Search results for “writing+the+book”

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"His conversation is so delightfully sauced ..."

“His conversation is so delightfully sauced …”

It was the verb in this sentence in “Braiding Sweetgrass,” a reissued book of nature essays by Robin Wall Kimmerer, that captivated me. It’s a strong, active verb, so the sentence leaps where similar descriptions stroll. The…
July 1, 2020
"Words are living things. They have personality, point of view, agenda."

“Words are living things. They have personality, point of view, agenda.”

 When looking for advice, writers shouldn’t be picky; sometimes even a fictional cannibal will serve.When NBC aired a series about Hannibal Lecter, the psychiatrist who moonlights as a serial killer…
June 16, 2020
How F. Scott Fitzgerald guided the hand and aspirations of a newspaper journalist

How F. Scott Fitzgerald guided the hand and aspirations of a newspaper journalist

Early in my career, while working in Minnesota as a reporter for the St. Paul Pioneer Press, I fell in love with F. Scott Fitzgerald, the city’s most famous native…
June 4, 2020
Reading (Stephen King) to learn to write

Reading (Stephen King) to learn to write

Now for something fun and funky, or at least distracting, but these days I’m sure we could all use fun and funky, or at least distracting. A starter’s guide to…
June 3, 2020
A day-in-the-life profile of a grocery store during the coronavirus shutdown

A day-in-the-life profile of a grocery store during the coronavirus shutdown

With a cell phone, an eye for evocative detail and 50 pages of notes, Brittny Mejia of the Los Angeles Times turned a day at a grocery store into a…
June 2, 2020
"... the only true medicine I could provide."

“… the only true medicine I could provide.”

They are no longer novel, these personal stories the front lines of the coronavirus. Reporters are barred from the kind of immersion that allows eye-witness accounts from that expanding front.…
May 29, 2020
The news joins the rituals of mourning

The news joins the rituals of mourning

EDITOR’S NOTE: This piece is published in partnership with our friends at the Poynter InstituteI was half-way through an essay on how the experience of news — especially in the…
May 28, 2020
"When we came back to Paris it was clear and cold and lovely."

“When we came back to Paris it was clear and cold and lovely.”

My wife, Karen, and I happen to have for more than a decade a good Catholic pastor, Msgr. Robert Gibbons. Among his many gifts, he is a news junkie and…
May 20, 2020
A displaced writer picks up a camera — and falls back in love with learning

A displaced writer picks up a camera — and falls back in love with learning

We’re all reinventing ourselves in this suddenly sideways world. So here’s my reinvention story, and the theme that goes with it: Do it for love.The micro of what I did…
May 19, 2020
A poet's distanced farewell to his students is an anthem for the times

A poet’s distanced farewell to his students is an anthem for the times

EDITOR’S NOTE: Gerald P. Costanzo moved his poetry class online March 10 because of coronavirus. As the semester ended, he wanted to leave his students with “something more substantial than…
May 12, 2020