These past few weeks, I've experienced an unusual stall-out in my writing.  I couldn't locate any still point inside, or that ...

A MG (middle-grade fiction) writer in one of my online classes posted a great question this week:  How do I make my characters more distin...

It's been an up and down week.  I got news on Monday of a student whose short story was accepted by a very prestigious journal and w...

One of my favorite kinds of emails come from past students in my book-structuring classes whose books are being published.  Three such e...

Dreams are a big part of my personal life--I've recorded my dreams since I was in college.  But I use them very sparingly in my writi...

I'm only a marginal poet.  I've had one poem published and written maybe ten others, kept in a drawer.  But I love reading poetry...

I never paid much attention to paragraph or sentence lengths.  I just wrote, felt satisfied if I got the story down.  Then, in the ...

Many writers want to write for kids.  They raised their own children on books, maybe thought I can tell a good story, too!  Or they love...

This week's writing exercise is simply a link to a fabulous article, an interview in Brainpickings with the Pulitzer-winning author...

I'll never forget the first year of my MFA.  I had a great adviser, a well-published writer, who was also a minimalist.  I am no...