Meg Houston is behind the excellent blog "Maker's Table", and her most recent post is her address to the Wine Bloggers Conference in NY on August 16th. The topic is 'Wine Blogging', which is relevant for us here at IbD not only because we will be writing our own wine blog here on /wine, but also because we think it may be interesting for you.
Excerpt:
As a nonfiction writer, you are a proxy for the reader. The reader relies on you to ask the questions she would ask if she were the one tasting with the producer, or walking with him in his vineyard, or stomping his grapes with him, your pant legs rolled up, your calves purpled. Have you ever listened to Terry Gross, who hosts the radio interview program Fresh Air? She asks the questions you’re thinking before you even know you’re thinking them. That’s good interviewing.
If you want to be a good nonfiction writer—if you want to be a better nonfiction writer—you must read good nonfiction writing. Read food and wine writing, both in periodical and book form, but don’t only read food and wine writing. Read the New Yorker. Read the Atlantic. Buy new nonfiction books about almost anything and read them, and while you’re reading, look at how the writer—and, let’s be fair, the editors—are stitching the narrative together.
I suggest you go read the whole thing if you are interested in this topic. And make sure to keep an eye on Maker's Table. We certainly will.
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