Shanghai Noir

Month: July 2018

  • Violent Femmes

    Last weekend, I gave a master class in novel writing for the International Writers’ Collective. Or, rather, I squirmed in the hot seat while director Sarah Carriger peppered me with a series of home questions about writing and eventually publishing my novel The Dancing Girl and the Turtle. I did my best to answer her […]

  • Graffiti

    When I was a kid in Los Angeles, graffiti was a bad sign. It meant gangs had moved into the neighborhood. Or, at the very least, teenagers with a taste for vandalism. No respectable homeowner wanted to find spray paint on his fence. So you hung up lights and bought a dog. Nowadays, graffiti is […]

  • Reading with Your Ears

    Reading is an act of concentration. To focus your eyes and all the powers of your imagination on the written page. But sometimes it just doesn’t work. For me, that’s whenever I’m in a moving vehicle. Or a train where there’s no room to sit, let alone open up my copy of War and Peace.  […]

  • Finding Nemo (aka the Perfect Critique Group)

    Finding a good critique group is hard work. Get into the wrong one and it’s easy to have your ego bruised or to lose your writing mojo. Some writers hate critique groups while others swear by them. How does a writer choose? First off: let’s get our definitions straight. There are writing groups and critique […]