Brian PanhuyzenTag

Oh, Suspense!

In some literary circles, "suspense" is a bad word. Some feel that rich language and interesting characters should be enough to engage a reader's attention, and those who need a little pep in their fiction ...

If Not DRM, What Then? (Part III)

Just a last few words and thoughts on DRM.DRM Can WorkOne hallmark of the anti-DRM argument is that DRM doesn't and cannot work. Doctorow lays out the reasons in the first part of his talk to the Microsoft ...

If Not DRM, What Then? (Part II)

A few people, some of them writers, have written to me, wondering about the fuss surrounding DRM. They very much want their work protected from copying, and didn’t realize a kind of hysteria exists ...

If not DRM, What Then? (Part I)

Over the next few days, I’m going to discuss DRM – Digital Rights Management – a way of “locking” a digital product, such as an ebook, to control its distribution. This has become a controversial ...

Cormac Mccarthy: "the Ugly Fact Is Books Are Made out of Books"

Before the publication and Oprahfication of The Road, and the Oscar success of No Country For Old Men, Cormac McCarthy was a critically-loved but relatively obscure novelist, unknown outside hardcore ...

Writing Sex

"And Panhuyzen really gives good sex.” ~National Post, August 1999 Sex! Did you hear that, sex! We’re talking about sex today. Oh, what’s that, you don’t want to talk about sex? Well, too bad, ...

You Are God

Writing is all on the page. Take most other arts: film, music, painting, and what goes into the making of each – the processes, the materials, the effort, are not obvious, are not laid out bare. There’s ...

The Reading Rulebook

I used to go to a lot of public readings of poetry and fiction. Then I had kids, and rarely went, but recently, due to changing circumstances, I've been out to a few more, and what hasn't changed are ...

Travelling for Research

Travelling for writing research is an exciting way to make your work genuine and also justify a vacation, but the timing of such travel can be difficult to determine: when in the writing process should ...

Novels vs. Serial Television

Novels are big. It’s something you recognize when you’ve got a draft and you need feedback – what a big favour it is to ask someone, a friend or acquaintance or agent, to spend a dozen or more hours ...