Tag: featured
How To Use Your Inspiration Effectively
Every now and then someone asks me where I get my inspiration. My answer must sound vague and generalized, maybe even tinted with avoidance. However, it is one hundred percent true. Inspiration is everywhere. I’ve traveled some wonderful places, and sure, inspiration is there. But the best sparks I’ve ever had sprouted from something simple; […]
THE CHAMELEON LEADER
By Dr. Ranya Nehmeh Chameleons are small slow-moving lizards with an extended tail, protruding eyes and a long tongue. The most unique characteristic of the chameleon is its ability to change colour in order to adapt and blend into its surroundings. If we take these characteristics and use the chameleon as a metaphor for a […]
Writing Challenges: Part I of III: Who Are You To Tell This Tale?
Who Are You to Tell This Tale? It took me a long time to love writing. When I first started out, my writer friends and I used to commiserate about how horrible it was, how hard it was to make ourselves sit in that chair, how we couldn’t wait to get something, anything, on the […]
Writing As A Nobody
Absolution, Regina Buttner’s captivating debut, draws back the curtain of a seemingly perfect marriage to reveal the dark and complex dynamic between a manipulative narcissist and a woman desperate to make amends for her past. The story reveals that when we seek forgiveness, we must also accept it for ourselves.” – Kaira Rouda, USA Today bestselling author of The Favorite Daughter I […]
The Best Character I Never Wrote—Unless You Count the Prologue and Epilogue
Her name was Kate, and she was eleven. She had a best friend named Emma, a father who was (still is, actually) a renowned oncologist, and a mother who vied with Florence Henderson (of the Brady Bunch) for Mother of the Year. Kate was dead from the moment I created her. She had long blond […]
A Writer’s Dream
“When will you stop checking out books from the library and start writing?” My husband asked me this more than six months after my announcement that I was going to write a novel set in Spain during both medieval and modern times. In it, I would explore endangered connections between cultures that are vital to […]
The Process Of Writing THE NIGHT OF THE FLOOD
The process of writing The Night of the Flood I wanted to describe the process of writing my debut novel in a way that would be helpful to other writers so I thought I would tell it as a narrative. This story, like most classic tales, is in three acts. Act One. Beginning. It was […]
Certain Cure Origins
Would you be willing to have a nanochip implanted if it could cure cancer? What if it’s the fountain of youth? That’s the premise of Jennifer Valoppi’s novel CERTAIN CURE: WHERE SCIENCE MEETS RELIGION. By Jennifer Valoppi “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” Sir Arthur C. Clarke, scientist, author and futurist. As a […]
A Strong Sense of Place
Should I have chosen an exotic location in which to set my new novel? Research can be done anywhere in the world (or at least, it could, pre-covid). Armed with a suitcase, laptop and my writing head firmly switched on, I set forth on a magical adventure to research my new book. But it was […]
From Nurse to Author by Nancy J. Cohen
In my early days, I wrote poetry, short stories, a Shakespearian-type play and multiple travel journals. But my main ambition was to become a nurse. I wanted to help relieve a patient’s anxiety about being sick and in the hospital. To this end, I worked as a paid nurse’s aide during my college summers. I […]
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