I’ve been reading more lately. And thinking a lot about books lately. This is not an entirely unusual state of affairs, because any writer worth their salt reads as much as they possibly can. It is simply not possible to be a writer unless you read constantly. But I’ve been even more engrossed in books […]
I am pleased to announce a new claim to fame: this site has been banned in Abu Dhabi. My husband has just returned home from working in the UAE for the better part of the last two months. Everything there is censored–TV shows, movies (which are shown with subtitles in Arabic), and websites. So when […]
I went to a book signing for a book I wrote the other night–only another person, a kind doctor, signed the books. The cover of the book features his smiling face and this same image graces the posters that were propped all around the store. But it would be impossible for you to find even […]
I may have already written about this before–and I reserve the right to write about it again. Does anyone else have that thing where you forget what you’ve written? It’s not age, or fading brain cells, it comes from writing a lot and being so present with what I’m writing that I forget everything that […]
One of the best tools a writer can learn is the art of listening. Actually, learning to listen is a useful tool for any human, period. I spent the weekend in a workshop with people who had varying degrees of skills in listening, which has had me pondering the subject. As my good and wise […]
Geez, things change in an instant. David Cook is no longer the front-runner to be the next American Idol (but I still think he should be, because he has way more artistic integrity than the pipsqueak David Archuleta and I voted for him a gazillion times anyway) and suddenly the TypePad interface is completely different. […]
In my ongoing attempts to takeover secure a spot for myself in the writing corner of the internet, I’ve been researching keywords. This fun little endeavor is part of my effort to find out what y’all want when it comes to writing and writing coaching. (Brief, but very important aside: Tomorrow is the LAST […]
The task of a novelist is to tell a story so riveting that it will hold a reader’s attention for hundreds of pages. To do this, the author must first know the story intimately herself—which is the reason we write rough drafts (also known as “discovery drafts” or, my favorite, from the beloved Anne Lamott, […]
