What does legacy mean for your characters? For you as an author? Heather Webb explores the concept, today at WU.
In the face of AI storytelling, what is it that makes our stories human? Agent and author Don Maass weighs in, today at WU.
As I watched the Knicks win the NBA finals unexpectedly and joyfully after decades of drought, I started thinking about what it means to dedicate yourself to a team, and, more importantly, what it …
Much on our minds nowadays is the issue of human-written versus machine-written fiction. There’s a lot to say about that, but for me it leads to a question: What actually makes human-written fictio…
Why ask why? Author (and former journalist) Kathleen McCleary has an incredible story to illustrate the reason, today at WU.
Ever wonder if you’ll ever achieve balance in your writing life? Author Kelsey Allagood shares a new perspective on balance, today at WU.
Are you wrestling with a story that won’t submit? Author Therese Walsh suggests maybe just embracing the uncertainty (without trying to pin it down), today at WU.
Why not try a dose of writerly positivity? Author Greer Macallister guides us to it, today at WU.
Even small stories can feel substantial. Author, editor, and teacher Kathryn Craft shows us how, today at WU.
Having an entire story world in your head can be a gift, but it’s also a burden. Author Julie Carrick Dalton helps us to navigate an often fraught path, today at WU.
Author and teacher David Corbett continues his exploration of grief in fiction, focusing on agency and authenticity, today at WU.
Sometimes it can feel like a manuscript is dragging you down. Sometimes the same story can become the book that saves your career. Author Matthew Norman shares his story, today at WU.
Years ago, in my other life as a journalist, I interviewed Michael Jordan for a cover story for the magazine I worked for at the time. At the peak of his fame, shortly after his father was murdered…
I am not a serious yogi. This feels important to establish before I say anything else about yoga, because I don’t want you to picture somebody who wakes up at 5 a.m. to flow through an hour of sun …
You’re working through a draft and things happen that you didn’t plan—and you had a plan, or at least you thought you did. A character is acting out of character. You’re questioning whether t…
You can do anything. You can write a book. You can get an agent, if that’s what you want, a real powerhouse. You can get a great advance. You can click with your editor in a life-changing way…
I recently finished reading Wild Dark Shore, a literary climate thriller by Charlotte McConaghy. Its cast is small and geographically constricted: Widower Dominic Salt and his three children are pe…
I missed the first two messages from my father when my mother fell last month and was taken to the hospital by ambulance. My ringer was off, as it often is, because I didn’t want anything to …
Where joy most revels, grief doth most lament. Grief joys, joy grieves, on slender accident. —William Shakespeare, Hamlet In last month’s post (“What We Write About When We Write About Grief”), I p…
Way, way back in 2011—a far more innocent time—my debut novel, Domestic Violets, was published. The book entered the world to several positive national reviews, a brief bit of gentle buzz, and, wel…
