Monthly Archives: January 2013

The real face of evil looks a lot like a garden slug, or why J. R. R. Tolkien kept the Big Bad off stage

Posted on January 28, 2013 by epbeaumont

I’m two-thirds of the way through The Two Towers, where the point-of-view swings back to Tolkien’s unlikely hobbit-hero Frodo and his faithful sidekick Sam, several days into some seriously uninviting territory. There’s a lot of rather foreboding and on occasion actively … Continue reading →

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Six Sentence Sunday, 27 January 2013 (Necromancer and Barbarian character interview)

Posted on January 27, 2013 by epbeaumont

I don’t have those moments when I’m about the work but in odd times between, when something rears up from the depths to remind me of my secret life: a pulse of fear, and then I remind myself that it’s … Continue reading →

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Apprenticing with the Dead: A Strong Dose of Truth (James Baldwin)

Posted on January 21, 2013 by epbeaumont

The last time that I read James Baldwin’s collected essays (in the Library of America edition) was 2006, on a road trip from Minneapolis to Cleveland to see my mentor, who was active in the civil rights movement and had … Continue reading →

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Six Sentence Sunday, 20 January 2013 (Annie Brown and the Superhero Blues)

Posted on January 20, 2013 by epbeaumont

“Ooh, your cutie’s on duty.” Rafe smirked, and Annie shushed him. Not that you could hide stuff like that from Rafe, because he had a supernaturally sharp eye for love drama. And she’d been fool enough to tell him, but … Continue reading →

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Apprenticing with the Dead: Reading Tolkien 35 Years Late

Posted on January 19, 2013 by epbeaumont

When I was in high school in the late 1970s, everybody was reading Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings trilogy. I resisted, for reasons I didn’t fully understand at the time. I think if you’d asked me then, I would have … Continue reading →

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Six Sentence Sunday, 13 January 2013 (The Shape-shifter’s Tale)

Posted on January 13, 2013 by epbeaumont

I reminded Trevor how he had kneaded the muscles of my neck and shoulders back to something like calm, that first night that I arrived. He said, yes, he’d thought of doing that for a living, and Emma had suggested … Continue reading →

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Six Sentence Sunday, 6 January 2013 (The Lost Pissarro)

Posted on January 6, 2013 by epbeaumont

New York in the summer time. New York under a blazing sun that seemed to have transported itself from the New Mexico desert. New York broiled in a heat wave that reminded her of a glassmaker’s kiln. Waves of heat … Continue reading →

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Writer Interview: The Next Big Thing (I’m the interviewee this time)

Posted on January 2, 2013 by epbeaumont

I’ve been tagged twice now for The Next Big Thing, by J. M. Blackman and Devin Harnois, so in honor of the new year and all, here goes. Watch this spot for an update on the next blogs I’m linking … Continue reading →

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