Sunday Poetry: and may myself do nothing usefully
Welcome to Sunday Poetry. If this is your first visit you can read about the purpose and inspiration of my Sunday poetry blogs here. Today’s poem is 53 by E.E. cummings. I love this one. I love the way the poet plays with capitalization, with structure, with pronouns. Those moments in the poem are stops along the way,…
Read MoreLists: All Those Things I Don’t Want to Read About
I’ll make a confession. I just slammed the cover on a novel by an author I have enjoyed in the past. I read 150 pages or so of this, his third book, which was, under the circumstances, way above and beyond the call of duty for any reader. There was some amazing writing on those…
Read MoreCast of Characters–a Novelist’s Inc. Anthology
It’s always such a pleasure to tell you about good books. Today’s is no exception. Cast of Characters, an anthology of stories written by twenty-eight of my esteemed colleagues, is now available. Cast of Characters is the quintessential satisfying read because no matter how limited your reading time, you can pick it up, enjoy a…
Read MoreSunday Poetry: Not the Inside of Stone
Welcome to Sunday Poetry. If this is your first visit you can read about the purpose and inspiration of my Sunday poetry blogs here. Today’s poem was written by Mary Oliver, one of my favorite poets and someone whose work has graced this blog several times since its inception. Recently she became seriously ill and cancelled all her…
Read MoreKiki Lowenstein Rides Again
One of the best parts of being an author is making friends with other authors. In 2008 my friend Joanna Campbell Slan began her new mystery series, the Scrap-N-Craft mysteries featuring scrapbooker Kiki Lowenstein, who manages to get herself into the most amazing predicaments. I had the pleasure of interviewing Joanna here two years ago,…
Read MoreLists: Forever and Always
Remember lists? It’s time for a new entry. Read about my list posts here, then comment and add your own thought. At the end of the month Random.org will choose a winner from everyone who added to any April list to receive an autographed novel. Remember, please stay away from politics, religion and general snarkiness,…
Read MoreSunday Poetry: That Special Undiscovered Something
Welcome to Sunday Poetry. If this is your first visit you can read about the purpose and inspiration of my Sunday poetry blogs here. I’ll confess I’ve spent a lot of time the past weeks discarding things I’ve held on to for years. Clothes. Books. Manuscripts. The list goes on and on. You know you have the makings…
Read MoreIndependent Book Blogger Awards
A reader and friend saw this on Twitter and suggested I enter Southern Exposure to win an Independent BookBlogger Award from Goodreads and the Association of American Publishers. While that would be lovely, the real fun was looking back over some of my previous blogs and trying to figure out which ones to use as…
Read MoreHoly Helping Hand, Batman!
I’ve spent a lot of time lately thinking about the ways we help each other. One Mountain Away, coming in August, explores that question among many others, and it will come up again and again as the series progresses. Do we give money? Do we bring casseroles? Do we hold hands and provide a listening…
Read MoreSniffing Out A Story (Again)
In the spirit of recycling, something I’m getting quite adept at as I get ready to move, today I’m recycling a blog from September 2010 about my silly beagle Nemo. I’m pleased to tell you that Nemo is, of course, still with us and every bit as neurotic as I paint him in the following…
Read More