James Joyce

Here is a link to an essay about Joyce's Ulysses which is so readable and lucid that I have to share--a bit about Rushdie too, but mostly Joyce.

http://greatliteraryworks.blogspot.com/2007/08/crucial-book-of-salman-rushdie.html

We watched last night, via On Demand, The Good German. The better parts of the movie were "real" scenes of postwar Berlin from old documentaries. The story was cliched to the max, but George Clooney is always easy to look at (ask Ms Snark), even when he's been beaten up beaucoup times. I won a tee shirt in a short, short story I made up about the movie poster. Actually, my story was better. No humblesness this morning. But: what the hell does one do with a tee shirt that reads "The Good German"? I have to confess I gave it to the VietNam Vets. It was also kind of small. The stupid-ass decisions we have to make every day.

Writing group meets tonight. Still need to get those agent letters for Promiscuous Mode out. The agents ain't gonna line up on my doorstep without communicatio, without queries, without synopses, without killer first chapters.

Festival Madness is almost ready, still lacking the killer first paragraph with a 'Hook.' The book one is writing is always the best one.

I'm having serious doubts about the marketability of the YA we are planning. The current wisdom is to write the book you love, the book you must write, but that wisdom hasn't produced anything but (at least) two unpublishable books. So I dunno.

Now for breakfast: Cheerios with vanilla yogurt, 2% milk, and half a banana. Good! Good for you! Some nutritional nazi will come out of the woodwork saying drink skim, not 2%. To them my cat's middle paw. Ooops! Friday is cat blog day.

Alors!

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