Further thoughts on J.D. Salinger

One thing that J.D. Salinger was famous for was his privacy. No writer has gained more publicity for not doing a single thing in the way of publicity. Pynchon is well known for his obscurity, and Harper Lee (who is still alive, many are stunned to learn) keeps to herself, but Salinger became the prototype [...]

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Do the Gute: The Laughing Man

J.D. Salinger, author of the greatest adolescent angst novel of all time and important character in of the greatest baseball novels of all time, passed away today. In his honor, here is what might very well be my favorite short story by anyone, ever.

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My Favorite Joke

Somebody stumbled across this website while searching for “my favorite joke.” I’ve shared it before, but here it is again. What’s yours? Please remember that this is a kid-friendly website. OK…. go!

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Mushrooms

One thing I’ve learned from my latest book is that mushrooms are really interesting. Whudathunkit? There are seriously more interesting fungi fun facts than I can even cram into the book. They are among the largest and oldest living organisms on earth, and are deeply intertwined with folklore and culinary traditions all over the world. [...]

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Ask me anything

I’m answering anonymous questions at http://www.formspring.me/skutir. I’ll post some of the more interesting questions and their answers back here. Of course by “ask me anything,” I mean, “I’ll answer if it’s a real question or even a silly question, but I’ll delete anything that’s overly personal or inappropriate.”

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CLN Trivia for January 22

What previous Newbery Award winning novel is the hero’s favorite book in the 2010 Newbery Award winning novel, When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead? Answer by February 5 to win. (Enter Here)

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In which the author gets ponderous

The other day I started back to my office after a meeting across campus. I came to an intersection where I could cross either of two ways and still make my way back to the office. I went with the green light. It was a slightly longer route, but I had extra time because the [...]

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CLN Trivia Answer from Last Time

With all the excitement of the end-of-the-year bonanza, I let a trivia friday go by without a whiff of a question. The last question (from Dec. 25) was, what holiday classic was made into a musical by Mel Marvin and Timothy Mason. The answer is The Grinch Who Stole Christmas. Mason has also written a [...]

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Duck Billed Platitudes

Ogden Nash wrote: I like the duck-billed platypus Because it is anomalous. I like the way it raises its family Partly birdly, partly mammaly. I like its independent attitude. Let no one call it a duck-billed platitude. I was thinking this morning about platitudes and ended up thinking about platypuses, because (a) they are more [...]

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Errata

I implied — er, by outright stating — in a previous post that Sarah at Knopf did the artwork for the cover of Mamba Point. Sarah is a designer, and while I originally assumed there was a different painter involved, I somehow got confused along the way and thought she had in fact also done [...]

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