I stumble when people ask the simple question what are your books about? I’m not good with canned answers, even though that’s what authors are told to do – find one or two sentences that summarize their books. You know the elevator summaries, like this from The Hustings: A Family Web: When a family estate … More What’s your book about?

Isolation or Inspiration? Time is always at a premium making it very difficult to write, read, organize, talk to friends and family on the phone, or just to sit and think. With COVID19, some of the time constraints may have been lifted. Free hours have not been a bonus for everyone. People who are managing … More Opportunities in COVID19

Simple Ideas to Remember The more a writer reads, the greater his or her chances are for improved writing. That statement seems to be universally accepted. Suppose, for just a moment, that the writer is distracted by the reading material. What if the material is outside the comfort zone and knowledge base of the writer? … More Writers Reading

Writing Amidst the Buzz It’s that beautiful time of year. There is much noise in our lives as we prepare for holidays and celebrations of all kinds. The buzz in the air can be a distraction to any serious writing that often happens on the fringe of the day. One suggestion for mining inspiration is … More Finding Seasonal Ideas

When you have written your characters into a corner and your mojo is leaving, how do you keep the production rate steady? Think about a writing ASSIGNMENT that you had to complete at some point in your life. It could have been an essay for a history class, a chemistry lab report, or a literary … More When Writing Motivation Wanes

When writing with natural speech patterns, authors usually use the correct verb tense with little thought. … More Which verb tense?

There are reasons to write across eras… … More Finding Descriptions

So, where does one begin? … More Preparing to Write a Sequel

Higher levels of critical analysis writing require students to think across texts and authors. Often this practice requires an ability to put aside author style momentarily in order to get to the bottom of how an author has developed a character. … More Cross-textual Character Analysis

…super writers are masters of language… … More A Theory on Super Writers