Kenneth Cutler's Blog

Finishing the editing of my third book of short stories. This one is entitled: Illusions and Other Stories.
Seventeen short stories that touch upon reality and illusion in our lives.
Should be on Kindle at amazon.com under Kenneth Cutler next week.

Finishing the editing of my third book of short stories. This one is entitled: Illusions and Other Stories.
Seventeen short stories that touch upon reality and illusion in our lives.
Should be on Kindle at amazon.com under Kenneth Cutler next week.

Finally finished my new novel two days ago, The Tour, and am now in the editing process. The first draft topped out at 310 pages.

Still reading The Lotus Eaters by Tatiani Soli and looking forward to getting back into it every day.

Moving along well with the new novel. It has a title: The Tour, and I've completed 250 pages so far.

Readings: finished reading Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury, which I hadn't read in about forty years. Thoroughly enjoyed it. He was very creative and very brave in his narrative approaches.

Now reading a novel on the Vietnam war entitled The Lotus Eaters. It's a first novel by Tatiana Soli and is very well written.

Finished William Golding's novel The Inheritors, a story of a small group of Neanderthals who come into contact with Cro-Magnons. Quite interesting. Technically rather difficult as the point of view for most of the book is through the limited perceptions of the Neanderthals. Golding did a good job in maintaining interest throughout.

Now reading Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury, which I hadn't read in over forty years. Talk about technical difficulty! The narrator is a mentally retarded man and the action jumps back and forth over thirty years, skipping back and forth between several of these periods several times on the same page! I'm fifty pages into it and enjoying the challenge.

Been distracted with several projects from the new novel . Only up to p. 185.

Still reading the Unbearable Lightness of Being. Almost finished. Enjoying it. Very philosophical.

Have finished 175 pages of my new novel (29 chapters). It was going very well but has slowed down the last week. Got to get it moving again.

Have a glob of books waiting to be read, several of which will be re-readings. Next two are Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury, and Hesse's Magister Ludi: The Glass bead Game.

Finished reading the James Lee Burke novel. Always enjoy his writing; so descriptive.

Picked up a copy of Beowulf in a Book Exchange place, the first long poem written in English, probably about 1500 years ago. I hadn't read it in some twenty-five years. What a wonderful, heroic poem. Thoroughly enjoyed it. Great writing.

Today, I started The Unbearable Lightness of Being. Haven't read it before nor seen the movie. Received incredible reviews, one critic from the Washington Times called the author (Chech writer Milan Kundera) "the world's greatest living writer."

On my own eighth novel, I've now finished 27 chapters (163 pages, 61,000 words) so far. Moving along quite well.

Almost finished with James Lee Burke's Light of the world. He's a commanding writer with good stories and an amazing ability to develop interesting characters with all the merits and flaws one finds in real life. Several critics call him the best living writer in the U.S.

Still moving along on my 8th novel. Don't have a title for it yet; up to now it's been called Work-in-Progress: Guatemala. At the moment, the action has transferred from Guatemala to Israel. Have finished 25 chapters, 145 pages, 53,000 words with plenty left to say.

Finished Nancy Milford's Savage Beauty, a biography of the American poet Edna St. Vincent Millay. Thoroughly enjoyed it. I had forgotten what an incredibly talented sonnet writer Millay was. She was the first woman to ever win a Pulitzer Prize. An interesting but very messy life. She also wrote a libretto to an opera, which received more attention than the music of the composer. She wrote plays and acted in them. That experience as an actress, a performer, allowed her to turn recitals of her poetry into special events attended by thousands. How popular was she as a writer? In the early 1930's, in the midst of the worst economic depression in the history of the United State, she published a new volume of poems, fifty-two sonnets all related to a love affair she had experienced. At a time when no one had any extra money, 50,000 copies of the book were sold in the first three months of it being published! Milford does a wonderful job of researching Millay's life and presenting it to us in all its glories and degradations.

Now, starting to read James Lee Burke's novel, Light of the World.

Still working on my eighth novel. Have finished twenty chapters (126 pages). It's been moving along at a decent pace.

Finished reading The Alchemist by Paolo Coelho. Enjoyed it very much.

Have just started reading Nancy Milford's biography of poet Edna St. Vincent Millay called Savage Beauty. Have enjoyed her poetry; now, look forward to reading about her life.

Working on Chapter 14 of the new novel. So far the location has been Guatemala, the towns of Chichicastenango, Panajachel, and Antigua. The protagonists are a small group of international travelers on a tour of Guatemala. Still working on developing relationships as they move from town to town. Down the road a piece, the action will move to the United States and to Israel.