Imagine this: It's your birthday. The doorbell rings: No one is there. But a book is there wrapped with ribbon silvery as London's Thames River at teatime in April. Alexander McQueen might well have tied the bouffant bow.

Kathleen Tessaro's new novel, The Perfume Collector (Harper), is a mystery,...

If you're thinking people are crazy, minds jammed up as the 405 going nowhere but backwards, where are the miracles? What's happened to good news? Then you'll want to see Yesterdays a jazz musical at the Promenade Theatre in Santa Monica. It's only running until May 5.

Theatre By the...

The essence of theatre is wonder. The Actor's Gang understands this. And so does Brian T. Finney, the actor who performs his own stunning one-man adaptation of the Heart of Darkness, at the Ivy Substation Theatre in Culver City. This classic novel has been tailored to fit our sleek time....

Last night I watched a Law and Order marathon. I learned a lot more about Elliot and Olivia. Elliot's mom was bipolar. This explained his perceptions, his conflicts. I needed to write new pages. Couldn't think what to write. Crossed this out. Tore that up. Bad Example for the writers...

"Want a light?" used to be the start up line with a stranger who had a look you liked. In a waiting room; in the seat next to you somewhere. Or standing in a line.
Lines are longer now.

"Can you believe it took 45 minutes to...

"Just write three pages. Every week..." Writers, who find that difficult, if not horrifying, are often the most talented, garrotted by dreams we fear will never come true. We've sat here, tapping out words for ages, like months, written up this whole story, covered all those pages.

Yes! The End....

The Last Book Store writers group decided a Sunday ago (or so) that instead of bringing three pages of our books or poetry to read, we would all write on one subject. I run the group because I wear a bow tie, but have no total command. So LaVerta suggested...

Last night I went to a Slam. No, this was not walking over to see you and you slamming the door in my face.

This was an event in Santa Monica at a place called Zanzibar. I went with the writer, George Jordan, who knows about these matters. He...

Just as I've been brooding about theatre and what it does that film cannot, I went to see Lincoln for the second time. There is no more vigorous movie about where we are right now. Yes, Lincoln is about the Civil War, but it is equally about the war between...

This really is about this riveting play. (I'll get there) But this is also about NOT writing. And my father.

Dr. Freud would see the connections.

When writers I love cannot write, I say "write what you cannot bear to tell anyone." I've kind of forgotten that lately....

When I swim I don't count laps. I was never good at arithmetic (never got to the level where they call it math). I mean, watch me try to add a tip. "Carry the two? Then take away..." What?
So, swimming. That's where we are. I am excited for...

After the Newtown shooting even our favorite commentators agreed there was nothing to say. Yes words do fail. Action strikes us dumb.

I tell new writers. "When you're grief stricken, shocked all words have fled, just pick up an object at hand, something manageable you haven't noticed -- describe...

I've been quite tender about the Equinox swimming pool, even rather complimentary.

It plays a nice supporting role in my new book, almost Oscar qualified -- it did, the pool, transform my life. After my Englishman left this planet, my body decided to give up walking. Lie down. Die.

Philip Roth says he will not write again.

I am corrected. "No," I am told, 'he said, he will not write another novel.'

Ah, but on the front page of the New York Times, our ultimate authority, there is a picture of you, Mr. Roth, not, indeed,...

I am smiling at this small oval sticker. In the center, two red stripes, and at one end of the egg shape, there are three white stars set in dark blue. In the center white stripe there are two words: I Voted. Around the oval is a garland of these...

I had not been back to the Motion Picture Home since my husband died one year ago.

I had finished the book about how we met, how we hung on close all the way to the end. And then how I have learned to swim on my own.

In 1941 I was 5 years old. I was standing in front of the RCA Victor radio in the living room. The wooden radio was the size of a manageable bear, with a fan-shaped face lit up like "Glad to See You!" when it was on. There were several knobs...

Laurie Lipton told me this yesterday. I first I saw Laurie at a London dinner party. She was lean, elfin; her narrow blue eyes cased people, sized them up the way my family did.

"You're from New York." I moved in fast. "Fantastic!"

"Yeah, and you're...

This guy talks first. He's got the build of an armchair a few generations of guys have sat in to watch football. He's talking about Mother's Day, taking flowers to the grave and then all the kids and their mate's and the grandkids went back to the house to eat...

I am old enough to have the clarity of perspective, which shows me the worst thing about the New Age is a lot of Solitude. But then, in Medieval Times, young people went to convents or monasteries for silence. To sleep in cells. And all cultures have retreats, or, times...