by Olive Balla
Just to dispel any misunderstanding up front, I never actually met Louis L’Amour. He never reached out his hand to pluck my struggling body from a rain swollen river. He never yanked me out of the path of a careering city bus.
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Louis L’Amour Saved My Life
10 Rules for Imitating Author Ken Bruen
by Bentley Clark
In an effort to procrastinate writing this article, I did some research on the internet (read: randomly surfed the web for stuff) about my favorite author, Ken Bruen. Bruen is an Irish author of hard-boiled/noir fiction,
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Characters in Conflict
by Chris Eboch
A strong story needs conflict. But conflict doesn’t just come from dramatic things happening. It comes from the character—what he or she needs and wants, and why he or she can’t get it easily.
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Taming the Beast: What to Do with That Frightful First Draft
by Kirt Hickman
You’ve gotten your first draft onto paper, but it doesn’t look anything like the novel you envisioned. Somewhere along the way, it took on a life of its own. It became grotesque: overblown, disorganized,
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An Interview with Author Elizabeth Ann Galligan
Elizabeth Ann Galligan, Ph.D, is a poet and retired educator from Eastern New Mexico University who completed her first novel Secrets of the Plumed Saint (ABQ Press, 2012) at the age of 73.
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Grammatically Correct: Mixed Constructions Make No Sense
by Dodici Azpadu
Sentence parts that do not fit together grammatically or logically result in a mixed construction. Although readers will see and hear the logical error first, the cause of the error is often mechanical. Writers force parts of speech to take on grammatical functions for which they are not designed.
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Whack-a-Mole Writing
by Olive Balla
Telling stories is great fun. But writing those stories in a way that will attract readers is a whole different stratum of the art. It’s a bit like the old arcade game Whack-a-Mole. The mole pops up and invitingly taunts the player.
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The Writing Life: Having it All
by Sherri Burr
When Anne-Marie Slaughter wrote “Why Women Still Can’t Have it All” in the July/August 2012 issues of The Atlantic, she caused quite a debate among women nationwide. Anne-Marie, a colleague from International Law circles,
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An Interview with Author Elizabeth Rose
Elizabeth Rose was born in the foothills of the Himalaya’s during the last decade of the British Raj, but she makes her home on the other side of the world in Galisteo, New Mexico. Once a sculptor, she now funnels her creative passions into her writing.
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On Write What You Know
by Bentley Clark
Write what you know. This ubiquitous advice is espoused on the first day of writing workshops, classes, and seminars all across the country. Need a story idea? Write what you know.
Story not going as planned?
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