Posts that focus on and link to the doings of others.
234 PostsI quite enjoyed these last year. Here's some of the highlights for 2024:
“pelicanos blancos” by Guillermo Soberón (MEXICO) and “Rocket” by Yuriy Stolypin (RUSSIA)
You can view all of the nominees here.
Some of last year's winners were extraordinarily good:
Site is here:
The HTML Review is an annual journal of literature made to exist on the web. Spring, 2024, means the third issue has been posted. It's broken into three sections: Poetry, Possibilities, and Expeditions.
As always, it's beautifully designed.
Past issues are also available:
They're brought to you by Maxwell Neely-Cohen and Shelby Wilson.
In Appendix-B of his book, A Swim in a Pond in the Rain, George Saunders asks us to write a 200-word story using only 50 unique words, constraints which Saunders suggests typically encourage an escalation of tension. Of course, someone's gone and coded a site to help you do just that, The George Saunders Escalation Exercise.
The GSEE reminds me of David Milch's process for defeating writer's block:
Believe it or not, this works.
(David Milch is a TV writer, which is why he's focusing on dialogue.)
Anecdote Alert
I believe Milch to be one of the greatest writers of all time. I've loved his work for many years. He's one of my heroes in art and heroes in life. I think Deadwood is as good as any Shakespeare, Picasso, or Dylan.
Years ago, after reading Mark Singer's terrific 2005 New Yorker profile, The Misfit, I reached out to Singer to ask if he still had the transcripts mentioned in the piece. He wrote back quickly to say he didn't.
About a year later I received an email from David Milch's assistant. The email simply said, "I hear you're looking for these." PDFs of the transcripts were attached. Just over 100 pages.
I've owned davidmilch.com for years and one day will make a site about him. I'll be sure to put those PDFs on them.
"In 1892, Cincinnati printer John Earhart, published The Color Printer: A Treatise on the Use of Colors in Typographic Printing, in which he detailed his methods for creating hundreds of color mixtures and thousands of color combinations as well as advice for complementary colors, using harmonious colors, and printing."
The Color Printer site is a digital edition of Earhart’s work created by Nicholas Rougeux with enhanced reproductions.
I really don't know how to describe this site. It's a large, intricate one-page animation. You can zoom in or out. That is all. Contains animated nudity.
Spine Magazine is an online publication devoted to book cover design and book culture. I linked to them back in 2022 when they featured a Vonnegut special, but they're worth checking out at the root url.
Plenty of interviews with designers, authors, and illustrators, and of course, lots of gorgeous book covers, including early drafts and alternates.
Vyki Hendy
Nice to see the Cabin Porn blog is still active.
And here's one of my own cabin photos, from Paradise Cove, Vanuatu:
Hundreds more cabins on Cabin Porn's blog.
Nestflix is a site for cataloging movies within movies and shows within shows. "Fictional movies within movies? Got ‘em. Fake shows within shows? You bet. Browse our selection of over 750 stories within stories."
For example, remember in Robert Altman's The Player, there's a film starring Julia Roberts and Bruce Willis? Yup, that's Habeas Corpus.
Lynn Fisher
Last year, Rotating Sandwiches took the top prize at the Tiny Awards. They're back for 2024 and nominations are open until June 23.
The Tiny Awards exist to 'celebrate people making stuff on the internet for the fun of it and the love of it and the hell of it." Their site is here:
You can view all of last year's nominees in this Google Doc and visit winner, Rotating Sandwiches, below.
Dead simple, drag & drop websites for anything can be created using mmm.page. A Tiny Bell was not made with this platform but it looks fun and like something others will find useful.
