from Across the Country

Evans Georgia Senior Living Residents Receive Support from Oaks Senior Living During Tropical Storm

Dock Workers' Strike Could Further Slow Critical Supply Deliveries

A Riveting Tale of Love, Lust, and Manipulation, Perfect for Film and Multimedia Adaptations

Celebrated Radio Personality and Author of Smooth Talker Marks a New Milestone in Her 38-Year Career with Prestigious National Recognition

Fast Guard Service Provides Critical Support to Flash Flooding Victims in Hurricane's Path

We hear a story from someone searching for their family’s history. This episode is hosted by Michelle Jalowski.

If you’d like to see photos of Jean-Michele and her grandmother, go to themoth.org/extras

Storyteller: Jean-Michele Gregory

This episode is a discussion about code and metrics visualization with Michele Lanza. Michele invented the Code Cities idea about which he talks in this episode.

A self-described "climate refugee" deals with the devastation of Hurricane Helene in Asheville, North Carolina.

After Hurricanes Helene and Milton, homeowners face the daunting task of cleanup and recovery. Industry expert Dan Mesenburg provides crucial tips to help property owners navigate the cleanup and recovery process.

GAF volunteers recently helped provide tens of thousands of meals to people in communities affected by Hurricanes Helene and Milton. 

DHS Secretary Mayorkas activated the federal employee volunteer force “due to the anticipated frequency and severity of extreme weather this season."

The post DHS activates Surge Capacity Force as Helene batters southeast US first appeared on Federal News Network.

Fueled by record-warm waters, the storm turned into one of the largest on record ever to slam into the Gulf Coast.

Helen Sawyer Hogg stood at the front of a small but growing force of woman astronomers in the first half of the 20th century. This is her story.

The post Helen Sawyer Hogg: Giving the Stars to Everyone appeared first on Sky & Telescope.

I know a lot of us are in the path of Helene in Florida and Georgia (Alabama, Tennessee, SC, NC, too! It's a big storm!). I thought it might be nice to have a (text-based, low bandwidth) place to check in and provide information updates as it moves ashore this afternoon and across the Southeast overnight and through tomorrow.

Millions have been impacted by Hurricane Helene, yet another tragic natural disaster that the world faced in 2024. Does the Bible say anything that can help us understand why? And how can God’s people help?

En 10AM Hoy por Hoy de Caracol Radio estuvo la expresidente de Chile, Michelle Bachelet, bajo el marco del foro Cumbre Mujeres Electas 2024 - 2027, para hablar sobre los desafíos que vienen para el 2024.

Tourists stayed away from western North Carolina this year after Helene swept through the area, and towns that depend on leaf lookers are bracing for big losses.

Mark Zuckerberg heeft aangekondigd dat Internet.org is gelanceerd. Deze organisatie is een samenwerking van Facebook, Samsung, Ericsson, Nokia, MediaTek, Opera en Qualcomm. Het doel is om een groter deel van de wereldbevolking aan internettoegang te helpen.

The songstress graces the Apollo Live stage!

Stuck between a rock and a hard place.

In the wake of the devastation rendered by Hurricane Helene, Carolina Furfare released a newsletter on October 1 stating the cancellation of the event that was to occur this weekend, and indicating that the hotels and facilities were needed in order to assist with rescue and sheltering efforts after the Hurricane hit the mountainous region.

This weather event hit the top ten most fatal and costly hurricanes in the United States even before full recovery efforts could be finalized. People who pre-registered have been given the option to roll over to next year, or to Bewhiskered 2025; due to the cancellation being so close to event day they cannot guarantee refunds for now.

read more

Satan is prepping Biden's chair.

Photo by NASA Natural disasters don’t just ravage landscapes—they also expose and deepen systemic inequalities. Recent hurricanes, Milton and Helene, tore through Florida, Georgia, and the Carolinas, destroying homes, businesses, and the lives built across generations. While governments rush to repair infrastructure and restore housing, they often overlook the people most impacted in the long term—especially […]

The post Natural Disasters Aren’t Gender Neutral – Hurricanes Milton and Helene Prove It appeared first on Feminist Majority Foundation.

What was the Versace’s Spring 2018 show like? If you did not have the time to see or attend the show, Helena Christensen and ’90s supermodels such as Claudia Schiffer, Cindy Crawford, Carla Bruni and Naomi Campbell walked the runway together in the honor to founder of Versace brand, Gianna Versace. Helena Christensen did not ... Read more

The post Talk with Helena Christensen appeared first on Star Two.

After-school activities will still be suspended Monday and Tuesday.

Helen Clark elected president of Chatham House News release jon.wallace 23 July 2021

The former New Zealand prime minister and Head of UN Development Programme has been elected president of Chatham House.

Former New Zealand prime minister and Head of the United Nations Development Programme, Helen Clark, has been elected president of Chatham House.

Ms Clark will replace former United Kingdom Prime Minister, Sir John Major, who is retiring from the role. She will join Baroness Eliza Manningham-Buller and Lord Darling as one of the institute’s three serving presidents.

Helen Clark was prime minister of New Zealand from 1999-2008. She then became the 8th and first female administrator of the UN Development Programme, completing two terms from 2009-2017.  

She is actively engaged in important international issues that are central to the institute’s priorities. She is currently chairing the Independent Panel for Pandemic Preparedness and Response with former president of Liberia, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, which was convened by the World Health Organization last year and has just completed its main report. Her expertise extends to sustainable development, tackling climate change and developments in the Asia-Pacific.

Chatham House Director Robin Niblett welcomed the appointment:

‘We are excited to have found someone with the high-level political experience and who shares the strong reputation for integrity that Sir John enjoys. Helen Clark is highly regarded around the world for her past and current endeavours. Her election also underscores the institute’s global outlook and priorities, which she is so well qualified to help guide.’

Ms Clark was elected at the Annual General Meeting of Chatham House on 20 July which also marked the last official engagement for Lord O’Neill, who has now handed over to Sir Nigel Sheinwald as Chair of the institute.

Chatham House is delighted that Sir John Major will remain affiliated with the institute as president emeritus, and that Lord O’Neill will become a member of the institute’s panel of senior advisers.

 

A new technology developed by NASA to predict space weather showed that Hurricane Helene produced "enormous" waves in the Earth's upper atmosphere as it came ashore on Sept. 26, the agency says.

MANUEL PLANELLES, EL PAÍS, Paris- “Agriculture is seen as a threat in the fight against climate change,” Maria Helena Semedo warns. The Deputy Director-General of the Food and Agriculture Organization [...]

The small town of Spruce Pine, North Carolina, is one of the only sources of high-purity quartz on Earth, but it has been left battered by the storm's heavy rains

Home to more than 300 artists, the neighborhood was submerged under the record-high waters of the French Broad River

The sprawling estate, which is the largest privately owned home in the country, will open its doors in November after a month-long closure

Penn State DuBois will welcome Michele Dunleavy, professor of dance in the School of Theatre, to campus on Oct. 23 for a live performance that includes storytelling and the potential for audience participation.

On September 26, NASA’s Atmospheric Waves Experiment (AWE) captured atmospheric gravity waves caused by Hurricane Helene’s powerful landfall along Florida’s Gulf Coast. These waves, observed as concentric ripples extending from Florida, highlight NASA’s efforts to understand how terrestrial weather can impact space weather and disrupt communication systems. AWE’s observations offer a critical step in decoding the effects of severe storms on the upper atmosphere.

Photo Caption: From left to right: Anna McDermott of the Food Bank of Delaware, State Rep. Ed Osienski, Lt. Governor Bethany Hall-Long, Cathy Kanefsky, Food Bank of Delaware President and CEO, and Megan Zavala of the Food Bank of Delaware pose for a photo in front of the Hurricane Helene donation to impacted areas.  NEWARK, […]

Hurricane Helene hit a quartz mine in North Carolina that is key to global semiconductor production, which could impact the entire tech industry. Here is everything we know so far

The storm decimated a region rich with dozens of species already struggling with habitat loss and disease

Hospitals have been forced to innovate with new ways of hydrating patients and giving them medications, after a key factory that produces IV fluid bags flooded during Hurricane Helene. (This story first aired on Morning Edition on Nov. 7, 2024.)

Today in my craft post, I'm going to talk about a straightforward skill… while referencing a book that's wonderfully un-straightforward.

H Is for Hawk is a memoir by Helen Macdonald that weaves together several threads, the three biggest of which are: her experience of training a northern goshawk; her analysis of T. H. White's memoir about training a northern goshawk; and her grief following the death of her father. In terms of balance and weaving, it's beautifully done. In terms of psychological insight, it feels searingly true. And in terms of the expression of emotion, it's stunning.

It's also an uncomfortable book at times, in ways that recommend it. And it's a fascinating memoir for a fiction writer to read while thinking about how to write character. H Is for Hawk left me with a lot of questions, for the book and for myself.

If you just want the straightforward writing lesson, which is on the topic of writing emotion, jump ahead to the *** below. If you're interested in a fiction writer's thoughts about memoir, read on.

I sat down to read H is for Hawk because a friend had described its structure and I was intrigued. I'm not a memoir writer; it's far too personal a style of writing for me. But I like to read books that differ greatly from my own writing, and I especially like to learn to write from them. After all, the more a book diverges from your own writing, the more it can stretch you into a broader perspective of what's possible. I was curious about what a memoir that weaves separate but related threads could teach me about writing a work of fiction that weaves separate but related threads; but I was also curious about what it could teach me that I didn't know about yet.

Here are some of the unexpected questions that arose for me while reading this book:

In terms of writing character (if one can use that word with a memoir, and I believe one can; more on that later), what are the differences between memoir and fiction?

For example, what advantages does the memoir writer have? Does a reader come to a memoir with a greater willingness to believe in a character than they bring to the reading of fiction? A fiction writer often has to go through a lot of contortions to keep a character believable while also fulfilling the necessities of the plot. Push the character's behavior too far outside the characterization you've so carefully established, and the behavior becomes unbelievable. The reader is left thinking, "I don't believe they would actually do that."

In contrast, in a memoir, a character is an actual person. They did what they did. The memoir writer reports what they did and we believe it, because it's a memoir. Any "unbelievable" behavior consequently brings power with it: amusement, surprise, shock value. (This is not to minimize the work it requires to make any character in any kind of book engaging. I don't mean to suggest that a memoir writer has an easy job creating character, only that they may have a believability advantage.)

Okay then, what advantages does the fiction writer have when writing character? Well, the fiction writer can make shit up; that's a pretty huge advantage. The fiction writer also generally doesn't have to worry about getting sued for defamation of character :o).

Another huge advantage: Though it's true that as a fiction writer I sometimes encounter readers who mistakenly assume I'm like my characters, for the most part, fiction readers remember that fiction is made up. This means that the fiction writer is unlikely to be accused of having done the things their characters did, or judged for that behavior. In contrast, a memoir writer writing about her own actions is opening herself to all kinds of very personal judgment. All writing requires courage and involves exposure… But this takes things to a whole other level! Fiction writers have some built-in emotional protections that I tend to take for granted, until I read a memoir and remember.

This leads me to another question that arose while reading this book: What is the place of the memoir reader when it comes to judging the people inside the memoir? For example, Helen Macdonald writes a compassionate but blistering exposé of T. H. White in this book. It's an exposé that T. H. White wrote first; anyone can learn from White's own memoir that he was heartbreakingly, sometimes sadistically abusive to the goshawk he trained. But Macdonald presents it anew, and she presents it with an analysis of White's psychology that shows us more about White than he ever meant us to know. She shows us the abuse, familial and societal, that brought White to this place. She shows us his heartbreak, failures, and shame. White feels like an integrated, complete person in this book.

But also, she shows us what she wants to show us — she shows us the parts of White that fit into her own book, about her own experiences. She's the writer, and this is her memoir. To be clear, I don't mean this as a condemnation — I'm not accusing her of leaving things out or misrepresenting White! This is a part of all book-writing. You include what matters to the rest of your book. Everything else ends up on the cutting room floor. As far as I know, Macdonald did a respectful and responsible job of incorporating T. H. White into her book, and I expect she worked very hard to do so. I believe in the T. H. White she showed us. But I think it's important to remember this part of the process when reading any memoir. Even when a writer is writing about themselves, their book has plot and themes, it has content requirements. There'll always be something specific the writer is trying to convey, about themselves or anyone else, and there'll always be stuff they leave out. No book can contain a whole person.

Personally, when I read memoir (and biography and autobiography), I consciously consider the people inside it to function as characters. It's hard to read H Is for Hawk and not come away with some pretty strong opinions about T. H. White. But I keep a permanent asterisk next to my opinions, because White was a real, living person, but I only know him as a character in this book. No matter how many books I read about him (or by him), I'll always be conscious of not knowing the whole person.

As a fiction writer, I find all of this fascinating. I think it's because I see connections between how hard it is to present a compelling character study of a real person and how hard it is to create a believable character in fiction. What are the differences between a memoir writer who's figuring out which part of the truth matters, and a fiction writer who's creating a fiction that's supposed to invoke truth? Also, I'm fascinated by how much all of this lines up with how hard it is to understand anyone in real life. How well can we ever know anyone? How much can we ever separate our own baggage from our judgments of other people? There's a third person getting in the way of my perfect understanding of T. H. White: me.

Next question: How does a writer (of memoir or fiction) make a character ring true to the reader? How does the writer make the character compelling and real?

A writer as skilled as Macdonald knows how to bring her characters, human or hawk, alive for the reader. One way she does this is by keeping her characterizations always in motion. White is many, many things — kind and cruel, sensitive and sadistic, abused and despotic. Macdonald's hawk, Mabel, is also constantly growing and changing. Mabel is a point of personal connection for Macdonald, but she's also always just out of reach. And of course, Macdonald herself is a character in the book. Macdonald lays bare her own successes, failures, oddities, cruelties, kindnesses, insights, ambivalences, and delights, and lets us decide. Personally, as I read, I felt that I was meeting a human of sensitivity and compassion; an anxious person whose need for both solitude and connection was starkly familiar to me; someone consciously composed of contradictions; a person of deep feeling who cares about what matters; a grieving daughter; a person I can relate to. Or should I say, a character I can relate to? Having read this book, I don't presume I know Helen Macdonald.

Here's something I do know about Helen Macdonald though: She's a damn good writer. In particular, as I read, I kept noticing one specific thing she does so well that it needs to be called out and shown to other writers.





All page references are to the 2014 paperback published by Grove Press.

Okay, writers. When it comes to writing a character's emotion, there's a certain skill at which Helen Macdonald excels. Namely, she conveys emotion via action.

Put differently: rather than describing an emotion in words, Macdonald shows us a behavior, one so meaningful that we readers feel the associated emotion immediately.

Here's an example. For context, Helen Macdonald's father died suddenly one March, throwing her into a deep and unexpected grief. Listen to this description of one of the things that happened next:

"In June I fell in love, predictably and devastatingly, with a man who ran a mile when he worked out how broken I was. His disappearance rendered me practically insensible. Though I can't even bring his face to mind now, and though I know not only why he ran, but know that in principle he could have been anyone, I still have a red dress that I will never wear again. That's how it goes." (17)

While there is some effective emotional description here — like when she's rendered practically insensible — the real punch in this passage is the red dress. Macdonald tells us that there's a red dress she'll never wear again, and immediately I get it. I get that the identity of the man is irrelevant; what's relevant is the passion she had for another person and how it connected to her grief, and I feel that passion and grief because there's a red dress she'll never wear again. I can see the dress, hidden away in the back of her closet. I don't have a dress like that, but I could. I get it.

Here's another moment. This one takes place at a much later point, when Macdonald has been grieving for a long time and is finally noticing that she's capable of happiness again:

"But watching television from the sofa later that evening I noticed tears running from my eyes and dropping into my mug of tea. Odd, I think. I put it down to tiredness. Perhaps I am getting a cold. Perhaps I am allergic to something. I wipe the tears away and go to make more tea in the kitchen" (125).

It's hard to write about tears in a way that doesn't feel like a cliché shorthand for sadness, grief, catharsis, whatever you're trying to get across in that moment. Macdonald succeeds here. This dispassionate report of tears conveys what Macdonald needs to convey: that grief is layered; that a person can have many feelings at once; that sometimes your body knows what's going on before the rest of you does; that when you're grieving, sometimes happiness brings with it a tidal wave of sadness. But imagine if Macdonald had listed all those things I just listed, instead of telling us about her tears dropping into her tea. Her way is so much better, and it conveys the same information!

Let me be clear, it's not bad to describe emotion. In fact, it's necessary in places. You need to give your reader an emotional baseline so that they'll know how to contextualize how plot points feel for the character. But if you can find a balance between emotional description and the thing Macdonald is doing here — using action to convey emotion — it will gives the emotion in your writing a freshness, an impact, a punch that you can't get from description alone. It will also give the reader more opportunities to engage their own feelings — to feel things all by themselves, rather than merely understanding what's being felt by the character.

It's hard to write emotion. It's especially hard to figure out non-cliché ways to explain how a character feels. Sometimes it's fine to use a known shorthand or a cliché. Sometimes it's fine to use emotional description. You want a mix of things. But Macdonald's book reminds me that whenever I can, I want to look for ways to use plot to convey feeling. Show what my character does in response to a stimulus. Let the reader glean the emotions from behavior. Your character is happy? Show us what they do with their body. How do they stand, how do they walk? Does it make them generous? Does it make them self-centered and oblivious? Remember that an "action" doesn't have to be something physically, boisterously active. If you're writing a non-demonstrative character, it's not going to ring true if they start flinging their arms around or singing while they walk down the street. But maybe instead of "feeling ecstatic," they sit still for a moment, reveling in what just happened. Maybe instead of "feeling jubilant," they listen to a song playing inside their own head. Internally or externally, show us what they do.

Here's Macdonald describing her childhood obsession with birds:

"When I was six I tried to sleep every night with my arms folded behind my back like wings. This didn't last long, because it is very hard to sleep with your arms folded behind your back like wings." (27)

I can feel the devotion to birds. She doesn't just love birds; she wants to be a bird.

Macdonald goes on to report that as a child, she learned everything she possibly could about falconry, then shared every word of it, no matter how boring, with anyone who would listen. Macdonald's mother was a writer for the local paper. Here's a description of her mother during the delivery of one of Macdonald's lectures:

"Lining up another yellow piece of copy paper, fiddling with the carbons so they didn't slip, she'd nod and agree, drag on her cigarette, and tell me how interesting it all was in tones that avoided dismissiveness with extraordinary facility." (29)

What an endearing depiction of a mother's love for her tedious child :o).

And here's a scene that takes place at a country fair, where Macdonald has agreed to display her goshawk, Mabel, to the public. Macdonald is sitting on a chair under a marquee roof. Mabel is positioned on a perch ten feet behind her. There are so many people at the fair, too many people for the likes of both Macdonald and Mabel:

"After twenty minutes Mabel raises one foot. It looks ridiculous. She is not relaxed enough to fluff out her feathers; she still resembles a wet and particoloured seal. But she makes this small concession to calmness, and she stands there like a man driving with one hand resting on the gear stick." (206)

Oh, Mabel. I get the sense that when it comes to the writer's need to convey emotion, Mabel is a challenging character. Macdonald does such a wonderful job creating a sense of the gulf between a human's reality and a hawk's reality, the differences in perception and priority. But she also gives us moments of connection with Mabel. Since Mabel is a bird, these moments of connection are almost always described through Mabel's behavior.

I wonder if Macdonald's intense connection with the non-human world, and with hawks in particular, is partly what makes her so good at noticing behaviors and gleaning their emotional significance? And then sharing it with us, the lucky readers.

That's it. That's my lesson: When you're trying to convey feelings, find places where an action or behavior will do the job.

And read H Is for Hawk if you want an admirable example of writing emotion! Also, Helen Macdonald has a new book, just released: Vesper Flights. I'm in.

Reading like a writer.

Patrick Soon-Shiong, M.D. and Michele B. Chan Join Prestigious List of Recipients of KCET Visionary Award at 10th Gala H