Tag Archives: phenomenon

May28

Maya Angelou, 1928-2014

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A great American writer has joined history. The message of the poem she wrote and read at Bill Clinton’s 1993 inaugural, “On the Pulse of Morning,” about how diversity enriches and strengthens us as a nation, stands in stark contrast to the actions of a young, disturbed madman in Santa Barbara recently.

Many others more eloquent than I have written about her themes of hope, love, inclusion, and dignity. If I can learn to write with one-third her power, I will count myself successful.

To hear her read the poem and find out what it meant to her, go here.

May15

Something freakish this way comes

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pillsThis happened to me on Twitter the other day. I was sitting up late at night, my allergies were going nuts, I was drowning in mucous, I was sneezing, I was coughing, my eyes were burning, my throat and ears were itchy, and I wrote a 140 character-with-spaces rant about it on Twitter, naming the over-the-counter medications I’d tried but that hadn’t worked. One of those medications I use all the time and usually have a lot of success with. The other medication I tried once and hurled it out the window.

So the next morning I log on to Twitter, and the company that makes the medication I like sent me a tweet, asking me to get in touch with their customer service department. I feel like the over-the-counter medicators are coming after me. Eek! I didn’t mean those bad things!

Mar1

Your Title Here

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BookBub's mystery category word cloud

BookBub’s mystery category word cloud

BookBub's historical romance word cloud

BookBub’s historical romance word cloud

BookBub, an ebook promotion services company, published a blog post about words that are trending in book titles. Using data from the last six months, BookBub analyzed 3,850 books from multiple fiction categories to see which words turn up most frequently in titles and then turned their results into word clouds.

Which word was used the most often? Love. Love appeared in the titles of religious and romance novels, but also horror, historical fiction, women’s fiction, and mysteries. Pious turned up in the titles of action-adventure novels, but not religious. (Religious, however, had Couponing. How inspirational is that?)

Murder and Death were huge for the mystery category, as you might guess, but some mysteries also used Dumpty (but not Humpty, as far as I could tell). Thriller titles used Justice, Blood, Black, and Blue the most (I guess there’s a lot of bruising going on in thrillers). War was the word used most often in historical fiction titles, and Destiny and Deadly—but also River—in action-adventure. Zombie and Dead turned up most frequently in horror titles, but historical fiction by a huge margin went with Bride. Historical fiction titles also used Sourdough and Bushwhacked. (I don’t know about you, but I’ve always wanted to use “Bushwhacked” in a title. Or anywhere.)

Contemporary romance titles included the words Audubon and Shopper. Children’s books went with Amazing, Treasure, and Princess. Religious books used the word Heaven most often in their titles (and let’s not forget Couponing).

Women’s fiction went big with food words: Ate, Pickled, Chocolate, Coffee, Shelled, Shucked, Fried, and my favorite, Geoducks.

Lots of words in book titles seem to be possessives. Everybody’s got one — God and the Devil, as well as normal people: Anne, Darcy, Doctor, Else, Gasparilla, Horatio, Jacob, Nefertiti, and Nobody. Tough guys get their time on the cover—Assassin, Hunter, Monster, Pirate, Rogue, Shooter, Warrior—as well as royalty: Emperor, King, Knight, Duke, and Lady. Abstracts that own things: Heaven and Freedom. Places that own things: Chicago and a Kingdom. Things that fly that own things: Bird and Fairy.

I couldn’t resist: I made up a few titles of my own using trending words. Ready?

The Assassin’s Princess Treasure (action-adventure)

Darcy’s Zombie Love Bride (historical romance)

Couponing on the Dumpty River (women’s fiction)

Deadly Destiny: Bushwhacked Justice (thriller)

Nobody’s Sourdough War (historical fiction)

Life just doesn’t get any better than those trending words—as long as you’re not bushwhacked.

Jan28

The day I sang with Pete Seeger

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peteSeeger2A long time ago, when I was an aspiring journalist, the Newspaper Guild, the union for writers and editors, was on strike against the daily newspaper in the town where I lived. A lot of newspaper unions, like unions everywhere, were losing ground in those days. If these editors and reporters lost the strike, they’d lose their jobs, and then if they wanted to keep working on newspapers, they’d have to move somewhere else. Where their future would be just as shaky.

The strike hung on through the winter. The cold often exceeded -20 degrees. Walking a picket line in that kind of weather isn’t just miserable; it can be life threatening. Because many of my friends and acquaintances wanted to be hired into those good jobs, too, we wanted that union to survive. And to help out the strikers, we often walked the picket line that winter to show our support.

The shift changed at 6am, so it was important to be out there when scabs drove through the gates for the morning shift. And one day when I got out there at 6am, standing in wind so cold I thought my teeth would shatter, there was Pete Seeger. He took off his gloves and played his banjo and sang a song. I think it was “This Land Is Your Land,” but I wouldn’t swear to it. We all knew it, and we all sang along.

Pete Seeger died today. When I looked at the photo tribute The New York Times posted, I noted how many times he’s standing on a stage with other people, highlighting and sharing their stories. That’s the way I’ll remember him, too. Standing outside on that freezing road, singing his heart out with a bunch of people who needed his voice.

Oct27

Blogging, blogging everywhere

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I’ve accepted some invitations to guest blog. I know, it’s ironic–I’m not putting up anything here, but I can put stuff up elsewhere. Don’t blame me, it’s the economy.

So first up, I’m blogging over at Shawna Thomas’s place next week Friday, Nov. 4, about what I’m thankful for. For the sake of her readers, I wanted to be thoughtful, but instead I ripped off a cultural icon. If you have time next week, drop on by. She made this lovely image for us to post on our own blogs, which color coordinates accidentally but beautifully with my background theme. It’s that tawny notice just over there to the right in the sidebar. Maybe you recognize some of the other writers who will be participating.

Then on Nov. 25 I’m guest blogging with PJ Schnyder. She’s got a bunch of people talking about NaNoWriMo, the November writing month phenomenon that Chris Baty started in 1999 with 20 friends. Their goal was to write 50,000 words, or a complete book. Six of them made it. Last year 200,500 people participated, and 37,500 got to the 50,000-words mark. On PJ’s blog, I’ll be discussing why I will never be one of these people. If you want to become one of the 200,500, check out NaNoWriMo here.