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.
When Readers Don’t “Get” Your Book: On The Delicate Subject of Difficult Books
When Readers Don’t “Get” Your Book: On The Delicate Subject of Difficult Books By Lindsay Merbaum “I had to actually read every word of your book!” is a comment I’ve now heard a few times in response to my debut experimental queer feminist horror novel The Gold Persimmon, (is that enough of a mouthful for […]
On Research: When Enough Is Enough
Since my forthcoming book, My Secret to Keep, is historical, I thought writing an essay on when to stop researching would be fun. This is pretty bold of me since I’m still researching a book that was published two years ago. But here goes. When Enough Is Enough But before I start, I want to […]
The Present Absent and the Figurative Literal: A Craft Lesson from Marilynne Robinson’s Classic Novel Housekeeping
The Present Absent and the Figurative Literal: A Craft Lesson from Marilynne Robinson’s Classic Novel Housekeeping Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson has been hailed a classic, defining the contemporary novel for writers and readers of our time. First published in 1980, the book, a debut novel, was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and […]
The Inspiration Behind The Shell and the Octopus
by Rebecca Stirling This story did not begin as a memoir. It did not even begin as my own story. I was asked by a close family friend, after his fourth bout with cancer, to write his story, because I knew it the best. Charlie is now a character in my memoir. He inspired my […]
How Social Media Made Me a Better Author
How Social Media Made Me a Better Author I know, I know—this is kind of an annoying headline, because most of us have a love/hate relationship with social media, but hear me out! For the past ten years, I’ve worked as a social media manager for companies like BuzzFeed, Netflix, and Amazon Prime video. Much […]
Authors Interviewing Characters: Penny Goetjen
Author Penny Goetjen interviews Victoria Sands from her new novel The Woman Underwater in which Victoria feels torn between hanging onto the hope her husband is still alive, after his disappearance seven years earlier, and the desire to move on with her life. She’s caught in an undertow of unanswered questions, submerged in a watery […]
“Keeping Up” an essay from The Kitchen is Closed and Other Benefits of Being Old
“Keeping Up” an essay from The Kitchen is Closed and Other Benefits of Being Old by Sandra Butler Either everything is getting faster, or I’ve slowed down to a crawl. I’ve decided to go with the former. It seems that it was just Wednesday four days ago, yet it’s Wednesday again now and there are […]
Nicola Matthews – My Writing Inspiration
Nicola Matthews – My Writing Inspiration I live on a peninsular which has a very distinctive feel with its ragged inlets, silken mudflats and wide open skies. My protagonist, Kitty, walked this same landscape three hundred years earlier. Although it would have changed somewhat, it is the same ground, the same rhythm of tides that […]
Forgotten Tudor Women: Writing Women Back Into the Historical Narrative
Forgotten Tudor Women: Writing Women Back Into the Historical Narrative “Divorced, Beheaded, Died. Divorced, Beheaded, Survived.” Most British school children learn this rhyme to help them remember the fate of each of Henry VIII’s six wives. The names of Henry’s queens are well-known: Katharine of Aragon, Anne Boleyn, Jane Seymour, Anne of Cleves, Katherine Howard […]
What Makes Authors Real?
WHAT MAKES AUTHORS REAL? By Christina Hamlett Once upon a long ago time, a velveteen rabbit felt insecure and inadequate when he looked around at the fancier, mechanical toys in the playroom. How could he live a happy life when the bar to perfection was set too high and beyond his reach? Even real rabbits […]
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