But almost no one wants to write. Even writers don't always want to. Let's define a writer, shall we? Because I've met people who write my socks off, yet they don't consider themselves "writers" because they've never been published. (Nevermind the fact that they've not actually submitted anything!) Any person who writes regularly is a… Continue reading Everyone Wants to be a Writer
I stood at the top of the cliff trying to work up the guts. It could be done, had already been done by others. But one could also slip on the rock and not get the distance required to clear the pregnant, jagged outcropping. One could misinterpret her strength and pay dire consequences for doing… Continue reading Unlike me, Jesus Didn’t Feel the Need to Prove Himself
First off, people think you're SO fun. You’re free-spirited, casual, instinctive, impetuous, unconstrained, uncontrived, uncontrolled. (And able to use the thesaurus.) You've got them fooled. Being spontaneous is a strategic decision. Deliberate. Planned. Premeditated. Intentional. To use a recent favorite word (I use it to describe my husband's approach to learning to line dance, and… Continue reading Why I Prefer Spontaneity
My short story "Turn a Blind Eye" will be published by AM Ink Publishing in their upcoming horror collection The Half That You See. The book takes its name from a quote attributed to Edgar Allen Poe: Believe nothing you hear and only one half that you see. Have you ever been misquoted? So was… Continue reading Turning Friends Into Villains: a Writer’s Right
I came across REJECTION IS PROTECTION as a part of the encouragement offered in #1000wordsofsummer, which is what it sounds like: a thousand words a day. Do you agree? Is rejection protection? I never thought of it that way, but as painful as rejection is, it might be the only medicine for my unready writing.… Continue reading Rejection is Protection – Jasper Black
Two streets south of mine is a little subdivision humbly named Castlewood. It's one street, really. And while the homes are relatively new, castle is a stretch. The street dead-ends at a retention pond where a sign warns of deep water, and a dingy orange life vest hangs on the far side corroborating just how… Continue reading The Truth Will Set You Free. Or Will it?
In my first novel (I just began #3), I have a character say something like, you can know a lot about a person by the books he reads. My character said this because I believe this. Not that everything my characters say are sentiments with which I agree. Except the villains. I agree with everything… Continue reading Judge me by my Books
A tide of writerly emails swamps my inbox each day. Everyone has advice on how to write and how to write better and how not-to-give-up-when-everyone-hates-your-work and here's some literary flash fiction. Here's some atrocious flash fiction from somebody you accidentally followed. Here's a Ted Talk. Here's some poetry. Here's this new author, that new agent.… Continue reading Language is Not the Star
Recently, I read an article that revealed a particular form of procrastination that mimics responsibility. And guess what? I do it. Maybe you do, too. Here's the thing. I am NOT guilty of cyberloafing, and I recently became that person who divorced Facebook and am now living under a rock, socially speaking. I write and… Continue reading My Procrastination Protocol
And by the way, everything in life is writable about if you have the outgoing guts to do it, and the imagination to improvise. The worst enemy to creativity is self-doubt. ― Sylvia Plath Shelter at home...and write a story. That's what the 5000 Words students did, and the results are in. Click the titles… Continue reading 5000 Words Winter 2020 Contest Winners!
