Tag: fiction
The Power of Never Giving Up
Time flies. We all know it. Whether you’re having fun or not. Whether the years are filled with sublime happiness or utter sadness, or, like most of us, with a combination of both. It simply goes, and sometimes, our dreams go with it. We turn around and ten or twenty years have whipped by and […]
Cooking And Writing
I’m at one of those spots in my book where I’ve made a wrong turn somewhere, and I don’t quite know what the mistake is. Maybe a character did something wrong. Maybe a scene has veered off-track. Maybe a backstory bit that’s not going to work with the emerging story. Something. And until I figure […]
The Inspiration Behind Strangers On A Bridge
I have lived in various locations in Switzerland on and off for more than thirty years. The Alps certainly have their fair share of beauty for inspirational settings for a novel. Think of Hemingway’s Farewell to Arms or DH Lawrence’s Women in Love where the reader’s imagination is transported to the mountains by the sheer […]
A Day in the Life of a Writer: Elyssa Friedland
While I was asked to write about a typical day in my life as a novelist, it would have been more appropriate to call this piece “A Night in the Life of a Writer” because my brain becomes most active in the hour before I fall asleep. I lie in bed and think about what […]
Listening for the Heartbeat by Eliza Maxwell
Sometime back in the days before Instagram and Snapchat I found myself in a place I never expected to be. Exhausted. Two babies in two years and I didn’t know if I’d ever see another full night’s sleep. The Dance of Diapers and Bottles was taking a toll physically, yet the mental seesaw between utter […]
When Truth Is Stranger Than Fiction . . . and Then Becomes Fiction
My book began as a list of men’s names scrawled on the back of a cocktail napkin. I was at drinks with friends, relating the details of my latest Match.com dates. I’d been dumped before the first kiss, donned full HAZMAT gear on a third date, and, been set up with another date’s mom. I’d fallen—hard—for a […]
What Happens When An Unreliable Character Pops Into Your Head?
The short answer: you write his story. Here’s what happened to me. Last summer I was working on the first book in what would be a women’s fiction series at the request of my agent. You see, with the exception of one of my previous novels, my books were considered women’s fiction, even though some […]
Writing in Disaster’s Wake
In January 2013, less than three months after Hurricane Sandy struck the East Coast, an audience of volunteers studied the diagram on the screen. Titled “Emotional Phases of a Disaster,” the figure resembled a tremulous, lopsided W, each point labeled with a stage in a community’s typical reaction to catastrophe: Pre-Disaster, Impact, Heroic, Honeymoon, Disillusionment […]
Falling in Love with the Enemy
After the end of the Second World War, my aunt married a German whom she had met before the war began. They were deeply in love but, for obvious reasons, the marriage sent shock waves through my family and no doubt through his. It must have taken all their determination and courage to weather the […]
Getting Past the Opening: Where to Start your Novel
We sit in front of the keyboard, poised, with an idea for a book spinning in our head, and find ourselves afraid to start. After all, we are aware we have one paragraph, or three at best, to capture the attention of the reader. What do we do? My friend and mentor, Elizabeth Searle, offered […]
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