A person wearing bight yellow gloves holds a pair of pruning shears next to a green hedge

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My writing this week consisted mostly of negative writing in the sense that I took words out of the WIP. That seems to be how it goes. Why? Sometimes I tell the reader too much about characters’ thoughts […]
The entrance to a bar with the name "Werewolf"

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I pushed myself this week to finish a scene so that a chapter would be more or less complete (first draft, that is). Even though I was busy with unpacking and starting a new writing class (Advanced Speculative […]
Tiles laid out on a Scrabble board

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Amid moving madness, I stuck to my writing practice. This week six and a half hours were spent on writing with additional time spent researching and reviewing a couple of short stories for other people. A lot of […]
A wooden bench surrounded by tall grass next to a small pond

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Comments land like a stone in a pond: they ripple through the work. Last weekend I had critique sessions with writing buddies. This week I followed those ripples and made minor changes in a couple of chapters. I […]
Three books lie open on a desk surrounded by stacks of closed books on either side

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Writing and reviewing happened this week. I had three pieces to review for writing groups that meet this weekend. I enjoy providing feedback on others’ work. It’s like a puzzle to solve, trying to figure out what the […]
A girl is twisted in terror in the poster for the movie "I Was a Teenage Werewolf"

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After last week’s focus on research—timetables, maps, photographs—I was ready to write this week. Notes on the next scene in the WIP had been drafted months ago. This week I worked on finishing this scene, which opens the […]
Blue road signs against a background of green trees

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Much of this week’s writing time was consumed with research. For the current WIP novel, I needed certain physical locations for key parts of the action. For example: a summer house on a lake in northern New England […]
A cartoon by Tom Gauld about authors and what they do

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A friend and I made an agreement to check in with each other weekly about the progress on our writing progress. We both have long-form books that we struggle to find time for amid jobs and other things […]
A parrot with a red head, green body, and yellow tail feathers

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For my first foray into chatty AI, I asked Bard (Google’s Chatbot): Write a short, humorous story about a detective who is also a talking parrot. A woman comes to the parrot to ask him to find her […]
Lucy snatches the football away from Charlie Brown, who flies into the air

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After working through the beta readers’ comments on the first draft, I solicited another review from someone who hadn’t seen the manuscript before. This isn’t a beta reader exactly. Is there such a thing as a gamma-reader? The […]