Category: Contemporary Women Writers
Female Connection And Inspiration
Writers are often asked: “What was the inspiration for your book?” and their responses are, not surprisingly, all over the map. Some writers take their inspiration from a specific place or event. For others, it comes from something they read or watch. I’ve even heard of a few that were inspired by a particular smell. […]
Believe In You By Anju Gattani
Stories don’t just fall from the sky like shooting stars, right? Wrong. When Duty and Desire fell in my lap 19 years ago, it wasn’t an idea, a concept or a seed. Not even a fruit that fell from a tree. But a scene that harpooned my soul. We had moved from Singapore to New […]
Making Nonfiction Your Own By Jennifer Keishin Armstrong
It’s tempting to say that every book is like your first, but the very good news is that it’s not. Having just published my sixth book, I’ve seen your future—if you’re anywhere between books one and five—and I can assure you that it does get easier. It never gets easy, of course. And every one […]
What Running a Bookshop Taught Me About Writing By Natalie Jenner
By Natalie Jenner Four years ago, I realized my lifelong dream of opening a small bookshop near the shore of Lake Ontario, in an idyllic and vibrant downtown community. For someone who had long ago given up trying to get published, yet still craved a way to make books a bigger part of her daily […]
Footnotes in History
Footnotes in History We traveled through the Bear River Valley in the forenoon . . . (it) is tolerably fertile and looks as if it might be well adapted to raising wheat. During the afternoon our road over the mountains was quite slippery in consequence of light showers which fell at intervals during the day. […]
Five Books by Women Writers I’ve Read More Than Once And Why
By Jill McCroskey Coupe, author of BEGINNING WITH CANNONBALLS Psyche: The Feminine Poetic Consciousness, An Anthology of Modern American Women Poets, edited by Barbara Segnitz and Carol Rainey. Dell Publishing Co., 1973. During my first bumbling attempts at creative writing, I devoured this book. I underlined important sections in the Introduction and marked passages in […]
The spark for A WEEK AT THE SHORE
The spark for A WEEK AT THE SHORE Given that I’ve written more than 80 books, approaching a new one is daunting. There are times when I feel I’ve written every story there is to be written – times when I have to struggle to leave my comfort zone in search of an original idea. […]
It’s Been Quite A Process
By Kimberly Dredger Last week, I held in my hands something precious, unbelievable. My first—likely only— novel. What a kick! It’s been quite a journey. The writing of it was magic. Instead of sleep, I’d lie in bed writing passages in my head, and then arise in the wee hours, and type madly. The characters […]
A Kid Interviewer’s Suggestions for Talking with Your Children
As a loving aunt to eight children and a writer who regularly interviews kids, I always ask myself whether I have listened closely and long enough to hear a child’s wisdom in any given conversation. I know for sure every sufficiently verbal kid has insights to share, and I see it as my job to […]
AUTHORS INTERVIEWING THEIR CHARACTERS: Ellen Meeropol
Interviewing the sisters in Her Sister’s Tattoo On a hot August day in 1968, sisters Rosa and Esther march against the war in Vietnam with thousands of others through downtown Detroit. When they hear that mounted police are beating protesters a few blocks away, they hurry to help, to try to stop the violence. In […]
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