Category: On Writing
Place Settings
I’ve often said that I could live in an airlock in outer space for the rest of my life and never miss fresh air. Fresh baked bread, I’d miss. But sunshine, a cool breeze, and the way the moonlight dances across the surface of the ocean? Meh. Suffice it to say, I am not what […]
Insults, Ordinary objects, and Empathy: A Doctor Discusses Empathy Through Writing
My first meeting with Neslihan Senoçak, an expert on medieval Italy, didn’t start well. I was in the early stages of writing my first novel, The Scribe of Siena, and I’d managed to get Nesli to meet with me. But she looked suspicious. After several minutes of introductory niceties, I realized why. She expected the […]
Catharsis
Over the years, my reading tastes have run the gamut from bodice rippers to serious literary works. I’ve devoured spy novels and biographies alike; lapped up women’s fiction and mysteries of all kinds. As a rule, if a story can elicit strong emotion, I’m all over it. Although lately, all I want to do is […]
Writing Menopause
Writing Menopause: An Anthology of Fiction, Poetry and Creative Nonfiction is a diverse and robust collection about menopause: a highly charged and often undervalued transformation. It includes over fifty works of fiction, creative nonfiction, poetry, interviews and cross-genre pieces from contributors across Canada and the United States that break new ground in portraying menopause. The […]
Patient H69: The Story of my Second Sight
I am methodically gathering visual information from those around me – building a mental picture of what I look like. I’m told my pupils are hugely and disturbingly dilated, the blue irises overtaken by black, unseeing orbs. I imagine that I resemble an owl, or with my increasingly unkempt hair, a zombie from a bad […]
The Memoir I Did Not Plan to Write
The best memoirs read like novels with their shaped plots and fully developed characters, yet the experience of reading a memoir can have a compelling power that fiction does not always match. The knowledge that the story we are reading is true and the immediacy of the author’s voice bring us into direct relation to […]
Invisible Women In The History Of Literature
As a child, I loved to write secrets in invisible ink. When I wrote words with orange juice, they could be read only in the heat of a candle flame. And that is how it felt when looking for women writers to balance the record during my research for A Biography of Story, A Brief […]
Interview with Smadar Herzfeld and Translator Aloma Halter
Smadar’s Herzfeld’s novel Trail of Miracles, translated by Aloma Halter, follows Gittel, a Ukrainian, Hasidic, Jewish woman as she makes a once-in-a-lifetime pilgrimage and discovers the unique gifts she brings to the world. The lyric beauty of Gittel’s voice will mesmerize readers into following her on her Trail of Miracles. Smadar, I am curious about […]
What College Math Taught Me About Writing
I remember the first time I cried in the shower. It wasn’t over a boy. And it didn’t involve a falling out with a friend. It was about numbers—and one big, fat letter. I had just finished my first semester at college and received my grades in the mail. This was, as you’ve already imagined, […]
All The Best People: Interview with Sonja Yoerg
New York Times bestselling author, Chris Bohjalian, writes that Sonja Yoerg’s All the Best People contains “Not just the best people, but real people: authentic, quirky and troubled. I cared for them all.” I couldn’t have said it better. Yoerg immerses us in family in crisis; instead of looking away, we become invested in their […]
Recent Comments