Lots of free, good-hearted advice comes your way as a writer, as in: “I have a great story. Let me tell it to you and you write it.” Or “You’re writing about X. Be sure to put in Y.” My…

My first published creative pieces were short stories that warped in some way from my own life. I didn’t realize the generative power of research and assumed that for historical  fiction, you read sources and took notes, rather as for…

There’s a German Shepherd in the neighborhood who likes to bark in the afternoons. Since this was meant to be a writing afternoon, I’ve been tense. Barking isn’t an intrinsically soothing sound and I prefer silence for writing rather than,…

Granted this is a fairly trivial topic, but ask an anxious writer how many ways there are to lose time while fretting over a passage and you’ll get a lot of interesting answers. So I was walking Jesse the dog…

Deep into the seriousness of preparing my manuscript for HarperCollins, I had the great experience of Brent Thompson’s Write Nite in the upper room of Knoxville’s Preservation Pub. It was fun, with edge and beer, very Cheers-like, a little rap,…

The New York Public Library has an exhibit on characters of Charles Dickens, including illustrations, notes, merchandising (he was very into this) and some astonishing quotes. Like this one: “If I could have married Little Red Riding Hood, I should…

In going through some papers of my college teaching years, I came upon a handout which I innocently thought would be enough to warn students out of blind faith in Spell-Check. Alas, faith is hard to shake. Here is the…

We went to a friend’s house last weekend at Laurel Mountain Lake, near Sweetwater, Tennessee. As you see: water, sky, peace. No phone, TV or internet (and I don’t have a fancy phone so really no internet). It is astonishing…

I’m revising today, staring at the screen and perhaps that brings the odd thoughts. For instance: 1. Did it ever strike you as odd that black marks on a page (or screen) arranged in certain ways can bring an emotional,…

So there you are gripping your book, literary magazine or print out of the pages you’ll read to a group of People Who Come to Readings. You are listening, you hope seeming wholly attentive, to the previous reader or else…