How many babies do you have? Which one is better?

I have one baby.

What is the best year?

1992.

Of all the Dragonlance novels, what is the best Dragonlance novel?

Some may find it unconventional to ignore the foundational Weis and Hickman trilogies, but there is something distinctive about the Elven Nations—

Some Frozen Night

Madison, Wisconsin

He’s been drinking with this guy for a long time.

It’s good.

It was a rough day and this just sort of happened. The guy sat down and ordered a bourbon, neat, and after ten minutes of silence, the two of them saying nothing and drinking their drinks, looking up at the TV, they started to chat. First about the basketball game, then about campus, then about classes, then about the cold. Then women.

A round-up of high quality tweets from people in the world of literature…

Jordan Castro:

I live in the same neighborhood as Phil’s brothers.  My embarrassment about this comes from an idea I got into my head when I was a student at the SSTD: Grayson (all of America, actually, perhaps even all of Earth) is separated into two halves.  One half, the real half, is the north side.  That’s where the artists, workers, and minorities live.  Honest people.  The south side is where all the white people with information jobs live.  They are by definition dishonest.  The south side is therefore not real; satellite televisions and hybrid, Bluetooth-wired vehicles work in concert to create the simulacra, occupy the space where reality is supposed to be.  Inside of here, we are all dying.  We don’t even bother to get out.  We don’t know.  I occupy this space, too.

Patrick, your wife recently suggested, very seriously, that you “avoid being masturbatory” during this interview. What did she mean? And how will you avoid it?

I’ve thought a lot about this, Bartholomew, and here’s how I’ll handle it.  First, I’ll no longer refer to “this interview” in order to get out of that self-reflexive, seductive trap that’s only been exacerbated by the internet redefining our methods of communication, and instead I’ll proceed as though the interview itself doesn’t actually exist, which is often how I manage both emotional crises and interviews in the first place, so no problem there.  (ROTFLOL.)  I’ll also use verbal illusions that imply I’m being interviewed by another person.