Despite their differences, a pristine landscape, a colorful parrot, a flawless ballet, a concert by a virtuoso musician, a painting by Rembrandt or Renoir, or simply e=mc2 are each beautiful in their own way. There’s no need to define beautiful. We know what it means....
Sometimes a novel absorbs me so completely I keep turning pages to find out what happens. If the outcome satisfies me, say the boy gets the girl (or vice versa!), I’m happy. If the girl marries someone else, such as in the short story White Nights by Fyodor...
In the prologue of my novel Jellyfish Have Eyes, Ricardo reflects on his dead wife and tells her, “If you had been there and seen the jellyfish, Lillian. They have eyes and minds. We have so much to learn from them.” Ricardo, a fierce believer in chasing ideas that...
After having written a few personal essays laying the foundation for a memoir, I was uncertain whether the story of my life – a government scientist who had never suffered adversity or injustice – would have an audience. This question resurfaced in a different format...
Near the end of my upcoming memoir on my life in science, I think back on my trip to Lilloet in Canada to visit Van, my high school friend, whom I hadn’t seen in some 60 years. Van lived an independent life, including many years in a commune off the grid in British...
