For the Letter-Writing Lovers

In this age of e-mail and texting no one writes letters anymore, and Stephen Elliott and the folks over at The Rumpus are trying to change that by introducing literary authors to readers via their Letters in the Mail project.

The Rumpus has also begun connecting their readers by offering them a chance to write to each other. Even better, the latest Letters to Each Other is open to anyone, not just subscribers to Letters in the Mail.

The basics: you write a one-page letter (double-sided is fine), send it along with a self-addressed stamped envelope and $2 to cover postage to the address specified in the post. The folks at the Rumpus make five copies and mail them to five other people who participate in LTEO. If you want the folks who receive your letter to write back, you include a return address in your letter.

I participated in the first LTEO, and I had a lot of fun replying to the letters I was sent. Do be aware that this is an entirely random chance sort of thing, what with the shuffling of letters and not knowing where they go. Think of LTEO as a way of sticking a message in a bottle and tossing it into the sea of the universe -- who knows where it will land?

Quilt or Innocence

Back in March I mentioned discovering The Writer's Knowledge Base, author Elizabeth S. Craig's site that provides among many neat things a search engine specifically geared toward writers. They also put out a free monthly newsletter, for which they kindly interviewed me in April as their featured blogger.

Since then I've been shamelessly rifling through the links on the site, and while reading Elizabeth's blog post Covering Our Bases I noticed her June release had quilts in the art and one in the title: Quilt or Innocence. Fiction featuring quilts is pretty rare to begin with, but this one is the first novel in a mystery series set in the North Carolina mountains, and features a retired art museum curator turned amateur sleuth.

Here's some copy on the book from the author's web site:

As the newest member of the Village Quilters Guild, Beatrice has a lot of gossip to catch up on—especially with the Patchwork Cottage quilt shop about to close. It seems that Judith, the landlord everyone loves to hate, wants to raise the rent, despite being a quilter herself…

But when Judith is found dead, the harmless gossip becomes an intricate patchwork of mischievous motives. And it’s up to Beatrice’s expert eye to decipher the pattern and catch the killer, before her life gets sewn up for good.

The quilt-themed books I encounter are generally of the memoir, angsty Amish or bestest-girlfriend/lafemmance variety, so I was happy to order a copy from B&N. Buying it also gives me an opportunity to show my support for an author who provides free resources for writers on the internet, aka practicing what I preach.

What authors have you discovered via their support for their peers? Let us know in comments.

Road Trip

What would you see if you travelled 5158.3 miles in two weeks, chasing the colors of your dreams? (warning for those of you at work, some background music)



5158.3 Miles by Jorge Gonzalez

Steampunk Antho

White Cat Publications has an open call for their steampunk anthology, Airships & Automatons: "We seek steampunk stories featuring strong characters, exciting plotlines, and automatons and/or airships. We don’t want the latter to be mentioned in passing; they should be central to the plot. We aren’t shooting for any particular mood with this book. Dystopian, humorous, pulp, Lovecraftian, upbeat or dark— all have a place here. Please don’t feel constrained to write in a Victorian setting. It’s steampunk, push the boundaries. We’re looking for that certain flavor of writing that’s hard to explain, but obvious when it’s present. Like most markets, we aren’t interested in erotica or unnecessary gore (I know, I know. I said push the boundaries, but I’m not cutting the checks)." Length: "5,000 words preferably"; Payment: ".05 per word first publication/ .01 per word reprint plus a contributor copy of the book. If translations are made, writers will be paid .01 per word and 1 copy for each version." Electronic submissions only, see guidelines for more details. Deadline: Until filled.

City in the Sky

The lotus flower has brought a lot of beauty to my life. In addition to practicing a form of lotus meditation, I also photograph and paint the flowers. I think they're elegant, serene and beautiful -- and I'm not the only one to be inspired by them.

To quote from the web site, City in the Sky is "a concept about an imaginary tranquil oasis above the mega developed and polluted city where one can escape from the everyday noise, stress and dirt. The concept is inspired by the Lotus flower which is known for its ability to emerge above the murky waters pure and clean." This video shows what that oasis might look like (and for those of you at work, this one has some background music):



Japanese poet Kobayashi Issa wrote a haiku about the symoblism of the lotus:

世の中よ針だらけでも蓮の花

Which translates to:

this world
full of needles and thorns ...
yet lotus blooms

Weave Your Art

If you'd like to try creating digital art but don't want to invest beaucoup bucks in expensive software, you might check out Artweaver, a digital painting program that allows you to play with many common digital art tools and features, customize your brushes, playback your session (handy if you want to show someone else what you've done.)

More features:

Support for many file formats like AWD (Artweaver), BMP, GIF, JPEG, PCX, TGA, TIFF, PNG and PSD (incl. layers)
Transparency, layers and layer groups
Common image editing tools like gradient, crop, fill and selection tools
Many effect filters like sharpen, blur, emboss and mosaic
Expandable by Plug-In modules (Artweaver standard)
Editable text layers
Pen tablet support
History function to undo/redo last editing steps
Support for many languages through language files


Plus it's freeware, so you don't have to pay a dime for it (OS: Windows 2000/XP/Vista/7.)

Pass the Sketchup

For those of you who like to build virtual models, the free version of Google Sketchup is an "easy-to-learn 3D modeling program that enables you to explore the world in 3D. With just a few simple tools, you can create 3D models of houses, sheds, decks, home additions, woodworking projects - even space ships. And once you´ve built your models, you can place them in Google Earth, post them to the 3D Warehouse, or print hard copies."

I personally downloaded this one, and while I definitely need to watch all of the tutorials it seemed a bit more friendly than Blender. I also like that you can access galleries of models built by other users and download them (and don't quote me on this, but I'm pretty sure you can even modify them to suit your needs.)