Birthmarked
Secret Summer Crush
I knew this girl once. She still won’t tell you his name, but he was older, and cute, and he played volleyball at the resort when her family took the boat over every summer evening to play. This guy, he teased her, and joked with her older brothers, and she had to pretend she wasn’t looking at him and listening to him all the time. She had to serve the ball, knowing he was watching. She got to watch him play. Sometimes he was captain… Continue reading
Open Letter to John Read, Department of Justice
John R. Read, Chief
Litigation III Section
Antitrust Division
U.S. Department of Justice
450 5th Street, NW, Suite 4000
Washington, DC 20530
Dear Mr. Read:
I urge the Department of Justice to drop the April 11th suit against Apple and five publishers who are accused of colluding to limit price competition for ebooks. I’m particularly troubled by the suit’s claim that “Together, Apple and the Publisher Defendants reached an agreement whereby retail price competition would cease (which all conspirators desired), retail e-book prices would increase significantly (which… Continue reading
Art Experiments on Us: High Line Park
High Line Park, NYC
Clever minds are at work in public art spaces. I was walking High Line Park in NYC with my family this weekend when we came upon a theater-type, open air seating area which descended downward, with windows at the bottom overlooking the traffic of 10th street that ran directly below. We gladly sat for a while, looking out the “screens” at the flowing taxis, thinking about how life is art if you look at it differently. Is “streetscape” a word? Probably.… Continue reading
BookExpo America 2012. Nice.
Stephen Colbert at BEA Breakfast
My first delight of BEA yesterday was being in the same room with Stephen Colbert. I felt this inner gasp of Wow! There he is! He was small, silly and far away at the podium, but fortunately, there were two big projection screens on either side of the platform, so I could see him in his normal TV-esque headshot, too. He took the success of 50 Shades of Grey as an excuse to make random references to his throbbing member throughout his… Continue reading
The Age Timeline
When I was six, walking along the sunny sidewalk in front of the apartment building, I imagined age like a timeline of numbers where 6 was big and close at hand, 7 was ahead, slightly smaller, and the other years of age drifted ahead of me in black print against a murky beige background, growing smaller in the distance. I could still see my age of 5 from my last birthday behind me, but it was shrinking, and 4 was smaller still. My older brothers would always be… Continue reading
Young Adult Readers: Inspiration
My audience is supposed to be young adult readers, but it’s useless to think of writing to them as if young adults were all one dark-haired girl curled up with a book in her bed at two in the morning. Talk to a young adult for ten minutes and you’ll find an individual as unique as your grandma. Talk to a young adult for decades, and you’ll find friends of all ages with a common young heart.
Determination
What’s more important than trying to write to teenagers is… Continue reading