Main Street Writers Davidson with Dale Neal

John had a great meeting last night with Main Street Writers in Davison. The special guest author was Dale Neal, who describes his book, Appalachian Book of the Dead, as a "Southern Gothic Buddist mystery." Dale read the first chapter of the book and answered our questions about his writing process and how he got published. We also workshopped John's short story "Bittersweet Gypsum" and it was great getting the group's feedback on his piece.

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FIELD NOTES: Random Cohabitation

In July of 1980, I received an invitation in the mail. It was from someone named Rod Smith, who introduced himself as my residence hall advisor for the upcoming fall quarter at Ohio University. He invited me to a "small get-together" at his house in Perrysburg for the incoming first-year students on his floor. I'll give Rod credit for trying, but I was the only person on that floor within reasonable driving distance, and I wasn't going to miss a night of work to attend his party. In retrospect, that might have been shortsighted of me. Except for a couple of high-school buddies who roomed together, no one on the first floor of James Hall that September had met or even communicated with anyone else until we showed up a day or two before classes. Apparently, that's not how it's done these days. I stumbled across a lengthy article from the Ohio University student newspaper, The Post, detailing how to go about selecting and vetting a roommate through social media....

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John B. Marek

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