Patricia Abbott (pattinase): Thanks to Nigel Bird at Sea Minor

Wednesday, September 08, 2010

Thanks to Nigel Bird at Sea Minor

for allowing me to get these bad attempts at humor out of my system. If you haven't been reading his blog, you can find his self-interviews at Sea Minor on most good days. And isn't he a peach?

11 comments:

Anonymous said...: Great interview, Patti! That interviewer is just wonderful, too! ;-); 7:23 PM
pattinase (abbott) said...: She thinks she's funny but I disagree.; 8:24 PM
Todd Mason said...: I think you're a little hard on her, particularly with that decade curse...; 9:35 PM
pattinase (abbott) said...: She can take it.; 10:01 PM
Charles Gramlich said...: I'll check it out.; 11:07 PM
Paul D Brazill said...: Great stuff. I chuckled away to myself.; 7:58 AM
Anonymous said...: Now that was a great interview. Nice job.

19? That really is young. So did your mother eat her words?

Jeff M.; 8:06 AM
Dana King said...: They say it's all right to hear voices in your head, until you start to answer them. Okay, maybe answering can be fine, as well. Just don't argue.

I've read before about your frustration with novels, and how your strength seems to be in stories of 2500-4000 words. Have you ever thought of writing a novel made up entirely of stories of that length? Each story can stand alone, but each is definitely a chapter in the larger work.

John McNally, a writing teacher of mine, published his first novel (what he called a "fiction") in this form, called THE BOOK OF RALPH. It worked very well.

Just a thought.; 9:17 AM
pattinase (abbott) said...: Dana-I guess I have that one, too. That would have been my first attempt. So three attempts.
My mother did eat her words. I have been lucky enough to have the best husband in the world. But it was mostly luck-I am sure she would have been right more times than not.; 10:01 AM
pattinase (abbott) said...: It seemed funny to me at eleven when I wrote it. The next day at nine-not so much. Thanks, Paul.; 10:02 AM
Anonymous said...: Dana, I just read (at Patti's instigation) Tom Rachman's The Imperfectionists, which is written in just the form you suggest. It's really a series of interconnected short stories (15-20 pages each) revolving around an English language newspaper in Rome.

Jeff M.; 11:47 AM