Welcome to Machine: Why ‘Dead Man’ is Jim Jarmusch’s Masterpiece
Sean MurphyJohnny Depp is going to be gone someday, and for those enjoying his work posthumously, an assessment of his enigmatic career—bookended by the cotton candy of 21 Jump Street, and…
How to Kill a Cliché: Celebrating Sam Shepard (One Year Later)
Lee: …That’s stupid. That’s one a’ those?—whadya’ call it? Whadya’ call that? Austin: What? Lee: Whadya’ call it when somethin’s been said a thousand times before. Whadya’ call that? Austin:…
The Catcher in the Rye, 67 Years On
She nodded. “Make it extraordinarily squalid and moving,” she suggested. “Are you at all acquainted with squalor?” I said not exactly but that I was getting better acquainted with it,…
My First Time, Revisited
July, 2015: It was my great pleasure to guest-post at The Quivering Pen, a fantastic site for writers (and readers) curated by David Abrams (himself an excellent reader and writer:…
Rebel’s Rebel: RIP Anthony Bourdain
I'm gutted, like seemingly everyone else in the world (for all the right and obvious reasons) by the sudden loss of Anthony Bourdain. In addition to being sad, shocking, and…
VCLA in the Fairfax County Times
I'm very grateful for the growing excitement around Virginia Center for Literary Arts. This week, we were featured in the Fairfax County Times (text below). Want to get involved? Join…
Original Fiction: Later, That Same Morning
Gratitude to Dash Journal, published by California State University, Fullerton (CSUF), for publishing my (very) short story, "Later, That Same Morning." *** Later, That Same Morning It is still dark.…
The Glorious Redemption of the Great Eight
5/24/18: 20 years ago was fun, if a bit of a fluke, courtesy of some top teams getting knocked out to expedite our unlikely run. And even then, it was…
Philip Roth, our Priapic Piñata, is now Immortal
“Making fake biography, false history, concocting a half-imaginary existence out of the actual drama of my life is my life. There has to be some pleasure in this life, and…
The Moon is Glued to a Picture of Heaven: Ten Thoughts on Chris Cornell (Revisited)
In Bull Durham, the cranky and overachieving Crash Davis, at once in awe and envious, explains to the preternaturally talented but callow Nuke LaLoosh why he should appreciate his good…