Author Archive: Women Writers Women Books
Dutch by birth and serial emigrant, Barbara currently lives with her husband and daughter in a tiny village in Galicia, Spain, as basic and simple as can be. W Barbara's website.
Authors Interviewing Characters: Lee Upton
About Tabitha, Get Up: Tabitha, Get Up is a comic novel about an ambitious but perpetually out-of-luck biographer trying to create her own story. In an effort to restore her self-respect and pay her rent, Tabitha leaps at the chance to write two biographies during the same summer: one about a stunningly handsome actor; the […]
Authors Interviewing Characters: Pamela Statz
Thorn City: A Novel Suspected murder, eclectic food trucks, and artisanal cocaine: just another day in Thorn Cit It’s the night of the Rose City Ripe for Disruption gala—a gathering of Portland’s elite. Dressed to kill in sparkling minidresses, best friends Lisa and Jamie attend as “paid to party” girls. They plan an evening of […]
On Writing California Dreaming by Noa Silver
California Dreaming is, in many ways, a love letter both to the Bay Area and to the twenties, “that unmoored, tripped-out decade between childhood and adulthood.” The book started in the spring of 2018 with just one scene. I was working on a project in downtown San Francisco, and I would take the train into the […]
Are You Afraid of What Might Bleed onto the Page?
By Nicole Meier In 2020, something unexpected happened to me. I’m not talking about the pandemic. I’m referring to a snag in my writing life. That year I penned a new novel manuscript and was feeling pretty good about it. In a flurry of inspiration, I rushed it off to my literary agent who, in […]
Three Genre-Crossing Blunders To Avoid
Three mistakes I made—and you don’t have to—when writing a first mystery or suspense novel By Andromeda Romano-Lax Recently, my first suspense novel, The Deepest Lake, was published by Soho Crime. It’s my sixth novel and a departure from my previous genres of historical fiction and literary fiction. Many people ask me why I made […]
Authors Interviewing Characters: Mary Pascual
WALK THE WEB LIGHTLY Fourteen-year-old Naya’s family is all about heritage: their art, their traditions, their secret ability to see time. Naya loves to walk the timelines, seeing people’s past and all of their potential futures, watching the world around her. There is one person she has noticed who always seems to be on the […]
What Men Whisper in the Green Room at Literary Festivals
In this piece, acclaimed writer Deanne Stillman talks about obstacles she still runs into, in spite of her extensive credits and numerous awards. “That’s very ambitious,” an editor said recently, in reference to my description of a new book I’m working on. Why not a throwaway compliment such as “sounds great”? I wondered to myself, as I […]
The Two Best Tips for Writing a Strong Story: Put Characters in Conflict
To write a strong novel or story, you need characters in conflict. But conflict doesn’t just come from dramatic things happening. It comes from the character—what he or she needs and wants, and why he or she can’t get it easily. If those aspects are strong, your writing will be dramatic. Let’s start with a […]
On Scary Women, by Lynn Schmeidler
It was in high school physics class, talking with Liz and Alan. Alan was talking about some girl he wanted to ask out (he was asking our advice, what should he say?) and I was a little sad, a little jealous. I had a crush on Alan. Liz asked him something about what he’d say […]
Who Am I? And Does It Matter?
By Valerie Taylor At what point does a writer admit to themselves (and others) that they are, in fact, a living breathing author? Must certain events take place in order for that moniker to be valid? Events such as completion of a book’s first draft; or when that manuscript is submitted for review to an […]
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