I have been waiting more than a year for the new Haven Kimmel book, The Farm, to be released by Waterstones in England. That’s why I penned into my blog calendar to make March 2014 Haven Kimmel Month. I was going to re-read all of her books (two memoirs, a children’s book, one YA, and four…
I always celebrate Oscars Night. For one, I like movies. For two, and more importantly for me, I can pretty easily digest a whole year’s worth of pop culture by participating in only a few televised events per annum. For three, I rarely pass up a celebration which can involve traditional food (ahem, pizza rolls…
In February, I joined something like 10,000 authors entering the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Awards contest. I did it with some reservations, because really I love self-publishing so much I am reluctant about a contract with anyone. However, a pay check and reader feedback–oh, and recognition–this is all important to my career. The catch with the…
The Night of One Hundred Thieves first draft? Check! Determine if it is a novella or a novel? Plllt. First things first. What the heck is a novella? Is it Italian? Does it have a moral or a “satirical bent?” Is it produced in parts? The answer to all of these internet jabs at the…
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald and published by Simon & Schuster in 1925. Notes and preface by Matthew J. Bruccoli. Let me just say, one of the best things about reading this book was its history in the forward. Not that I would wish this on anyone, but knowing that The Great Gatsby–widely…
It has been a month of the unexpected, driven by the weather and that nasty flu bug. I’m sure we were in the same boat as lots of people. Work-wise, it was Self Help month here on the blog, and I read only two books the whole month (the second, in one day). See here…
We are leaving behind the Superbowl, not to mention Puxatawny Phil and our New Year’s resolutions, and are headed dead-on for Valentines Day (February 14) and the Oscars (March 2). In celebration of the Oscars and of movies in general, I am going to spend the month of February reading great books that made great…
Of course, my goal for January was to read as many of the self help books I have sitting unread on my book shelf, as I could. I never intended to post book reviews as I finished each book, since these are nowhere to be found on the “Best Books” list. That worked out fine,…
I am no stranger to the forced pause. I am a migraine patient (aka migraneur) and have been since I was five years old. I have what used to be called classic migraine, which means my symptoms include blindness or partial blindness, confusion, disrupted speech, etc. on top of the usual pain, nausea, sensitivity to…
Let’s be smart about this. I am all for intuition, as a writer. But the other day, I had a moment where my subconscious writing process made a leap to my consciousness, and that’s when one can all of a sudden share that process. We’ll call it a teachable moment. Whereas before what I was…
You know what overwhelms me? Yeah, well, plenty of things. But I am referring to my daily walks from the desk in the quiet room of the library to the restroom or drinking fountain. Book covers! There are just so many of them! There are so many great ones! And surely not all those books…
Besides being buried under the holidays, I managed to take some new head shots in December. They are needed for book promotion in 2014, so I came in right under the line. But only when my husband–a newly signed actor–needed his head shots, did I join him and our camera in the back yard for…
Have you managed any New Year’s Resolutions, yet? Are any of them writing-related? I, for example, have goals to write my business plan, to read and review more than 40 books, to publish two of my novels, edit another for Owl and Zebra, and win at NaNoWriMo 2014. Which brings up my first point of…
Samuel Beckett, Waiting for Godot: A Tragicomedy in Two Acts, 1952 by Grove Press. The play was first written in French, and translated later by the author himself. Seems everywhere I turn, “Waiting for Godot” is lauded as the height of theater in the 20th century, if not the best literature of the 20th century.…
I have a friend who is sort of like an oracle of writing advice. It seems like any time we are having writing conversation, he pops out some real gems. Last time I was talking to him, I took notes, so here is a combination of my own contributions and thoughts with his excellent, random…
Sitting in my most recent writers’ club meeting, my mind wandered to the issue of the modern reader and how a writer should and would respond. Most specifically, I was thinking about the attention span and the action requirements of the modern reader. Personally, I can relate. I have adult ADHD and even though I…
I pay close attention to first lines. One of my writer aspirations is to have such a great first line that they’ll be begging me to use it in the “First Lines” section of Poets & Writers. I read that section, every month, scrutinizing the novel lines. Then whenever I start a new book, I…
With NaNoWriMo, I honesty haven’t been taking in too much to entertainment, even reading (which is like half-entertainment, half-work). My plan for these last two months was several books, but I haven’t even finished one all month (unless you count the first book of Parade’s End, which I guess we should). We did, early on,…
I hate losing. Not that I’m very competitive. I like other people to win, too. But I also hate losing and I love being first. I lost NaNoWriMo. There was no avoiding it, for me. I severely sprained my spine (read: ruptured a disk) on October 30 and spent the first several days of November…
They all said to make a plan. I even chirped the same advice to my writing friends: October should be NaNoPlaMo, National Novel Planning Month, we said. Because if you want to succeed at the 50,000 words demanded of you to conquer National Novel Writing Month in November, you want to have all guns blazing…
the starving artist 