Work to a Calm #7 - Two Poems

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Two of my poems, "Flood" and "Nothing and You," now appear in Issue 7 of Work to a Calm, a striking little literary journal that is carving a nice home for itself online. If you haven't heard of it, please do check it out; it will be worth your while. Editor Nastia Lenkova has a keen eye for quality work, and I'm not just saying that because I've had a few of my own pieces in there over the years. If you like what you see there, consider my New & Selected collection of poetry, Dealing With the Devil in the Middle of the Road. The poems of mine that now appear in Work to a Calm were written during the same period as this book, and I still have signed copies available. You can also find links to purchase the book online in the Books section above. Thanks to Nastia for selecting my work, and thanks to you for reading!   

My Summer Reading List, 2014

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The start of summer officially came and went, long after summer weather actually arrived, and this means I’m well overdue for an evaluation of what I plan to read during the upcoming months of blazing sunlight, a lazy half-attempt to go to the beach, short breaks in the shade during kayaking trips, and lots of walking around looking for the Mr. Softee truck in Manhattan. This list is far from definitive, but these are the ones waiting at the top of the stack. So here you go, my summer reading list for 2014. What are your suggestions?

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New Poetry in Riverbabble #25

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My poem "Burning in the Freeze" now appears in Riverbabble #25. The poem was written during my final month in Beacon, NY, about a walk home from the local pub during the still of a chilly winter night. There are a number of other poets and writers worth checking out in this issue, including Bill Gainer, John Swain, Felice Aull, John Oliver Simon, and others. Thanks for taking a look! 

San Antonio Spurs, 2014 NBA Champs - Why #5 Matters

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Even though the San Antonio Spurs are the 2014 NBA champions, it is impossible to talk about this year’s run without first discussing last year’s heartbreaking loss. I live in New York, so I usually watch Spurs games alone adrift a sea of Knicks fans. When San Antonio came so close in Game 6 last year only to lose it in the last 25 seconds, and then to drop a Game 7 that felt like an inevitable loss—painful doesn’t begin to describe it. Sitting there alone, it was devastating. And for some very personal reasons…

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Too Much: An Anthology of Excess

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I am pleased to announce that my short story, "The Rube," is scheduled to appear in the upcoming Too Much: An Anthology About Excess from Unknown Press. The book is due in late July and is overflowing with poems, short stories, essays, and interviews about the pleasures and pitfalls of excess, be it alcoholic, sexual, mind-altering, or what have you. A big thank you goes out to editors Chuck Howe and Bud Smith.

My story, "The Rube," is a brief and humorous look at alcoholic excess experienced during a point in my life when I was ... well, to be honest, a bit of a barfly, working as a freelance writer, surviving on meager poetry sales and the kindness of friends, and how a destination wedding invitation turned into an alcohol-infused brush with death in a third-world country. Part memoir, part fiction, and definitely excessive.

I'm also excited that a poem of mine, "Burning in the Freeze," will soon appear in riverbabble #25. I just need to return the publishing agreement on Monday morning. I haven't sent out many poetry submissions recently, so this is a real treat. I'm excited to be in riverbabble once again. Many thanks to the editors for selecting my poem.

I'll post more details when each of these pieces become available. Thanks!   

The Cards We Keep - Signed Copies Available

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Signed copies of my short story collection The Cards We Keep will soon be available again! The book includes ten stories of down-and-out private detectives, bounty hunters on the run, disgraced celebrities, crumbling marriages, and boxcar hobos heading for the end of the line in search of love, redemption, and maybe just a little peace in this crazy world. Author Bud Smith recently said the books contains "wonderfully written short stories that take on a wide variety of genres, purposefully, and carries them through to succession with some sharp writing, interesting characters, and non-formulaic plotting." (See the full review at the link.) There are also a growing number of great reviews over at Goodreads. If there are any presses or magazines that would like to review the book, I have free PDFs and e-reader files I can send along. Just shoot me an email at jhdwriting@hotmail.com for details. Thanks for all of your support!  

Composing a Novel: Create a Soundtrack to Help You Re-live the Story You Have Yet to Write

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Whether or not you outline your entire novel before you begin or leave plenty of room for surprises along the way, many writers will reach a point where they struggle with a story. Maybe you wrote yourself into a corner. Maybe you’re having trouble bridging main plot points with smaller scenes of character development. Maybe the characters feel flat. Maybe you want to add an unforeseen subplot but nothing fits just right. Whatever it may be, story speed-bumps are out there waiting for you, but I’ve found a little “game” I like to play that can help flesh out a story idea and possibly turn a handful of outlined scenes into an expansive epic full of action, drama, and tension.

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The Club Dumas: A Review

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** Warning: May Contain Some Plot Spoilers **

Like many readers, I saw the Polanski/Depp film The Ninth Gate before I read Arturo Pérez-Reverte’sThe Club Dumas, and despite what I felt was a let-down ending in the film (we’re taken all the way to the final gate, and then...), I enjoyed it enough to pick up the book years later, hoping for a fleshed out story and an improved finale.

But for those wanting to dance with the devil after an eerie, mysterious, occult-infused plot, the movie may have come closer to a satisfactory ending than I first realized.

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My Alma Mater is Making Me Jealous: Southern Vermont College & The Shire Press Series

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I recently discovered that my alma mater, Southern Vermont College in Bennington, VT, has cooked up a new angle to their creative writing program, one that I’m really excited about even though I haven’t stepped foot in a classroom at SVC in over ten years. (Wait, am I really that old?!) SVC has teamed up with Northshire Bookstore to create The Shire Press Series (see the press release below with my quote included). This is an opportunity for SVC students to learn how a real indie book press works, and not only get their hands dirty with submissions, editing, production, and marketing, but each student comes out of the process with their own published book to sell in the bookstore or elsewhere. Cool, right?

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The Writer, Lost in the Woods

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The end of April and beginning of May have been frustratingly slow in terms of writing progress. I wouldn’t call it writer’s block so much as being lost in the woods—figuratively for me, literally for my characters. It's not the type of situation where I don't know what to write, but I keep writing and getting deeper and deeper—and what's worse—more lost.

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How to Find the Perfect Name for Your Characters

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No matter what genre of fiction you write, be it horror, mystery, YA, erotica, or more literary fare, there’s one very basic thing all fiction writers have in common—we LOVE coming up with perfect place and character names. I know some writers who seem to pull names of people, towns, rivers, roads, and ranches out of thin air, as if these fictional locales have always existed in the recesses of their minds. I can’t always do that, and maybe you can’t either, so here are some ways I go about gathering names for the characters and places in my own books and stories.

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The Mathematics of Revision

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I enjoy re-reading Stephen King’s On Writing every few years. Not only is his personal, humorous, accessible prose in the book a pleasure to read, but as I grow older and more experienced in the writing world, I find so much of his advice to be spot on. But there’s one particular tip in his book that seems to have struck a chord in my writing life. In the long run, the piece of advice he offers is very true…but it took me a few drafts of one of my novels to see the light, and to develop my own equation for coming up with a book that, at least to me, is complete and satisfying.

That piece of advice? Put on your mathematician's hat and get out your pencil, because this is one equation you’ll want to write down and remember, and then revise and make your own. 

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Three New Poems in Kleft Jaw #5

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My poems "Assurance," "Last Appointment of the Day," and "Three Bookmarks" now appear in Kleft Jaw #5, and I'd like to thank the staff over there for including my work for the third time. They're a real wild rumpus of a publication, and as they put it, "There is a magna-force of possibility teeming inside all of us, and that’s why we exist - to invoke the transcendental realist spirit in contemporary writing - to establish a new aesthetic, to make words dangerous again." I'm proud as hell to be a part of it.

Poem of the Week - The Bicycle Review

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My poem "Seasick on 46th" now appears as the 'Poem of the Week' at The Bicycle Review. It's a huge honor as they've featured quite a lot of poets I admire and read. The poem also appears in my section of Lantern Lit, Vol. 1, a split-author chapbook of poetry that also features Mat Gould and John Dorsey from Dog On A Chain Press. Copies are still available at the publishers website (he even has copies that all three authors have signed!), and I think "Seasick on 46th" offers a great sample of what you can find inside. Take a look at "Seasick…" if you get the chance. I hope you enjoy, and thanks for all of your support!

Lantern Lit, Vol. 1 Now Available at Powell's Books

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Lantern Lit, Vol. 1, which features my mini-chapbook "The Darkest Bomb," as well as the poetry of John Dorsey and Mat Gould, is now available at Powell's Books in Portland, OR. If you're in PDX, stop in and ask for it. If not, you can order it via their website. The book is also available in Quimby's Bookstore in Chicago, IL and Kulcher: Text, Art, and News in Cleveland, OH. And it's always available via the publisher, Dog On A Chain Press. Thanks for all of your support!!

** Update: It seems the book already sold out at Powell's. Granted there weren't a ton of copies, but still, that's great. The Publisher is planning to send more, but in the meanwhile you can still order the book from the publisher (link above) or try the other stores listed. Thanks! **

The Hustle Continues: Updates on Life & Writing

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So far this new blog is mostly writing advice and a couple of new book announcements. In the hopes of appearing more like an actual human doing actual human things and not a PR spam-bot posing as a writer, here are some real, true, honest "life-things" for your optical intake receptors. Engage!

The new novel (the one fictionalizing a real missing persons case from 1945) was in a major slump over the last week, like a ‘Dostoevsky freezing at the train station I’ll never be able to write again’ slump. Then I finally broke through in the last 48 hours. Mostly because I told myself, “forget about description and action right now, the next 3-4 pages is all dialogue, so just do that and come back later and pick up a Crayola and jazz the scene up.” And that worked. Just stop worrying, thinking, planning, outlining, tinkering, and just write dialogue and revise later. So, like the Kool-Aid Man — KABOOM — breakthrough.

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The Five W's (and One H) of Soliciting Feedback for Your Novels, Short Stories, Poetry, and More

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My newest advice column at Writer's Digest's blog is now live. It examines the Who, What, When, Where, Why, and How of soliciting feedback for your novels, stories, poems, etc.

On a related note, I also recently wrote about how writers can become publishers by creating DIY literary anthologies in my interview with author/publisher Bud Smith. 

For all of my articles at the "There Are No Rules" blog, click HERE. Thanks!

My Roundtable Interview in Writer's Digest

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The newest issue of Writer's Digest magazine (March/April 2014) contains my roundtable interview with some of the top literary magazine editors who are making great things happen out there in the writing community, including Dave Housley (Barrelhouse), David Lynn (The Kenyon Review), Emily Nemens (The Southern Review), Todd Simmons (Wolverine Farm Publishing/Matter Journal), and Rob Spillman (Tin House). We discuss what editors are looking for, what will make them reject a submission, common misconceptions about literary magazines, and a lot more. It was fun to write, they're all amazingly dedicated and passionate people, and I can't wait for you to read it! 

Berlin: A New Chapbook from Maverick Duck Press

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I'm very excited to announce that my chapbook of new poetry, Berlin, was just accepted by Maverick Duck Press, a great small press dedicated to featuring, as they put it, "cutting edge talent with an eye for detail and a powerful voice." This will be a limited-run printing, and as soon as I have a release date I'll let you all know. Between this new collection and the currently available Lantern Lit, Vol. 1, which features my mini-chapbook The Darkest Bomb, I'll have to get myself out the door to some readings this year, and I'll post details about that as well. But for now, a big thank you goes out to MDP editors Kendall Bell, Kayla Marie Middlebrook, and Bronwyn Haynes, the magnificent city of Berlin, and Marguerite Gisele for walking me down the cobblestone, lamplit streets and for helping me order beer at The Nordwind! And a thanks goes out to all of you for your support and for reading my work. It's deeply appreciated.  

7 Tips for Revising a Novel

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*Previously published at the Writer's Digest blog, There Are No Rules. I blog there once or twice a month. Take a look!*

I spent my December revising a noir/crime novel (I seem to spend most Decembers revising a novel) and I also had a recent discussion with two other writers about the revision process. Both occurrences brought to mind some tips you may find useful. Mind you these are rather simple pieces of advice, and everyone has their own process that works for them, but they might help you feel a little less like you’re swimming upstream during this vital step. I hope they help. Happy revising!

1. Use One File — This is especially true in fiction, but I advise all writers to write the early drafts in one Word file (or whatever software you use). Not only does it help keep a sense of continuity as you progress, but if you make a change that affects an earlier chapter, all you have to do is scroll up. It also makes a key word search much easier without having to open multiple files. I’ve seen novelists use a new Word document per chapter (I did with my first novel way back when) but it can become a confusing jumble of files once you get up to chapter sixty, seventy, eighty…

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