ClimbingSky

Why Baseball, Books, and the Grateful Dead matter

QUOTATIONS

  • THROWBACK THURSDAY: Vonnegut’s 8 Rules for Writing a Short Story

    Throwback Thursdays” at ClimbingSky feature posts I wrote over a 15 year period for various blogs. This was first posted on February 17, 2011. My long-time friend (for almost 40 years now) Mitchell Stocks forwarded this list: “Kurt Vonnegut’s Rules for Writing Short Stories.” I had never seen the list before. Since I know that… Read more

  • Hardboiled Coffee Waiting

    Joe drank two cups of coffee. It was hot and strong, the way it always tasted best to him. He sat back in his chair, his fingers toying first with his spoon, then drumming noiselessly on the table. But he couldn’t sit still very long, and he arose, rinsed his cup and left it standing… Read more

  • FOOD FOR THOUGHT: Auden on Detectives

    Completely satisfactory detectives are extremely rare. Indeed, I only know of three: Sherlock Holmes(Conan Doyle), Inspector French (Freeman Wills Crofts), and Father Brown (Chesterton). The job of the detective is to restore the state of grace in which the aesthetic and the ethical are as one. Since the murderer who caused their disjunction is the aesthetically defiant individual, his opponent,… Read more

  • Hardboiled Coffee Scenery

    I found Big John and Doc on a small flagstone patio that opened off the kitchen. They were seated at a large glass topped, wrought iron table and there was a huge pot of coffee on a hot plate at Big John’s elbow. The view from the patio was of the tumbled mountain range north… Read more

  • FRIDAY FOOD FOR THOUGHT: DANA GIOIA ON STORIES

    “There are some truths that we can only express to one another in stories. These insights need to be embodied in action, character, and circumstance. Otherwise the truths seem vague and unconvincing. To say “You can’t avoid your destiny despite your best efforts” is a dull platitude, but the tale of Oedipus, who mistakenly kills… Read more

  • Hardboiled Coffee Manners

    I was about to apologize for having disturbed him in the middle of the night, then decided it would be better to play it tough. Big John had said I had “manners.” A certain amount of manners would be okay. But guys just didn’t come real polite in the heavy rackets and courtesy could be… Read more

  • FRIDAY FOOD FOR THOUGHT: P.D. James on The Art of Short Stories

    The scope of the short story is inevitably restricted and this means it is most effective when it deals with a single incident or one dominant idea. It is the originality and strength of this idea which largely determines the success of the story. Although it is far less complex in structure than a novel,… Read more

  • Hardboiled Coffee On the House

    “You want a cup of coffee?” “I wouldn’t mind.” Phoebe returned to the urns and drew a cup and brought it back. Purvy watched her broad hips going and coming under the white uniform, but he didn’t get the pleasure out of it that most fellows would have got. He stuck his nose into the… Read more

  • FRIDAY FOOD FOR THOUGHT: Stephen Jones on Silence

    During my first few visits [to the Sand Hills of Nebraska] I experienced a persistent ringing in the ears as my hearing adjusted to the absence of background noise-the roar of cars, airplanes, and machinery that has become a subliminal part of our daily lives. – Jones, Stephen R.. The Last Prairie: A Sandhills Journal. Read more

  • Hardboiled Coffee Shock

    In the kitchen, she found the note on the table and read it several times, as if it were in code and had to be deciphered. Finally, she left it where she had found it and went outside. She was gone a long rime. When she came back to the kitchen, she read the note… Read more