Get It by Dec. 24 - 1 day left to order with Standard Shipping

So says amazon.com. You know what this means?

That's right, it's Liminal Suggestion #3!

If your last-minute scramble to buy Christmas presents has been thwarted by the snow, then online shopping is the way to go.

This picture was taken in June when I (once again desperately in need of a comb) read at RJ Julia Independent Booksellers in Madison, CT, from my new book FROM SQUARE ONE: A MEDITATION, WITH DIGRESSIONS, FROM CROSSWORDS.

You can order from Amazon by clicking here.

And if you click on the link you'll see this review from gerryb of Cambridge, MA (another stranger, I promise): "I loved the amazing information so fluidly presented- a fascinating history of crosswords and the gossip, recollections and stories of puzzlers both famous and unknown. I loved finding out that Meg Wolitzer, author of one of my favorite novels ('The Wife') is a serious crossword person."

One last thing: remember how valuable it is if you recommend this book to others who are also having a hard time thinking of the perfect gift.

Thank you,
Dean

Time and Space Defied Once Again

We humans get accustomed to new realities so quickly, it can be frightening sometimes.

I was thinking about this during the anniversary of the fall of the Berlin wall. Here was this thing that had defined our lives for decades after World War Two. I spent my junior year in France convinced I'd be incinerated by a nuclear bomb. And then, suddenly, the defining reality was gone literally overnight.

And within a couple of days we already became accustomed to our new life we were living utterly devoid of fear.

Every once in a while I am reminded of what a sea change has taken place in the very, very recent past. Here is the interview I did on Thursday, December 3, with Ellen Rocco and Chris Robinson, for the program Readers & Writers on North Country Public Radio. An interview that was conducted live on local radio - in other words, at a specific time in a specific place.





And now, barring disaster, anyone can listen to it at any time, wherever they want on the planet.

Liminal Suggestion: 21 Shopping Days Left

I'll Be on the Radio - Where the Winds Hit Heavy on the Borderline

I'm looking forward to being back on the air again at North Country Public Radio. The Next Big Thing enjoyed a happy home on this sweet little (big, actually!) network of stations in upstate New York. I'll be interviewed about FROM SQUARE ONE on the book show Readers & Writers Thursday, December 3, from 7 to 8pm. NCPR's live stream can be heard from anywhere on Earth by clicking here.

Of course now I can't get this out of my head:

Cyber WEEK?

Yes, according to an email from PayPal.

Who knew?

CyberMonday Is Upon Us

If you are starting to shop for holiday gifts, I hope you’ll keep in mind my new book, FROM SQUARE ONE: A MEDITATION, WITH DIGRESSIONS, ON CROSSWORDS.

It’s an obvious gift for crossword lovers, but it was written to interest a general audience.

If you plan to buy it or have done so already, thank you. Even better would be if you recommended it to others who might be shopping for gifts.

Barbra Tarkenton of Simsbury, Connecticut (a stranger, I promise) gave it five out of five stars and wrote the following review on Amazon:

"I loved this book. What's wonderful about it is the way it seamlessly blends autobiographical details with a solid, well-reported appreciation of crossword puzzles. Yes, you learn about how avid British crossword puzzlers were recruited to help solve the Enigma code during WWII, and yes, you learn what the editors of crossword puzzles think makes a good puzzle ('fresh fill'), but what really lasts in the reader's mind are the scenes between the author and his father. (And also the story of a couple wherein the husband wakes up early to do the puzzle, and then erases all his answers so his wife can do it.) This book is literary in the best sense of the word."

To buy the book from Amazon, you can click here.

Barnes & Noble has a special CyberMonday deal going. To buy from B&N, you can click here.

And don’t forget Powell’s, the wonderful independent bookstore in Portland, Oregon, which sells online here.

Thank you. And remember: it would mean so much if you suggested the book to your friends who are buying gifts, too.

Happy CyberMonday,
Dean

Maybe There Are Too Many Books in the World

Exhibit A:


The idea of a bookstore that takes up a whole city block is superlative. The reality of it is so overwhelming that the world overwhelming just doesn't cut it.


But, if you know the needle is in the haystack ...


... you make the effort, and search.


But really. If Dan Brown can't turn things around, who can?

Wordstock Update

I will still be at Wordstock in Portland, Oregon, this Saturday at 1pm. But I will be on a different stage: Wieden + Kennedy. It's a place where I can make more noise. (Me, making a big noise? Go figure.) Anyway, I do hope that if you have friends in Portland that you'll steer them toward the show.

Thank you and good night.

Invite Everyone You Know in the Pacific Northwest (Please)

I'll be performing FROM SQUARE ONE: THE LIVE SHOW one week from today at the Wordstock Festival in Portland, Oregon. That's October 10, at 1pm PT on the Powell's Books Stage. James Ellroy will follow me on the same stage, but I'll be on opposite Joyce Maynard. You're going to have to choose between me and her.

Update: I'll be on the Wieden + Kennedy stage - still at the same time, which is 1pm.

Live, from Labastide-Esparbairenque, France, It's Tuesday Morning!

In other words, thanks to Skype, I'll be appearing on blogtalkradio (http://bit.ly/1EfsMt) at 9am ET.

Nel mezzo del cammin

I’m midway through a writer’s retreat in southern France, at La Muse -- about a half hour north of Carcassonne. Under normal circumstances, home would feel a world away, but of course that is no longer the case thanks to << les internets >>. While here I was gratified to read a review on Goodreads that captured, in a single sentence, what I was trying to do in FROM SQUARE ONE. As Phillip points out, I wrote the book to “mimic the feel and philosophy of a crossword puzzle.” I believe he is the first to notice.

From the Evanston Public Library

http://bit.ly/xnXEW

A Reader Writes

A review of FROM SQUARE ONE, by the blogger Morningstar.

http://inallweathers.blogspot.com/2009/08/square-one.html

In case you were wondering, the source quote for the blog title is by James Russell Lowell: “The only faith that wears well and holds its color in all weathers, is that which is woven of conviction and set with the sharp mordant of experience.”

As for the origin of morningstar as a single word, I’m afraid you’re on your own.

[Correction: I got that one all wrong. Although Bartleby provided me with the Lowell citation above, Morningstar posts the source of the quote right on her blog. I just wasn't paying attention. Anyway, here's what she had in mind: “He that loves a book will never want a faithful friend, a wholesome counselor, a cheerful companion, an effectual comforter. By study, by reading, by thinking, one may innocently divert and pleasantly entertain himself, as in all weathers, as in all fortunes.” -Barrow]

The Favorite Clue Project

What's your favorite crossword clue? Please leave it in the comments below. I want to know why you like it and also any interesting story that may go along.

In the interest of full disclosure, my ulterior motive has to do with the further development of FROM SQUARE ONE: THE LIVE SHOW.

No promises. Hey, that's show biz.

P.S. Please sign in using your email, or at least leave some way that you can be contacted.

Thanks!

First the Good News

While newspapers and magazines elsewhere are cutting back on crosswords, the Harrisburg Patriot-News is adding more puzzles to the paper.

Now the bad: they're adding sudoku and KenKen®.

I'm quoted in the article and, FYI: I do not say "play crosswords."

Where Did He Go?

Hi. Sorry. It's been a busy week. On Wednesday, there was the debut of FROM SQUARE ONE: THE LIVE SHOW at Union Hall in Brooklyn. Hoping to have video of that up on the site very soon.

And then Amy Reynaldo, who I think of as the Pauline Kael of crosswords, asked me to sit in the big chair over at Diary of a Crossword Fiend and serve as guest blogger while she took a desperately deserved day off. And let me tell you, where she has set the bar, blogging is hard work!

Click here for my post.

W(h)ither Crosswords?

Anne Trubek, writing for Good magazine online, asks if crosswords are destined to go the way of the newspaper. (Along the way she mentions my skepticism about the ability of crosswords to protect us from dementia.) I think her question is worth asking. Her post has prompted more than 70 comments and counting, many in vehement disagreement.

Please Do Not Steal This Book

A reader from Canada writes: http://bit.ly/4a1lnN

Two for Two

Once again, minutes before the scheduled start of a bookstore event, violent weather strikes. I am trying not to take it personally.

The first time it happened, at RJ Julia in Madison, CT, turnout was slim - there was a tornado warning, for Pete's sake! - and I do not have a local circle of friends in that area.

Last night, however, playing for the home crowd, not only friends but total strangers packed the Lenox Bookstore. The interview on WAMC's Roundtable seemed to do the trick.

While at the Bookstore, I learned from proprietor Matt Tannenbaum about this review of FROM SQUARE ONE, in the Kenyon Review.

On to Brooklyn!

From the Roundtable Today on WAMC

I was interviewed by Ian Pickus, who gave me lots of room to give a sense of what I tried to do in the book.

Here's one clip.

Here's another.

And yet another.

By the way, there's an update to report since the interview was taped. The Atlantic apparently has not read my book and has announced it will no longer run Cox & Rathvon's outstanding Puzzler, even online. You can read the Times story here.

Favorite Indie Bookstores, Part Two

The Bookstore in Lenox, Massachusetts, where I'll give a reading on July 16 at 7pm.


This is Matt, the proprietor. He cracks me up.


And this is Jim, a talented artist and customer, not only of the Bookstore but also the Coffee Shop around the corner.


When I was writing the book, I would see Jim and Matt at the Coffee Shop an awful lot. (I never noticed all the generic business names in Lenox. Maybe they should rename it Town.)

Anyway, if you'll be at all nearby on the sixteenth, please come. Matt promises refreshments, and I promise more than just a reading. I'll be there with my sound gear to present an excerpt from the live show the following week at Union Hall in Brooklyn.

FROM SQUARE ONE: THE LIVE SHOW

will make its debut two weeks from tonight, at Union Hall in Park Slope. It consists of me sitting on stage and performing material drawn from the book, with original music and sound design. Think Laurie Anderson, Spalding Gray, Anna Deveare Smith - that end of the continuum.

Click here to find out more about Union Hall. Click here to get a better idea of the spoken-word edition of FROM SQUARE ONE. Most important, click your heels together and come to the show:

Wednesday, July 22 at 7:30pm
Union Hall
702 Union St. at 5th Ave.
Brooklyn, NY
$10 at door

Hope to see you there!

Lenox Bookstore, Here I Come

July 16 at 7pm
The Bookstore in Lenox, Massachusetts
Click here for more info.

It's going to be an enhanced book reading, with the addition of sound design and original music - an abbreviated version of FROM SQUARE ONE: THE LIVE SHOW, which will make its debut very soon. Watch this space.

Can't Let Go

When I was working on FROM SQUARE ONE, I asked a writer friend how I would know when it was finished. She explained that books are never finished. They are taken from you.

Sure enough, now that the book is out there, I'm starting to hear all kinds of remarkable crossword tales that I wish I had known about before I handed in the manuscript - so many that I'm now thinking about the book's afterlife, as a live show. (More on that later.)

In any event, with such a future in mind, I am using this space now to collect your crossword tales. Feel free to write them in the comments or, better yet, email them to me.

The Anxiety of Influence

The first question after my reading last week at the Upper West Side Barnes & Noble was, "What books shaped the writing of From Square One?"

I acknowledged the following:

Robert Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
M.F.K. Fisher, How to Cook a Wolf
Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse-Five
Sarah Vowell, Radio On
Edward Burton, The Anatomy of Melancholy

The last one is a little eccentric, since I've never actually read it. But based on what I know of it, I think it's a direct antecedent.

I'll find out soon because it has gone to the top of my summer reading list.

Radio Radio

On Tuesday, June 30, I'll appear on New Hampshire Public Radio talk show Word of Mouth, which is hosted by the lovely and amazing Virginia Prescott. The segment is scheduled from 12:43 to 12:51pm ET. This is not a typo.

Then, the next day (July 1) I'll be on for a whole hour, taking calls and everything, on WHYY's outstanding Radio Times. That's from 11am to 12 noon ET.

For updates about future appearances on air, watch this space.

A Grid

The window of one of my favorite independent book shops: Three Lives & Co., on the corner of West Tenth Street and Waverly Place in New York City's Greenwich Village.

One More Thing

The spoken-word version of FROM SQUARE ONE was released yesterday by Random House Audio.

It is not a conventional audiobook, i.e., a verbatim reading of the text over the course of eight hours. It is not a replacement experience for the book.

Instead, imagine a monologue with sound design and original music, 70 minutes long, a little in the tradition of Laurie Anderson. Here's a sample:


It's a download only, available from iTunes, eMusic, Simply Audiobooks, and Audible.

Thank you for listening.

On the Radio

Today:

The Leonard Lopate Show, 12:40-1pm ET

Then, in the evening (News willing), an interview with Melissa Block on All Things Considered

[updated update: These things are always highly subject to change, even at the last second, but the All Things Considered interview is now scheduled for today at 4:20pm ET - and every two hours thereafter.]

“Hooray! Hooray! Hooray! Hooray!"

“The Cross Word Puzzle Book is out today.”
—columnist F.P.A. in 1924, greeting the first title published by Simon and Schuster

Tomorrow

If This Doesn't Draw the "True Blood" Crowd, Nothing Will

From the New York Daily News:

Rex Parker Does FROM SQUARE ONE

To read his review, please click here.

On Shelves Now

In the sports section, apparently.

"I Don't Buy It"

The idea that crosswords offer protection against Alzheimer's. I just don't buy it. It came up during the interview on the Faith Middleton Show (WNPR in Connecticut) this week. Click here for that clip and click here for the entire episode.

More or Less the Opposite of What I Would Have Expected

Amazon.com now lists the hardcover FROM SQUARE ONE as in stock. However, if you want to buy the Kindle Edition, you must wait until the official publication date, which is June 23.

Back Where I Came From

I jumped from commercial to public radio 25 years ago when I took a job as a board operator in Hartford, Connecticut. The station's star interviewer then was Faith Middleton. She still is. Yesterday Faith did an interview with me, and it's scheduled to air today. Of course, you never know with these things - there's always the possibility of being bumped to a later date. This link will take you to her show.

They're HEEeeere!

The official publication date isn't for another week, but according to customer service at barnesandnoble.com, there are copies of FROM SQUARE ONE in stock in at least two warehouses. And, as you'll find out if you click through, this is your LAST CHANCE for Fast and Free Delivery by Father's Day.

Barnes & Noble will also host my first reading, on the official date, at their location on Broadway at 82nd Street. That's June 23 at 7PM. Click here for details.

More soon. Watch this space.

From My Editor's Shelf

These are a few of the titles my editor is shepherding to print:

Finally, the Other Shoe

As always, it drops more quietly than the first one.

I'm talking about the refutation of sensational news. The startling claim gets everyone's attention; the sober follow-up does not.

This is consistent with the man-bites-dog nature of journalism. But what's unfortunate is that it allows misleading information to get encoded in our culture as fact.

For that reason I wish to draw your attention to this post from the New Old Age blog at nytimes.com. It's very much in sync with an argument I make in FROM SQUARE ONE, where I pick apart claims that crosswords help you to keep your marbles.

The book should be on shelves any minute now. Maybe even in time for Father's Day. Official publication date is June 23.

Grids

Confession

I have not done a Sunday Times crossword in years. It simply requires too much effort for too little payoff.

The decision is made all the easier by the appearance every Sunday of a variety puzzle on the bottom of the page. Too infrequently – every six weeks or so – the Times runs a diagramless crossword in that space. These are quite fun, if only because they're a little like being dropped into the jungle and having only a compass, and no map, to find your way out.

The clues in a diagramless tend typically to be somewhat easy, since it would be unfair to make you come up with answers and figure out the grid all by yourself. This weekend, though, the Times prints a diagramless with more challenging (and rewarding) clues than you normally get. And it was made by Francis Heaney, leading player in From Square One, which will make its way onto shelves any day now.

The Calm Before the Calm

I haven't verified the quote, but that is what Dawn Powell is supposed to have called this period of waiting for your book to be published.

Today Is Buy Indie Day

Toby Cox, proprietor
Three Lives & Company
Booksellers

To mark the occasion:
The Song Is You, by Arthur Phillips
purchased by me as the doors opened at 11am
Three Lives & Company
154 West Tenth Street
New York, NY 10014
212-741-2069

Slightly Startling . . .

. . . since the conclusion of this study directly relates to the climax of my book, which is in production and comes out in the next few months.

You're right. The book is about crossword puzzles. What do music and autism have to do with a book about crosswords?

You're going to have to stay tuned for the answer to that one. Or maybe buy the book.

I Might Be Pregnant

If so, that would explain a lot.

Twice in the last week I was asked, "When's your delivery?"

(pause, confusion.)

Oh, right, they mean the book.