I Have A Deadline. I'm Glad. I

Along The Way, He Or She Discovers That The World Has Been Broken For As Long As Anyone Can Remember. Everyone, Sooner Or Later, Gets A Thorough Schooling In Brokenness. The Question Becomes What To Do With The Pieces?

The Magician Seemed To Promise That Something Torn To Bits Might Be Mended Without A Seam, That What Had Vanished Might Reappear, That A Scattered Handful Of Doves Or Dust Might Be Reunited By A Word, That A Paper Rose Consumed By Fire Could Be Made To Bloom From A Pile Of Ash. But Everyone Knew That It Was Only An Illusion. The True Magic Of This Broken World Lay In The Ability Of Things It Contained To Vanish, To Become So Thoroughly Lost, That They Might Never Have Existed In The First Place.

That's Why School Was Invented - To Give Your Parents Some Peace And Quiet During The Day.

I Hate To See Great Works Of Literature Ghettoized, Whereas Others That Conform To The Rules, Conventions, And Procedures Of The Genre We Call Literary Fiction Get Accorded Greater Esteem And Privilege. I Also Have A Problem With How Books Are Marketed, With Certain Cover Designs And Typefaces. They're Often Stamped With An Identity That Has Nothing To Do With Their Effect On The Reader.

I Feel That In The Past, My Style Has Shown Itself To Be Capable Of Handling Dark And Light In The Same Paragraph, Or Even In The Same Sentence. That's Something I Almost Take For Granted. I Think It Was More A Concern To Get The Details Right And Persuasively Recreate The World I Was Trying To Write About.