Scott Lax

 

In that this is a blog, and most blogs have comment sections; and in that some people are reading this blog, I thought it would be a good time to explain why I don't have the comment section enabled. It's not complicated: I have limited time (as we all do) and I have so much writing to do -- the new novel to be edited, other fiction projects, as well as paid journalism. I also like to spend as much time as possible with my family.

But there are excellent blogs that do allow comments, operated by bloggers that have managed to make their reader exchanges to be part of their writing lives, and do so in a lively and respectful way. They're better at it than I could be, too. For now, here are two: workingwithwords.com, operated by John Ettorre. And for food lovers and writers, ruhlman.com is exceptional. (Links to the left.)

I'll continue this format: some thoughts and advice on writing. If you like it, please come back. If not, there is a universe of blogs out there (I guess I'm supposed to say "blogosphere"), so enjoy that, too.  Read More 

This is a quote I like: "Human beings have their last great chance in the novel."
- E.M. Forster

Here's how I look at that. Characters with no depth or meaning, but only action and characteristics, produce stories that don't matter. What is the "last great chance" that Forster talks about? I don't think it means a chance at fame, or money, or even redemption - though a character might achieve worldly things, or spiritual enlightenment, or anything else. I think, rather, that the human beings that populate a novel have a chance to express their humanity; to express who and what they are. Isn't that what human beings want, after all? Why should a novel be different? Read More 

After I finished up a newspaper column this morning, I read it out loud to myself. I caught a number of small typos, and an extra word here and there that I thought I'd edited out. For most of us writers, there is no edit like reading your work out loud - to see how it flows, and to catch mistakes. Do yourself a favor: read your work out loud before you submit it to an editor or whomever. I think the brain skips over errors when you simply read mentally, without physically hearing them. Reading aloud allows you to hear the pacing, too, and adjust accordingly. Read More 

Yesterday I named this blog, "Writing as Breathing." So much for that. Today I researched it, just in case, and it came up in the title of an article about the poet Nikki Giovanni from 1989, by Lois Rosenthal. The quote from the article is, "She talks about James Joyce 'who wrote as he breathed. And you should write the way you breathe.'"

I suppose we all come up with words and phrases that make sense to us - "writing as breathing," I thought, simply came to me. Or maybe it was buried in my subconscious. So it wasn't original, but it led me to a fine article about a great poet.  Read More 

There are times, like today – late afternoon, the sun shining, the air balmy – when I'm sitting in my little, 1850s, brick and beam office that overlooks the village, and much work is done for the day, and I'd rather be sipping a lemonade or glass of rosé, and not thinking about anything, or trying not to think about anything. It’s exactly the time when working on the novel is most important for me. So that's what I'm doing. Read More 

For those looking for information about Northern Ohio Live magazine, for which I've been senior writer for six years, please click the link to the right. I'll update you more as I find out the status of the magazine.

I'm working on the second draft of my new novel. It's for fans of literary fiction, wine, psychological murder mysteries, and love stories that take place in Paris, the South of France, and small towns in the Midwest U.S.