Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Lynn Coady solves your problems

Apologies, but I think I'll only be able to manage mini-posts this week--things are a little hectic in my world right now.

But at least I have fun stuff to link you to! I have been enjoying novelist Lynn Coady's "Group Therapy" column in the Globe for a while now--I'm sorry I never read it when the columnist was Claudia Dey--I'm sure she was great, too!

I find it really interesting that us fiction writers (often) build our work around all this insight we allegedly have about how human beings are, but speaking only for myself, I'd be absolutely terrified by, and incompetent at, this gig. It's actual real problems that people send in to the site, occasionally serious ones. But Coady seems to be able to parlay her insight into fiction people into insight into real people, and actually be helpful.

The problems are sometimes a bit sad, but generally they don't pick blues-song type disasters. Then readers write in with their advice and Coady counters with her own. She's funny, very very funny, but she's also pretty insightful and not-mean even when the problems are inane or have obvious solutions.

So maybe you want to tune into her Valentine's Day live chat today at 1pm EST (and if you know what EST means, I wish you would tell me--is that Toronto?) You can write in with your romantic problems (not that you would have romantic problems) ahead of time or during the chat, or be like me and just read it after to marvel at the wisdom.

RR

6 comments:

AMT said...

E is eastern. that's you. M is mountain that's me. apparently A means even east-er than easter, because that's atlantic.

Phil said...

The S means standard, as opposed to daylight savings. In the summer you (probably) observe EDT. The difference is a little bit important, because Saskatchewan, for example, is always on C(entral)ST, since they refuse daylight savings.

Rebecca Rosenblum said...

You linguists know everything! Why *does* Saskatchewan refuse daylight?

August said...

I think this is the clearest evidence (beyond her word, of course) that Rebecca does not watch television.

I may actually just steal this to mark a non-TV watching character in some future fiction. This is totally the kind of 'telling detail' I would never have thought of on my own. :)

(Television programmes have been advertised in the format "8pm EST, 7pm Central" since time immemorial.)

Rebecca Rosenblum said...

Oh man, seriously? That totally makes me feel old, because I was deeply into TV when I was kid/teenager. So I must have known this then, but since it's been *so long* I guess I forgot... Ah, elderhood.

Amy said...

The E/A thing sort of reminds me of how, when we were growing up we would get all excited when bands would say they were going on a "cross-Canada tour" ending in Eastern Canada. Which, inevitably, meant ending in either Toronto or Montreal. I guess they must've been going by time zones.

It also meant that tv shows came on an hour later for us. Which wasn't a big deal except on school nights.