Category: On Writing
Seven Essential Writing Exercises
Rich Characters and Dialogues that Drive the Story: 7 Practical Exercises to Avoid Falling Flat By Chrystyna Lucyk-Berger I will never forget sitting in that room full of grad students in a creative writing class at the University of Minnesota, My short story was coming up for critique. Here was the problem: I was a […]
The-It’s-Never-Too-Late Edition: Publishing A Debut Novel At 79
By Anne Oman, author of MANGO RAINS (published by Galaxy Galloper Press) To make life complete, you’re supposed to bear a child, plant a tree, and write a book. Not sure who said that. It’s been attributed to the Talmud, Cuban revolutionary Jose Marti, an obscure Czech poet, and maybe even Mark Twain and Yogi […]
AREN’T YOU FORGETTING SOMEONE? Excerpt
Kari Lizer is a gifted comedic storyteller. She is an Emmy-nominated, co-executive producer and writer for Will & Grace and creator of the award-winning show, The New Adventures of Old Christine, which was based on her life as a single working mother raising three kids. Lizer recently signed with ABC for her new comedy series, […]
The Antidote for Us Versus Them
Hoax! On my screen was what looked like a painted daguerreotype family portrait from an era when people lived in hand-hewn log cabins, raised shoats, and wore dresses sewn from potato sacks, but what made this portrait surely a work of trickery was the color of the complexion of five family members: bright, shocking, no-doubt-about-it […]
Authors Interviewing Characters: Angela Barton
Angela Barton interviews her character Arlette Blaise, the main character of her novel ARLETTE’S STORY. Arlette’s story takes place in the French village of Oradour-sur-Glane during WWII. The SS Panzer Division Das Reich, destroyed it during WWII and today it is preserved In a Ruined State. (find out more here) About Arlette’s Story: One woman’s struggle […]
When Writing Flows (Or Doesn’t!) by Phaedra Patrick
Before I got a publishing deal for my novels, I had an image in my head of what writers did all day and how they looked. They wore a satin robe, drank copious amounts of wine and often smoked long slim cigarettes. They lived in their heads, in a kind of serene wonderland where magical […]
An Intangible Legacy By Meera Ekkanath Klein
An Intangible Legacy By Meera Ekkanath Klein My family’s past is shrouded in legend, myth and history. That’s because my lineage comes from the ancient matrilineal tradition, once prevalent in the southern state of Kerala in India. Now, it is a fading memory, barely remembered. The origin of this venerable tradition is the stuff of […]
I Can’t Breathe…
Hendrika de Vries is the author of When a Toy Dog Became a Wolf and the Moon Broke Curfew: a memoir about her childhood in Nazi-occupied WWII Amsterdam. “I can’t breathe…” “I can’t breathe” whispered George Floyd as a white man in authority put his knee on his neck and crushed him to death. “I can’t breathe” […]
Writing About the Environment for Teens
By Tracy Richardson, author of The Field (April, 2019), Catalyst (June, 2020) and Indian Summer (Sept., 2020) I’m a science geek. Everything about the natural world engages and amazes me. From observing a snail inching a slick path on a rotten stump during one of my hikes, to contemplating the vastness of the unknowable Universe, […]
What We Don’t Talk About When We Talk About #MeToo
JoAnn Wypijewski’s book What We Don’t Talk About When We Talk About #MeToo: Essays on Sex, Authority & the Mess of Life is just out from Verso. Maybe there is no good time to put out a collection, but this seems to be the worst of times—unless one has been writing about contagion, public health, […]
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