The truth can sting like a bee to a warm, plump thigh. When a “shark” from TV’s Shark Tank bluntly tells the contestant, “This is a hobby, and not a business,” a fight or flight switches on. Either anger ignites his checks to red or he cowers in admittance that maybe the “shark” is correct. There is much conversation about [...]
I’m going to write a book report. Some of you may not know what I’m talking about but can probably deduce that I’ll be writing a report on a book. When I had book report assignments in school, I had to discern what the story was about. Otherwise known as “theme,” sometimes I thought I didn’t really get the entire [...]
It's all in the books. I've been at an impasse on my memoir. After receiving an editor's comments, of which I agree, I'm dazed to think how to go about incorporating her suggestions. "More about the birch tree." Yep, I know I've got unused "thematic potential" here, as she says. I appeared to have dropped my family members! Since they [...]
. . . exerpt from Under the Birch Tree We took photographs in front of the picture window at our brick house on Carlisle Street because it was the perfect suburban backdrop. Two-story homes sat like gems on their velvet lawns set with oak and maple trees and manicured hedges. I remember my picture was taken there on my first [...]
The folded blueprints I plucked from my grey bucket came from the building department at the village. They felt like a treasure in my hands; I wanted to delve into them with abandon. I separated the inky paper folds, spreading the map flat on the floor. I squatted to read the details of the reverse print. The building commissioner had [...]
I've read them all - on plot, beginnings, middles and ends, writing life stories, memoir, personal essays and whatever falls in between. Writers of these books have been prolific with general guidance and "how to" described in no uncertain abstract terms. Finally, I succumbed to just one more read on the memoir subject. "Writing & Selling Memoir" by Paula Balzer [...]