25 years
I remember a lot of things about first grade. I remember the thrill of celebrating the 100th day of school by counting out 100 Cheerios. I remember receiving a small blank book in which I could write...
View ArticleThe best of 2012
This year, I decided to do something a little different. Since there are so many best books of the year lists, I wanted to write about not only novels I loved, but those that had social or cultural...
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Getting personal
I have a small bone to pick with the Gawker piece on journalism and narcissism, and not only because it fails to give proper weight to this wacky thing that happened to journalism since the advent of...
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Work ethics and the ethics of work
Sailing away on a schooner in Key West So what do you do? It’s the inevitable question that comes within the first 15 minutes of most conversations at parties, on first dates, or otherwise awkward...
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May the children be forgiven?
In novels written for adults, children don’t often exist. They seem written into the text for the sake of giving the adults something to be responsible for. But hold a match to them and you’ll see...
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Lifetime sentence(s): on Tepper, Gilbert and Roth
For all this to make sense, clearly Julian Tepper will have to write an amazing second novel. The bizarre kerfuffle between Philip Roth (who hasn’t actually thrown a punch) and Elizabeth Gilbert,...
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Writing about doing it
“Somewhere between 30 seconds and all night long. That’s your problem.” Nora Ephron was talking about cuddling. Or rather Harry was talking about post-coital cuddling in one of the many instances he...
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La VIDA loca
If you work anywhere in media and publishing, you’ve probably heard about the VIDA (Women in the Literary Arts) numbers and realized not much has changed since last year, or the year before (although...
View ArticleHonesty in disguise
Philip Roth’s recent kerfuffle with Elizabeth Gilbert (if one can even call it a kerfuffle) didn’t help to soften his image as a miserable curmudgeon. But that Roth is nowhere to be seen in Philip...
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Falling back or leaning in?
The other day I overheard a woman at a coffee shop talking to a male friend about Sheryl Sandberg’s Lean In: “Have you heard about this book? It’s like the new manifesto for professional women. My...
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Crowdfunding the revolution
Me striking a ridiculous pose near the Galata Tower The revolution may not be televised or authorized, but it will be crowdfunded. When I first heard that the sit-in at Istanbul’s Gezi Park had...
View ArticleA few recent articles
Women’s e-News: Why the “never enough” sales strategy has women in retail scrambling LA Review of Books: Up in the Canyons - Lawrence Blume adapts his mother’s Tiger Eyes for the big screen
View ArticleShort bus
On Friday I was crossing Nostrand Ave. at Avenue N en route to the Q train. I planned on stopping in Cafe Hadar on the way. I like the coffee there. The owners are Israeli. They make me feel at home...
View ArticleMaking an impact
There’s this movie I love. Margaret. It’s about a New York City teenager (Margaret, played by Anna Paquin) who witnesses a devastating bus accident. The crash is the inciting incident, but it’s the...
View Article(Picnic, Lightning)
I was told to take a warm bath with epsom salts to deal with any soreness. At first I didn’t want to because I put epsom salts in a category labeled decrepit and old. Mothballs, Bengay, mecuricome,...
View ArticleTiny Madmen
I’ve been working on the same personal essay for three days straight. This always happens when I’m writing something I really care about. It’s probably why I’m afraid to start revising my novel. I get...
View ArticleNote to self
Apropos of nothing, the man next to me on the bus starts talking. “What happened to global warming?” he asked. I was about to say um, nothing, I’m pretty sure the globe is still warming. I glanced at...
View ArticleBattle for Brooklyn
Is there a venn diagram of people who attend boxing matches and people who attend literary events? I wonder. I just might be the only one to fall in the sliver of overlapping space between the two...
View ArticleBuzz(feed) kill
What were we talking about? Oh yeah. Writing. I’m reading Great Expectations. Donna Tartt is on deck. They say you need 5 different references – online, in your social media feeds, from face to face...
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Minor inconveniences
There was a panel on using these cool frames. Invent this: a system of classification for the interwebs. I’m talking the species and genus breakdown of SEO, click through ratea, page views, tags, alt...
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