Stephanie Vanderslice

Author, Professor, Blogger, and Huffington Post writer

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Me ‘n my Book Guys Watch!!!

October 15, 2008 by Stephanie Vanderslice Filed Under: Uncategorized

You can see me posing with my Book Guys watch here. Scroll all the way down to the bottom of the page on the right. There aren’t too many people with watches on there, so I don’t think I’m too hard to find.

Unfortunately, the watch has stopped, but I’m hoping it just needs a new battery because I really love that watch. I was hoping it would last forever.

In other news, my friend and colleague, Anna Leahy has started a group on Facebook called Creative Writing Pedagogy and she’s asked me to join her as co-leader/coordinator. Fun, fun! We’ve reeled in 60 members in just two days and already people are posting questions and books. So go join already–you don’t want to miss out.

I took a seminar this morning in van driving in anticipation of driving a honking big vehicle for the writing project in November (to the annual conference in San Antonio). It was actually kind of fun; they fed us well, we watched videos, discussed hypothetical hazardous driving scenarios and then took a written test. I think I might even have gotten a perfect score–if not, I did pretty well. I wasn’t sure how it was going to go, especially after my youngest asked me as I went out the door this morning, “Well, what are you going to do if you fail?”

How’s that for a vote of confidence? He may be remembering the family legend of how I–ahem–had to take my driver’s test three times. But that’s because New York State is really tough and you can’t pass if you ride the clutch–which was a teeny, tiny issue with me back then. As in, I eventually had to rent an automatic car to pass the test.

In case you’re interested, the two most important things you need to know when driving a big honking (like 16 passenger) van are:

Avoid Backing Up At All Costs!!!!
Stopping time, acceleration time, stopping distance, you name it: YOU NEED MORE.

That about sums it up.

I think I might frame my certificate of completion.

Bye for now y’all,
Steph

I won, I won, I won!!!

May 24, 2008 by Stephanie Vanderslice Filed Under: Uncategorized

Let me paraphrase:

THE BOOK GUYS LETTERHEAD HERE (use your imagination)

Dear Stephanie,

Congratulations on your winning response to the “Caulfield” quiz. You have a choice of nine prizes. . .

Ok, I won’t detail the nine, I’ll just tell you the prize I picked for winning the quiz on The Book Guys, my favorite radio show on NPR: A Book Guys Watch with the logo and slogan, “Reading Is a Family Affair,” along with the Center for the Books’ slogan, “Building a Nation of Readers.”

It was even signed by Kim Stypeck, who I’m assuming must be related to Allan Stypeck who co-hosts the show along with Mike Cuthbert, and runs Second Story Books in Washington DC, a fantastic secondhand bookstore I used to frequent in my grad school salad days.

I am so PSYCHED. Talk about luck; there must have been a lot of correct entries; the question just wasn’t that hard. In fact, if you go to the website, you can see them. I think mine was the May 8th quiz.

I was actually on the show once about eight years ago, when I learned that the Edith Wharton first novel, first edition I have was worth significantly more than the 50 cents I paid for it at a yard sale (but not enough to consider breaking into my house-FYI).

Speaking of Edith Wharton, I just got another letter from the Edith Wharton Restoration Fund. They have opened for summer business (and if you are anywhere near the Berkshires this summer, believe me, it’s worth a stop) and have another 6 month extension on the loan during which they hope they can raise the other roughly 2 million. Let’s keep our fingers crossed.

In other news, I am still reading The Artful Edit and can confidently report it’s one of the best books on writing (well, actually, editing, of course) I’ve read in a long time. I’m heavy into the part where she discusses Max Perkins’ and F.Scott Fitzgerald’s co-editing of The Great Gatsby, from which we could all learn a great deal. The book is littered with my post-it notes, since it’s a library book and I can’t write in it; but I’ll be getting my own copy as soon as I can and hope to report more on it. It’s definitely going to have to nudge something else out of my top five books for writers category.

My niece and nephew are visiting, which means lots of fun kids stuff AND I’m not the only girl in the house for once. Last night was coloring and bracelet making. Now, we’re off to do our nails–and we’ve even got the sparkly polish!

Bye y’all,
SV

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STEPHANIE VANDERSLICE

Author, Professor, Blogger, and Huffington Post writer. Stephanie Vanderslice aims to write what she likes to read: fiction and nonfiction that spins a web to lure the reader in. Read More…

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