Friday Finds for Writers

by Erika Dreifus on
2

Treasure Chest
Writing-related resources, news, and reflections to enjoy over the weekend.

  • As happy as I was to meet my 2014 Goodreads Reading Challenge, I couldn’t help thinking that I should have read more poetry during the past 12 months. So I’m grateful for this Page-Turner post featuring some of The New Yorker‘s 2014 poems.
  • My job change in summer 2014 has led to less of a focus for me on freelancing tips. But if freelance writing is *your* thing, you should perhaps take a look at these “17 Super-Useful Posts About Story Ideas, Article Writing, Interviews, and Editors” over on Carol Tice’s Make a Living Writing blog.
  • As one of the few people on the planet who has ever heard an episode of Serial, I probably won’t stun anyone with the news that my forays into podcasts are few and infrequent. But I do plan to listen this weekend to the 100th episode of Gil Roth’s “The Virtual Memories” show. Gil’s is one of the few podcast series that I *do* make an effort to keep up with, and this episode seems especially intriguing to me: “For the 100th episode of The Virtual Memories Show, we bring you an interview with your podcast host, Gil Roth! Thirty past and future guests provide the questions for an in-depth conversation about books and life. Find out about my reading childhood, my dream list of pod-guests, my best practices for productivity (don’t have kids!), my favorite interview question, my top guest in the afterlife, the book I’d save if my house was on fire, what I’d do if I won a Macarthur Grant. and more!”
  • I’m proud to say that I’m not often guilty of committing the top offense cited within the NPR Grammar Hall of Shame. (But that doesn’t mean that I’m *always* so innocent!)
  • And to conclude, a reminder for those who may be inclined to be interested: I maintain an entirely separate blog, My Machberet, in which I focus on literary and other matters of primarily Jewish interest.

    • Pre-Shabbat Jewish Lit Links

    by Erika Dreifus on
    Disabled

    Photo Credit: Reut Miryam Cohen
    Photo Credit: Reut Miryam Cohen

    Every Friday My Machberet presents an array of Jewish-interest links, primarily of the literary variety.

  • “A smarter dream would be to get a quality Jewish paper in the hands of every Jew in America. At the very least, that would keep Judaism in the game for the multitudes that now ignore it.” So argues David Suissa as he explains “Why Judaism Needs Journalism.”
  • And several Jewish journalists and writers are among Batya Ungar-Sargon’s “10 Women’s Voices We Want To Hear More From.”
  • The Jewish Week‘s Gary Rosenblatt does a superb job presenting the significance of Yossi Klein Halevi’s Memoirs of a Jewish Extremist: The Story of a Transformation, one of the most memorable books I read in 2014.
  • ICYMI: Remember the Scholastic map flap last year? This time, HarperCollins is in the hot seat.
  • Just under 2 weeks left to enter poetry for this year’s Anna Davidson Rosenberg Awards for Poems on Jewish Experience. No entry fee indicated.

    • Shabbat shalom.

    Midweek Notes from a Practicing Writer

    by Erika Dreifus on
    2

    I suppose this post could also be called “End-of-Year Notes from a Practicing Writer.”

    I’m going to keep this short. Hope that bullet points are okay with all of you today!

  • I’m thinking of last year’s spotlight on Lisa Romeo’s wonderful “I Did It!” list idea. I’m thinking that I should work on my own “I Did It!” list for 2014.
  • I’m thinking of the seminar application that is my current “work-in-progress.” (3 essays required!)
  • I’m thinking of the post on “My Year in Jewish Books” that I’ve just published over on my other blog—and applauding myself for actually managing to meet my Goodreads challenge for the year.

    • How about you? What’s on your writerly mind as 2014 ends and 2015 begins?

    Happy New Year!

    My Year in Jewish Books

    by Erika Dreifus on
    7

    StarFor the past three years, I’ve found it useful (and kind of fun) to look back on “my year in Jewish books.” So, borrowing some of the same introductory wording, I’m going to attempt to do something similar for 2014.

    Reviewing my reading for 2014 (thank you, Goodreads!), I can see that I do not and would not ever limit my reading to “Jewish books” exclusively; it seems that this list comprises about half of the titles I read this year in toto. (By the way, in case you haven’t heard me say this before, I define “Jewish books” in the simplest terms as books with substantive Jewish content. In my view, non-Jewish authors can write “Jewish books.” And Jewish authors can write books that don’t strike me as overtly Jewish.)

    But this year, as usual, I did read quite a few books that fall within the “Jewish book” category. And, as an advocate for Jewish literature, I’m proud of that.

    Below, you will find these books presented in the order in which I read them (most recent first, this year). Please note that, where appropriate, I have included links to reviews, essays, and newsy items I have written; interviews I have conducted; “Sunday Sentence” citations; and the odd blog post. I have also disclosed how I obtained each book: P (purchase), R (complimentary review copy), L (library). This year, I’m adding a category: FTB, for books I’ve read in manuscript prior to their release from Fig Tree Books in my job as FTB media editor. (more…)