Magical Memoir Moments
High Crimes Against the Memoir Form?!
Ryan Grim’s searing essay in The Huffington Post about George W. Bush’s new memoir deserves our attention. Grim claims that many of the passages of Bush’s Decision Points are taken word-for-word from accounts of other writers. Read his review here. In it Grim describes high crimes and misdemeanors in the Bush memoir. He found lots…
Mary Karr's Secret–Humility and Confidence–Interview in the Paris Review
Mary Karr has done it again. Maybe I should say that Amanda Fortini has done it–meaning that the interview Fortini published in The Paris Review with Karr as a subject is wonderful. If you haven’t read any of Karr’s poetry or her three memoirs, you will want to do so after reading the interview. If…
Smell: The Memoir Writer's Stimulus Package
“What smells trigger memory for you?” My niece Joyous Derner asked the above question on her Facebook page a few days ago. She got lots of responses, which led me to remember a wonderful book: Diane Ackerman’s A Natural History of the Senses. I read this book soon after it was published in 1990, and…
Just in Time for Halloween: A Review of Out of the Transylvania Night
Lanie Tankard, guest reviewer, is back! This time she has chosen a book that connects to an experience of her own life. I think her “bookend” intro and conclusion is as interesting as the review herself. I also think Lanie could write a great memoir some day. Perhaps this guest gig is getting her ready….
Reposting a Tribute to My Mother-in-Law: A Mini-Memoir
Note to Readers: My first blog was created on the Santa Barbara Writer’s Conference site. When the site closed, I lost the web connection for this post written in 2008. I am reposting it so that others can appreciate the woman I considered a second mother–and so that one small piece of her legacy is…
A Perfect September Day
Corn fields ready for harvest along the Kal-Haven Trail What is more beautiful than a day in September? Today the answer was, “nothing!” I am looking out the window in my office right now as the sun is setting in the west, lighting up the weeping willow tree that has doubled in size since we…
Jonathan Franzen’s Genre-Bending FREEDOM: Part II
On September 24, 2010, Part I of Lanie Tankard’s comprehensive review of Freedom was published here. Today the review concludes with a fascinating report on Jonathan Franzen’s visit to Austin, TX, Lanie’s home. Channeling Walter Cronkite, Lanie makes you believe that “You Were There!” If you can, I suggest that you get a cup of…
Jonathan Franzen's Genre-Bending FREEDOM: Part I
Freedom by Jonathan Franzen New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, August 2010. Available in hardcover, CD, digital audio, and ebook formats. Reviewed by Lanie Tankard Author Jonathan Franzen, an avid birder, has trained his binoculars here on a different species: Homo sapiens. While he does deal extensively with our fine feathered friends in his new…