Tag: featured
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 […]
Make Like a Nun and Get Your Writing Habit On
What habit might that be, you ask? Is it: The habit of sitting down to write at the same time in the same location each and every day even though Spring is here and your hands would rather be digging in the dirt than pounding on the keys? The habit of editing a draft over […]
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 […]
When Opportunity Knocks, Answer The Door
There’s only one secret to success, and it’s hardly a secret. When opportunity knocks, answer the door. You’d be surprised how many people don’t. They turn up the TV while glancing warily through the window, sighing in relief as opportunity moves on to another house. Here’s why it’s important not to do that. Every accomplishment, […]
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 […]
5 Tips to Turn Ordinary Interactions into Book Sales
In the course of a day, even introverted writers (which I must admit, I’m not) have the opportunity to turn everyday interactions into book buzz. This week alone, I was talking to the Macy’s clerk and as she hung the cute new dress I was buying, I mentioned that I had a book coming out […]
Writing an Authentic YA Voice
We all remember what it feels like to be a teenager, right? A tumultuous time filled with angst and first love and new friends and burgeoning independence. Whether we had positive or negative experiences in our high school years, they tend to stick with us. I speak for myself when I say that I remember […]
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 […]
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