Tag Archives: Writing

The Petting Zoo by Jim Carroll

by Cimaxion

image

Oh boy have I found a great book!  Poet Jim Carroll was finishing this thing up when he passed away in 2009.  I have only read 73 pages so far but I recognize this as one of the greatest novels I have ever read.  A New York painter reacts strongly to some paintings by Velazquez, stumbles into Central Park and winds up in the looney bin where he finds some time to think straight.  Simple and magnificent.  What a damn great writer!  I think this will actually be the first novel I write a review of.  Now back to reading.

Mystery Contest for Halloween 2010 – Winner

by Cimaxion | 4 Comments

The winning continuation of the Halloween Mystery Contest story was submitted in a comment by Paper_flower.  Congratulations to this fantastic writer!

Read the winning story here by scrolling down into the comment area.  I have only posted the winning comment entry.  Enjoy it and have a happy Halloween!

Mystery Contest for Halloween 2010

by Cimaxion | 4 Comments

If you want to enter the mystery contest, just finish the mystery I’ve started below by entering your part of the story into a comment.  The contest is open to all writers of any age and skill level.  Have fun and take the story in any direction you like.  None of the comments will appear until a winner is picked.

I’ll post the winner on Thursday, October 28.

The beginning of the story takes the form of a hastily written email complete with misspellings and awkward phrasing.  Just finish the story by entering your text into a comment and make it as scary as you can!

Good luck.

Here’s how the mystery email starts:

From: stephipro31
To: [email protected]
Date: 10/30/2009 12:31 pm
Subject: I’m Don’t Know What to Do – Please Call Me!

Jen, oh my god I really don’t know what to make of this or do.  You must call me soon.  Right away!!!  I can’t believe this!  Am I going crazy or is this for real?  Anyway I guess I better lay it out for you as quickly and simply as I can.

Oh well… ok, so it was the other day, Wednesday I think, right after you told me on the phone that you would meet me for lunch at Mr. Pete’s and we’d go from there to the park.  Remember I was in a hurry doing laundry?  Well I got mad because the washer got stuck, you know how with too much in the load the spin thing goes all out of whack and wobbles until the whole thing just stops dead?  That happened.

So I was all pissed and I had a pile of Jake’s whites in my arms and I was tripping over crap on the floor and his shoes and I tried to reach with my finger to push my coffee cup away from the edge of the dresser but it spilled and I got ever madder.

So I threw the clothes down and yanked his drawer open and it came all the way out of the whole dresser and made a big crack and it smashed my foot.  Well after I stopped cursing and being all curled up on the floor holding my foot I tried to put the drawer back in place.  But i saw a little package on the floor underneath where the drawer should be.  It was wrapped in brown paper and twine.  I picked it up.

This is really freaking me out, Jen.  So anyway, I held the little package and then I just thought, ‘Who cares?  I’m just gonna open it and if Jake gets mad well then he can do his own laundry for a while.

So I unwrapped it and it turned out to be a really old black book with a leather cover that smelled that way old leather things get in an attic you know?  It was even crumbly at the edges and the spine was broken and the whole front cover was almost wiggling right off.  But I opened it and it was filled with writing.  Some in ink.  Some in pencil that was faded.

The very first thing on page one said, ‘London is a town with much to offer me and it is with a sinking heart that I leave it, bound for Austria on the fourth, then on, several days later, to Sarajevo.’

That’s how it started, Jen.  So I read that and then my finger went in the pages at the back of the book and there was this lump.  I flipped to the back and some pages were all stuck together.  Glued, Jen.  Glued together to make a pouch.  It felt like something was in there, so I tore it open and some pictures fell out.  Four little photos.  And then I picked them up and I looked at one which was of a woman in a black dress with a big locket on a chain around her neck.  She was beautiful even though the photo was very old and hardly even there any more.  I saw photos of two different houses lying on the floor.  Just houses with lots of trees around them.  But then I saw the fourth photo Jen.  And oh god I don’t know what to do and I screamed.  My body was shaking and I just let out a scream I was so scared Jen.  The fourth little photo on my bedroom floor had a date written on it right on front Jen.  1897.  That’s what it said.

And I picked it up to see it closer.  I couldn’t breathe  it was jake

can you help me now jen?  I’m so scared now because it was him.

Now, continue the mystery by leaving a comment.

I Write Like David Foster Wallace

by Editor

Apparently, I write like somebody named David Foster Wallace. I know… it’s weird. Who would have thought? Who is David Foster Wallace? I think he’s kind of high literary serious-minded and wild sort of college professor type stuff. I should just do a Wikipedia on him, but I don’t really want to know who this person is that I supposedly write like. Below, you can see my official badge that proves the Wallace connection:

I Write Like by Mémoires, Mac journal software. Analyze your writing!

I got my writing-like-David-Foster-Wallace badge from I Write Like. It could not have been easier. I simply pasted several of my very opinionated and slightly acidic blog posts into the I Write Like form and then pressed the button. Each time, this David Foster Wallace guy popped up. One blog post that I dribbled out because I had nothing of interest to say on that day came up as Dan Brown. No surprise there because Dan Brown is so numbingly uninteresting that his brain should be transplanted into the body of Tom Hanks where it would dwell very contentedly for some time I would suppose.

I Write Like is really loads of fun. I could paste entries into it all day long and feel that I had spent my time well. That’s what I’m doing today. For the entire rest of the day I’m going to sit here dropping my blog posts into this machine to find out if maybe I really am David Foster Wallace.  I may even start to make stuff up just for this writing machine and eventually maybe I’ll see my own name pop up: I write like…

Student Essay Winners Announced in Wilmington, Ohio: Third Place Winner

by Editor

essaywinnersCandlelight’s favorite children’s author, Artie Knapp, working with the Wilmington News Journal, sponsored a fourth grade student essay writing contest and the winners have been announced! The students were asked to write about Clinton County, Ohio where they live. Their essays were judged by education majors at Wilmington College.

This is one of those encouraging activities that can really make a kid feel like they’re at the top of their game. It makes them want to keep writing and reading and learning. Artie tells me that Clinton County has been absolutely devastated by high unemployment since DHL moved out. Rachel Ray and Jay Leno have recently done free shows there to help feed some of the people who are hurting. I think these three kids who can write so well are really helping everybody in their county to feel good this holiday season.

Excellent job, kids! Keep up the fantastic work and keep writing!

Here is the third place winner by Katlyn Jamiel, a student at Sabina Elementary School.

What I like best about Clinton County
By KATLYN JAMIEL

jamiel, katlynI love Clinton County.

These are some things that happen in Clinton County. Clinton County has good places to have a home. In Clinton County police keep us safe. In Clinton County you meet new and nice people. Clinton County has nice jobs for parents too. Sabina is a nice place because it is very small and has nice homes. That’s some of the things I like about Clinton County.

In Clinton County these are some festivals and parades that go on during the year. One of my favorites is the Clinton County Fair. I like all the rides that they have at the fair because they are fun to ride, because they’re all different.

These are some activities that I do in Clinton County. I go to the bowling alley and I go to the YMCA to exercise and swim. I go do putt-putt golf and sometimes I go to the track too.

These are some of the restaurants and shops I go to. I go to Subway and Frosties too. I also go to West Side and IGA. I go to the China Buffet and Family Dollar. I go to Walmart and Dollar Tree. I also go to Corner’s Pizza and Charlie’s place too. These are some of the places I go to.

I go to school and the library too. I like Clinton County because there are a lot of fun things to do with my family. When I moved to Sabina it was a great feeling. Clinton County is a wonderful place because there are a lot of fun activities and some great jobs for parents. Clinton County is a wonderful place because it has a lot of space for new houses. When you first move to Clinton County you won’t believe what you see. I like Clinton County because it is a nice peaceful place. Clinton County is a great place because your kids get a good education. At Clinton County schools you learn new and great things.

If you lived in Clinton County you would have a lot of fun with your family and friends because there are a lot of activities, like putt-putt golf, the bowling alley, and more. Your kids will like Clinton County because there are a lot of parks and a lot of nice children. I like Clinton County because there are a lot of new restaurants. I like Clinton County because Walmart has a lot of good things at a lot of good prices. I like Clinton County because there are a lot of wonderful people. (When I go to school I learn a lot of great things like multiplying and dividing. I like going to school because I get to learn a lot of great things.) I like Clinton County because every time I go somewhere in Clinton County I fell like I’m learning more and more about it. I like Clinton County when Halloween comes because you get to walk around town and you get candy and you get to dress up into a costume.

I also like Clinton County because at Wilmington College I got trained by a Wilmington College coach. I like Clinton County because I get to go to Wilmington park and practice soccer. I like Clinton County because there are ducks you can feed at the Wilmington park and there are picnic tables where you can eat too. I like the Sabina park because you get to watch baseball and ride your bike and run track if you want to. I like Clinton County because most of my family lives here and I get to see them a lot.

Student Essay Winners Announced in Wilmington, Ohio: Second Place Winner

by Editor

essaywinnersCandlelight’s favorite children’s author, Artie Knapp, working with the Wilmington News Journal, sponsored a fourth grade student essay writing contest and the winners have been announced! The students were asked to write about Clinton County, Ohio where they live. Their essays were judged by education majors at Wilmington College.

This is one of those encouraging activities that can really make a kid feel like they’re at the top of their game. It makes them want to keep writing and reading and learning. Artie tells me that Clinton County has been absolutely devastated by high unemployment since DHL moved out. Rachel Ray and Jay Leno have recently done free shows there to help feed some of the people who are hurting. I think these three kids who can write so well are really helping everybody in their county to feel good this holiday season.

Excellent job, kids! Keep up the fantastic work and keep writing!

Here is the second place winner by Erin Wilson, a student at Blanchester Intermediate School.

What I like best about Clinton County
By ERIN WILSON

wilson, erinThere is a lot of places that I like in Clinton County, but here are some of my favorite places.

First there is the Clinton County Fair. I like the Clinton County Fair because I like to look at the animals. I like to show animals too. I like to show goats and chickens at the fair. I love the fair food too. That food is so good I don’t want to go home and eat.

The second thing is the corn festival in Clinton County. The corn festival is cool because there is lots of fun crafts to do. There is lots of good food to eat and cool stuff to buy. I like to look at all the cool tractors too. There is tons of them there. I love going with my family and running a booth.

The third thing I like is Cowan Lake because it is so pretty. I love to go fishing too at Cowan Lake. I love to go sailing also. The water is so pretty. I just love it at Cowan Lake. I like to camp there too. I like to camp there because you can ride your scooters or bikes there and you can have camp fires. You can also just hang out with your family too.

The fourth thing I like in Clinton County is Walmart Super Center. I like Walmart because the food that you buy from them is really good. I like to buy toys from Walmart too. I love to buy clothes from Walmart.

The fifth thing that I like is the Murphy Theatre. I like the Murphy Theatre because it is really old. They have a lot of good plays. I like it also because it is really pretty inside because of all the decorations.

The sixth place that I like in Clinton County is Denver Park. I like Denver Park because it is really fun, and the playground is really cool. I like the Denver Park also because you and your family can hang out there all day and maybe even have a picnic. Or you and your friends can hang out there just for fun.

Another thing I like is the Caesar Creek Flea Market. I like the flea market because there is a lot of cool and interesting stuff to look at and buy. I like the flea market also because all the traditional stuff is there.

The last thing I want to talk about is my church. My church is the United Methodist Church. I love my church because it has a lot of really nice people and my best friends. I have a big church. My church has an upstairs and a downstairs. I love my county, Clinton County.

Student Essay Winners Announced in Wilmington, Ohio: First Place Winner

by Editor

essaywinnersCandlelight’s favorite children’s author, Artie Knapp, working with the Wilmington News Journal, sponsored a fourth grade student essay writing contest and the winners have been announced!  The students were asked to write about Clinton County, Ohio where they live.  Their essays were judged by education majors at Wilmington College.

This is one of those encouraging activities that can really make a kid feel like they’re at the top of their game.  It makes them want to keep writing and reading and learning.  Artie tells me that Clinton County has been absolutely devastated by high unemployment since DHL moved out. Rachel Ray and Jay Leno have recently done free shows there to help feed some of the people who are hurting. I think these three kids who can write so well are really helping everybody in their county to feel good this holiday season.

Excellent job, kids! Keep up the fantastic work and keep writing!

I am going to post the three winning essays over the next few days.  Here is the first place winner by Jared Penick, a student at Roy E. Holmes Elementary School in Wilmington.

What I like best about Clinton County
By JARED PENICK

Penick, JaredI moved to Clinton County Sept. 18, 2005. My mom’s job moved from Kentucky. I really liked my new school, Holmes Elementary. When I began kindergarten at 5 years old, I loved how I wrote letters to my mom and dad.

I like the Clinton County YMCA because I learned how to swim at Summer Day Camp. I took fun field trips to Kings Island.

I love Clinton County’s library because they have interesting books, movies and music tapes. The hill across the street is the best place to go sleigh riding because you can make ice ramps and ramp off them. At the end of the hill boys and girls make snowmen. Children enjoy playing inside the tree that is there.

Tractor Supply is so awesome. I wish I could have everything in the store. I like how Tractor Supply has baby chicks to pet and sell. I like how they sell farm supplies like fence, feed, wires, hats, shoes, gloves, buckets, halters, lead ropes, whips, bridles, toys, go carts, four wheelers, lawn mowers, dirt bikes and wormer for animals.

I like Clinton County’s beautiful farms. I like the big crops of soy beans, corn and alfalfa hay fields. Their animals are called pigs, cows, dogs, goats, sheep, horses and chickens.

I like Clinton County’s sports like football, baseball, basketball, bowling, soccer ball, put put golf, volleyball, track, tennis and lacrosse.

The rock that is in front of the Wilmington College is huge and fun to watch. It also gets painted once a month. When they paint it, the rock looks like it gets thicker. Sometimes people make good designs and words like go Hurricanes and this is the best college ever. Also the rock sits up on a hill for everyone who drives by.

Denver park is one of the best places to run and play. I like to play on the equipment like slide, swing, monkey bars and the tires stacked on top of each other. I like the pond because kids can fish without a license.

At the Murphy Theatre is a very cool building with the stage of talent where people sing, dance and act. It gives Clinton County residents a chance to be a star for the night. In the third grade my class went to the theater to watch a movie called Hotel for Dogs. The seats are comfy and sized just right. I had a fun time with my class mates watching that great movie.

There is a really cool horse arena called Roberts Arena. One of my favorite things to do is horse pull competitions. Some of the horses are black, bay, sorrel, brown, white and redwhite. Some of them are big and strong muscles to help them pull. They have light weight and heavy weight competitions. Horses pull over 9000 pounds to win. Horses also sometimes strain themselves so they can pull. Horses wear harness to work them and control the horses.

These are the things I like best about Clinton County.

Mystery Contest for Halloween 2009

by Editor | 7 Comments

If you want to enter the mystery contest, just finish the mystery we’ve started below by entering your part of the story into a comment. We do not need any personal information about you. You can just enter your name or your online nickname. We don’t need an email address or anything else. The contest is open to all writers of any age and skill level.  Have fun and take the story in any direction you like. There’s no real prize other than getting some attention for your writing on this site.

We’ll post the winner in our blog sometime right near Halloween.

Good luck.

Continue reading …

Mystery Contest Winner

by Editor | 8 Comments

The winner of our April 2009 Mystery Contest is Pippa, age 10!

Congratulations to the winner!  Pippa has written an imaginative and interesting continuation of the story that is a pleasant surprise.

Riley’s Crypt

The trees of the forest bent over sideways in the howling wind. The white disk of the full moon shimmered behind the swaying branches. Southbay Forest was being battered by the storm. Rain began to pelt the ground. It was an altogether nasty evening.

Riley Hitchens made his way along the muddy path with dread. The lantern’s feeble light swung wildly back and forth across the narrow way as his fingers gripped its handle tightly.

It was just an old crypt. That’s all. Nothing but a pile of old stones with a rusty iron door. That door was clanging in the wind now. It had disturbed Riley’s sleep.

So now poor Riley staggered in his soaking nightclothes toward the crypt that was creating such a din.

A wolf howled.

Riley stopped in his soggy tracks and glanced behind him. A shape flashed between the trees. He lurched forward and bolted down the mud path toward the old stone crypt.

He burst through the half-open door and sucked the dank air into his lungs. His mud-caked slippers echoed in the stone chamber. The rain pounded the forest outside. Just ahead, Riley could make out the dim shape of the tunnel entrance.

He stopped and felt the cold sweat of terror at the back of his neck.

From far down the dark winding way of the tunnel, underneath the raging of the storm, came the delicate sound of… music.

The winner’s story continues from this point…

Continue reading …

George Orwell’s Quest for Truthful Language

by Editor

New Statesman has a very interesting article by Keith Gessen about George Orwell’s ‘plain spoken’ style that manifested itself in a series of essays in the 1940s and found its full expression in his masterwork, Nineteen Eighty-Four. It’s fascinating to read about how Orwell’s experiences with fighting in Spain during the civil war in the 1930s and journalistic coverage of the events of that war influenced his use of altered and entirely untrustworthy newspaper articles in Nineteen Eighty-Four.  Orwell apparently believed in clear, sharp and truthful language.  He did not want ready phrases or dead metaphors.  He wanted keen observation and simple expression.

I think he achieved this in Nineteen Eighty-Four to a great degree.  Mr. Gessen says one thing in his article that I don’t necessarily agree with: “In truth, Orwell was wrong about all sorts of things, not least the inner logic of totalitarianism: he thought a mature totalitarian system would so deform its citizenry that they would not be able to overthrow it. This was the nightmare vision of Nineteen Eighty-Four. In fact, as it turned out in Russia, even the ruling elite was not willing to maintain mature totalitarianism after Stalin’s death.”

I don’t think that’s quite right.  The totalitarian regime in Nineteen Eighty-Four is overthrown.  In the last section of the book the writing jumps out into the future and discusses a quite obviously defunct and long-gone totalitarian state that tried to reduce language to its own ends.  I think the point of Nineteen Eighty-Four is that complete control of a population can be largely achieved with various mind-control techniques and the constant application of fear, but that it requires only a modest intelligence to resist and eventually overthrow such control.  The novel’s protagonist, Winston Smith, is just an ordinary schlump.  He’s not very bright.  Pretty dim in fact.  The idea with Winston Smith is if he can do it then anyone can.  And yet he is capable of resisting until his will is ultimately beaten out of him.  But the point is that the will to resist is a real pest.  You can’t remove it from society.  It always comes up and eventually overpowers all control structures.

Purchase Nineteen Eighty-Four

Does the Strunk & White Book Suck?

by Editor

25style480These folks are all in an uproar about The Elements of Style by Strunk and White which has been a mainstay for writers and students for many decades in many colleges and writers’ studios and lawyers’ offices and high schools and elementary schools where lots of people have made their first adventuresome forays into writing and take me for example who can never remember the definition of an adverb and can never understand a past participle or what the heck a conjunctive phrase is so you see I actually need a book like The Elements of Style very badly and cannot really understand why anyone would have such hard feelings about such a small book I mean after all it does contain some pretty useful little references about the english language that can be quite helpful when you are in a grammar jam and the authors of the little tome were perfectly willing to admit that sometimes rules can be broken or stretched or ignored altogether and even rejected out of hand I guess.

Podcast of Henry David Thoreau on Poetry and Writing

by Editor

486px-henry_david_thoreau

DOWNLOAD MP3 AUDIO

In 1839, Henry David Thoreau and his brother made a river voyage in a boat that they built themselves. This voyage became the subject of Thoreau’s first book, A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers, published in 1849 at his own expense. In this thirty-three minute excerpt, Thoreau finds himself describing the incredible beauty and serenity of the natural scene around him. But his mind wanders into a profound examination of poetry and the requirements of good writing. His call to man for a life of poetry and his demand that writers create simply from an impulse to action are powerful and true. I don’t think there is a better piece of advice that exists for writers and readers alike.

Thoreau frequently quotes from Homer’s Iliad and other sources in this piece. I have tried to separate his quotes with pauses and a change in reading tone. You might want to glance at the actual words as you listen for clarification.

Here is the text of the reading:

What would we not give for some great poem to read now, which
would be in harmony with the scenery,–for if men read aright,
methinks they would never read anything but poems. No history nor
philosophy can supply their place.

Continue reading …

National Poetry Month has Begun

by Editor

It’s National Poetry Month!  That means that bookstores, publishers and bloggers all over the U.S. and elsewhere are celebrating poetry in all its forms.  There’s a poem-a-day series that will email you one poem each day for the entire month.  Poets.org has instructions for teachers trying to motivate students to enjoy poetry in the classroom and tips for bookstores trying to sell poetry.

The video is from W. W. Norton publishers who decided to ask eleven of their published poets what poetry is for.  Their answers are incredibly bad, but it’s a good try.  It should be abundantly clear from these poets’ answers that there is very little actual thought going on about what poetry is for.

Here’s my answer:  Poetry is for bread.

But here’s a guy named Charles Bernstein who says that National Poetry Month is a bad thing.  He says it encourages the most bland of easy-reading poetry available to make people think poetry is safe to read.  He’s right.  And so what?  So people read some bland crappy poems.  That is what most poetry is.  That’s realistic.  Perhaps a few of those people will have the energy to go out and find the real, hard, evolving, beautiful and terrifying poetry that would never even stoop to asking, ‘What is poetry for?’

Online Novels Boom in China

by Editor

In China, there’s a revolution in online novels.  Writers are uploading their books to be read by millions of Chinese readers who pay a small amount for each book.  The leading company offering online novels in China is Shanda Literature.  Their site, Qidian.com, is the most popular destination for novel readers.  Even regular bookstores are now offering print versions of online novels.  Apparently, the online universe is China is relatively free of censorship and authors find themselves with more freedom to criticize.

Here’s a CNN article about the online publishing boom in China.