David L. Lukudu/ Blog

Inspiring message from Lee Child:

The truth about becoming a writer with Lee Child | Meet your Maestro | BBC Maestro ✍️ Every great writer starts somewhere. Join as a channel member to access exclusive courses from world-class writers like Lee Child and Alan Moore, all righ...

Wow. Finally, I completed Raymond Carver's Where I'm Calling From, The Selected Stories, after owning it for over a decade, and only started reading several weeks ago.

This is indeed "the essential Raymond Carver story collection". Carver (b. 1938 - d. 1988) was described as "the American Chekov" in the Sunday Times and "the master craftsman of the modern American short story" in the Daily Telegraph. He was a renowned minimalist, with the writing style characterised by leanness and simplicity; the reader expected to take part in the imagination of the details.

Some of the themes explored in the book were alcoholism, blindness, middle age crisis, divorce, old age, death, etc. I found a great deal of the stories engrossing and touching. "Cathedral" with blindness as a theme, said to be Carver's very best, still stands out. But it was "A Small, Good Thing", after I had long finished reading, that got me thinking for long: about the story itself and how it was well-written; about the pressures of life reflected in it; about how we strife day in day out to make ends meet; about how we relate to each other as humans, even when we are not blood-related, and how this can impact on our very lives; about family life and family love; about how we do not accept death in our families and how we cope with it when it finally strikes; about how we console those who have lost their dear ones ... etc. ... etc.

In a few words, the writings are serious and engaging and relevant.

Thumbs up to these guys making South Sudanese proud! All the best in the biggest tournament, come 25th August to 10th Septemper.

Reinforced South Sudan an emerging force, not just Cinderella 😤

https://www.fiba.basketball/basketballworldcup/2023/news/team-profile-reinforced-south-sudan-an-emerging-force-not-just-cinderella

x 🇸🇸