Straight talk from the sisters about blood, sweat and ink
When Fifty Shades of Grey crashed into the publishing world, everyone was aghast. On so many levels. Talk shows brought in therapists and psychologists— specialists on sexual abuse and relationships, and quickly labeled it mommy porn. Stuck home with my first broken ankle and nearly dead from boredom, I couldn’t resist the idea of reading something so risqué in …
Continue reading “U for UnderCovers: Writing the Erotic Romance”
T is for Team, Twitterific, and Talent There was never any doubt in my mind, if I ever wanted to participate in a blog, it had to be a Team effort. When we started Write On Sisters we never thought we would be as successful or have as much fun as we are today. Now …
Continue reading “Team, Twitterific and Talent”
Happy 2014 Earth Day everyone! This is one of my favorite holidays, and anyone who follows my posts knows I’m crazy about Old Mother Earth, and I write about her as often as I can. Luckily for me, the other sisters haven’t told me to give it a rest. Yet! Here are excerpts from two …
Continue reading “Surprising, Sensational and Strange, it’s Nature!”
I read constantly. I bet you do too because, since you’re reading this blog, you have access to the Internet where there’s an infinite amount of stuff to read – emails, articles, blogs, tweets, books, essays – all at your nimbly typing fingertips. People read more now than ever, not just for work, school or …
Continue reading “Reading Overload in the Information Age”
While I would argue that a woman can play any character, hero, villain, mentor, the Queen might be considered the most dynamic of the female archetypes. Queens are by nature powerful and public, making them ideal protagonists or antagonists. I had a hard time picking my top queens, but here are three of my favorites. …
Continue reading “Casting Call: Queens, The Archetype of Female Power”
Thirty years ago we wouldn’t be debating the viability of prologues. Readers assumed writers would build their world and characters a little before diving into the thick of the story’s plot. Now including a prologue can trigger an instantaneous pass from agents, editors and readers alike. So how did we end up in this mess, …
Continue reading “Pro the Prologue or Against?”
My debut novel, WIVES OF LUCIFER, has been through many incarnations since the first draft, almost as many as my young protagonist, but one aspect has remained stable: the setting. In this story, I invented alternate world concepts for what many would call Heaven and Hell and struggled mightily with taking the traditional concepts for …
Continue reading “Originality: Building the Unique World”
I’ve never been a fan of graphic horror. I have vivid memories of burying my face in my boyfriend’s shoulder whenever our friends talked us into watching a horror movie. However, I love gothic tales, the darker and creepier the better. I will always drop whatever I’m doing to watch black and white episodes of …
Continue reading “Nightstalkers and Nightmares”
I’ve always believed that a story is created for the story’s sake, and not to fit a mold or template. I subscribed to the notion that if characters lived, they were intrinsic to the novel’s unfolding, and their agendas might differ from that of the author. There’s magic in that conflict between writer and work; …
Continue reading “Mixing Genres: Are We Committing Career Suicide?”
(“L” is for LOVE in the A to Z Blog Challenge) If the interwebs are to be believed, YA readers are sick of insta-love – that moment when the heroine sees a cute stranger and decides immediately he’s the one! On Goodreads people have made “No Insta-Love” shelves and there’s even a Listopia “Young Adult …
Continue reading “Love in YA – The Problem with Insta-Love”