How ’bout a rant in iambic pentameter? Nothing so telling as a paroxysm rounded with a couplet.

p.s. Just got ‘Secret Lives’ and ‘Why Should I Cut Your Throat’ from Amazon. Still looking for a few earlier works. Soon, though, I’ll be a veritable Vandermaster. Vanderversed?

Bill–not at all. I have wonderful fans and friends and readers for the most part. In a way, I think I’m also saying it’s my fault. I have made myself much more transparent and accessible than, say, Kelly Link, who works off of a different paradigm because she’s a different person. Which means people quite reasonably expect more. And they also sometimes feel more ownership of the person rather than just the work. So I’m just kind of posting a reminder about what’s important.

And here I am commenting on my own blog today because…it’s not a writing day. Another thing is, recharging is important. I wrote about 15,000 words this past week, not including revising some scenes and rearranging some things. So it was important to give myself the weekend to be away from the novel. (Also very re-invigorating for me were Minister Faust’s posts–I just love that guy.)

And you’re absolutely right in your reading of that section of Shriek. I wanted readers to wonder why Duncan isn’t commenting, and I think you nailed it. Although reviews of Shriek were almost uniformly positive there were a couple of negative reviews saying the characterization wasn’t three-dimensional, to which I mentally replied, “you have no fucking idea what you’re talking about.”

Well, I’m probably just being paranoid here, but I want to make sure you aren’t referring to my comment on Litkicks, “If Jeff ever decides to stay home . . . but he’s too busy with book tours in Romania and the Czech Republic, conventions in California, and a Book Festival in Louisiana . . .” because that was my kidding way of telling people how busy you are.

I love the photos of the novel in progress! Someone should make a video of the notes morphing from one stage to the next.

I finished reading Veniss Underground (great!) and started Shriek (also great). In style, you are onto something fine and solid. Sure, other writers have used journals, records of correspondence, etc as narrative devices, but there is something remarkable in the way you do it.

Describing Duncan Shriek as “composed entirely of digressions and transgressions” is delightfully original, but you take it a step higher by using the “empty space” of a LACK of commentary to evoke poignancy. At least that’s how I see the paragraph on pages 34-35 of Shriek. Leading up to the moment in question, there is a pattern of narrative/commentary, narrative/commentary; that is, Janice Shriek writes the narrative and Duncan Shriek adds the commentary on a fairly regular basis, so that the reader comes to expect it. When Janice speaks of Duncan getting stuck in the sewer pipe, that entire passage is very touching, all the more so because when Janice says, “I wonder, Mary, if Duncan ever shared memories like this with you…” there is (to me) a palpable lack of commentary until that thought has passed. I found myself wondering what Duncan was thinking! Was there a tear in his eye? Like when you’re talking to someone on the phone and they stay silent for a moment.

I can sure talk a lot, once I get going. One more thing: The last couple of lines of this post, about the weather outside the window seething with storm clouds & not knowing where stack of pages came from or what they might mean – very poetic!