My son’s Language Arts class is required to do a literary analysis at the end of each quarter on whatever novel they’ve read for fun. I got an email yesterday from one mom [...]

Hi everybody! Hope you’ll pop over to my friend Kaye Barley’s blog, Meanderings and Muses today for my guest post there on “Things I’ve Learned About My Writing Process.” This covers a little [...]

Here are writing links that I’ve posted to Twitter for the past week. I’m delighted that now we have an efficient method of locating resources on writing topics when you need them—via the [...]

I’m pretty sure that I’ve mentioned before what a terrible memory I have. It’s bad.  It’s always been bad, and it’s certainly not improving as I get older, either. The bad thing is [...]

I talked last Saturday a little about setting reasonable goals to encourage ourselves to stay motivated. I think it’s also important to find intrinsic rewards from writing.  I was away most of the [...]

HarperCollins announced that it would only allow 26 borrows of its ebooks at libraries. This, naturally, ignited something of a firestorm. The point of libraries, of course, is to lend books to readers [...]

March is the 14th anniversary of Small Press Month. The organizers of the Small Press Month events state: Held annually in March, Small Press Month raises awareness about the need for broader venues [...]

If you missed yesterday’s post, I’m running a short series on useful tools for writers. The nice thing about writing is that it can be a nearly free activity. But there are tools [...]

I came across this article a few days ago on the WordCount blog on tech tools for writers, and it got me thinking about the tools that I use every day. The nice [...]

Here are writing links that I’ve posted to Twitter for the past week. I’m delighted that now we have an efficient method of locating resources on writing topics when you need them—via the [...]

I would like to be a gardener. Time seems to get in the way of my being one, though. Maintaining the lawn and bushes seems to be all I have time for…and usually [...]

One of my hobbies is working jigsaw puzzles. One of my husband’s hobbies is finding a puzzle to make my life difficult. He has given me puzzles with no edges, puzzles with little [...]

I was picking up a carpool of high school and middle school boys for Scouts on Monday evening. It was absolutely pouring cats and dogs, lightning was illuminating the darkness every couple of [...]

Writing, like life, evolves from the journeys we’ve taken. Adventures, life lessons, relationships, love. Regardless of genre, these are experiences all writers encounter, either within ourselves, with other writers or even with our [...]

I don’t know if y’all subscribe to Writer’s Digest, but this past month’s issue (the February one, pictured left) is especially good, I thought. There was a nice article in the issue called [...]

I think most writers are almost overwhelmed by ideas. The problem is usually too many ideas or getting ideas for new books when they’re not finished with the old one. That’s they way [...]

Here are writing links that I’ve posted to Twitter for the past week. I’m delighted that now we have an efficient method of locating resources on writing topics when you need them—via the [...]

I did our taxes this week, which is cause for tremendous celebration for me. Doing taxes is a real grind, especially sifting through all the bits of paper and receipts that I keep [...]

As I mentioned a couple of weeks ago, I’m working on a new mystery series for Penguin/NAL…a series set in the South that involves a quilting guild. I’ve probably never mentioned my quilting [...]

Sometimes I’d like to be my protagonist. Time moves at a much slower pace for them than it does for the rest of us. Margot Kinberg had a thought-provoking post on her Confessions [...]

I’ve always said, and believed it to be true, that I’ve never been more creative than when I was 9 years old. My whole 4th grade year just crackled with creativity. I wrote [...]

I had an ‘oops-moment’ the other day when someone emailed me and asked me to explain what a cozy mystery was. This is what happens when you get so close to your subject [...]

One of the best bits of advice I picked up last week was this gem from the Gatekeepers Post: author publicity makes better sense than book publicity. It’s something I think I’ve tried [...]

Here are writing links that I’ve posted to Twitter for the past week. I’m delighted that now we have an efficient method of locating resources on writing topics when you need them—via the [...]

“If you don’t have the time to read, you don’t have the time or the tools to write.” Stephen King, On Writing As I mentioned a few days ago, I’m reading Stephen King’s [...]

Each month, I wait for my book club’s pick with some trepidation. Book clubs are frequently fond of books that make me wince a good many times during the course of the novel. [...]

It seems like I’ve unintentionally set up this past week as Protagonist Week. :) Can you tell I’ve been working on a new protagonist for the new series? I’m also reading, at the [...]

I’d heard a lot about the movie The Social Network, and decided to rent it last weekend to see what the fuss was about. The movie was well done, I thought. One thing [...]

I’ve never really thought about it until now, but my friends are very, very specific whenever we set times to meet. I’ll arrange to pick up a friend for lunch or to volunteer [...]

Hannibal from the A-Team always loved it when a plan came together. Unfortunately, the Writer’s Knowledge Base (WKB) didn’t emerge from some well thought out plan. While I’m not a believer in destiny [...]