According to Betty Smith in Joy in the Morning, dialogue in literature serves three functions. It should and Good dialogue has two of these elements, she says. Great dialogue has all three. I’m happy if my dialogue hits any two of those notes but most of the time most of us will hit one and…
The statue of a Greek archer, found in the temple of Aphaia on the island of Aegina, just offshore of Athens. The temple was built circa 600 BC. This statue is a 3D printed copy of the original and painted to what they think it looked like back then. –currently on display at the “Chroma”…
This is the cover art (and pre-order links) for the next Kate Shugak novel. I’ll be publishing teeny, tiny excerpts from it in the next four newsletters so you should definitely sign up for it here. This, aspiring authors, is what we in the biz call “promotion.” I wrote about it before here, and I’ll…
On the importance of setting. Can’t remember who I wrote this for. The US Coast Guard invited me to do a ridealong on cutter Alex Haley in the Bering Sea in February of 2004. I was invited to write a daily blog from the ship so the shorebound families of the crew could eyewitness as…
So…the Kate Shugak series is under option. Again. Yes, this means that someone, brow furrowed, is thinking hard about making a Kate Shugak film or a Kate Shugak television series and paid me money so no one else could think about it for the length of the option. I am not allowed to say who…
So I did some publisher shuffling a bit ago, which led my agent to inquire what I’d be doing to promote the books at the new/old house (don’t ask). I took a deep breath and let it out very, very slowly. Before I lost consciousness entirely (or my temper, which was a lot closer to…
So…Isis3 publishes in 12 days, as you could hardly have missed if you follow this blog. On November 3rd at the Poisoned Pen in Scottsdale I’ll be signing the hardcover, where people will ask me questions about the book, like where the idea for it came from (well, I’m sorry, but you do always ask…
I’m already on record as someone who heartily endorses the Authors Guild as any writer’s one stop shopping for professional services. This includes their Resource Library, where they post videos from workshops and events, including as of today this year’s WIT Festival, where a bunch of writers gave forth serially over a weekend on various…
I heard recently from a friend whose sister applied to Storyknife and didn’t get in. I wrote back as follows. Please do tell your sister to apply again. We had 599 applicants last year, it was tough. There are even more this year (our poor adjudication committee). In some ways this is very gratifying, but…
No one wanted me to write the Eye of Isis series. Business associates said, “No, no, keep writing Kate Shugak novels, they are what sells.” My agents didn’t want me to write them because they couldn’t sell them without a multi-book contract that included a, you guessed it, Kate Shugak novel or a Liam Campbell…