I just wanted to put out a quick call for submissions for Booth. If you—or anybody you know—or anybody THEY know—has some killer fiction, poetry, nonfiction, or a quirky list, please get it over to us. Apparently we're the only magazine in America not currently drowning in submissions. So, please, spread the word so we can drown a little, too.

Booth, out!

http://booth.butler.edu

Okay, two quick things. First, the Lit Events calendar is stocked full. There might be a few events I've missed (if you know of anything, please give me a heads up) but I think I've got just about everything. Browse & enjoy.

Secondly, here's a letter from Barb Shoup, the executive director of the Writers' Center, about the upcoming workshop at UIndy with YA authors John Green and Doug Crandell. The letter was originally meant for teachers, but at this point I think we can open it up to all interested parties.

Dear Teachers—

A week or so ago, you (may have) received an e-mail from the Writers’ Center of Indiana inviting you and five of your students to attend a special writing workshop with John Green on Monday, February 8 or with Doug Crandell on Thursday, February 11. Pretty much across the board, teachers have responded that requests to attend the programs were turned down due to lack of funding for substitutes.

We are rescheduling these workshops as after-school events with the hope that you and/or your students will be able to take advantage of the extraordinary experience of meeting and working with two accomplished writers, whose work has special appeal to teenagers.

In each case, students will hear a short talk about creative writing, participate in a writing exercise, and have the opportunity to ask the authors questions.

John Green

Monday, February 8

4:00-5:30 p.m.

Wheeler Art Center

1035 Sanders Street # 111

Indianapolis, IN

John Green is the author of three best-selling novels for young adults, Looking for Alaska, An Abundance of Catherines and Paper Towns. Looking for Alaska won Michael L. Printz Award for excellence in Young Adult literature, and was a finalist for the L.A. Times Book Prize. For more information about John Green and his books, visit www.sparksflyup.com.

Doug Crandell

Thursday, February 11

4:00-5:30 p.m.

Wheeler Art Center

1035 Sanders Street #112

Indianapolis, IN

Doug Crandell is the author of The Flawless Skin of Ugly People, Hairdos of Mildly Depressed, The All America Industrial Motel, Pig Boy’s Wicked Bird and Fear Came to Town. His short stories and essays have been anthologized in Mother Knows: 24 Tales of Motherhood; Stories From the Blue Moon Café: An Anthology of Southern Writers; and When I Was a Loser: True Stories of Barely Surviving High School. Doug has won grants and fellowship competitions from the Sherwood Anderson Foundation, the Hohenberg Foundation, and the Virginia Center for Creative Arts. For more information about Doug Crandell and his books visit www.dougcrandell.com.

John Green will give a free reading at 7:30 p.m. on Monday, February 8 in Good Hall Recital Hall; Doug Crandell will give a free reading at 7:30 p.m. on Wednesday, February 10 in Good Hall Recital Hall—both as part of the Kellogg Visiting Writers Series. These events are open to all teachers students, without reservation.

Driving Directions: http://www.uindy.edu/cpc/directions.php

Fountain Square Map: http://www.uindy.edu/cpc/images/cpc_color.jpg

Please contact Bryan Furuness at furuness@gmail.com as soon as possible to let him know if you or your students plan to attend. Students may attend without a teacher, but please send Bryan the names of those you invite.

Please forward this e-mail to teachers you think might be interested in attending.

Hope to see you there!

Barbara Shoup

Executive Director

Writers’ Center of Indiana

P.S. I would love to hear from you about what kinds of programs the Writers’ Center of Indiana might provide for you and your students in the future.

Indianapolis is Three Bookstores Poorer

By Claire Kirch -- Publishers Weekly, 1/26/2010 8:59:00 AM

Independent bookstores are dropping like flies in the Indianapolis metro, a region that’s been especially hard hit by the recession. In late December, Outword Bound, an 11-year-old indie specializing in GLBT titles shut its doors, as its two co-owners could no longer juggle their full-time jobs elsewhere and their responsibilities at the bookstore.

This week, two other Indianapolis area stores announced that, unless they find buyers soon, they too will shut their doors. The Mystery Company in Carmel, founded by Jim Huang in 2003, is planning on closing in early February after its last author event, an offsite book launch scheduled for February 9 for Book Seven: Dragons Released by Jeff Stone. The Wild, a children’s bookstore founded by Jane Mills in 2005, plans on closing when its lease expires at the end of February.

Huang, a veteran bookseller well-known in the mystery book world as co-founder of the Independent Mystery Booksellers Association and co-chair of Bouchercon last fall, started his career at Spenser’s Mystery Books in Boston in 1987, and owned Deadly Passions Mystery Bookshop in Kalamazoo, Mich. from 1992-2000. He told PW that he decided to close down The Mystery Company because his wife’s job is on shaky ground in this roiling economy, and also because he “has been in an independent bookstore environment for 22 years and is ready to do something new.” He is starting his new job, bookstore manager at the Kenyon College Bookstore, in Gambier, Ohio, on February 15.

As for Mills, she cites her spouse’s cut in pay as part of a “perfect storm” that is closing her store, located in Noblesville. She also blames the opening of a “shiny new” Borders opening 18 months ago in a development near her store, which caused a 37% decline in sales, though her store is still profitable with a “loyal and enthusiastic client list” of 1000 customers. “We had a really strong 2007,” she told PW, “But on my monthly sales sheets, I can see exactly when the [Borders store] opened.”

Ah, shit.

Dear estranged customers of these stores: please do check out Big Hat Books and Bookmamas, two other great Indy indies.

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Colts vs. Saints. Art vs. Art. Things are gonna get odd. Especially when the museum directors from Indy and New Orleans start trash talking.

UPDATE: Tuesday, 11:20pm EST: These museums are getting serious.

In an email I received while I was, er, on my way to dinner, Bullard raised the stakes: "I am amused that Renoir is too sweet for Indianapolis. Does this mean that those Indiana corn farmers have simpler tastes? If so why would Max offer us that gaudy Chalice -- just looks like another over-elaborate Victorian tchotchke. Let's get serious. Each museum needs to offer an art work that they would really miss for three months. What would you like Max? A Monet, a Cassatt, a Picasso, a Miro? Sorry but we have no farm scenes or portraits of football players to send you."

Hey New Orleans! Sorry you don't like the chalice—we figured the city of Mardi Gras would actually consider a jewel-encrusted goblet understated. OUR MISTAKE. But apparently you want something simple. Well, I gotcha American Gothic right heah.

Also, yo mama's so fat that Rubens was like, Uh, no thanks.

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Re: the iPad: I dunno, isn't it just a big-ass iPhone?

Maybe not.

From French Exit, on poems published only because (we suspect) they were written by famous poets:

I get the feeling that these writers are accustomed to being published because of who they are--because they have come to be accepted as good poets--rather than because of the particular poems they have submitted for publication. Everybody knows this happens. Everybody's read a throwaway poem by a good poet in a journal. Fine. I write those too. But I don't want to publish those poems in Absent. I admit it's hard to turn down mediocre work by a poet you're excited to have a submission from at all, but you have to publish the poem, not the poet. Otherwise you end up being, I don't know,Ploughshares. (Sorry to pick on you so much this week, Ploughshares. But you're so namey.) When I scan the TOC in an online journal and it's just the usual suspects, half of me assumes they are half-ass poems, potentially written primarily to keep up with solicitations from online journals.

She then goes on to say what she would like to see in submissions:

Here's what I'd like to see more of in submissions: IDEAS. Why don't poems have more ideas? So many poems I read are essentially just descriptions. So you went outside. It was beautiful. Or not. I don't care how creatively you describe it, if it didn't trigger any thoughts beyond "Hells yeah I am going to describe this," it's not a poem. It's just showing off to yourself, or as Matt Rass used to say, "masturbating to language."

And later:

Poems are not supposed to be beautiful (though they can be). They're supposed to be good.

With Apple's Tablet due to be unveiled tomorrow, agent Nathan Bransford takes his shot at some predictions and key questions.

(It) seems clear to me that the days of grayscale e-books are likely coming to an end. While the iTablet will probably be too expensive to change things immediately, it's a harbinger of things to come: color and video and audio are coming to e-book readers near you.

And it's going to be interesting to see how it shakes out. Who will be the first author with an animated cover? Will people crave enhanced e-books or do people want their e-books to remain static and moving-part free? Will Apple come to dominate the e-book business the way they do e-music, or will other competitors like Amazon remain strong? Will dedicated devices still appeal to core audiences?

I personally think a big question is: will people still read books on a device so eminently capable of distracting you with movies, the Internet, games, and anything the geeks of tomorrow invent?

We'll see. But I suspect the future of publishing is about to take another lurch forward.

-----------------------------------------------

In other important news, the time for Junot Diaz's Q&A session at Butler has been set:

When: Friday, February 12, 9:00 a.m.

Where: Butler University, Jordan Hall, Writers' Studio

____________________________

In other, less important news, the Indy Star's book page is still boring and irrelevant.

Atticus Bookstore and Cafe (near Yale University) has caused a stir with a policy requiring employees to speak English only in public areas. "Spanish is allowed in the prep area, the dishwasher area and the lower level. Let's make our customers feel welcome and comfortable," a copy of the policy says.

In a statement owner Charles Negaro said: "We encourage the use of English because it's an appropriate way to be most helpful to our customers. To continue to provide the best service possible, we try to help those employees who speak English as a second language by helping them improve their use of English."

In other news, Atticus employees have been ordered to shout at deaf people to help them improve their hearing.

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The Circus in Winter: The Musical

From Cathy Day, author of THE CIRCUS IN WINTER:

"I’m headed to Ball State this week because a group of 14 students at the Virginia Ball Center for Creative Inquiry are adapting my book THE CIRCUS IN WINTER into a musical. In this year-long seminar, they will adapt the novel to stage for performances in both Muncie and Chicago. They will also submit their musical to the New Play Festival in New York City. The project has a long-term goal of a fully realized production as part of University Theatre's 2011-2012 Season at Ball State University.

Find out more here: http://www.bsu.edu/vbc/sem_20092010_spring_turcotte.htmland check out the students’ process blog here: http://thecircusinwinter.blogspot.com/. Listen to the musicalized songs here: http://www.myspace.com/thecircusinwinter

Reading from The Circus in Winter
Thursday, Jan. 28 @ 8 PM
Ball State University
David Letterman Building 125
On McKinley Ave.
http://www.bsu.edu/map/media/pdf/parkingmap.pdf

So, if you want to see the musical, you don’t need to come to this reading—wait for further updates from me or the students at Ball State. Follow them on Twitter or follow the blog. If you can’t make it to Muncie, I’ll be back again in March at the University of Indianapolis."

I have seen the future of e-readers, and . . . holy cats.

Mag+ from Bonnier on Vimeo.

I don't see myself ever abandoning physical books for two reasons. One, I love bookstores. They're a jewel of any community, and a center of artistic & intellectual life. Two, I fetishize books. Not in that way, you sicko. I just like being surrounded by paperbacks. One of my earliest fantasies was to live in a house with built-in bookcases and one of those sliding ladders.

But if e-readers turn out to be anything like this, I could see myself going ambibiblious. Bi-dictual. Transtextual . . . somebody help me out here. There has to be a better word for swinging both ways with paper and screen.

_______________________

In other news, The Mystery Company Bookstore is moving out of their current location in about a week. Where to? They're not telling. Not yet. I guess it's a mystery. . .

The Millions has a really good article that talks about the Apple Tablet (scheduled to be revealed on January 27), and what it means for the future of e-readers. And, hell, what it means for the future of readers.

Here's what I want to know about the Tablet: will the screen be backlit, like a computer monitor? If so, it will suck as an e-reader. And if the screen isn't backlit, then it will suck at everything else. In this tech-dummy's opinion, the real breakthrough in these tablet-y devices will come when some genius makes one that can toggle back and forth between a backlit and a non-backlit screen. Here's hoping the Tablet is just that device.

In other Tablet news, U.S. publishers seem to be looking to Apple as their best hope to kill Kindle before it kills them.

Andrew's Book Club is asking for you to vote for their second February selection. Right now, Terrence Holt's IN THE VALLEY OF THE KINGS has 37% of the vote, Lynn Kilpatrick's IN THE HOUSE has 63%, but somehow Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is in the lead with 146%.

_________________________

Book Choy pal Sarah Layden has an interesting, wide-ranging interview with Porter Shreve up at Knee-Jerk.

Here's a brief cut:

What is most gratifying for you about writing fiction? Least?

Most gratifying of all is the process. I love playing with syllables and cadence, zeroing in on the mot juste, shuffling scenes, inventing and being surprised by characters, learning a trade from the outside in, collecting factoids and finding a place for them (Did you know that John Adams and Thomas Jefferson died the same day, July 4, 1826? Or that Henry Ford got his idea for the assembly line by studying the disassembly lines at meat packing plants?) I love the research and often hate to let a book go. But go it must, and that’s perhaps the least gratifying part of writing a novel. There’s the ecstatic day of completion, but soon thereafter a malaise sets in. I also don’t like the stress leading up to a book’s publication or the anxiety that sometimes, inevitably, only three people will show up – the bookstore owner, a guy I knew in Social Studies class in third grade, and someone named Shreve who thinks he’s related to me but isn’t – which is what happened at a reading I did in Plano, Texas. I’ve been lucky to receive warm reviews, by and large, but you do feel exposed putting a book out there with your name on it.

___________________________

And come see Book Choy pal Leigh Ann Hirschman at her book launch this Friday at Big Hat.

Her new book is LIVE A LITTLE, co-written with Susan Love and Alice Domar.

It'll kick off at six with a reading, and then, according to Leigh Ann, "we will have all the other elements of a fun book launch--spirited chatter, wine, and air kisses (mwa! mwa!). And YOU, my fabulous friends and guests."

*Yes, I know the formatting is all screwed up in this post. No, I don't know why. I don't think it's due to my own technological idiocy, but I might be wrong.

Hot Off the Presses from Butler

The scheduled reading by Edwidge Danticat this evening, January 13, in the Reilly Room has been postponed until a later date this semester.

Campus Fiction-Writing Workshop Open to the Public

Butler University English Professor Dan Barden will lead a 12-week fiction-writing workshop for the public on Wednesdays from 7:15 to 9:45 p.m. beginning Feb. 24.

The workshop, which will held on campus in Jordan Hall, is open to all levels of writers. Cost is $200. To apply, send a letter and a writing sample (15 pages maximum) to dbarden@butler.edu or Dan Barden, Butler University Department of English, 4600 Sunset Ave., Indianapolis, IN 46208-3485.

Applications are due by Jan. 29. The workshop is limited to 15 students.

Barden, an associate professor of creative writing, is the author of John Wayne: A Novel (Doubleday, 1997) andThe Next Right Thing (Dial Press, 2011). He has published personal essays in GQ, Details and Esquire.

He began offering public fiction-writing workshops in 1999. The idea is to create “a community of enthusiastic and committed writers.”

“The biggest thing I hope students will get from the course is a sense that it's possible to be serious about their writing,” Barden said. “We all know that it's lonely and hard to be a writer, particularly when you're starting out. But that's also the most important time to develop a discipline and a seriousness about your work.”

Over the years, students have raved about the workshop – and Barden. Some comments:

"Holy cow, he's committed. Also enthusiastic and incredibly encouraging. I felt like he really wanted more than anything to help us – all of us – succeed.... Dan's amazing."

"Dan is extremely encouraging about the abilities we all have. He has really instilled in me the idea that 'making it' is not about talent; it is about hard work and motivation. I enjoyed being taught by someone who is actively pursuing writing while teaching."

"This was one of the best fiction writing classes I've taken. I would recommend it to anyone who has a serious interest in creative fiction."

The course is conducted like a graduate writing workshop, but “we will also talk about the methods and the means by which one can become a serious writer,” Barden said. “People often come into this course with a sense that their desire to be a writer is like a dream, that it may not be possible, that it is entirely dependent on whether they are ‘talented’ or not. I think this course is really good at showing them they can do this kind of work if they're willing to make a few adjustments in their thinking.”

Today's depressing news item for all striving, yet-to-be-published writers out there: Tori Spelling just signed a deal for her third book.

God almighty. I don't like to be mean, but does anyone out there believe that Tori Spelling has even read three books?

I'm sorry. That's not fair. Maybe she reads all the time. Maybe she wrote the book herself, and it's awesome. And maybe that's a pig that just flew past my window.

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People, I need some feedback about the calendar. Yesterday, when I went to plug all the spring events into the calendar, I realized there were—no joke—about 400 entries.

On one hand, this is great news. It means that we have a thriving—nay, bustling!—literary scene around Indy. On the other hand, my brain withered a bit at the thought of all that data-entry.

I will do it . . . if you actually read the calendar. The thing is, I don't know if anyone does. Can you help me out? Can you de-lurk just long enough to answer this multiple choice question in the comments section?

Q: Do you refer to the Lit Events calendar?

1. I do, and I LOVE IT!
2. Never. Well, once, but I don't like to talk about that.
3. What Lit Events calendar?

Something "with" Our Own Leigh Ann Hirschman!

January 5, 2010

WELL

New Health Rule: Quit Worrying About Your Health

By Tara Parker-Pope

Have you had your five to nine servings of vegetables today? Exercised for an hour? Cut back on

saturated fat and gotten eight hours of sleep?

Dictating the rules for healthful living has become a cottage industry, with Web sites, talk shows

and books (and health columns like this one) devoted to the dos and don’ts of staying healthy.

But when it comes to achieving these goals, many of us feel we are falling far short. Whether

you’re a busy parent who can’t find time for exercise, a chronic dieter struggling to lose 20

pounds or a multitasker who gets by on six hours of sleep, it is virtually impossible to follow the

rules.

Now Dr. Susan M. Love, one of the country’s most respected women’s health specialists, offers a

new rule: stop worrying about your health.

In the new book, “Live a Little! Breaking the Rules Won’t Break Your Health” (Crown), Dr. Love

makes the case that perfect health is a myth and that most of us are living far more healthful lives

than we realize.

Dr. Love, a clinical professor of surgery at the David Geffen School of Medicine at the University

of California, Los Angeles, says that failing to live by the various health rules is a major source of

stress and guilt, particularly for women. For most of us, “pretty healthy” is healthy enough.

“Is the goal to live forever?” she said in a recent interview. “I would contend it’s not. It’s really to

live as long as you can with the best quality of life you can. The problem was all of these women I

kept meeting who were scared to death if they didn’t eat a cup of blueberries a day they would

drop dead.”

The book, written with Alice D. Domar, a Harvard professor and senior staff psychologist at Beth

Israel Deaconess Medical Center, explores the research and advice in six areas of health — sleep,

stress, prevention, nutrition, exercise and relationships. In all six, they write, the biggest risks are

on the extremes, and the middle ground is bigger than we think.

“Everything is a U-shaped curve,” Dr. Love said. “There may be times in your life when you’ve

gotten too much of this or too little of that, but being in the middle is better, and most of us are

probably there already.”

Take the issue of sleep. Most people believe that it’s best to get at least eight hours a day. But the

studies on which this belief is based look at how much men and women sleep under ideal

conditions — silence, darkness and no responsibilities other than taking part in a sleep study.

These studies tell us how much people will sleep when they have nothing else to do, but they

don’t tell us anything about how much sleep we really need on a daily basis or what will happen if

don’t tell us anything about how much sleep we really need on a daily basis or what will happen if

we get less.

A 2002 report in Archives of General Psychiatry tried to address those issues by comparing sleep

habits and mortality risk. The study found that people who slept seven hours a night were the

least likely to die during the six-year study period. Sleeping more than seven hours or less than

five increased mortality risk. It wasn’t clear from the study whether more or less sleep increased

risk or whether an underlying health problem was affecting sleep habits, but the findings did call

the old “eight hours” rule into question.

The reality is that individual sleep needs can vary. Some people need very little while others need

more than the average. “The issue of sleep causes a lot of guilt by women,” Dr. Love said. “We

need to be more realistic. If you’re sleepy all the time, you’re not getting enough sleep for you. If

you’re fine on six hours, don’t worry about it.”

Likewise, while exercise is important, many people don’t place enough value on the fitness that

comes from everyday tasks like lifting and chasing children, lugging groceries and cleaning house.

And there is nothing magic about losing weight. People who are obese or underweight have

higher mortality rates, but people who are overweight are just as healthy as those of normal

weight — and sometimes healthier. “The goal is to be as healthy and have as good of a quality of

life as you can have,” Dr. Love said. “It’s not to be thin.”

Health experts agree that moderation is important and that people should not panic about their

health habits. But Dr. Elizabeth Barrett-Connor, professor of family medicine at the University of

California, San Diego, cautions against interpreting a relaxed health message as an excuse to

overeat or stay sedentary. “I think the problem is the slippery slope,” Dr. Barrett-Connor said. “In

the process of translating this message simply to the masses, they may feel they’ve been forgiven.

They shouldn’t feel like they’re sinning, but they shouldn’t feel like this is a license not to try to do

better.”

Miriam E. Nelson, director of the John Hancock Research Center on Physical Activity, Nutrition

and Obesity Prevention at Tufts University, who has read the book, says it may help people realize

that it is easier to be healthy than they thought. “There is a large part of the population that

doesn’t do anything because they’ve been overwhelmed,” Dr. Nelson said. “This book could get

them interested because it’s not so complicated anymore.”

Dr. Love said she and Dr. Domar decided to write the book because many people seemed to have

lost sight of what it meant to be healthy. “The point of this is to use your common sense, and if

you feel good, then you’re fine,” she said. “The goal is not to get to heaven and say, ‘I’m perfect.’

It’s to use your body, have some fun and to live a little.”

Join the discussion at nytimes.com/well.

Copyright 2010

Well, as you've probably heard by now, Ruth Lilly has passed away. Not only was she a huge supporter of poetry, but apparently she wrote a little herself. In 1939, she landed a few poems in the New York Times. Well, technically, someone under the name of "R. Lyly" landed the poems, but as far as pseudonyms go, that's a pretty thin veil. That's like me going by Ryan-bay Uruness-Fay.

Here's a cut from one of her pieces:

From “Retrospect”

Had I surmised what weather would betray
my giant peonies and winking limes,
what crows would annotate my inch of day,
what hell would clatter in the gnomish climes
I never would have shrugged and relegated
my vial of wisdom to a fickle wave . .

By the way, if you want a vial of wisdom, Lilly urges you to ask your doctor about Athenigen©.

___________________________________

Possible Vonnegut library in Indianapolis?

Three of Kurt Vonnegut’s children are working with local fans of the famed author to open a memorial library in Indianapolis.

“This is the only endeavor like this,” said Donald C. Farber, a New York lawyer who is executor of Vonnegut’s estate and a close friend. “And it’s in Indianapolis, where it should be.”

Vonnegut fans from around the country have found the Web site, www.vonnegutlibrary.org, and sent in donations.

Thanks to JL Kato's blog for pointing me to the last two items.

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Aaaaaand, finally, here's proof that God loves irony:

With the recession, shoplifting is on the rise, according to booksellers. At BookPeople in Austin, Tex., the rate of theft has increased to approximately one book per hour. I asked Steve Bercu, BookPeople’s owner, what the most frequently stolen title was.

“The Bible,” he said, without pausing.

Apparently the thieves have not yet read the “Thou shalt not steal” part — or maybe they believe that Bibles don’t need to be paid for. “Some people think the word of God should be free,” Bercu said. As it turns out, Bibles are snatched even at the Parable Christian Store in Springfield, Ore., the manager told me, despite the fact that if a person asks for a Bible, they’ll be given a copy without charge.

I'm pretty sure that Vonnegut would have loved that story, too.

New picks up at Andrew's Book Club:

Time to start your 2010 reading list. And because I'm in the middle of renovating my kitchen, I've chosen two excellent collections by carpenters.

When you're done with either of these books, post reviews online. Share your thoughts at the ABC site. Give the book to a friend or potential reader of short stories. Spread the word.

. . . and if you need a little motivation or guidance in your new year of writing, check this out.

It's resolution time, writers. Here's Ann Patchett with hers:

My New Year's resolution for 2010 has its origins in a couple of conversations I had late in the year 2008. The first was with the bassist Edgar Meyer. I live in Nashville, where it is possible, even easy, to have conversations with famous musicians, and on this night we were at a dinner party complaining to one another about work. Edgar had several promised compositions he had yet to write. I was trying to get started on a new novel. Neither of us was having much luck. We were bemoaning the commitments that kept us from pursuing our most important obligations. But then Edgar admitted he had made a discovery: He put a notebook by the door of his studio and kept a careful record of the number of hours he actually sat down to work. The startling conclusion of this experiment was that the more hours he spent working on compositions, the more music he actually composed.

I don't know why this struck me as such a radical concept, but it did -- time spent working equals output of work. Amazing! I have long tried to fit my work in around all the other obligations in my life, and many days the work finds itself low on the list of things to do, way below laundry and replying to e-mail. Was it possible that by giving my art the same amount of time and attention that I gave to, say, meal preparation, my art might be more likely to flourish?

The second important conversation I had that winter was with my friend Bethany, who teaches yoga. She told me that her teacher, a great and wise yogi, believed that whatever a person did with thoughtful consistency for the first 32 days of the year set the course for the entire year. As a Catholic, this struck me as a warm-up for Lent, and I am a great fan of Lent. I am a genius at giving things up. Since the conversation with Edgar was still kicking around in my head, I decided that I would work on my then un-started novel, or at least make a concerted effort to work on it, for at least one hour every day for the first 32 days of 2009.

Block out time on your calendar. Go somewhere with a minimum of distraction, like the business section of the library, or white-collar prison. And when you're ready to get honest with yourself, start tracking your time. You can do it in a notebook, or an excel document, or, if you're an Iphone or an Ipod Touch person, you might want to check out a free app called Hours Tracker. You can clock in and out every time you read or write. But I have to warn you—the first couple of weeks that you track your time, you'll probably be surprised at how little you're actually reading and writing compared to how much you thought you were.