Things to Read Online

 

Email Meredith Sue Willis at msw@meredithsuewillis.com
Meredith Sue Willis's Complete Book List
MSW's Bookstore: A percentage always goes to local bookstores.

Email List and Free subscription to Books for Readers and Writers

 

Things to Read Online (3-20-23)

Joe Chuman has some excellent context on Anti-Semitism.

See an excellent short piece by Jane Ainslee, "The Iceman."

Check out Ayun Halliday's web page:   She makes cartoon-style hand lettered publications. She says,"I’ve got this theory that 99.9% of all humans who toil creatively throughout history have not been and will never be rich as a result of their art....I interviewed dozens of creative humans and share my own experiences in this rallying cry for the “small potato” who persists in making cool, meaningful work and living a creative life devoid of (gasp!) wealth or celebrity." This is from her Manifesto of Small Potatoes. And her hand lettered pages and art work are just delightful. And encouraging!

Troy Hill has new stories online: The Write Launch published his long short story "Aquarium Life" and The Bangalore Review published his story "Ford Man."

Norman Danzig's powerful and fearsome story "The Angel of Death" has just been published at Blue Lake Review.

Review by MSW of "Foote" A Mystery Novel," by Tom Bredehoft, at Southern Literary Review, November 2, 2022.

Also, see Ed Davis's "Artemis" at The Plentitudes.

Barbara Crooker's beautiful October poem

Nikolas Kosoff's story about a boy with a unique world view is available online at "Evolution." The boy's world view--and his world-- are very interesting. It's a gripping story of school life, New York City, making friends--and seeing, if not solving, a mystery.

Diane Simmons' "The Big Time" in Hippocampus Magazine.

Check out Harvey Robins on how New York City could return to putting the needs of the public over the needs of corporations (for-profit and non-profit both) in public spending.

Suzanne McConnell reads a short short about Arkansas and much more.

Nancy Solomon, who covers New Jersey for NPR, has a new podcast about the deaths of a New Jersey power couple: Dead End: A New Jersey Political Murder Mystery.

What to read instead of J.D. Vance's book Hillbilly Elegy.

A piece by Ed Davis at Journal of Practical Writing on publishing a story after ten years and forty submissions.

Information on Short Short and Flash fiction, including collections to read. From Lit Hub.

Check out the NY Times on the growing importance of TikTok to book publishing. Note that the writer they feature is the excellent novelist of ancient history and myth, Madeline Miller, whose Circe I reviewed in an issue of Books for Readers Newsletter.

A site for book clubs to get in touch with authors and more: Authorpods.com

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I have a new blog post/ book review of Eric Foner's A Short History of Reconstruction and some thoughts that led me to at this moment of hope and history.

 

Things to Read and Do:

• An article in the Times about The Turner Diaries,
  a white supremicist novel that inspires insurrection...

• The Ultimate Fiction Writing Prompt

• New Year's Poem by Hilton Obenzinger

• New at A Journal of Practical Writing: "Cultural Appropriation in Creative Writing."

 

Excellent New Reviews:

• Review of Saving Tyler Hake in The Herald-Dispatch

• Saving Tyler Hake in Southern Literary Review

• Saving Tyler Hake at Books for Readers Newsletter

• Soledad in the Desert at Review Tales.

12-23-20 Issue Books for Readers #212:

Reviews by Donna Meredith and Carrington Hatfield

Books by Octavia Butler, Madison Smartt Bell, Yxta Maya Murray, Sidney Schama, Wallace Stegner, Timothy G. Huguenin, Cobb & Seaton, and more.

 

 

Stand for the New Year by Hilton Obenzinger

December 31, 2020

People are so glad that miserable 2020 will be behind us. But what makes us so sure it will be gone? Only on January 20, when Biden is sworn in, will 2021 begin. That will really be a new year. Or maybe when the pandemic is throttled once and for all, maybe in 2022? 2023? Perhaps we're lost in a maze of our own making. Grief and fear stretch across the country. Time gets stretched out too, cooped up at home, and maybe 2020 never ends. The decade will be known as the Roaring 20 (no 20s, just one long 20).

Maybe the Y2K glitch has arrived 20 years too late. I look at the digital calendar on my smart phone and the date reads, "December 32, 2020." We may be trapped in a glitch of time.

But then I talk with the redwood tree in my backyard.

Scientists have learned that trees in forests communicate with each other through fungus attached to their roots. They talk to each other. The Tree of Life is actually a Forest of Life. A lot of "primitive" people have known this for a very long time. Trees don't need to move around, they are separate above the ground. But underground is another story. Fungus connects one root system to another and then to another and another. The trees share nutrients and information between each other.

The redwood tree in my backyard is probably hooked up to the nearby maple and grapefruit trees, and even to the squat palm below the loquat tree, and of course to the plum tree. I ask the redwood what next year will be like. The redwood consulted with all the other trees. I waited but I didn't hear or feel anything that would be an answer and turned around, walking to the backdoor of my house.

What do I expect from a tree? My athlete's foot rash is not the same fungus that connects all the trees, so there's no way to communicate. Besides, what does a redwood tree know about years? The revolving and spinning of the earth the tree understands, the change of seasons, the sun, the mist, the buds and plums, the fires, that's what time is to a tree, not the flipping of calendars humans make.

But then I felt it just as I reached the backdoor. I felt a flash of revelation and turned around. I looked up at the tall tree, and I understood. The tree just stands. One redwood near our house is over a thousand human years old; my redwood tree is not that old but old enough to be wise.

Keep standing, don't fall, sustain yourself and your family, keep close to your friends, be happy with what you do, and love the pleasures that give life meaning. Stand.

Stand for happiness and health. Stand for freedom and food. Stand for everything you love. Stand for life.

Ultimate Fiction Writing Prompt

New short piece in A Journal of Practical Writing

 

A page of obituaries of some of my favorite writers and activists. I just added Dan Menaker and Diane di Prima.

I've started using my blogger blog for some political observations. Example: One America News Network, a place for news from an alternative universe...

 

Fall 2020 Hamilton Stone Review Issue #43

Poetry: Tony Beyer, R. T. Castleberry, William Cordiero, Shannon Cuthbert, John Davis, Robert Fillman, Howie Good, Nels Hanson, Michael Hettich, Richard Jones, Tricia Knoll,Naomi Bess Leimsider, Tim Mayo, John Palen, Bruce Parker, Kenneth Pobo, Will Reger, John Repp, Stan Sanvel Rubin, Rikki Santer, Carla Sarett, Terry Savoie, Claudia Schatz, Claire Scott, Phillip Shabazz, Ben Sloan, David Spicer, D. E. Steward, Eleanor Swanson, Taunja Thomson, Bill Tremblay, Carol Tyx, Richard Weaver, Charles Wyatt, and Mark Young.

Prose: Austin Adams, Olusola Akinwale, Ron Dowl, Natthinee Khot-asa Jones & Hardy Jones, Eleanor Lerman, Nicanor Millan, J. Alan Nelson, Leah Sackett, Jeff M. Sellers, and Diane Simmons.

 

Thanks to the South Orange/Maplewood Community Coalition on Race for honoring me at the annual celebratioin on 10-17-20. See information and my remarks here.

 

 

 

Podcast of MSW on Having Fun With Revision: The bite size story telling show

 

Youtube interview of MSW by Carter Seaton on her program Chapters. It's about MSW's new book Soledad in the Desert and other matters.

 

Mountain State Press Announces New Book by MSW:
Saving Tyler Hake: A Novella

 

Review of Saving Tyler Hake in Appalachian Mountain Books:

Tyler Hake is a 10th grader in Southern West Virginia. He needs to be saved because, after the community uproar surrounding the death of his father, Mason Hake, a Gulf War veteran, Tyler brings Mason's blood-stained shirt to school. The plot thickens when one of Mason's classmates shows up unexpectantly in her hometown and seems to be joining with his teachers in offering support to Tyler....Since 1979 when Charles Scribner's Sons brought out her first novel, Meredith Sue Willis has been West Virginia's most prolific and versatile author, well-known and well-loved for her willingness to share what she knows and to encourage the state's prospective writers.
                                   -- George Brosi, Appalachian Mountain books.

 

 

 

 

• Soledad in the Desert Discussion with Tyler Chadwell, Eddy Pendarvis, Donna Meredith, Phyllis Wilson Moore--and MSW!

• Review of Soledad at Renaissance Writer!

• Review of Soledad by Diane Simmons

• Read a sample here.

• MSW's Their Houses is featured at Snowflakes in a Blizzard.Take a look!

• Discussion about Soledad in the Desert--with MSW!

• Instagram "Pandemic Profile" of MSW and her new book

• MSW talks about revision at Commaful.com

• Podcast of MSW on Having Fun With Revision: The bite size story telling show

   

  Latest Writing Exercise

 

Things to Read

• Article on Story, Plot, and Character: Dennis Lehane appreciates Elmore Leonard

• Best George Floyd poem: (by Toi Derricotte, "Why I Don't Write About George Floyd," on Poem-a-Day)

• Latest Issue of Books for Readers #211! October, 2020!

• Have you read Thich Nhat Hanh's poem about how we are all everything? Prey and predator? Joy and pain? "Please Call Me By My True Names"

• A blog post from Reedsy about how to make your novel into a series.

• Advice from a copyright lawyer on using corporate and trademark names in fiction

• Jane Friedman's blog has a post by a professional editor about strained, too fancy, and badly mixed metaphors.

• Writing exercises and Prompts!

• Book Buying: You are now able to buy books at Bookshop.org where a percentage of every sale goes to a pool that is shared every six months among brick-and-mortar bookstores. MSW has her own storefront at Bookshop.org. It shares profits with bookstores and pays the author a little!

 

Latest Issue of the Hamilton Stone Review #42!

Poetry by Carol Alexander,Tony Beyer, Charles Cantrell, David R. Cravens, Steven Deutsch, Brian Fanelli, Aaron Fischer, Kara Goughnour, Pat Hanahoe-Dosch, Nels Hanson, Marilyn Humbert, Alex MacConochie, Bruce McRae, Mary K. O'Melveny, Simon Perchik, Claire Scott, Barry Seiler, David Spicer, Tim Suermondt, Reed Venrick, and Erin Wilson.

Prose by Joe Giordano, Natascha Graham, E.J. Myers, Caroline Sutton, and Eleanor Levine.

 

 

In Memoriam-- Taxicab Willis-Weinberger
Extraordinary Budgerigar!
March 2006-March 30,2020

Especially for Writers:

• Latest Free Writing Exercise/prompt

• Check out Reedsy.com for free lessons and information
  and to hire publishing specialists (and lots more information. Some sample articles:
  

  • What to look for when you're looking for an editor.

  • What can authors expect from their fiction editor?

  • What to expect from your book cover designer,
  

  • How to work with a typesetter or layout designer

• An essay I wrote a few years back reflecting on my development as a visiting writer, and about the people who began this work in the early 1970's:  "Still a Writer in the Schools"

• New in A Journal of Practical Writing: Recycling Your Old projects--Notes from Ed Davis.   Also in A Journal, Five Writing Lessons from George Eliot in A Journal of Practical Writing.

• A List of Books for Young Adults with Appalachian Themes and Writers
  From Phyllis Wilson Moore

 

---

Praise for MSW's Their Houses:

• 11-27-19 Review of  Their Houses in Southern Literary Review!

• "[In Their Houses, Willis] sets up a bizarre but plausible set of circumstances, and rides the wild waves from there..."   The Monday Book: Wendy Welch blog 10-29-19

• "Five Ideas for Reads to Cozy Up To" includes Their Houses!

• Good Review of Their Houses byJess Walker in Morgantown Magazine

• Review of Their Houses at Appalachian Mountain Books

• "Love Done Wrong," Excellent new review of Their Houses in American Book Review Volume 40, Number 3, March/April 2019, pp. 23-24, by Allison Epstein: "Their Houses treats religion sympathetically without being afraid to criticize its failings."

• Review of Their Houses by Emily Masters in Appalachian Heritage, UNC Press Volume 46, Number 4, Fall 2018 : "Perhaps the most fulfilling aspect about Willis's novel is the way it engages themes of mental and physical illness.

• Review of Their Houses in The Greenbrier Valley Quarterly

   

More for Readers and Writers:

• Explore our page on Literature for Pleasure and Study.

• Jane Friedman on Fair Use and other copyright issues. Excellent summary.

• The Hamilton Stone Review no. 42, spring 2020, edited by
  Roger Mitchell and Dorian Gossy.

• MSW's story "Tiny Gorillas" about a religiously mixed marriage is now available online.
  

• A poem for the hard-of-hearing: "Disclosure" by Camisha L. Jones

 

Past Events

10-15-19 MSW made a presentration at "Lunch with Books"
in Wheeling, West Virginia. Read about it here.

.

MSW read with Marc Harshman and Valerie Nieman
at McNally Jackson Prince Street October 9, 2019

The picture above is of MSW with Bethany Nutter, who was the Top Honors winner for the high school section of the West Virginia "Letters About Literature" project (5-16-19). (Read more here)

I got a review and recommendation for my Website from an online editing services company. They have a lot of reviews of interesting material and, of course, sell services!   Please take a look.

And another website review of my website at Woven Tale Press Central, which is the web presence of Woven Tale Press. Check out WTP's latest Literary and Art Competition.

 

Older Events

(for lots of past events, pictures, blog posts etc. click here.)

November 2018, MSW read with Diane Simmons at
Jefferson Market Library in New York City.

Cat Pleska interviews MSW on "West Virginia Authors;" Septemer 2018

Recent Anthologies That Include MSW's Work: