Sometimes to see, you need to listen first. For almost all of the projects I would create before 2016, I ran into a wall over and over again: For some reason, I couldn’t visualize anything about my stories the way I needed to. It wasn’t because I didn’t have a vivid imagination or that my… More Writing With Sound: Making playlists for your stories
Laura van den Berg is a short story writer and novelist known for her collections What the World Will Look Like When All the Water Leaves Us and The Isle of Youth, as well as her debut novel Find Me, which was listed as a “Best of 2015” by NPR, Time Out New York, Buzzfeed,… More An Interview with Novelist and Short Story Writer Laura van den Berg by Carleton Whaley (2016)
by Laura Ruttan
“An author ought to write for the youth of his own generation, the critics of the next, and the schoolmaster of ever afterwards.” —F. Scott Fitzgerald The great American novel, The Great Gatsby turned 91 yesterday. Little did he know the success that his novel would see when F. Scott Fitzgerald published his novel in… More The Legacy of the Great Gatsby by Laura Ruttan
By Emily Zimmer
“I have a horror of the blank page. I simply cannot write on a blank page or screen. Because once I do, I start to fix it, and I never get past the first sentence.” — Charles Krauthammer The vast emptiness of the page is overwhelming. The stark white seems blinding without the interruption of… More The Threat of an Empty Page By Emily Zimmer
By Carleton Whaley
“Young farmers and rural characters, obstetrical nurses, scholars, clergy—all the rest!—will have their great hopes realized more often than not—unless I decide to tell their stories.” — from “Head of the Big Man” by Diane Williams As a first time reader of Diane Williams, I wasn’t sure what to expect. The slim volume that arrived… More Very, Very, Very, Very, Very Good: A review of Diane Williams’ new book Fine, Fine, Fine, Fine, Fine By Carleton Whaley