Featuring an exclusive golden shovel poem
One of the valuable bits of advice I did not cover in a recent Friday Five post about the book Writers on Writing was this morsel from the essay by Rosellen Brown (author of Tender Mercies and much more):
Continue reading “Switching it up”If it begins to feel too easy to do something, change forms. Make yourself an amateur in a new genre.
Links to my latest published writings.
Over the past week I had three pieces published in various literary magazines:
I have one other piece, a short story, that should be published sometime this spring, and the short story that will appear in the Warren Zevon-inspired anthology that comes out in July. Other than that, no other writings have been picked up lately. I hope that changes soon. Whether it does or it doesn’t, I plan to keep writing.
A Q&A with the author of the raw, unflinching pro-life memoir ‘In This House We Lived’
The subtitle of Faith-Ann Dalton‘s debut book In This House We Lived–“A Faith Journey of Choosing Life Again and Again”–is more than a play on her first name. The memoir, which comes out May 8, is a raw and moving account of this first-time author’s struggles to move from a harrowing childhood through an unplanned pregnancy and many other personal trials to establish a life centered around her faith in God and herself.
The publisher, Anointed Colony Media, describes In This House We Lived as “a raw, redemptive memoir of trauma, crisis, faith, and the slow, intentional construction of healthy habits. “
“With unflinching honesty and hard-won clarity, Dalton traces her story of becoming a mother before she was ready, learning to choose herself without abandoning her soul, and discovering that healing doesn’t always mean getting it right—it’s about refusing to give up.”
Now a licensed cosmetologist, married, and a mother of four, Faith-Ann lives in St. James, Missouri.
Read on to learn more about Faith-Ann and her memoir. But first, please read this disclaimer:
Continue reading “Friday Five: Faith-Ann Dalton on her memoir of faith”Announcing my crime fiction debut in ‘Bad Intentions,’ coming this summer
Strike up the band, Johnny! Now it can be told: one of my short stories will be included in an anthology of crime fiction inspired by the works of the legendary singer and songwriter Warren Zevon (1947-2003).
Am I an excitable boy? Hell yeah.
I am one of 15 writers to be included in this collection, called Bad Intentions. It’ll be published in July by the good folks at Literary Garage, a Philadelphia-based lit mag that defines itself as a place “for writing that’s a little off the beaten path.”
Continue reading “Inspired by the music of Warren Zevon”What some of the best in the craft say about voice and rhythm, getting started, similes and metaphors, and the need for writers to “admit that nothing in this world makes sense.”
It was a cool winter’s day and I was on a minor dusting spree when I discovered tucked away in a far corner of my bookcase a paperback called Writers on Writing: A Bread Loaf Anthology. Published in 1991 by Middlebury College Press and edited by a couple of Middlebury English professors, Robert Pack and Jay Parini (neither of whom I’d heard of), the list of authors displayed on the cover piqued my interest. There, presented on a slant, a graphic treatment no doubt trendy in the late ’80s and early ’90s, was an all-star cast of writers I recognized–Stanley Elkin, Richard Ford, John Irvin, Erica Jong, Joyce Carol Oates, Tim O’Brien–along with many names I didn’t. Holding the book in my non-dusting hand, I studied the cover and concluded I must have purchased it at some long ago library book sale, then tucked it away for safekeeping. (I’m always a sucker for books about the writing craft, and buy any I find, especially if they’re cheap.)
I set aside the dust rag and began reading. Dusting would have to wait.
Continue reading “Friday Five: Some thoughts on ‘Writers on Writing’”
