My mind being on the how-to of writing at present, I thought I’d post some reflections on various aspects of the craft. I’ll try to put them up Wednesdays, so as to add some structure to all our busy lives, as well as to give myself the deadline I seem to require to get anything…
Read MoreWith the upsurge of e-readers, there has been an accompanying growth in the impulse to self-publish. I really have no problems with self-publishing. If I had any out-of-print titles, I’d probably put them for sale online. A lot of people love their direct, author-to-reader book sales. J. A. Konrath is one of the more fervent…
Read MoreYesterday morning, news reached me that the woman who had picked me from a pile of obscurity had died. 92 year-old Ruth Cavin, the legendary Ruth, who started her career at the age of sixty and overnight seized the heart of the publishing industry; whose eye went to the essence of a book’s strengths—and weaknesses;…
Read MoreWell, that’s about done and dusted for 2010: anyone ready for a new year? I’ve never been much for New Year’s Resolutions—who needs to start a clean slate with a cloud of threat and incipient guilt over her head? But taking down a heavily marked-up calendar whose dozen images you know by heart and replacing…
Read MoreTo everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under heaven. When I was new at this business of writing novels, I was also a young mother. Which meant that if I had free time, I wrote. If it was a school day, I wrote. If it was a weekend and my…
Read MoreA study at Columbia and Harvard, reported in TIME, suggests that acting powerful makes a person powerful in fact. When tested before and after spending fifteen minutes in aggressive, macho, top-dog postures (the two on the left)— —the (male) reporter’s testosterone level doubled. Doubled! I can believe this. I am by nature an introverted, even…
Read MoreThis is my favorite time of year. One of the pleasures of late fall is the view out my window, of a single tree, probably a liquidamber, that becomes scarlet as soon as the frost hits it: To my amusement, I realized a couple of years ago that the people on that side of the…
Read MoreI’ve been quiet here on Mutterings for several months, I know. I didn’t realize that I needed a sabbatical from posting until I took a break, and it went on. And on. After five years here, I was feeling that I’d said it all before. A sensation that’s bad enough when it’s connected with a…
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