A blog for fiction readers, writers, and history lovers
If there’s one thing my writerly soul detests, it’s a buzzword. A fork in the thigh of originality and wordsmithery, every insufferable time. Remember “bundling,” one of early 21st century’s most annoying argots? Whole industries, from telecommunications to healthcare to pet grooming bundled bigger and spiffier packages in hopes of persuading, often forcing, us to buy services we may or [...]
My dad worked his brand of offbeat magic on my mother at their first meeting, a blind date wherein he greeted her with “Shall I impress Superwoman by playing the buffoon, the sophisticate or the intelligentsia?” She was hooked. He had done all three at once, in the space of a single sentence. And when, a few months later, in [...]
We all know George Santayana’s ominous warning, “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” We could call it a kind of unintentional recycling. Then there are of us who remember the past and are called to repeat it, with the greatest of intention and purpose. Across a twenty-year writing career, I’ve written fiction and nonfiction, history [...]
What She Thinks About When She Thinks About Shoes is an exploration of how my mother’s dementia impacted our relationship, ultimately exemplified by a pair of hauntingly, unforgivably ugly shoes. A Chanticleer International Awards finalist for short prose, it's published in the April 2023 issue of Well Read literary magazine. Excerpt: WHAT SHE THINKS ABOUT WHEN SHE THINKS ABOUT SHOES [...]
In this time of Defund the Police vs Blue Lives Matter, it mattered to me to tell the story of a beloved young police offer killed by bootleggers in 1893 North Dakota. Locals called it “the most atrocious crime in Traill County history” and waged a 20-year battle for justice, fighting back ferociously when political and fraternal cronies tried to [...]
Story Circle Network Celebrates Women's History Month with our FREE Special Event moderated by Ellen Notbohm Mar 15, 2023 6:00 PM Central, 4:00 PM Pacific Ellen Notbohm, 2018 Sarton Award winner in Historical Fiction (The River by Starlight) and current Sarton Book Award Coordinator in this genre, will facilitate a panel discussion with five historical fiction authors whose books inspired [...]
My 2021 interview with Authority magazine asked, “Based on your experience, what are five thing you need to know to become a great author? Please share a story or example for each.” But one needn’t be a writer to benefit from these five things. While my advice was directed at writers, it can apply to many things from parenting to [...]
In a culture that demands instant-everything, writers live in a parallel universe call Waiting. Our work requires the antithesis of now! now! now! The ability to embrace patience and perseverance will be a make-or-break quality for most writers. Before our omnipresent cell phones, people hoping for important calls Waited by the Phone, annoyingly personified by the love-sick young woman or [...]
Kudoplauseulations! You undertook the grand adventure of writing and publishing a book. And now you’ve either learned, or will shortly learn, that the final page of your book is not the end of writing, but the segue from writing the book into writing about the book. Today’s publishing market is a media-content glutton. Whether you’ve written a novel or a [...]
“Nothing new here.” Three little words. I often come across them in book reviews and when I do, I always stop reading and move on. Because with those three little words, the writer has declared that their focus doesn’t extend beyond themselves. What they mean is, “nothing new here to me.” Assuming that your reading audience has the same level [...]