Since April is National Poetry Month, I’ve been trying to spend more time reading and thinking about poems and poets — no mean feat, since I tend to grow much more frustrated with poetry than I do with other forms — because I think my own sense of rhythm in writing will be improved by the study.
When I was younger, I loathed Paul Laurence Dunbar’s poems in dialect, for some of the same reasons I loathe Tyler Perry productions today: If they were the only exposure someone had to black art, I thought they’d be a poor representation of who and what we are.
…I’m in Austin, Texas.
Because I’m a huge geek, I’m again attending the South by Southwest Interactive conference today through Tuesday. SXSWi is one of the largest technology gatherings in the country.
This year, there are several sessions at the conference that are of interest to authors, book lovers and other people in the book industry. I’m [...]
It’s a new year, and I’m thinking that I need to break out of my reading comfort zone.
This year, I’ve promised myself that I will read at least two books unfamiliar to me in the following subject areas/genres:
1. Economics. The recession has inspired my interest in, well, money. I don’t mean that I’ll be reading [...]
I know what you’ve been saying to yourself: How can I see what Anika looks like when she literally rolls out of bed, doesn’t do anything with her hair, puts on one of her husband’s sweaters and starts cooking and talking about books for a ridiculously long time?
You’re in luck. If you can’t see the [...]
Even when I wasn’t sure that Barack Obama would win the Democratic nomination, much less the presidency, I was fascinated by his literary steez.
Not only is he a published author with an astonishingly lyrical hand (for a politician, I mean), but our president-elect is a book nerd, y’all. As I’ve noted at WriteBlack, he’s been [...]
…for books with good food scenes.
About a week ago, I finally got around to reading The Sweetest Temptation, by Rochelle Alers. It was a nice trifle for a lazy Saturday afternoon, featuring a heroine who was a pastry chef. I’m trying to avoid sweets these days, but I was ravenous when I put that book [...]
Like many of you, I watched the political conventions during the past few weeks. And I learned a lot about the candidates on both sides of the aisle.
Not much surprised me – except when I did some research and the phrase “book banning” turned up.
It seems that a candidate on one of the presidential tickets [...]
Hi.
My name is Anika, I write for a living, and I sometimes struggle with criticism of my work.
I’ve found that it really doesn’t matter whether the criticism is constructive or vindictive or even whether it comes from someone who knows my industry well or a complete naif.
It all hurts at least a tiny bit.
I blog about books because, well, I like books. It would seem that I’m the perfect person to whom an author should want to pitch novels.
However, most of the pitches I get are quickly deleted, because it’s clear that the authors haven’t given much thought to why my site would be a good place for [...]
