Congratulations to Jean Hall for winning Otis P. Oliver Protests and Doreen Robinson for winning Travel Guide for Monsters on last week's blog. For those of you who didn't win--stay tuned. I just received a large stack of picture books from Sleeping Bear Press. ******* Today I'm going to talk about my friend and writing… Continue reading All About Joyce Hostetter: Write2Ignite Instructor and Author of EQUAL (and pssst… A Cover Reveal Too!)
Yesterday Joyce Hostetter and I brainstormed our upcoming workshop for the Write2Ignite conference. We have presented “Using Life Experiences to Inform Your Writing” at other venues, but we like to tweak it each time to make it fresh. We introduce ourselves by each reading a passage that springboards from our own life experiences. Previously, I have… Continue reading Wild Onions, Orange Popsicles, and Truth
This interview is dedicated to Harold Underdown and Ann Manheimer, who have pushed me to figure out what my main character in Half-Truths wants. *********As I read novels I try to uncover what the characters want and the obstacles that get in their way. In a well-written book this tension between goal and satisfaction… Continue reading Getting to Know Kate
The last time you enjoyed a novel I bet you didn't stop to think if the author deliberated over what point of view to use, if she worried over the scene sequence, or if she wondered about just how much dialect to include. My guess is that you didn't question why the author gave the… Continue reading Writing into the Unknown
If given the option, I could much easier describe a crimson leaf that is heralding the approaching season, then picking the words my character, Kate Dinsmore, uses when talking to her sister Ginny. It feels as if there are no rules when writing my story. Of course there are reams of guidelines and lots of… Continue reading No Rules
"I write as a participant, to see what will happen." Patricia MacLachlanMany of the recent quotes which headline this blog have come from SCBWI's journal, Ideas and Images. I thought MacLachlan's words were worth their own separate blog since she expresses my feelings as I write my first novel. Although I have a broad outline… Continue reading Ideas and Images
I think it does!I've been thinking about this topic as I've prepared a proposal for the IRA (International Reading Association) 2008 conference. My main idea is that there are many crossover skills between fiction and nonfiction such as focus, organization, including appropriate details, and practicing writing mechanics. On top of that, writing a short story… Continue reading Does Fiction Writing Help Students Write Nonfiction?