These days, technological marvels seem to pop up faster than you can say “Abracadabra!” Standing at the edge of innovation, even our smartphones become outdated before we even finish setting up our voicemail. And guess who’s leading the charge? None other than artificial intelligence, or AI, a digital wiz that’s both the apple of your eye and the monster under…
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The Sideways Realm of the Wordily Wonkaverse What is absurdism? A conundrum wrapped in a riddle and stuffed into a tuba.
Once upon an upside-down tea party, in the sideways realm of the Wordily Wonkaverse - a place where adjectives dined on verbs and metaphors rode unicycles - there thrived a gnarled tree called Absurdia that bore fruit of a peculiar variety: the preposterously delightful absurditastic literaturaniums. As an author-slash-dodo-whisperer, I’ve nibbled on the juicy and jumbled offerings of the Absurdia tree, and now, my…
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Before a Night of Fripping Spittlestoat, catenaliggette and other secrets behind mastering the new age of contemporary writing
Five minutes after signing the contract, I dropped to the floor, gasping for air. Next to being waterboarded as a Vietnam POW, I could tell that editing this manuscript was going to be the most horrendous experience of my life: Inquiring my well-wishers, which is the deadliest mistake as inherently scheduled to jealousy or hawk eyesight on your wardrobe waiting…
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The Secrets Behind Writing Riveting Television Screenplays You too can become filthy rich by crafting exciting police, courtroom, and crime scene investigation television dramas
Prosecutor: “You killed her, didn’t you!” Defendant: “No, no. I’m innocent.” Prosecutor: “Admit it. Your DNA was all over the maid!” Defendant: “Alright, alright. I did it. Now, please. Let go of my throat.” There’s no secret to writing riveting screenplays for television. I should know. I’ve written thousands of them. From Naked Homicide and The Streets of Wichita, Kansas…
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Where’s Your Sense of Humor? An award-winning author shares how to find humor in everything you write
Every year after winning the Pulitzer Prize for humor, I’m besieged with questions from new writers about how I went about writing my award-winning humor pieces. They run the gamut from “What in the world were you thinking?” to “Were you drunk when you wrote that?” So, to clear up the confusion, I thought I’d take a moment to offer…
