I love independent bookstores. Who doesn’t? The curated selection! The friendly booksellers! The atmosphere! I miss a lot about life outside my house, and dawdling through a bookstore with a coffee and my baby in a stroller ranks pretty high on my list. (I’m gonna cry through writing this one, aren’t I). It’s only natural that some of my favorite indies are in Baltimore, where I currently live. There’s the…
We all know December is traditionally hellish, what with the looming holiday madness, the ten thousand “festive event” obligations, and the ubiquitous viral plague that bitchslaps everyone into total uselessness. Here at The Deb Ball, we decided to take it easy on ourselves this week. So instead of writing real columns, we’re listing a handful of favorite quotes on writing. (Or that’s what I’m doing, anyway. For fun,…
This week the Debs are writing about our vices. Aldous Huxley once said that “Most vices demand considerable self-sacrifices.” I think that is apt. All of my vices force me to sacrifice something else, be it health, time or money. But oh, how fun a vice can be! Of mine, these are my worst: Video Games If I think about how many hours I’ve whittled away at video games over…
I’m a capable woman who spent fourteen years as an independent adult before getting married. I entered into my marriage with my own power drill, mortgage, and system for organizing my book collection. We are an evolved family: my husband does the laundry, I order take-out for dinner, and the kids are learning how to mix Manhattans (okay, not quite, but a mother can dream). Husband travels occasionally for work….
Technically, the topic is guilty pleasures, but when it comes to THINGS I WILL NOT SURRENDER no matter how good or bad they may be for me, Coffee heads the list (at least where inanimate objects are concerned). Calling me a “coffee drinker” seriously underestimates the situation. I drink, on average 12-14 8-oz cups per day. No, that’s not an exaggeration. I drink the coffee, in part, to control a…
New Year’s resolutions frighten me. They have a habit of getting broken, thus undermining my belief that I can achieve legitimate, important goals and generally leaving me a self-pitying mess. But this year, I’m going to keep my New Year’s resolutions. I’m going to keep them with ease and sit back with a smile as those around me fall off their various wagons, plunge into self-hatred, depression and all-encompassing bitterness…
Middles are tough. To start off, my middle is currently much too wide, the result of too much chocolate and caffeine this past month as I finished THE ALOHA DIARIES. I just didn’t think that a few extra bites of chocolate, McDonald’s, potato chips and all sorts of junk that seemed to call to me would matter in the end. I was wrong. To go off topic here for a…
I’m one of those readers always looking for parallels between protagonists and the writers who create them. The extent to which writers use autobiographical information (or not) interests me. I know writers who take the “write what you know” advice to the extreme and write themselves into the story in a way that almost borders on memoir. I’m not saying this doesn’t make for great fiction: it often does. Here’s…
This past week, instead of writing, I’ve been dealing with contractors — the retaining wall beside our house has fallen in and our roof is leaking. The guy building our new wall — and it is a beautiful wall — is fascinated with the fact that I’m a writer. He says he wants to write a book. Instead of working on my new book, I stand out in the cold…
