Tag: featured
Radio Daze: How Working In Broadcasting Influences My Fiction
“Let the listener invent their own dragon.” I can’t remember who uttered this line, but it has stayed in my mind since last century, when I took a BBC News Skills training course in London. The nervy young broadcast journalists renamed it News Kills. Until a man in tweed came to our stuffy classroom to […]
So You Want to Be a Detective
We writers are many things. Sometimes, our subjects make us into even more. When writing and promoting The Magician’s Lie, which features a stage magician as its main character, I did a lot of thinking about the similarities between illusionists and novelists. And to write my new book Girl in Disguise, inspired by the life […]
Please Don’t Give Up
This is for all the struggling writers out there who are considering giving up. Please don’t. What if Kathryn Stockett had given up? Or J.K. Rowling? Sure, they’re big names so I’ll throw in other big names, friends and colleagues: Camille de Maio, Julie Buxbaum, Emily Carpenter, and Jamie Brenner to name a few. The […]
Five Books, Five Destinations: A Mystery Tour
“Reading a good book is like taking a journey.” * I write mysteries, not travel books. So my journeys usually take me to the exotic locale of Buffalo, New York. If this sounds incongruous, let me explain. The best stories are all rooted somewhere. And at times, the setting itself is like a main character […]
Sweet Instead of Spicy: Writing Sweet Romance in a Fifty Shades Kind of World
Pounding hearts and sweaty body parts. Looks of lust and feverish kisses. Sexy words and entwined limbs. Foreplay leading to racy scenes, blush-inducing positions, and unbridled passion. These are the things romance novels are made of. Or are they? As a sweet romance writer living in a writing world where Fifty Shades of Grey […]
Writing, Redemption, and Pop Music
My “difficult second novel,” as yet unpublished, bears the rather ambitious title The History of the World in Pop Music. It’s not actually a history of the world in pop music, it’s the story of a girl growing up in an Irish Catholic family in Liverpool in the 1970s who discovers that the stepfather she […]
In conversation with Sonia Taitz, author of Great With Child
Having gone to law school and practiced law for several years, what made you decide to write books? I was one of those people, common in the children of immigrants, who wanted to “succeed” in academics and my career without really knowing what I wanted out of life beyond that. I always loved writing […]
In Support of New-Adult Fiction
In the world of writing, we all know that we should not write to trends, and we all know the reasons why that doesn’t work. Nevertheless, we all hope that when our work-in-progress someday emerges into the world, it will fit right in with the current mega-bestsellers. That happened to me with new-adult fiction. 2012 […]
Indian Cooking and Storytelling: Similarities
When someone says “India”, the free associated word that often pops up in mind is “spices.” India and its cooking methods are becoming a world known phenomenon. What few people know is that Indian story telling is greatly inspired by Indian cooking. As a matter of fact, in India the Theory of Dramatics— Bharat Natya […]
Growing as a Writer
No matter what stage you are at with your writing – whether you write for pleasure, or in the hope of achieving your publishing dream, or are busy writing your third bestseller – there’s always something new to learn. Here are my suggestions for making the most of your journey as a writer: Join a […]
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