My article on fantasy writer Robert Holdstock was just published in the journal Coreopsis. I love Holdstock’s work– he is one of my favorite novelists, and it was fun going through these books and writing on why they hold a special place in fantasy. If you haven’t read him, I highly recommend his work. This article will give you an idea of why I think he’s so unique.
I found a variation of the Nigerian Prince scam again. This time, the unsolicited email promises wide exposure through an interview/reader discussion group. The message seems very likely to be AI generated, with the typical kinds of generic writing and telltale signs. The name of a real podcasting group was used–The Moth, in this case, along with the real name of one of their producers, though the name was misspelled. It gave a gmail account to which I was supposed to respond. It was obviously suspicious, but what really put this over the top was that the email asked for an interview fee, which cracked me up. I hope no one out there is tricked by this kind of thing, but I’m posting this in case anyone has received this sort of email and is wondering about it. No one, whether its an agent, publisher, or interviewer, would ever ask an author for money, if they’re legitimate. Beware of the Nigerian prince! I noticed a lot of hits on this blog recently from Nigeria and Indonesia, which is probably where this originated from.
I keep this site going to try and review books I’ve been reading, when I have time, which is less and less recently, and also to promote my new book when it comes out. However, I am wondering lately if it’s worth the effort, with so few readers out there, and irritating scams like this coming to my inbox. I will keep the site up for now, but I am not really able to blog regularly, given my other time commitments.
If you’re a writer reading this, happy writing, and watch out for scams.
In the late 1990s, I got my first email account. Every so often, I’d receive an email, as everyone did, from a Nigerian prince who wanted to make me rich beyond my wildest dreams. All I needed to do was send him some money and bank routing numbers, and it would all fall into place. It seemed counterintuitive, I know, but maybe I should’ve trusted the prince. He seemed nice. Alas, I never took him up on his generous offer. Had I done that, I’d no doubt be a wealthy man now.
Recently I’ve received a spate of emails from enthusiastic readers who claim to absolutely love my work. The emails sound generated by an LLM, but no matter. They wish to make me rich: all I must do is fork over a few hundred dollars for publicity purposes, you see, and then my book sales will be off the charts and I’ll be raking in millions.
I was invited to a discord server, which I visited, out of curiosity. Who is running this scam, I wondered? I was greeted by a few people with handles like “Bookreader953” who told me how much they loved my work. When I asked what they loved about it, they couldn’t quite say. But they knew it was great, and I suppose that’s all that matters.
After this exchange, I logged onto my blog and saw that I had recently received a lot of hits from—you guessed it—Nigeria, as well as India and Pakistan. I’d never had anyone who’d visited my blog from those nations before, since my book was published by a small press without an international presence. But hey, I am always open to new readers.
I guess the Nigerian prince never went away. All these years, he’s been plotting new ways to make me rich.
I can honestly say that this is an animated film at which you can take a nice relaxing nap. I see a lot of animated films with my children and I cannot always do that. Five stars for restfulness.
I purchased a Dell laptop in December. Three months later, it won’t boot up. I called Dell support and they tell me the fact that it won’t boot up is my problem, not theirs, not covered by warranty. Incredible. Dell used to make serviceable machines, but no longer. Avoid them and get a Lenovo or macbook.
Many years ago, when I was taking a graduate creative writing workshop, a well-known novelist instructor of mine commented that my story, set on a college campus, did not compare well with similar books by Philip Roth, Jane Smiley, Richard Russo, and other exemplars of the genre. She was correct. My story was in no way up to that lofty standard. But perhaps, since I was an earnest young student, she might have been kinder, instead of comparing me to some of the most famous writers of the day. This particular instructor had a reputation of being this way with everyone. In fact, most creative writing professors I encountered had this same reputation, causing me to stop taking such workshops after awhile. Even so, I took these sorts of criticisms personally. I should not have done that, but I think most young writers do.
I recently saw the obituary for this person and thought it was sad. She may have been a terrible teacher, but maybe she was a good person. Then I thought that her passing really didn’t rate up there with the deaths of the true, all-time literary greats, if that’s what we are to measure lives by.
I’ve been writing and submitting for decades now. I’ve had some modest success. To be blunt, in my experience, most of the writers and creative writing professors I’ve met have been ungenerous, competitive, petty, and small minded. If and when you meet a mentor or friend in the field, you should consider this very lucky indeed. It’s everyone for themselves.
The creative writing workshop at the MFA level was a particularly odd experience. The idea, I was told again and again, was to ‘respect the work,’ yet in my classes there was little respect or support given by instructors or other students, all of whom were usually desperate to impress the professor, a person who had met with some sort of literary success at some point in their career.
What no class or instructor can do is give you the drive to write better stories. This motivation has to come from within. And in my experience, creative writing programs do almost nothing to help you navigate getting an agent or making any commercial sales, mostly because the professors have no idea how to accomplish this.
So, you write stories because you want to do it–you enjoy it and it brings you satisfaction. For most of us, we may meet with some success, or maybe not, but that becomes almost beside the point. If you meet a generous writer who wants to help you along in writing endeavors, be thankful. To quote E.B. White at the end of Charlotte’s Web: “It is not often that someone comes along who is a true friend and a good writer. Charlotte was both.”
Given the direction MLB and the Mets have been heading, I will not give them a cent this year, and will pay less attention than I have for many years. I recently posted about my disgust: I’m sick of the greed and the ownership and the corruption of the sport. But I’m writing tonight’s post after receiving an email from the Mets that I found totally bewildering.
It was typical promotional stuff about bobbleheads and other giveaways. For decades, teams have given out small promotions on certain days as a sort of inducement/thank you for coming. So you’d receive a poster or t-shirt or hat or flag or bobblehead or whatever. Just some little gewgaw you could keep and put on your shelf or file away with your memorabilia.
The weird part was that the Mets wrote that you needed a special extra ticket, beyond the price of admission, to get the bobblehead. That seemed crazy to me–these things are cheap junk, after all–but what I found out when I clicked the link was even crazier. That extra ticket costs–get this–$120. So you pay for an outrageously expensive ticket just for the right to buy another ticket to get the tacky tchotchke.
Incredible. As PT Barnum once supposedly said, there’s a sucker born every minute. Or as Waylon Smithers remarked of a 100% surcharge on tickets tacked on by Mr. Burns: “Well, it’s a policy that ensures a healthy mix of the rich and the ignorant, sir.”
A $120 bobblehead. And I thought the price of mlb tv was absurd.
Gene Wolfe is one of my favorite writers, and this is a wonderful book of his that I found some years after reading his epic Book of the New Sun, an amazing series that I want to reread soon. Unlike that dense, lengthy work, this is a shorter novel of mystery, adventure and myth, but like Wolfe’s other novels, it is beautifully written, tightly plotted and great fun to read. I just re-read it over the holidays, after hearing the carol, ‘Good King Wenceslas,’ which reminded me of the book. Wolfe explains his writing inspiration for this novel in the epilogue:
“Shortly before Christmas one year, Gene Wolfe was singing the carol ‘Good King Wenceslas’ and was struck by the king’s questions to his page: “Yonder peasant, who is he? Where, and what his dwelling?” And by the page’s answer: “Sire, he lives a good league hence, Underneath the mountain, Close against the forest fence, By St. Agnes’ fountain.”
Wolfe recalls, “I found myself wondering who, indeed, was that nameless medieval peasant from whom most of us are, in one way or another, descended.”
The Devil in a Forest is Wolfe’s story surrounding this peasant, whose little village becomes involved in a struggle between a nameless evil and the forces of good. There is a dangerous highwayman, a mysterious murder, and strange powers that converge upon this village and create havoc for Mark, the protagonist. The attention to detail in Mark’s day to day life, and that of his fellow villagers, is quite well done and made for some interesting reading. Mark’s trials and his battle for survival are suspenseful, keeping you guessing right until the end. I enjoyed this one very much—it is so different from some of Wolfe’s other books, but his concept and the execution are excellent. I don’t want to spoil the fun for those who may be interested in reading this one, but I recommend it to anyone who has enjoyed Wolfe’s more well-known books. Fantasy writing doesn’t get much better.
I recently read the first of Steven Erikson’s Malazan Book of the Fallen series, Gardens of the Moon. I had a fun time with this book, and enjoyed the epic scope of it. This is a long and dense series, and this first installment is a huge doorstop of a novel, with a cast of dozens of mages, wizards, soldiers, fighters, assassins and those caught up in the war enveloping the Malazan empire and the city of Darujistan. There are plenty of plot twists, political intrigue, and enough magic and battles to satisfy any fan of epic fantasy. If you like reading writers like George RR Martin, Tad Williams, Robert Jordan, and Brandon Sanderson, I think you’ll definitely enjoy this book. An added benefit is that this series is already completed, though the ten novels in it may seem daunting. Gardens of the Moon was first published back in 1999, and though I’d seen his books in the store and the library, I’d never read Erikson before. I’ve already picked up the second of this series and will continue with it after finishing some of the other books I’m currently reading. Highly recommended for fans of epic fantasy.
Glenn Jochum’s latest album, Frank’s Truck Stop, is a joy to listen to. Fans of roots and country rock will find so much to enjoy in this collection of songs. Jochum has a soulful, sincere voice that really engages you, and the playing of Don Cerce Jr. complements it perfectly. Cerce is an amazing player and an inductee of the New York State Country Music Hall of Fame who brings his talents to this record. His emotive playing is a fine counterpoint to Jochum’s singing and lyrics—they’re quite a dynamic duo.
“Rose in her Hair” starts off the fun—Glenn gives us a bluesy vision of better days here, singing “Come share the vision that life on the land brings/Come see the world with an innocent face” advice that all of us can take to heart in these hyper-connected, tumultuous days. You have to like his optimism here– it’s infectious.
The title song is a jaunty, fun tune that evokes a place where ‘We’re down-home folks, who like telling jokes, where food tastes like the frying pan.’ It’s a song that reminded me of listening to country music with my dad when I was growing up in the 80s, and would feel right at home in your collection of Glen Campbell or Johnny Cash albums. It’s a neat trick to tell a story and evoke a little world out of time in just three minutes, but Glenn accomplishes that here, has you tapping your feet along with the song, and he makes it sound easy.
No collection of country tunes would be complete without a heartbreaking tale of loss, and Glenn doesn’t disappoint, with “Smithereens,” among other tunes. “I can see the misty mountains…but I’ll never see this place again, cause I sabotaged my dreams…I smashed it all to smithereens,” he croons, and you can hear the regret and sadness in his voice. It’s not the cheeriest thought, but sung with such conviction and sureness that you can’t feel too sad about it. Like the best blues and country songs, it leaves you wanting more. Reflections is another song that speaks to loss and love, a brooding, sad tale of a broken relationship.
Copyright Blues is my favorite song on this collection. It has the kind of humor that I love in music, and Glenn is great at this sort of song. “Everybody told me about you, they all said that you would leave me blue, but I didn’t mind, my love for you was blind,” he sings, and you can almost see him grinning through the blues. “They might steal your copyright and walk away from you,” he says, concluding that he’s going to confiscate pictures of his lover and toss them in the sea to exorcise his loss. If you’re heartbroken and need to see the humor in it, this is the song for you. I was laughing at the image. It’s excellent advice for the broken-hearted. “What if?” is another great song in this vein, where he’s musing on the uncertainties of life and songwriting.
The other songs on this album are just as good as the ones I’ve highlighted. It’s been on rotation in my collection since I bought it, and I hope it will be in yours, too. Glenn is a poet, a fine songwriter, and if you enjoy your country and blues with a dash of humor, you’ll be happy you got this record.
Christopher Tuthill 