Category: Contemporary Women Writers
Seasoned Romance Empowers us All
A decade ago my friends and I started a monthly gathering called “Dirty Old Women.” There we were, in our fifties and sixties, reading our sexy stories to a packed audience in a California bookstore. Women in their thirties would thank us afterwards because everywhere else they went, the message they heard was romance and […]
What Hallmark Taught Me by Mary Flynn
By Mary Flynn On the very first day that I “cared enough to send the very best,” I sat down with the Editorial Director of Hallmark Cards in Kansas City. I admit I felt intimidated. As someone who routinely wrote book reviews for The New York Times, Web Schott was the most serious and erudite […]
The Inspiration for my Book: A Song, Chekhov’s Gun, and Heroes
By I.M. Aiken The wisdom at our dining table involved “write what you know.” What does a kid know? My answer was: join the volunteer fire department, earn your EMT, work in the inner city on urban ambulances, sail the oceans on long voyages, work as a cook, teach skiing professionally, move to Alaska, spend […]
Authors Interviewing Characters: Cynthia Reeves
Cynthia Reeves’s novel The Last Whaler is an elegiac meditation on the will to survive. Tor, a beluga whaler, and his wife, Astrid, a botanist specializing in Arctic flora, are stranded during the dark season of 1937-38 at his remote whaling station in the Svalbard archipelago when they misjudge ice conditions and fail to rendezvous […]
Something New From Something Old – On Creating a Linked Story Collection
I grew up in a family of dedicated New Yorker readers, and my taste was formed early on by the stories of J.D. Salinger, Ann Beattie, and Raymond Carver. Decades of reading would pass before I started writing myself, but when I did, back in 2009, my hope was to publish a collection. A goal that seemed […]
Turning Trauma into Fiction for Young Adults
In 2017, I published my young adult urban fantasy novel *The Great and the Small*, a story delving into themes of good and evil that had intrigued me since childhood. The first edition primarily followed Ananda, a troubled teenage girl, and Fin, a young tunnel rat who, as a loyal follower of his uncle, the […]
Vermilion Harvest: Playtime at the Bagh by Reenita Hora: Excerpt
Reenita Hora is the unrivaled ‘Nora Ephron’ of South Asian storytelling, spinning yarns as eclectic as Mumbai’s iconic ‘Bhel Puri’ – a tantalizing concoction of flavors with an occasional bug for that extra crunch! Her stories star a motley crew of characters caught in the whirlwind of gloriously imperfect scenarios, all while stubbornly refusing to […]
From Super Collaborator to Solo Historical Novelist
By Peggy Joque Williams If I could claim to have a writerly Superpower, it’s that I am a great collaborator. As far back as sixth grade I was collaborating with friends, spending our summer evenings brainstorming and passing around the notebook as we wrote the next great Beatles movie after A Hard Day’s Night came […]
How Women Experience Illness: One Mystery at a Time
By Kate Michaelson It’s a good bet you know at least one woman with a complex, ongoing health issue—whether it’s an autoimmune disease, endometriosis, or something not yet diagnosed. Maybe you deal with an issue like this yourself. I’m one of those women too. In fact, my own quest for a diagnosis is part of […]
Does the World Really Need Another Beach Book? (Yes!)
By Suzanne Kamata I have always loved going to the beach. I grew up near Lake Michigan, and while my family did not live on the shore, I had friends who did. I loved hanging out at their houses, where we’d watch sunsets, hold bonfires on the beach, or just go for long walks, scuffing […]
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