The first person I met online was Nancy Werlin. I suggest you purchase her novel The Rules of Survival, which was both a National Book Award and Los Angleles Times Book Prize Finalist.
More and more of my friends have web pages -- and I am meeting new friends through the web, too. Here they are, plus some not mentioned on my other pages.
The first person I met online was Nancy Werlin. I suggest you purchase her novel The Rules of Survival, which was both a National Book Award and Los Angleles Times Book Prize Finalist.
My best friend's brother designs buildings, plays the vibes, and often dyes his hair unusual colors.
Her husband is an orchestral conductor and violinist who likes to vacuum.
However, she herself does not have a web presence. Smart cookie.
Jen Hubert Swan is Reading Rants! girl. She tends library at Little Red, which is a proud member of HVLA.
Can you name a bisexual Canadian YA librarian with a tongue pierce and a tattoo? I can: Catherine Jones.
It's always nice to find another kindred spirit like Holly Duthie.
I first met sara ryan when she was working on the Internet Public Library's Teen Division. She has a kickass job in Portland and is Miss America. (She is also an author.)
Then there're sara's friends, Jessamyn West (yes, that is her real name), lydia ievins, and Ellie Dworak (nee Laura Hudson) (who called me "the alpha femme" -- following in my mother's high-heeled footsteps). All of them are also librarians.
(Wait, Jemiah isn't a librarian. My bad.)
Jessamyn thinks Rebecca Blood reminds her of me.
Dana reminds me of Jessamyn.
Vicki Jean Beauchamp and I became email friends through sara. I stayed with her in Portland. She got a whippet and is now an athlete. (I don't think that these two things are related.)
Small World Part IX: VJ knows Cathy Young, a fellow YA aficionado, and the original designer of the Harper Children's site.
Andy Resnick was one of the musicians who found Cora in that parking lot in Iowa. His wife, Robin Zachary, is a talented, stylish designer.
Here's someone else with a difficult name: Allura Ellington. I think it's a much better (given) name than mine, actually.
I like Chel Micheline's design sense.
Meet the multitalented and ex-Midwestern Tad Hutchison: artist, drummer, worrier, loon.
Ben Jackson has always reminded me a bit of Hobbes. But I can't imagine Hobbes windsurfing or coding a website. (Or, for that matter, being a father.)
Rest in peace, Burt. We all miss you. (When I saw this, I instantly thought: "I ought to call Burt and tell him!" Then I remembered again and my heart broke.)
RIP, Greg Sewell. No words here.
Greg's friend is and was the brilliant and natty and equally Canadian Clive Thompson.
Elise Matthesen makes some of the most gorgeous (and gorgeously-named) jewelry around. You should buy some. (I want her to take me to the Norske Nook, too.)
My children's book friend Wendy McClure has her vintage Weight Watchers meal cards on display.
Meandering her way through Ellensburg, it's Hollie Butler, the Maternal Dairy Marionette!
Mark Turner is the husband of Megan Whalen Turner. His research concerns the nature of mind and language. I have no idea why their respective brilliances don't cancel each other out.
Mark doesn't know this yet, but his soulmate is Jesse Sheidlower, who went to the University of Chicago (where Mark taught, and where he met Megan) and is the US editor of the OED.
Lyndsey Pickup is still at Oxford (as a vegan Ph.D, not a dictionary).
Erin McKean is one of Jesse's colleagues, and maintains one of my favorite blogs, A Dress a Day. It is because of Erin that I own a pair of Liberty print Jack Purcells.
One of my former colleagues goes by the netname of Lunacat -- her page has terrific stuff about female authors of fantasy and sf.
When I was 16, I discovered Betty Friedan's The Feminine Mystique and, yes, it really did change my life. I mistakenly thought that Disgruntled Housewife was along the same lines. But I liked it anyway. If you ever need an exceptionally dapper exorcist, call David Devereux. This is not a joke.
Madeleine Robins, author and dry wit, is married to Danny Caccavo, Emmy-winning recording engineer/absurdist, with whom I sort of went to high school. They have two wonderfully demented children.
fairrosa is an excellent person with whom to have dim sum.
It took long enough, but I have finally met Bill Shunn (also, his wife).
Patrick and Teresa Nielsen Hayden are scarily smart and articulate and nice. They are good friends to have. They also own a hamster.
Through them, I know Lucy Huntzinger, who is not a hamster.
Lynn Peril is one of Lucy's best friends; I have followed her work since her zine Mystery Date, actually! Now she is my friend too.
And living near Lucy and Lynn is Gordon Edgar, the rock star cheesemonger of the very PC Rainbow Grocery Cooperative. Rainbow Grocery does not stock Velveeta.
The extremely twisted Scott Getchell, my erstwhile comix-via-fax buddy, has a book you might like to read.
Not to forget a few other awesome comics folks -- Ellen Forney and Nina Paley -- who don't know each other, but should.
One of our genius designers is Tony Sahara. He reinvents cover art and patiently translates bizarre and obscure Japanese for me. (Tony isn't his given name; he took it on when he came To New York.)
When I told Tony about his link, he suggested that I also link to two of our other designers. I had no idea that either of them had websites! Meet Christian Fünfhausen and Jeanine Henderson. They're both great.
Thanks to AltaVista, I am now friends with the photographer Elsa Dorfman, whose work I really recommend.
Once, at a party, Andrew Hearst pulled me aside and said: "You act sarcastic, but you're just a big sweetheart." How was he able to see inside me like that?
Kathy Dawson is a colleague (and good friend) who often serves as a voice of sympathetic acknowledgment. She is both genuine and very, very smart. I like her partner's work too. And maybe one day I will meet their cats.
Steve Christensen used to work for the Children's Book Council. He plays bass in the band Jerkwater and has a most excellent phone voice.
As does another bass player, Mishka the literate sometime radio engineer.
Maura Johnston has worked all over the web, from 1.0 on.
Maura introduced me to the guy who first hosted this site. He dictated the following: "andrew springsteen, he's the big poppa!! he's living large AND in charge! like heavy-d he knows the score, he eats some cake, then eats some more!" (Sometimes he eats Beefaroni sandwiches, too.)
andrew introduced me to Angela Martini, who can really draw and has cats.
I know the samurai photographer Jodi Shapiro through (A) Maura and (B) Echo.
Matthew Amster-Burton and his wife, Laurie, teacher with a degree, are now parents. Matthew is friends with Neil deMause, which proves that there are no people in this world, only coincidences.
When I was curious about Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab (also known as BPAL), Storme Winfield was nice enough to swap some samples (also known as "imps").
Lucy Wollin is a retired school librarian who loves the Greenmarket.
I didn't meet jane and her friend dollie at the Sloan show at Maxwell's, but I'm emailing her now. They have a great TV show: Ding Dong...You're Wrong.
Daniel House is yet another friend of Jessamyn's (she is Most Links Girl on this site). He says, and I quote: "You must be insane, obsessive, brilliant, and sleep 4 hours a night. I love your site." An unsolicited testimonial!
Elizabeth S. Q. Goodman is a math scholar. Also a reader. Also impressive.
Before you visit the website of the debonair Garth Nix, I suggest you purchase Sabriel. Thank you.
Sandra Payne is a woman of style, taste, talent, and vision.
Jon Bonne's last name is pronounced 'bo-NAY'-- as in Lisa -- but he looks nothing like her. Back when I started in children's books, one of the first friends I made was our then-copyeditor, Margo Fox, She now writes for the Times, and has a book out.
Gaylord Fields, who has consoled me through various crises (and does a wicked T. Valentine impression) is a DJ for WFMU and married to Kitty, who runs an awesome vintage clothing store. They own a Predicta -- Danish Modern, of course!
Winner of the award for Best Domain Name: Catherine Skidmore.
I lose all sense of myself as an adult when I go to shul, and become a fidgeting child. However, lots of people I know swear by the services at B'nai Jeshurun and Ansche Chesed.
Years ago, when I used to go and see bands every single night, I met someone who had the same taste. His name was Issa. He was a talented artist and a truly sweet guy. We became good friends and hung out a lot. Then, all of a sudden, he dropped off the face of the earth. Last night, I finally learned what had happened to him. I still have no words.
For years, the author Ann Cameron oversaw a library in Guatemala. Now, like half of the people on this page, she lives in Portland. (My nickname for her: 'I Am a Cameron.')
The next six entries comprise a Venn Diagram. The center of this diagram is Sarah Lawrence College.
Maureen Mulhern-White lived across the hall from me one semester. She went on to get her MFA and publish a terrific book of poems, Parallax. Her husband is a jazz musician.
Bob Goldberg is also a musician, and also went to Sarah Lawrence.
Seth Goldman was one of the very first people I met there, in the post office. Years later, we are still friends. He now runs an historical museum.
Seth's roommate that freshman year was Max Shapey, who had to put up with my obliviously yattering chain-Gauloise-smoking self after a bored Seth fell asleep. Maybe this is why he is such a good shrink.
Max worked on a student film starring Stoney Emshwiller. I now publish Stoney's brilliant mother, Carol. Since I didn't even really know Stoney while at SLC, I find this amusing.
Cori Eckert-Chu is everyone's favorite Designated Girl. She is now a Designated Mom.
I used to work with Tanya Mancini. I like the fact that she is "Missus Tanya."
Reuben Radding has the best name. He reminds me of a sullen teddy bear.
Back about eight lives and twenty-five years ago, I met and was awed by Marnie Mueller. I was a clueless, arrogant teenager at the time, but at least I had enough sense to be impressed!
It is lovely to find someone with a great visual sense of humor, especially someone (with an equally unusual name; she's female) like Jeremy Dennis.
I stayed with Jeremy's (and my) friend, Jenni Scott, while in Oxford. Smart, interesting, practical, and a one-stop comics resource.
Through Jenni, I met Elly Spilberg, a photographer, Kinks fan, and excellent London tour guide.
And then, through Elly, I became friends with a fellow New Yorker, Peri Lyons, who comes straight out of a Carole Lombard movie. And she is psychic.
A is for Anna, who is Awesome. G is for Genoese, which is her last name.
I met Michael Chatham while waiting on line to see NRBQ at the (late) Tramps. Turned out that he was a bass player; a couple of years later we wound up playing together. He is also very tall. I love him.
The drummer and second guitarist in another band of mine introduced me to Dave Kessler. He auditioned in a suit. On purpose.
How did I forget to include Alejandra Valera de Barrett and her photographer husband, Christopher? I met Alex the way I met Elsa Dorfman -- through the miracle of search engines. I am lucky.
The multitalented Barbara Dunshee is now a potter!
I knew about my pal and author Nina Kiriki Hoffman's older brother, Kristian, years before I met her. Their entire family is fascinating.
My friends Alan Beatts and Jude Feldman are, respectively, the owner and general manager of Borderlands Books, in San Francisco. It is my favorite genre bookstore in the known and unknown universe(s).
Jamie Barnett is the King of Art. Buy things from him.
I always wondered what happened to Fred Wilhelm!
Someone else who went to Roslyn High School and loathed it as much as I did: Min-Je Michael Choi. Edited to add: Some of my former classmates have tracked me down via Facebook, which is bizarre as hell. Hello the past
Jacqui Shine
Elizabeth Bluemle and her partner, Josie Leavitt, run a rockin' bookstore in Vermont. Before they left Manhattan, we went to see Alison Bechdel speak. It was just like being back at school.
I call Todd Belton "Todd Columbine" because he was Columbine in his original journal. He has awesome coding skills, and is from Louisiana . . .
. . . like another friend of mine, Julie Robichaux. Her first name is pronounced "zhu-LEE."
I met Anna Puchalski at my favorite toystore, Dinosaur Hill. Under the name of Angel Devil, she creates amazing small creatures you can buy to inhabit your home. One of her signature characters is Waif, which is sold all over the world (and the internet). We often go to Saint's Alp Teahouse for interesting drinks and fried snacks. She is also my younger sister and Cleaning the Apartment Support Team of one.
I have a friend whose father was a famous set designer. He would like The Federal Theatre Project Collection, I bet.
Azi (it stands for Azadeh) was the intern from heaven.
My friend Gail Jaitin, a new geekgirl and Camp Boiberik alumnus, is beautiful, smart, interesting, and a Vassar graduate. If I were male I would date her.
Tom McMahon from Gale Research said that he would have given this site his five-star rating, but I hadn't included any links to the Green Bay Packers. That sentence, however, has just earned me my stars. (NB: I do not "do" sports.)
Laila Ionescu helped me escape from my post-college life. She was and is a visually brilliant world-changer.
Or you could get in touch with Diana. She is a "cello siren" who designs web pages and is in general fascinated by "delicate decadence and ethereal music." (Among other things.)
Someone I know once referred to part of my job as "Libraria." This just shows how little he knew. For example, he did not know Tracey Firestone.
Jay Lake (who looks as much like his dad as I resemble my mother) is my fake internet boyfriend. Oh and also a writer..
Canadian trumpet player with a Chet Baker fixation: Leif Arntzen.
Meet a mover and shaker in the children's book world: GraceAnne DeCandido. (And her son, Keith, a mover and shaker in alternate worlds.)
Who would have thought that our resident computer genius had a secret life?
Jennifer Callahan is a blow-you-away-talented writer. Email her to experience Virtual Normality, her first story collection on her own Vanity Press.
I regularly read a few online journals, bulletin boards, and blogs, including: abada abada; Ask MetaFilter; Notes from Coode Street; Making Light; The Obscure Store and Reading Room; bobofett; Bois de Jasmin; and Waiter Rant. You can see many of these sites and more if you dance in a circle.
Obviously, I have many friends who are librarians. One of them is Ann Chambers Theis.
If you've wandered around here a little, you know that I am basically the Dental Queen. I have a dental support pal: that would be Garret Freymann-Weyr. (Who is female, and whose last name is pronounced to rhyme with "I'm on fire.") I will probably buy her a set of chocolate dentures from Mueller's when it's all over.
Pay a visit to a geek house or two. Or one in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Or one in Burbank, California in the late 1960s. Or two in Seattle. Or a house made entirely from books.
Conversely, you could go home.