Word and Journey

"What happens in Oscar Wilde's bedroom stays in Oscar Wilde's Bedroom." "...unless it happens on the stage, and then we call it theater!"   "To reveal art, and to conceal the artist, is the artist's aim." - Oscar Wilde               Who is Dorian Gray? He's young. He's rich. He's beautiful. Lord Henry says those are the best and most important...

What makes a book good? And how does a story grow from being a good book to a great one, or earn the rank of classic literature?          Is it by being a good plot, like The Passage Trilogy?          Is it by building a fantastic world, like in Lord of the Rings?          Is it by developing compelling and relatable characters as in The Book Thief?          Is a book "Great" because the...

If you could make 10 people immortal, who would you pick? If you could make some people immortal and not others…should you? Who gets to choose? As we conclude the Passage, we delve deep into the ethical conundrums of transhumanism, and it’s fun. We reflect on stories such as Jurassic Park, the classic movie Deep Impact, Battlestar Galactica, and LOST, all to further expound on the problem raised h...

Moses and Nics are back at it again - we’re almost done with The Passage, and the action is getting intense! More interesting, though, then car chases, and viral hunts, and intrigue among remnant tribes of militia are the concepts played out among the characters. What would it be like to erase, edit, or misunderstand most or all of which came before us? How does our understanding of history and th...

How do you make a monster? No, it’s not through viral injections, nor radiation, nor supernatural curses - Monsters are made by hate, anger, resentment, and wounds that never get healed. Moses and Nics are back, talking monsters and heroes, love and hate, abuse and attachment, trauma and legacy. We talk about what it means to be a parent, and to hold the power to shape multiple future generations...

We're getting on the IFS Soapbox and blowing the Orthodox Trumpet and Woking Ourselves and unpacking Trauma and pondering the essence of being Human...and SPOILING the movie Avatar: The Way of Water! Long-time friend and colleague Aaron Kelsay makes his first appearance on the show, after having taken me to see the new James Cameron film. We discuss and review it at length, and conclude with our e...

How do you write an epic? Moses and Nics(aka Rhys and Justin) analyze the writing style of Justin Cronin and reflect on how he brings the world and characters of The Passage to life. We look at world building, characters, plot, and word-smything. We discuss writing in multiple eras, writing with ensemble casts, and how to write info dumps and make them pretty. In the content of the story, we utter...

This is the episode where everyone is dead. In the book The Passage , by Justin Cronin, it took thirty-two minutes for the world we know to end. The “Jumps,” or the Virals - the vampire characters, have broken containment, defied any attempt to contain them, and have spread their chaos across the continent. All the characters we have known and loved or hated so far have been slain, except for Brad...

“Growing up, what was your favorite bookstore?” For Nics, as a kid, it was the school library, and public library. For Moses, as a kid, it was Bookman’s, in Flagstaff, AZ. As an older kid, it was Barnes and Noble in Medford, OR. As adults, both Moses and Nics have a fond respect for Powell’s in downtown Portland. Welcome to a new series with the Word and Journey! We are reading “The Passage,” by J...

Happy Holidays! My holiday of choice is the Nativity of our Lord, otherwise known as Christmas. This year, I commemorated the season by reflecting on some favorite stories associated with Christmas, Nativity, winter, etc. For the full line-up, check out the last episode, "Holiday Stories we Loved and Lived." Of particular interest, is Charles Dickens' classic novel, "A Christmas Carol," in which t...

For this episode, I gathered together friends and family to reflect on stories we have loved, that have become part of our holiday traditions, that have created experiences for us, which in turn created more tradition. Our accounts range from the very silly, to the very personal, to the deeply thoughtful. We need tradition to know who we are and how to be. Holidays, particularly the Nativity, prov...

“There’s these stories, they live in us, they gotta come out!” More on how to write a book, AND how to market a book, even while also reading good books. You’d think writing a book is about inspiration, or even skill…but functionally, it ends up being more about discipline and persistence. We talk about our concerns about representing our characters well and doing them justice…as peripheral to how...

Crucial to every work of fiction is a good editor. Moses and Eric are back, and talking about writing! We discuss why we have editors, how to make good use of an editor, and what are some features of a good editor. As writers, we get deep in our heads and profoundly affected by our work, and we need the occasional grammatical gut punch to set us on a right course. Eric shares tips on how to best u...

Eric published a book! He shares bits of his journey of self-publishing and marketing, which, he says, was harder than actually writing the book. Word to the wise - getting a book published on Amazon is easy. Getting a book on Amazon correctly and effectively , is hard and complicated and a multi-layered process. Eric states that there does not yet exist a concise instruction manual for how to acc...

How do you get inspirited to write a novel? Do you dream a dream? Work a challenging job? Live through major world events? How about all of the above? In this episode, Moses returns to the podcasting rhythm, this time with new friend and fellow writer Eric Love. This marks the first series of episodes done with a fellow writer. Per Eric’s recommendation, we started reading the 1991 novel “Boy’s Li...

All the twists are revealed as we conclude this epic and chaotic tale. Here at the end, we wonder - just what is Chuck Palahniuk teaching us? We reflect on the camaraderie and community that has grown up around the Fight Clubs and Project Mayhem. There’s an instant and sometimes unspoken bond between people who have been through a shared struggle. The two brothers reflect on the quickly understood...

Jeremy raises the really good question of, should we be concerned about a group that doesn’t allow itself to be questioned? And we conclude…YES! This raises the question - what is the appeal of Project Mayhem? (Just as, what was the draw to the original fight clubs?) We raise the question, what mind of mental, emotional, spiritual state must a person be in for them to find an abusive relationship(...

fight club part 3 Is Fight Club literature? Can we fairly call it a classic? Just how does a story transition from being a story that is written down to a story that is a classics? Are classics just stories that endure? Are they popular? Do they address a particular kind of content at a particular kind of level? Jeremy compares stories to whiskey and says the best whiskey is the whiskey you like t...

This episode marks the birth of the first Word and Journey baby! Jeremy becomes a father and Moses gets to be an uncle! Let the Dad-Jokes freely roll… In reflecting on pop-culture references, Moses offers the quiz - name the source of the quote, “There is no spoon.” We pick up with chapters 6-10 of Fight Club, in which we witness the actual birth of the Fight Club. Here we talk about violence, spi...

“Tyler gets me a job as a waiter, after that Tyl;er’s pushing a gun in my mouth and saying, the first step to eternal life is you have to die.” Welcome to the iconic story of Fight Club ! Moses welcomes very special guest, his very first family member to guest on the show, and master martial artist, Jeremy Pasimio into the studio to read the novel by Chuck Palahniuk written in 1996, later made int...

I could say "I finished a book of poems." But does one ever finish such things? Does one not rather linger long on word and page taking in favored moments again and again until the words find themselves embedded in memory where they may shape the soul? Welcome to Bower Lodge, the first book of poems by poet, writer, editor, and connoisseur of ordinary miracles, Paul Pastor. Paul is a genuine Nativ...

It’s here! After much delay and interruptions, that one terribly dystopic and scrutinized year is coming to an end - we are finally finishing 1984! So what happened to Winston and Julia? Did they hold fast to their convictions? Did they betray each other as they predicted they would? In the end, what won out? Principles, or pleasures? We compare and contrast Fear of Pain versus Fear of Loss of Lib...

Happy June! Here’s a list of what I’m reading this month. Check out the full episode to hear brief commentary on each, as well as a few choice excerpts! Artemis , by Andy Weir. A fun, fluffy heist novel set on the moon. Altogether You, by Jenna Riemersma. A Protestant rendering of the Internal Family Systems model of counseling Picture of Dorian Gray , by Oscar Wilde. Dorian is young, rich, beauti...

Here it is, friends, that time when we talk about slavery, racism, and how we as fellow humans have responsibility to each other! In today's special episode, I interview Cree Gordan about a book we both love - Kindred , by Octavia Butler. Here's a brief synopsis for those who haven't read it: Dana, a black woman living in Los Angeles in 1976, is repeatedly pulled back in time to the early 1800's t...

Does the show stand up to its own hype? So far, we think….yes? Matt continues nerding out over all the foreshadowing, Moses scrounges up a scarcity narrative around language, and Aaron almost cries. We meet a False Dragon, a Feral Channeler, and a farm boy who almost becomes a werewolf. Aaron can hold a map of the world in his head, while Moses is distracted by the medium of the television show. W...