Category: on writing

The Best Writer’s Birthday Gift

Lori Twining 8 Comments

Every writer gets to celebrate one birthday every year. If you have a writer in your life, what do you get them?

Sure, writers love things like coffee, pens, highlighters, cake, wine, empty notebooks (cheap ones from the dollar store will do just fine), leather bound notebooks are awesome too (although most writers are afraid to write in them for fear of wrecking them), coffee, wine, dinner out somewhere, cake, coffee, maybe some more wine, definitely some more cake… but seriously, what is the one present a writer could receive, that would make them the happiest writer you know?

What is it? Read more

Old School Writer Catching Up With Digital Communication

Bernice Connell Leave a comment

Would Shakespeare approve of the world’s new digital communication?

I’m a wordie who, curiously, has never used the word before now. It’s a recent addition to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary along with sub-tweet, life-hack and casual approximations of speech such as hmm, ooh, and mm-hmm. All nods to our ever-evolving lexicon.

Deciphering Shakespeare’s early English vernacular in high school helped me see communication in a new way. He was a wordie as well, creating hundreds of words and often shortening others to suit his poetic writings. ‘Tis, oft and o’er are familiar shortened words while ope and gi may require a google check but the spelling is correct. Read more

Everyone else is a Better Writer than Me – And other Fictions I Tell Myself

Diane Ferguson Leave a comment

I imagine that all those published authors and prolific writers sit down at their computers and just let it flow out of them. Sure, they may have to edit a bit, but they never have to struggle for the words, they’re in the zone. Then because I do struggle, I take this as a sure sign I musn’t be a real writer. It’s just another example that I’m faking it, I’m a “wanna-be”.

Because in my head, everyone else’s life is perfect, especially if you’ve already published a book! Then something comes along to burst that bubble and make me realize, no, this is tough for all writers. Each of us has a process but the most important part of that process is: bum in seat, hands on keyboard, social media shut-off. Read more

10 Great Reasons Why Writers Should Take an Online Writing Course

Lori Twining 6 Comments

You already know how to write, so why should you take an online writing course?

Good question. Let me explain…

I became an empty-nester in September. All three kids are off living in three different cities, studying to become someone who can earn a living at something they enjoy for the rest of their lives (at least this is the plan). As for me, this means I should have oodles more time to finish that novel (or multiple novels) that I have on the go, right? There are no kids wandering around my kitchen begging to be fed at a certain time. I have a husband who enjoys cooking for me and he doesn’t mind throwing in a load of laundry or washing dishes, while I write.

What’s my problem then? Read more

Food in Fiction: What are your characters having for dinner tonight?

Seana Moorhead Leave a comment

In Ian Hamilton’s crime series, Ava Lee is always eating interesting and descriptive food. In the book, The Wild Beasts of Wuhan, Ava Lee orders “sautéed languoustines with crab tortellini in a shellfish bisque as a starter, and pan-fried black bream with truffle mashed potatoes as her main.”

Later in the same book, Ava orders without hesitation: foie gras and black sea bass with oyster mushrooms.

What are languoustines?

I had to look it up: it’s also called “Norway Lobster”, a luxury seafood prized for its sweet meat. They’re crazy expensive because of their rarity. Bream is a fish. Ava Lee adores expensive luxury food. It tells the reader about her income and social status. It also makes me hungry.

Being specific about the food your characters are eating can bring richness and depth to your writing. It can help establish the setting, the historical period, and the culture of your characters. But it can do more.

Here is my nine course meal of how food can add flavour and spice to your novel:

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Not-so-Happy Endings

Bernice Connell Leave a comment

Beginnings and endings are arguably the most important and memorable parts of our reading journeys. “How does it end?” is a familiar question when sharing what you’ve read or recommending a book to a friend.

In an effort to hone my writing skills, I’ve been paying closer attention to what I’m reading; studying what I love about an author’s style, thus inspiring my own writing. Readers are frequently able to anticipate twists and turns and to occasionally predict the ending, but primarily, we are willing participants in the suspension of belief and enjoy being taken on an adventure. We take the storytelling at face value and enjoy every moment without ‘reading’ too much in to it.

Admiring an author’s style and thoroughly enjoying the story only to be let down by the ending is disappointing. The relationship between writer and reader is symbiotic and there’s a sort of mutual trust that what has been promised will be delivered. Read more

The Love (And Hate) Of A Great Book

Tracey Richardson Leave a comment

As writers, we love to read good books. We appreciate them, we celebrate them, we admire them, we lose ourselves in them. Why, then, does reading a good book sometimes cause our writing insecurities to rear their ugly little heads?

One of my writing acquaintances recently complained that while she was loving a book she was reading, at the same time she was finding it discouraging. Why? She elaborated, saying it made her feel like she could never write something that great and so why the hell was she even trying.

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