Category Archives: Literary-type Goings-on

This Seinfeld parody is the ‘Riddley Walker’ of fan fiction

Posted on September 5, 2013 by kamper

Gawker is serializing The Apple Store, a piece of Seinfeld fan fiction written by @Seinfeld2000. It’s the novel that Russell Hoban would have written if he’d been a deranged Seinfeld fan instead of a London-bound magical realist. Now it seems … Continue reading →

Posted in Humor, Literary-type Goings-on | Leave a comment

Eez terrible: the eight worst sentences in Dan Brown’s “Inferno”

Posted on May 15, 2013 by kamper

Tom Chivers at The Telegraph rounds them up. They’re all great, but the last one, which is actually a passage rather than a single sentence, rises to new heights. This is Danikova, an East European, leaving the most expositional voicemail … Continue reading →

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Write Like You’re Dancing Like No One is Watching

Posted on November 20, 2012 by kamper

L.E. Henderson over at Passionate Reason has some insightful comments on writers and writing and the messed up messages that those demons in our heads hurl about like monkey feces. On a particularly painful writing day, on the verge of … Continue reading →

Posted in Literary-type Goings-on | 5 Comments

“You have placed your services at the disposal of interests who are turning America into a police state . . .”

Posted on September 11, 2012 by kamper

. . . by the simple device of deliberately fostering the conditions that give rise to criminality and then demanding increased police powers and the retention of capital punishment to deal with the situation they have created. You have betrayed … Continue reading →

Posted in Literary-type Goings-on | 3 Comments

Maureen McHugh doing AMA at io9 for ‘After the Apocalypse’

Posted on September 6, 2012 by kamper

Hey all you reader types, my friend Maureen McHugh is answering questions tomorrow at io9 for her new book After the Apocalypse. This book kicked my ass! it’s nine stories all set in one way or another after an apocalypse. … Continue reading →

Posted in Literary-type Goings-on | 1 Comment

The Jon Anderson Battle Stance

Posted on June 26, 2012 by kamper

The funniest line I’ve read in a novel in a long, long time appeared in The Devil You Know by Mike Carey. It’s a detective novel only our detective, Felix Castor, is a freelance exorcist who, in classic gumshoe fashion, … Continue reading →

Posted in Beautiful Writing, Humor, Literary-type Goings-on | 4 Comments

When ‘The Hunger Games’ was called ‘The Long Walk’

Posted on March 23, 2012 by kamper

With The Hunger Games opening this weekend, a lot of people are pointing to Battle Royale as an obvious precursor, but I’ve been thinking of The Long Walk, a novel that Stephen King published under his pseudonym Richard Bachman in … Continue reading →

Posted in Literary-type Goings-on | 17 Comments

I don’t enjoy this war one bit

Posted on February 21, 2012 by kamper

Today would have been David Foster Wallace’s 50th birthday. Letters of Note

Posted in Beautiful Writing, Literary-type Goings-on | 2 Comments

Teller’s Advice to a Young Magician

Posted on February 20, 2012 by kamper

Magician Brian Brushwood shares some advice he got when he just wee lad from Teller of Penn & Teller. It’s good advice no matter what your field. Here’s a compositional secret. It’s so obvious and simple, you’ll say to yourself, … Continue reading →

Posted in Literary-type Goings-on, Quotable Quotes of the Quoted | Leave a comment

And now you find you fit this identikit completely

Posted on February 19, 2012 by kamper

The Composites is a website that uses law enforcement software to create composite sketches for famous literary characters based on their descriptions. Below: The Misfit from Flannery O’Connor’s “A Good Man is Hard to Find.” Description: He was an older … Continue reading →

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