Suspend Your Disbelief

Posts Tagged ‘lit blogs’

Shop Talk |

Thursday Morning Candy: Bookseller Chick

by Celeste Ng

After a long hiatus, the blog Bookseller Chick is back, providing thoughts on bookstores, publishing, and all things literary. Writes Linsey, the “Bookseller Chick” herself: A lot has been happening in the book world lately—the flood of great Young Adult books, the rise of the self-publishing success, the increased sales of ebooks, Borders’ bankruptcy, HarperCollins’ new electronic policy for libraries, and Apple’s new reading app requirements—and these things are really starting to make fundamental changes in publishing. Regardless of whether Old School wants it to or not, publish or perish has taken on a whole new meaning. These shifts from […]


Shop Talk |

Thursday Morning Candy: The Grub Street Daily

by Celeste Ng

“Grub” and “candy” probably don’t go together in your mind, but trust me, this week’s Thursday Morning Candy is delicious. The Grub Street Daily is the new daily blog from Grub Street, an independent, nonprofit writing center in Boston. (Disclaimer: I teach there!) The newly launched site offers quotes, prompts, and exercises; publishing success stories; and quirky blog posts like Tara Masih’s thoughts on a writer’s Oscar acceptance speech. There’s even a weekly advice column, “Friday Five-O,” which answers reader queries such as: Dear Friday Five-O: I have a timeless writing question: how do I make a writing schedule and […]


Shop Talk |

Thursday morning candy: Tin House

by Lee Thomas

The founders of Tin House – magazine, book publisher, workshop destination – put their mission best, so I won’t try to improve upon it: The first issue of Tin House magazine arrived in the spring of 1999, the singular lovechild of an eclectic literary journal and a beautiful glossy magazine. Publisher Win McCormack said of the effort, “I wanted to create a literary magazine for the many passionate readers who are not necessarily literary academics or publishing professionals.” From their latest issue (pictured above), which fills me with a tinge of nostalgia (did anyone else think of Jan Brett’s wonderfully […]


Shop Talk |

Bloggers: Give Quote, Get Promo

I’m writing a chapter for a course on blogging, and I’ve been asked to collect quotes about writing from bloggers. So I’m turning to you, readers of the FWR blog, to help me keep my day job by making this great! To participate, you must have a blog, preferably one on writing, but it could be on something else. And you must send me a short quote – about 3-5 sentences – about writing. You can send more than one, but we’ll only use one from each blogger. If we use your quote, we’ll give you credit and likely ask […]


Shop Talk |

From Hemingway's portrait to lit-tats

by Lee Thomas

I recently stumbled upon Poets & Writers’ “Clips” section, “a curated selection of videos, including book trailers, brief interviews, and other literary curiosities updated daily.” It’s an interesting, eclectic cross-section of video that touches on the literary, but isn’t always quite so literal. There’s a clip of photographer Alfred Eisenstaedt’s recalling what it was like to shoot Ernest Hemingway’s portrait for the cover of Life magazine in 1952, a Notre Dame student performing his musical homage to Daisy Buchanan from The Great Gatsby, a timelapse video of artist Mike Stilkey assembling an installation with books as his sculptural medium. Or […]


Shop Talk |

Inside Indie Bookstores: Boswell Book Company in Milwaukee

by Anne Stameshkin

The July/August issue of Poets & Writers hit the newsstands earlier this week, and among the current features is the latest installment of FWR Associate Editor Jeremiah Chamberlin’s Inside Indie Bookstores series. Joining the ranks of previously featured stores like Square Books (Oxford, MS), Powell’s Books (Portland, OR), and Women & Children First (Chicago, IL) is Boswell Book Company (Milwaukee, WI). Jeremiah spoke with Boswell owner Daniel Goldin–who worked as the book buyer for Harry W. Schwartz Bookshops for nearly two decades before that illustrious store went out of business in 2009–about why he chose to open his own shop […]


Shop Talk |

Win a copy of If I Loved You, I Would Tell You This, by Robin Black

by Anne Stameshkin

Before I recommend or send any book to one of FWR’s reviewers, I always read a sample story or two, a chapter, or maybe the first fifteen pages. If I fall in love, I order a copy of the book for myself. But sometimes there’s a novel or collection that demands to be read immediately. If I Loved You, I Would Tell You This (Random House, April 2010) made me forget I had a job, a website, friends, a boyfriend waiting for me to pick him up, dinner burning on the stove. And even after finishing this book (and sending […]


Shop Talk |

Short Story Month 2010: The Collection Giveaway Project

by Anne Stameshkin

Inspired by the Emerging Writers Network—who dubbed May as Short Story Month again this year–and the Poetry Book Giveaway for National Poetry Month, Fiction Writers Review is excited to propose a community effort by lit bloggers to raise attention for short story collections: Short Story Month 2010: The Collection Giveaway Project. Warm thanks to Erika Dreifus (The Practicing Writer), who suggested FWR as a home for this project, and who will be joining the cause. To participate in Short Story Month 2010: The Giveaway Project: (1) This month, post an entry on your blog recommending a recently published short story […]


Shop Talk |

Dating Advice as Writing Advice

by Celeste Ng

Over at The Elegant Variation, Marisa Silver guest blogs, drawing some parallels between love and writing: On love: 3. You will never know your partner. 4. You should never know your partner. 5. You will never know how things will end up. On writing: 3. People will ask you what your work means and you will try to explain it to them, but you won’t really be able to explain it even if it sounds like you are saying something intelligent. 4. You should not be able to explain it. There should always be something ineffable and mysterious about it, […]


Essays |

Shop Talk: From the 2010 AWP Panel "Evolution of the New Media"

“During my years as a bookseller, I cherished the opportunities to talk with fellow readers who were enthusiastic about books: how we read them, why we read them, where we read them—you name it. And whether mysteries or metaphysics, non-fiction or nature writing, Chaucer or children’s literature, there was a world of writing to discuss, much of which I had never heard of. I loved nothing more than learning and contributing to that community. It is this same sense of community that we try to foster at Fiction Writers Review. One that is made up of tastes and interests as divergent and varied as our contributors. But if there’s one unifying element, I have to say it’s that very same enthusiasm for books. An unabashed, unapologetic, earnest love of ‘shop talk.'”




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