This essay also appeared in The Startup on Medium In the fall of 1985 I sat down at an ancient typewriter and called myself a writer. I wrote short stories, one after another, and nine years later published my first one. Eventually I collected the best...
A long time ago, when I was a wild rebellious eighteen-year-old who left my mother’s home with a young man I would soon marry, I liked to experiment with LSD. Not as often as some of my generation did, but often enough to learn that...
originally published in Women Writers, Women's Books Susan Cheever, daughter of the famous author, John Cheever, once said that fiction is not a competitive sport. Also a writer, living in the shadow of her father’s reputation and achievements can’t have been easy. I believe she made...
originally published in Writer's Digest We’ve all heard it said that readers have increasingly short attention spans. Spending time with a print medium isn’t as engaging as watching things move or interacting with content on a screen. Does this mean that we should write stories that...
originally published in Women Writers, Women's Books Literary fiction is a strange, yet compelling animal. So much emphasis on language, rhythm, imagery. And let’s not forget character. Some novels are all about the character and the mad world behind her eyes. When I started writing fiction, my...
My second book, Our Love Could Light The World, is a collection of linked stories about the Dugan family in the fictional town of Dunston, New York. The Dugans are made up of the parents, Potter and Lavinia, and their five children. Potter drinks and can’t...
Originally published on Medium by Unsolicited Press My first attempts on the page were carefully wrought renditions of a single scene, expression, item, or thought. My focus was tight, keen, and probably overly analytical. After describing something in minute detail, the challenge was always to locate...
originally published in Book Riot A happy statistic I read recently is that women, especially older, educated women, buy more books a year than men. This confirms that women are good—and essential—readers. As fictional subjects, they’re also well-represented. Women in both novels and screenplays often face...
originally published January 1, 2018 in Volume 3, Issue 1 of MockingHeart Review Deluge The white horse grays in the deluge Beneath of the limbs of an evergreen The red-handed woman waves me down She wears no coat against the cold, her rubber sandals Are what you slip on to fetch...
Americans are practical people. We think about profit and loss, success and failure, maximizing our utility, avoiding diminished returns. We’re healthy Capitalists. We live for the business model of constant, steady growth. We seek profits at every turn. What if you’re an artist? Or someone for...