I’m one of those guys who has more ideas than he has time to exploit those ideas. Retirement is coming one of these days, and my hope is that I will finally take the time to turn these kernels of stories into fully fledged novels. In the meantime, I came across the idea of writing … More One Mind, Many Options
Writing is a mind game. As I have mentioned before, writing is about 80 percent psychological. After 40 years of writing, I have a semblance of mastery over grammar, vocabulary and use of words. What challenges me the most is seeing the story, and putting it in a logical structure. That’s not quite so bad … More Better Than Sex
Yesterday I wrote about getting started on your next book, how intimidating it can be and how important it is to just start, regardless of quality. And then I followed my own advice, and started my new book. Now I have the prologue, but don’t know where to go from there. Well, two things have … More I’ve Started. Now What?
I was just cleaning out my email inbox, and I came across a video that my wife Shelly sent me for safekeeping. It was of our grandson, Gavin, when he was probably less than a year old. He’s in one of those seats that has the wheels so that he can push himself across the … More Watch That First Step
Well, I haven’t been posting later, and a lot of the reason for that is that I am embarrassed. National Novel Writing Month has started, but I haven’t. I signed up, mind you, but that’s as far as I have gotten. In the signing up part, they asked for a synopsis of my story. In … More Flummoxed
I was listening to NPR this morning while I was in pursuit of a rumor of free firewood (a story for another time). They were talking about research on happiness. The question came up: does having children REALLY make you happier? Research showed that the acts involved in taking care of children actually ranked pretty … More Happiness Is a Warm Keyboard
I am in the first official week of Christmas break. Because I am a writer as well as a university professor, one would think I would be throwing myself into another writing project at this point, grateful that I am unencumbered by the many details of being a professor. Well, a couple of problems with … More Physical Therapy for the Soul
I swear, this is the last time that you will hear about NaNoWriMo from me this year. Well, maybe one more time… Tomorrow is November 30, the last day of my attempt to write 50,000 words of a novel in 30 days for National Novel Writing Month. I am at 43,333, within spitting distance of … More Eve of Destruction
I have a young friend who sees himself as a writer of screenplays. He has education along those lines, with some of it coming from me. He’s currently working on a short film that he has high hopes for. I’ve read the script, and I also believe that it shows some promise. I’ve actually read … More Give a Man a Fish
Well, after last week’s last blog, the obvious question is, How goes NaNoWriMo? In one word, slow. Because I am working on a book I already started, I dropped 14,000 words in on the first day of NaNoWriMo, and have since added about 6500 words. That’s not too bad, considering that today is only Day … More Slow and steady wins the…something
The Great Adventure 