Writing

Michele Filgate, editor of the gorgeous anthology What My Mother and I Don’t Talk About (Simon & Schuster, 2019), included this essay about my mother and her intense “friendship” with the abstract painter Haywood “Bill” Rivers. My mother knew Rivers before she met my father, but she spoke of him to me through much of… … Read more

FLASH FICTION & MICRO-MEMOIR: a one-day writing intensive Heather Sellers and Dylan Landis, Instructors Saturday, July 26, 10 am – 5 pm Greenwich Village, New York Flash fiction and micro-memoir are powerful, shapely narratives—in 750 words or fewer. In a workshop with intensive one-on-one feedback, hone your ability to compress, to focus, and to write… … Read more

Why am I intoxicated today by a 17-page alphabetized list titled “Words That Should Not Be Used in Fiction, a Selection” (and is exactly what it sounds like)?

L Label, labia, labile, labored, laconic, lair, lambent, lame, language, lapel, lapels, largely, largess, lash, lashed, latter, laud…

Oh, stop nodding off. Could it be that the… … Read more

This is what I know about myself: the safest thing I can do is take a risk, while the riskiest thing for me is to play it safe.

–from Poet Mom, the blog of poet January Gill O’Neil, author of Underlife Perversely, when I am several months into writing a story, or several years into… … Read more

Ten rules for writing fiction, an article from The Guardian, recently went viral at The Grotto—a group of about 35 San Francisco authors who share office space and comradeship. Thanks, Natalie Baszile, for the link. Don’t be put off that the piece starts with Elmore Leonard, whose ten rules you read nine years ago in… … Read more

Deborah Eisenberg talks to Ron Hogan about intensely close third: “What does it feel like to be a human being? Whoever the character is, how far can I crawl into the mental processes of that character?” … Read more

“When you’re writing a scene, give one character a task to complete…” and other elements of the Jim Krusoe writing litany that plays in my head. … Read more