife trying to get her husband to quit smoking when she tells him it makes her want to pity him. In "Millie Floating," a husband waking up one snowy morning is convinced his wife has murdered the family dog.  "Jenna's Mother"finds a daughter troubled by her mother's late life situation living in Section 8 senior housing. Jenna Tambore feels uncomfortable in the building and confused about how to help her mom.  In "House Sitting," a husband struggles to understand why it is he and his wife are always fighting. He gets his answer taking care of the neighbors...