TUCKED MY HAIR UNDER my daisy-covered swim cap until my scalp stretched so tight my face hurt. Mom said I had to wear a rubber swim cap because girl hair clogged pool drains. In beginner swim class, mostly I held on to the side in the shallow end, kicked and blew bubbles for a pretty […]
English Only?
IT WAS AUTUMN in suburban Richmond. Cheerful, acute voices overwhelmed the muted sounds of falling leaves. “Córrele Guillermo,” yelled Elena to her toddler. “Te tengo aquí unas galletitas.” Just next to her, a round, middle-aged face surfaced from behind a USA Today. With deepening, fresh wrinkles, he glanced and gruntled, “In this park we only […]
Writer Turf Wars
I RECEIVED AN EMAIL today from writer Nancy Edwards talking about me getting mentioned in a newspaper article. She’s a student at my Random Writers Workshop. The irony is she was my college English professor in the early 1990s. I always point this out. At a recent memoir event I blamed my last twenty years of […]
Caroline Leavitt: Why I Write Fiction
WHY DO I WRITE FICTION? Because I’d go mad if I didn’t. Fiction helps me understand the un-understandable. It helps me forgive the unforgivable. I get to be lost in a whole other world and as I learn the language and figure out the terrain, I heal the things that haunt and obsess me. And […]
A Colorful Sound In Chicago
SOMETIMES I DON’T WEAR MY GLASSES or my contacts because I’m sick of seeing all the beautiful people in my city. They make me feel green as I listen to their silky shirts lick their skin and the hollow, yet echoing sound from a woman’s shoes. Five days out of seven I am on this […]
Dealing With The Killing Squads
DURING THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE of 1915, one of the many ways a woman could die at the hands of the killing squads was by the game of swords. The killing squads were bands of ex-convicts, released from prison or recruited by the Ottoman government for the purpose of massacring Armenians. The game of swords involved […]
My First Boyfriend, Leslie
I KNEW LESLIE AS A QUIET BOY who sat in the last row of my fourth grade class at Fammatre Elementary in San Jose, California. The following fall, on the first day of fifth grade, Leslie came to school wearing a pink-flowered sundress. Leslie’s slicked brown hair waved in boy fashion behind her ears, and […]
Spelunking
I FALL DEEP INTO OBLIVION – into something that’s too big to hold me. The history is too big, my color is all wrong and even while I hold the sides I can’t see my hands. Somewhere, there’s a rope. I know it’s there because it’s around my waste. I start to climb. The rocks […]
Changing Hands
ON A RECENT TRIP back to Phoenix, I went to Changing Hands Bookstore. I’d made a point to stop by every time I came to the area, to see the place and take in what are, for me, positive associations. I frequented the store when I started my time in the English program at Arizona […]
Latino In America, Part One: Immigration Reform
LAST YEAR MARKED a turning point for me as a Latino poet supporting comprehensive immigration reform. My increase in social activism was related to the increased need for solutions to America’s problem of over-deportation and significant roadblocks in paths to citizenship. I can’t blame any immigrant for seeking a better, honest life in America. I […]
Reading Aloud For Meaning
READING ALOUD HELPS catch those pesky typos and shifts in verb tense. That’s obvious. What if there’s a deeper meaning to crooning your fiction across the dining room table? I thought I would dig a little deeper and explain why I like to read my drafts aloud. The word “writing” for me regarding fiction often […]
Why Comedy Tweets Are Good For Writers
HADN’T REALIZED I’D TWEETED forty or so times about talking to my novel. Sure it’s a far cry from the 935 tweets that make up Small Places (Twitter novel I tweeted between 2008-2010. Read some on The Nervous Breakdown). Me: You like being a second draft? Novel: I don’t feel as crazy-eyed. Now what? Me: […]
What Does It Mean To Writers When An Indie Bookstore Closes?
RUSSO’S BOOKS, perhaps the only independent bookstore left in California’s Central Valley, is closing in a little more than a week. Some people say it sucks. Others have an “oh well” attitude. But what does the indie bookstore’s impending doom mean to writers? It’s a little premature to say the Bakersfield bookstore is going away. […]