Today I'm chatting with Cliff Garstang, author of In An Uncharted Country (Press 53, 2010) and What The Zhang Boys Know (Press 53, 2012). As you'll read, Cliff is both very interesting and highly accomplished. He and I have crossed paths a few times in the last...
Available this October from Oceanview Publishing Pre-order here: Lamentation, Joe Clifford’s riveting new novel, is a page-turner in the classic sense. You can’t put it down. You need to know what comes next. At the heart of this particular bundle of darkness is an ordinary guy, Jay Porter,...
If You Don’t Profess a Mainstream Religion, Hobby Lobby Just Made You a Second-Class Citizen The most important thing about the Hobby Lobby ruling wasn’t that it allowed the owners of a closely held corporations to opt out of including contraceptives in the health benefits available...
Before she was my landlady, Velma Wiley was my co-worker. We were housekeepers in a retirement home. I was nineteen. Velma was in her sixties. Although there were six of us on staff, I was usually paired with her, because the steady stream of chatter...
Today I chat with writer, poet, and musician Lawrence Parlier. Parlier's debut novel, Sierra Court Blues, was published in 2013 by Hawkins Publishing Group. What fuels your writing? And what, if anything, slows it down? I think curiosity is what drives me. I am infinitely curious about...
Poor, poor Nora Etheridge, that woman upstairs. You know the one, pleasant, genteel, a good neighbor, always helpful, never demanding, forever single and trapped in a career – teaching art to third graders – that is far below her true talents. Does she complain? Never! ...
I'm pleased to share my interview with author Leesa Cross-Smith, whose debut story collection, Every Kiss A War, was just published by Mojave River Press. Please tell us about the origin of your book’s title! It’s a wonderful name. Thank you so much! It comes from a...
Ours was a middle-class family. We weren’t poor. We didn’t struggle. That came later, after my parents divorced and my mother, lacking financial savvy, exchanged child support payments for having my father’s name removed from our home’s deed of trust. In the 1960’s married women...
Coming this October, from She Writes Press. Available for pre-sale here: Have you ever questioned the teachings of childhood, or doubted the version of God you were raised on? What Is Found, What Is Lost explores four generations of women, their struggles with faith, and their...
How funny it is to suddenly remember someone you’ve not thought of for decades! There I was, having dinner in front of the television (a nightly affair), when someone I worked with back in the Seventies crossed my mind. Her name was Virginia Farrell. We...