Posts from ‘June, 2009’

And now, for your convenience, a handy scale for measuring evil. We’ve been watching a show on Investigation Discovery called Most Evil in which forensic psychiatrist Michael Stone rates assorted murderers on a 1 to 22 scale he’s invented for classifying their “evil.” You’d think that would be a slippery concept, something beyond even philosophers [...]

The Stonecoast MFA residency is just a couple of weeks away, and I’m critiquing workshop manuscripts. This is not a part of the process I relish, largely because I’m nervous about the old doctor’s oath to do no harm; I worry that I’ll say something to send someone chasing the wrong way, thereby destroying a [...]

…brought to you by the governor of South Carolina: The attempted absence of clues is itself a clue. Nice try, though.

Poor J.J. Abrams, likely awake all these nights since my scathing review of Star Trek, can now rest easier. Why? Because I forgive him. After listening to his talk at TED about writing and excitement and mystery, I realized that J.J. was clearly drunk on Star Trek when he made the movie, bedazzled by all [...]

A meme is going around in which people are listing the Fifteen Books They’ve Read That Will Always Stick With Them. I wasn’t sure what “sticking” meant, though I assumed for my list below that it had something to do with reading it early (elementary and high school). I make no claims about the quality [...]

Especially if you’re concrete, apparently. After three hours of this: I ended up with this: And this: Fortunately, I had the help of this: