I barely escaped high school with my sanity. Now I have to worry about Twitter Klout? Every year or so, it seems I have to rediscover the fact that adult life is a hell of a lot like high school. Evidence… Do you Twitter? Do you FB? Have you ever friended someone? Or friended someone …Read More
Have you seen them yet? I haven’t seen them in person, but I know for certain that there are many hardcover copies of my first novel ISABELLA MOON out there on remainder tables and carts this very minute. What are remainders? They’re the books piled onto the carts you have to struggle past to enter …Read More
When you were five or six years old, did you have a dream for your life? A ready answer to the question, what do you want to be when you grow up? I didn’t. I find that kind of sad, like I missed out on something really important. This memory is fuzzy: When I was …Read More
Christmas a year ago, a friend gave me some paperwhite bulbs. After looking around on the web for growing instructions, I planted them in a pot with water and seashells for stability instead of dirt. They grew fabulously tall and heavy. When the whole shebang fell over, I discovered that the results were almost alien. …Read More
Way back in the day–July 18, 2008, to be exact–writer Kelli Stanley dropped by the Handbasket to blog about the background of her excellent debut novel, Nox Dormienda. You can visit Kelli’s website to read about the exciting things that have happened to her since then, including all the praise-filled reviews she’s been receiving for …Read More
I’ve been in an introspective frame of mind of late. Sometime around 2:30 this morning I finally completed the first draft of my latest novel, so I guess introspection has actually been required. The earliest file date I can find for this story is late November, 2008–which means I’ve been at work on it for …Read More
It’s been several months since I was on the road. I think the workshop at the Hindman Settlement School was my last gig. And it’s been almost a year since I toured for CALLING MR. LONELY HEARTS. I can hardly believe it. Today I had a welcome break from my looooong winter writing schedule. I …Read More
You knew it had to happen. Right after I posted about how I almost never blog about writing, here’s a post that’s (kind of) about writing. Revision, specifically. Why do so many writers dislike revising their work? I see many updates on Facebook and Twitter from writers who are agonizing over their edits or revisions. …Read More
I get a real kick out of teaching writing workshops. Not just because I get to meet interesting new people, but because I get to spend the weeks leading up to it trying to figure out (again and again) how to teach people to write. Sometimes I forget how to write. It’s kind of like …Read More
Every year our wonderful poet friends John and Llewellyn McKernan of West Virginia send out a Christmas poem. This summer, when I saw Llewellyn at the Appalachian Writer’s Workshop, I told her once more how much I treasure this annual gift, and asked if it would be okay if I posted some of them. You …Read More