I’m sub teaching in a tenth-grade English class today. The students have been reading “To Kill a Mockingbird” and are down to the last few chapters. This seminal novel in American literature is often required reading for ninth or tenth-graders, and most of the students in the class have at least some level of appreciation for the book. I’ve read it. You’ve read it. Most of us have seen the movie...
I’ll admit what few American male writers of my generation would or could: I’ve never read Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Tom Sawyer or its follow-up, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. No excuses, it just didn’t happen. Those novels were never assigned in English. Maybe as a young teen I picked them up on my own and something about the style or voice didn’t grab me. That’s my best guess...
Another innovative writer has died. Beginning in the late 1960s, Robert Coover emerged as a star of metafiction—fiction rejects narrative conventions and realism. It uses language, style, and structure to point out the artificiality of itself. Last week, I wrote about “To Whom It May Concern:” by another metafiction god, Raymond Federman. This week, Robert Coover, who just passed away at age 92...
I earned my MA at the University of Buffalo in the writing program chaired by Raymond Federman—a name you’ve likely never heard. Federman was born in 1928 in France and at age fourteen his parents hid him in a closet while the German Gestapo rounded up the Jews in Paris and sent them to perish in the Nazi death camps. Federman survived. His parents and siblings did not. Federman went on to become...
Four years ago I stopped mowing a section of lawn behind my house. It was a couple of hundred square feet we no longer needed for soccer, baseball, and football from when the kids were young. I no longer built backyard ice rinks. What was the point of having all that lawn? I allowed the patch to return to nature’s whim. During the first summer the grass grew uniformly tall and a breeze...
I’m putting on my suit for my nephew’s wedding. Jack and Kristin are getting married today on a perfect September day in Portland, Maine. It’s true: I own only one viable suit, and I haven’t worn it since . . . there’s something in the jacket pocket, and I pull it out—a memorial card for Thomas Grande, Jack’s uncle who passed away last year. This is my wedding and funeral suit. I last wore it at...
After being the object of celebration in my household on Father’s Day yesterday, I’ve realized something about fatherhood: I can’t recommend it. Sure, it’s worked out for me. I happen to have won the kid lottery. I’ve got two adult children in their twenties who are thoughtful, loving, and kind. Who seem to appreciate me as much as I appreciate them. Who have, from the moment they were born...
Recently I noticed my little free library looking beaten down. Its foundational post was listing, the paint peeling, the glazing on the glass door chipping away. I did nothing about it, because I was contemplating shutting down my library. Version 2.5 standing straight with a fresh color scheme. I’ve been hosting this community book repository for about eight years. Mine was one of the first in...
It doesn’t happen nearly often enough, in fact hardly ever, but it happened twice in one week, and I admit I feel damn good about it. First, I got a letter (actual handwriting, ink on paper, delivered to my mailbox) from a reader who said great things about my novel In Flight. “The mystery of what happened when Robert was in the fugue state made it a real page turner . . . I’d be reading along...
During the Battle of Fort Sumter in April 1861, Major Robert Anderson, the Union commander, ordered the U.S. flag to be flown upside down to signal dire distress and to request assistance as Confederate forces were bombarding the fort. More recently, the upside-down flag has been used in protests to express dissatisfaction with government policies or actions, symbolizing a belief that the...
Occasionally someone leaves an interesting novel in my Little Free Library—and I snatch it up. This time it was Brooklyn, by the Irish writer Colm Toíbín, published in 2009. The timing was perfect because Toíbín just published a sequel to Brooklyn, which is now on my list to read. Until now, I hadn’t had a chance to read Brooklyn, but back in 2015 I saw and greatly admired the movie based...
It was our kitchen that got me thinking. Twenty years ago we decided we were staying in our smallish house that we loved and we embarked on a massive renovation. The biggest project was a new kitchen: we knocked down walls to create a bigger, open concept; we installed new windows, floors, cabinets, appliances, and countertop. Now, against any standard of trends and current taste, our kitchen is...
The love triangle fascinates me. It’s a classic storytelling device because it comes with built-in drama, tension, and excitement. It radiates sex, secrets, and heartache. What more can you want from a story? Rick, Ilsa, and Laslo in Casablanca. Jay, Daisy, and Tom in The Great Gatsby. Vampire, Werewolf, and Bella in the Twilight series. The love triangle never stops delivering. I’ve been...
I’m not a dedicated social media user. I have a LinkedIn account but use it only to keep tabs on a few professional contacts. No Instagram, no TikTok, and no other platform that I happen not to know about because I’m too old or not cool enough. I fiddle with Facebook, mostly as a lurker and tracking old friends, with the occasional shameless self-promotion to persuade someone, anyone, to buy one...
It’s my first job in the corporate world. I work at a software company called MapInfo, a supposedly cool tech company. And yet today there’s a television on in the cafeteria and there must be a hundred people gathered around it to watch the verdict in the O.J. Simpson murder trial that had captured our entire nation’s attention. Former NFL star, ad pitchman, and film actor Simpson had been...
