by Cynthia Newberry Martin | Sep 18, 2009 | catching moments, journeys, Pam Houston, place, poetry |
It’s writing group week. At this time of the year, we’re at Pam Houston’s ranch in Creede, Colorado. There are nine of us here, two who couldn’t make it. Saturday night we arrived to a dinner of salmon, fresh corn on the cob and green beans,...
by Cynthia Newberry Martin | Sep 14, 2009 | my writing, stories |
My story, “The Splitting Sound,” appears in the fall issue of Clapboard House. Here’s the first paragraph: Across the street, I leaned against the yellow rental car. The house was smaller than I remembered, but that’s what everyone always said. The...
by Cynthia Newberry Martin | Sep 11, 2009 | poetry, the day |
In remembrance of September 11th, 2001, this poem by Judyth Hill: WAGE PEACE Wage peace with your breath. Breathe in firemen and rubble, breathe out whole buildings and flocks of red wing blackbirds. Breathe in terrorists and breathe out sleeping children and freshly...
by Cynthia Newberry Martin | Sep 8, 2009 | accumulation, journeys, my writing |
It’s been a year. Yes, it has. To celebrate–we’re going to have music. Enjoy listening to the 10, 000 Maniacs as you read, and I’d like to thank Natalie for her congratulations at the end of the song! I’d been thinking about starting a...
by Cynthia Newberry Martin | Sep 1, 2009 | Dani Shapiro, How We Spend Our Days |
Annie Dillard wrote, “How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives.” On the first of each month, Catching Days hosts a guest writer in the series, “How We Spend Our Days.” Today, please welcome writer DANI SHAPIRO: A I awake as I...
by Cynthia Newberry Martin | Aug 29, 2009 | shapes, stories |
In Mary Gaitskill’s story collection, Don’t Cry, is a story entitled, “Mirror Ball.” It’s one of my four favorites in the collection and is described on the book jacket as an “urban fairy tale” in which “a young man...
by Cynthia Newberry Martin | Aug 25, 2009 | details, memory, reading |
The Music Room by Dennis McFarland was published in 1990. I read it the first time in 1991, and then again at the beginning of August–eighteen years later. I enjoyed it just as much. Here, McFarland could be describing his own writing, instead of a feeling:...
by Cynthia Newberry Martin | Aug 21, 2009 | details |
Okay, here’s the thing. I got carried away in my post about the detail hunt. When I started writing it, I just wanted to write about how hard it was to catch details and maybe generate a discussion about where all the good ones were hiding and how other people...
by Cynthia Newberry Martin | Aug 17, 2009 | craft of writing, details, Pam Houston |
The more I think about Pam Houston’s writing advice (via Henry James), that a writer ought to strive to be “someone on whom nothing is lost,” the more I want to be aware of what is going on around me. A couple of weeks ago, in the interest of...
by Cynthia Newberry Martin | Aug 11, 2009 | accumulation, life |
If your life includes reading, writing, and books, then it’s likely filled with piles of books and papers and other things you’ve cut out or printed for ideas and then there are all the little notes for inspiration and the notes of daily reminders and the...
