Dispatches since 2005
The journal
Announcements, new editions, travel, diving, cooking and the working life of a novelist — 3,174 entries, all of them here in full.
February 21, 2019 · 63 words
When I Wrote It
Some days I’m glancing at my Amazon sales numbers and can’t avoid reading the reviews. There was one review of This Is Not a Game and the whole Dagmar series that said they were excellent books, but warned the reader that they weren’t in any way science fiction. To which I can only respond: They were science […]
Read entry →February 19, 2019 · 239 words
Boxes
More boxes of books have arrived. They’re coming faster than I can give them away! Be that as it may, this photo should tell you that the revised edition of The Praxis is finally in print! (It’s been available as an ebook for some time.) It’s the “Author’s Definitive Edition.” It says so right there on […]
Read entry →February 16, 2019 · 92 words
Black Beret
Motored up to Santa Fe last night to see the (seemingly) immortal Richard Thompson, OBE, and his current four-person trio. I donned a black beret in tribute. Pardon the amateur quality of the video (not by me), but it has the virtue of showcasing Thompson’s phenomenal guitar skills in a song that is a tribute […
Read entry →February 12, 2019 · 232 words
Abandoned Carcass
Shoshana Zuboff takes aim at surveillance capitalism. . . . the digitization of everything was giving technology firms immense social power. From the modest beachheads inside our browsers, they conquered, Blitzkrieg-style, our homes, cars, toasters, and even mattresses. Toothbrushes, sneakers, vacuum cleaners: our form
Read entry →February 8, 2019 · 82 words
Sympathique
I’ve been trying to work hard and mostly failing, so I might as well listen to Pink Martini and surrender to the mood. The chorus is a riff off the French composer Poulenc, and translates as follows: I don’t want to work I don’t want to lunch All I want is to forget And I […]
Read entry →February 4, 2019 · 133 words
Sea Smoke
My home town of Duluth was hammered last week by the Polar Vortex, and so of course there were various photos of frozen eyelashes and stalled cars and people bundled up like the Michelin Man. (Fortunately it didn’t last. In a single day the temperature went from -31 to +31. That’s Fahrenheit, of course, since […
Read entry →January 29, 2019 · 198 words
Now Hear This!
Friend of the blog Allen informs me that the audio book of Metropolitan is now available, narrated by Emily Woo Zeller. I’m sure City on Fire was recorded at the same time, so probably by the time you finish listening to this one, the sequel will be available. So there’s no reason to hesitate! Find it on […]
Read entry →January 29, 2019 · 515 words
Cavorting
I would like to report further on my trip to Los Cabos, but there isn’t a great deal to report on. I wrote every day, but other than that, I relaxed. I spent a lot of time sitting under umbrellas, reading or watching the whales cavort just offshore. In addition, I spent a certain amount of […]
Read entry →January 26, 2019 · 65 words
Hasta la Vista
Last night in Cabo. My friends have been terrific, the hospitality was wonderful, the drinks pretty great. (Never had a tequila that tasted like pecan praline before. You’d think that would be bad, but you’d be wrong.) I’ll be returning to the world tomorrow, but in the meantime I’ll be enjoying the last of my [&hellip
Read entry →January 24, 2019 · 111 words
Have a Flight!
And pour an extra one for yourself, Etaoin Shrdlu, because you’ve won the contest! I am in fact in Cabo San Lucas, a guest of my longtime friend Terry Boren, whose relations own a timeshare. It’s not exactly a vacation, because I’ve been writing every day, but normally my week is full of all sorts of […]
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