Truth is so relative it takes courage each morning to get out of bed. Will the ground stay beneath my feet? Seeing life as illusion is a habit of mine as anyone who’s read my novel, Trompe l’Oeil, knows. Yet nothing in my fiction compares with the bizarre circumstances of ordinary

A noble woman in the novel The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky says, and I paraphrase: “I love humanity. What I can’t stand is the individual.” When I first read those lines, I remember how hard I laughed. Being young and with little experience, the character’s distin

I admit it. Writers can’t be trusted. In their desire to share insights, they can forget someone’s feeling might be hurt. In an earlier blog on Truman Capote (Blog Dec. 12, 2012) I wrote about the author’s roman à clef, a fictionalized profile of some of his friends in New York

Aaron Swartz was a hacker. He committed suicide in January of this year at the age of 26. He killed himself because he feared he would be prosecuted and jailed for attempting to share medical information stored on the computers at the National Health Institute. The agency charges hand

The other day, the mail brought the latest edition of Portal, a glossy magazine published by my local art museum. Browsing through the pages, I came across two articles of interest. The first was a critic’s essay defending an exhibit that angered several patrons, material which, the

I sat down to eat my oatmeal this morning when I was interrupted by a call from a friend who lives in South Africa. Before heading home from her job, she stopped to wish me a belated happy birthday. I’m always glad to hear from her and for a time we caught up, chatting about mutual

When I was 29, I was dating a man who was intelligent, financially secure and cultured. Nonetheless, I wasn’t attracted to him, despite my mother’s encouragement. “He has beautiful teeth,” she said, fearing I was being picky and would end up alone. At 29, I considered that pos

I dropped off a couple of books at my neighborhood community library box the other day — New Age material which my cerebral cortex had outgrown. As I stood peeking through the glass door, I noticed a novel by Gabriel García Márquez: The General in His Labyrinth. Márquez is fa

I turned on my computer this morning and found another pitch to market my books. This time it was for an “Author Marketing Kit.” I was being offered a $1,000 package for $125 if I signed up right away. The company’s mission, they said, was to help ”authors and small publishers

At Saturday brunch not long ago, I sat down over pancakes and eggs to enjoy the company of an old friend and his recently graduated 22 year-old son. The son was on his way to graduate school on a full scholarship at a large university and his father was basking in the glow of his off-