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I have a very serious and well-written piece up over at The New Yorker. 

You can read it here. If the piece leaves you feeling excited to check out the poetry  of the young and ambitious Alexander Wilkins, then I encourage you to check out his site here. 

booksmatter: Literary fact of the day, courtesy of Seth Fried and Julia Mehoke’s brilliant new webcomic, The Factspace.

booksmatter:

Literary fact of the day, courtesy of Seth Fried and Julia Mehoke’s brilliant new webcomic, The Factspace.

Your New Favorite Webcomic

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As we all know, the internet is famous for two things: pornography and misinformation. If you’re a fan of the latter, then Julia Mehoke and I urge you to check out our  brand new webcomic, which will be providing the internet with more fake trivia than it can handle. 

Please visit thefactspace.com for our weekly updated comic and follow us on twitter (@thefactspace) to enjoy our unending stream of non-traditional facts.

Das Kolumne #10

Das Kolumne #10 is up over at Tin House. This installment is a healthy mix of writing advice and basic iguana care advice.

I suggest you mix up a couple of hot toddies for you and the special lizard in your life, then drag your computer monitor into a hammock for some relaxing blog reading. You can let my literary humor column rock you gently to sleep while Dr. Grooper’s Extra-Strength Lizard Expectorant courses perniciously through your blood stream.

I can’t think of a better way to spend this fine Monday morning. But then again, I’m a maniac.

READOMMENDATION: Godforsaken Idaho



If you look at how infrequently I use this blog to recommend things that weren’t written by me, then you should be able to infer that Godforsaken Idaho is a pretty rare treat of a book.

That said, while I might be okay talking about someone else’s short stories, I understand that as devoted “Seth-heads” you might not feel comfortable reading fiction that wasn’t written by me. In that case, I encourage you to cross out Shawn Vestal’s name on your copy of Godforsaken Idaho and replace it with mine.

Then you can tell your friends that you’re reading a fantastic collection by Seth Fried, which is full of vastly entertaining and insightful stories. Anyway, that’s what I did with my copy of Vestal’s book. So far I’m really pleased with the responses I’ve been getting.

Daily Writing Tip #238: Wear A Baby Bjorn With A Hoagie In It

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WRITING TIP #238:
Ron Carlson once wrote, “The writer understands that to stand up from the desk is to fail, and to leave the room is so radical and thorough a failure as to not be reversible.” I agree with this sentiment wholeheartedly. A writer must stay in the room and face the difficulty of the task at hand without giving in to easy distractions. That said, if I stay at my desk too long, my blood sugar drops and I start to describe all of my characters as being “assholes” with “smelly faces.” That’s why I always wear a baby björn with a giant hoagie in it when I write. As soon as I start getting that urge to throw my protagonist down a spiral staircase or to have him be attacked by a swarm of eagles, I just reach down for some hoagie goodness, replenishing my blood sugar without getting up from my desk.

BONUS TIP: 
Try to avoid sandwiches with a strong odor, such as egg salad or grilled limburger. These can be distracting while you’re trying to write. Also, they will require you to clean out your baby björn with a pressure hose after each use. 

Das Kolumne #9

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Oh, folks. Folks folks folks folks. You do not want to miss the new Das Kolumne.

As you might have guessed, it features a picture of a giraffe on roller skates heading toward the edge of a cliff and drinking out of a beer helmet. What else do you want from the internet? What else is there to want?

Click HERE to read it and click HERE to read it again.

Seven Habits Of Highly Effective Caged Birds

There is a brand new Das Kolumne ready for you over at Tin House. You can read it HERE. It will tell you what gifts to buy your pets for the holidays. After all, just because they are your terrified prisoners doesn’t mean they don’t deserve presents. 

I also want to encourage you to check out the Das Kolumne Archive, which is being maintained at the taxpayer’s expense HERE. In the archive you will find my worldly and aggressively thoughtful advice on such topics as:

HOW TO GET AN AGENT
HOW TO WRITE EROTIC FICTION
HOW TO WRITE A NOVEL WHILE HIGH ON OWL URINE
AND MORE.