Tag: Writing
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Twinkle for Gents—A Close Shave
I ask around about haircuts. Authoritative Mumbai sources say: Twinkle for Gents. Five weeks into our stay, haircuts are essential. But am I to test Twinkle for Gents? I take a 2 and 3 across the sides and top. My sons buzz down to 4 and 5. Not haircuts, so much as a few quick strokes…
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What We Talk About When We Talk About Writing
Writers write. This simple premise covers everything I need to know about our craft. The axiom provides all the cover I need to shut out the world and pretend I fulfill my purpose merely by sitting down with a few trusty instruments. A Parker Jotter. A Moleskine Cahier. A keyboard, perhaps. But the platitude, it…
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Always
Puzzled that I’d spend my time doing this, people will ask, ‘How long have you been writing?’ Part accusation, part sincere inquiry, it deserves consideration. The truest answer I have—and it’s not a wise guy answer—is always. I say ‘truest’ because of the stages leading up to my present output: two published novels; two mid-grade…
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Elevatorwala
Mumbai has a wallah for everything, no task too big or small. Outside my 14th-story flat, one of four elevatorwalas pushes the button that takes us to the street and back again. The other night we ate our first dinner at a Parsi restaurant called—this is all one word—Sodabottleopenerwala. It’s a chain. Derived in part…
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Posting from a New Home
After five years posting from DC, BenEastBooks moves on to Mumbai. Expect the same focus on craft and reviewing serious books by independent authors. Expect new writing invigorated by travel and adventure. Expect postings flavored with the exotic, the ancient, the extraordinary, and the very new. I welcome contributions, requests for reviews, and sensible observations. When…
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Reader Wanted
Today I finished my fifth novel. Tomorrow, it will be a gift for my son on his eighth birthday. I await the sense of release, the great pocket of freedom that opens up when a large file is deleted. Last December a man walked into the SweetLife Cafe wearing nothing at all but his socks.…
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Maximum City
We are neither here nor there. The carpets are up and the curios down. The boys are packed and shipped off south for a week with Naniji. A week from tomorrow the packers arrive. They’ll invade for 3 or 4 days to box up several categories of shipment: 700 lbs of air freight; 7k lbs…
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Can He also Ride a Porcupine?
Two weeks ago (yes…) I visited my son’s class. I read to them from my current work in progress, a novel soon to be presented IHO Mohan’s eighth birthday. Before I finished the hands were up and all the mouths were saying ‘Ooh! Ooh! Ooh!’ They had plans for my principal foil, a character named…
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Tom Wolfe,1930–2018
Tom Wolfe’s passing takes me back to undergrad years and The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test. I loved Bonfire of the Vanities and The Right Stuff, but it was Acid Test—published 50 years ago—that made Tom Wolfe electric. We were studying Ken Kesey under Barry Leeds and there was never enough to go around. Cuckoo’s Nest…
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Titles for World Book Day
Re-posting these titles I wish I could find on Amazon, with a few more. Happy reading, writing, and whatever else it is you do with your books. The Novel Is Dead—A Murder Mystery The Novel Is Dead. Long Live the Novel: An Arthurian Legend The Attorney for the Attorney Representing the Client’s Attorney—A…
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