Colson Whitehead's short essay about what it's liek to be a writer in Brooklyn.

Quoted: Google “brooklyn writer” and you’ll get, Did you mean: the future of literature as we know it?

100 Best First Lines from Novels. A ton of great stuff here, including Thomas Pynchon at #3!

For fans of the TV show "Firefly," this is supposed to be a pretty great piece of fanfic.

Writer Michael Pollan has an adorable writing house. I'd like one of those!

I love the idea. Famous writer gives short story messages in a bottle. The recipient has the option to bash the story out of there or leave it as it is.

Quoted: So this is cool: Michael Swanwick, who has published both a new novel (The Dragons of Babel) and a new collection of short stories (The Dog Said Bow-Wow) in the last four months, unwinds by writing short-shorts, sealing them in a bottle, then destroying every other copy or draft of the novel that exists on paper or hard drive. And then he gives it away—"usually to a charity auction or such, but sometimes to a friend," he explains. "The owner of the bottle, whoever he or she is, can either read the story or else possess the object—but cannot do both."

A detailed look at the creation of characters in various writing styles.

Quoted: From Jane Eyre to Jean Brodie, David Copperfield to David Brent, whether solidly realised or lightly sketched, fictional figures can be as vivid to us as real people. But just what, exactly, is a character, asks James Wood

If I ever start writing that science fiction novel I've been putting off, this program seems like an excellent choice for organizing the thoughts and getting to writing.

The Bookgasm list of best and worst of the year in literature.

Quoted: In a world where the Goldman family is now making money (and taking writing credit for) O.J. Simpson's tasteless IF I DID IT book, and where the Kindle and the iPhone have made the media act like giddy schoolgirls, we at least have the solidity of BOOKGASM, presenting good (and bad) books for ...

The LAist interviews compelling author, Mark Z. Danielewski.