oliver yeh

“Regardless of what kind of book it is, this is the way...

Wed, 22 Feb 2012 22:31:20 -0500

“Regardless of what kind of book it is, this is the way you’re going to visually preserve it first before you open it. But this doesn’t have much to do with someone buying it. People tell me they buy books for their covers. But it’s not a sales tool in the sense of you’re going to buy it because you like that cover. Really, what the cover should do is get you to open the book and start to read it and investigate it. And at that point, the book is going to sell itself to you, or not.” — Chip Kidd

The Tyranny of Footnotes

Wed, 22 Feb 2012 16:54:00 -0500

The Tyranny of Footnotes:

Paul Wachter investigates why Kanye West is acknowledged in a 2008 authorized biography of V.S. Naipaul.

Quick tightener: There is, there was, there are, it is...

Wed, 22 Feb 2012 14:07:04 -0500

Delete them.

We’re talking here about style and efficiency: getting to the point and getting the reader’s attention. — David Galef

Hmm. Wonder if they’d make one to fit a human.

Wed, 22 Feb 2012 12:22:00 -0500

Hmm. Wonder if they’d make one to fit a human.

Want. “Mothers,” Tóibín writes, “get in the way of...

Wed, 22 Feb 2012 09:26:00 -0500

Want.

“Mothers,” Tóibín writes, “get in the way of fiction; they take up the space that is better filled by indecision, by hope, by the slow growth of a personality, and by something more interesting and important as the novel itself developed. This was the idea of solitude, the idea that a key scene in a novel occurs when the heroine is alone… Thus her thoughts move inward, offering a drama not between generations, or between opinions, but within a wounded, deceived or conflicted self. The novel traces the mind at work, the mind in silence.” Read more of the review.

"A writer never has a vacation."

Mon, 20 Feb 2012 16:00:05 -0500

““A writer never has a vacation.”

- Eugène Ionesco

Photo

Mon, 20 Feb 2012 12:45:05 -0500

Lending Library Public Sculpture on Kickstarter The Hundred...

Thu, 16 Feb 2012 16:33:00 -0500

Lending Library Public Sculpture on Kickstarter

The Hundred Story House is a piece of interactive public art. It is a miniature Brooklyn brownstone whose windows open upon shelves of books (about 100 of them) which can be borrowed by the community. Situated in the Cobble Hill Park on Clinton Street, the House is a tiny lending library open to all and operating on the honor system — take-a-book, leave-a-book. This is an effort to celebrate the BOOK as a physical object, and the pleasure of holding one in your hand. Or better yet, placing one in someone else’s.

"If writing is not a tearing of the self toward the other within a confession of infinite separation…..."

Thu, 16 Feb 2012 14:40:33 -0500

“If writing is not a tearing of the self toward the other within a confession of infinite separation… then it destroys itself.”

- Jacques Derrida

Most important. Will give the nets a miss and make better use of...

Thu, 16 Feb 2012 14:02:00 -0500

Most important. Will give the nets a miss and make better use of the poundage.

Will have one for you. Thanks and cheers!

"If he literally pissed off the Devil in the process, he’d be standing on top of the Devil and..."

Thu, 16 Feb 2012 13:52:53 -0500

“If he literally pissed off the Devil in the process, he’d be standing on top of the Devil and urinating off him while simultaneously falling in love with a vampire whose soul he just replaced.”

- Fragment of a query critique over at BookEnds, “Workshop Wednesday.”

I thought about that. Do they lease large nets in case I have to...

Thu, 16 Feb 2012 13:48:00 -0500

I thought about that.

Do they lease large nets in case I have to fish out a body or two?

Doors to a writer’s acuity. By sarcoptiform.

Thu, 16 Feb 2012 13:08:00 -0500

Doors to a writer’s acuity. By sarcoptiform.

Oxford, England

Thu, 16 Feb 2012 07:49:00 -0500

Need timewarp to engage, now. Heading to Oxford at the end of March for a vaca. Never been. Looking forward to its rich history.

But even more excited for The Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival.

"I write because I can’t do normal work like other people."

Wed, 15 Feb 2012 11:32:22 -0500

“I write because I can’t do normal work like other people.”

- Orhan Pamuk

"I was writing, yeah, but nothing spectacular. I had some unicorn notebook, and all of my stories..."

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 22:00:00 -0500

“I was writing, yeah, but nothing spectacular. I had some unicorn notebook, and all of my stories were the same. And it’s funny because I actually think it’s the same plot I still use. Like, ‘Once upon a time a bunch of magical forest creatures lived in peace!’ ‘And then,’ new paragraph, ‘there was a flood!’ [Laughs.] It’s really all the same.”

- Karen Russell when asked if she’d been writing since elementary school.

Copia Lets Readers Ask Author Questions Inside eBook

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 21:40:00 -0500

Copia Lets Readers Ask Author Questions Inside eBook:

What was clean would then look like a Microsoft Word document with Show Markup selected. Great… distraction.

Through February 21st, readers who buy a copy of Hermes’ book through the Copia eBook store can use Copia’s free eReader app to pose questions directly to the author which will show up in the margins of the eBook. The author will answer questions digitally.

The author will answer questions digitally forever and ever and ever on each page.

Writers: If you're going to procrastinate, do it right.

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 19:50:00 -0500

From Gretchen Rubin’s, “Problem With Procrastination? Try This: Do Nothing.”

[Raymond] Chandler set aside at least four hours each day for writing; he didn’t force himself to write, but he didn’t let himself do anything else. He wouldn’t let himself read, write letters, write checks — nothing. He summed up: “Two very simple rules: a.) You don’t have to write. b.) You can’t do anything else. The rest comes of itself.”

If I could tear this digital list into shreds I would. This is...

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 10:29:00 -0500

If I could tear this digital list into shreds I would. This is lazy writing.

Ever seen someone who feels dejected? A kid perhaps who was declined a date to the dance? THIS is what you write down, not the word. The word is a shortcut to telling. Showing what the character looks like or how he acts is in my mind better writing.

Don’t make it easy on yourself. Don’t subscribe to these lists. Your writing will appreciate it.

Letter to Restaurateurs in Delaware

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 18:58:00 -0500

Sometimes simple, authentic cuisine is all you need to create.

Stop with the unique takes on sauces. If I see more than one sauce option, I’m not ordering it.
Stop with “this is my version.” Do you know what you’re doing?
Stop with nouveaux. Replace “new” with fresh, local.
Stop with fusion. Leave fusion for those late nights when you return from the pub.
Stop with ala. Ala nothing. Stop rubbing the lamp.
Stop drenching everything with Sriracha, honey, gorgonzola, Buffalo, 4-cheese, wasabi, _________.

You would be boldly unique if you’d just give me real genuine food. Fresh food cooked the way everyone’s mama used to. Go back to basics. That’s all I want to afford.