The Sublime Joy of the Epistolary Romance by Kilby Blades
Well, here we are in the modern age. Forget Love in the Time of Cholera. Love in the time of Tinder has arrived. Suddenly we have dating profiles; we’re swiping left, and sliding into people’s DM’s. It’s efficient. But is it right? Love was once a drawn-out affair–an endeavor that found us hopeful. It made… Read More
How to Embrace the Cliché
by Cookie O’Gorman What is a cliché, and why do people always say it like it’s a bad thing? “Trope” is a word I didn’t know until a few years ago. I didn’t realize there were these preordained categories of romance. Though I’d enjoyed and read several of them, I never knew there was an… Read More
I Remember Mama
“I Remember Mama”–Do any of you remember that TV show way back when or the even older black and white movie of the Swedish immigrant family in San Francisco? Lyn Cote here–This is the month we celebrate mothers and I want to share a fond story of my complex mother. I must have been around… Read More
The Little Teashop on Main
One cold day in March I walked through the sunroom where my granddaughters often play. I stopped as the real world touched my writing world. There the girls were, wearing their hand-me-down ladies hats and gloves having tea and cookies. The tea cups might have been full of juice and the cookies were raided from… Read More
A New Year, and New Goals
by Pamela Ann Cleverly The second book in my Tanner series became available on December 18th. Watching it go live was exciting and rewarding. I felt a tremendous sense of accomplishment and rejoiced with family and friends. But now it’s time to move on. So, I left Northeastern Ohio’s cold, grey days and moved on… Read More
Family Ties
I’m so excited about the upcoming release of my new book MENDING FENCES on June 19. It’s a book about family. Specifically, the book revolves around a widowed father and his four daughters: Sharon, Kathy, Patti, and Helen. My mom and dad had six girls. Actually they had three girls, waited ten years, then had… Read More
Discovering My Characters
People often ask me which character is me in a book. I always say, “Them all.” In MORNINGS ON MAIN, I was a young woman driving through town looking for a place to stop for a few months. Looking for a piece of her life that was missing. She traveled light from town to town,… Read More
Inspiration in Content & Structure: If you want acorns, look under an oak tree
By Katharine Britton Inspiration in content Inspiration, the root of which is the word “spirit,” comes from the Latin “spiritus,” meaning “breath.” Early (c. 1300) definitions of “inspiration” meant the “immediate influence of God or a god” mainly in religious writing. Inspiration, when it comes to an author, can feel like divine intervention. But even… Read More
THE FIRST STEP—AN IDEA…OR CHARACTER…OR…
by Carolyn Haines People often ask writers where ideas for books come from. I think it’s different for each story—a tidbit for a newspaper or magazine, a chance conversation with a friend, happening upon a historical fact while looking for something else, or maybe a dream. Sometimes, as in the case of Rock-A-Bye Bones, one… Read More
Twelve Authors Participate in The Inheritance Collection
By Margaret Daley From Judith Arnold about how The Inheritance collection originated: The idea for the series was born during the “Let Your Imagination Take Flight” conference in 2015. Patricia McLinn, Day Leclaire, Lisa Mondello, Kathryn Shay, and Judith Arnold were all at the conference, and we were tossing ideas around, searching for… Read More
A Pirate’s Guide to Modern Romance
by Jean Lafitte (with translation by DJ Jaco) Bonjour, mes amies. I was most pleased when asked to offer my considerable knowledge of the art of l’amour to modern women who might wish to please a man of the world such as myself. (DJ: He means pirates. Specifically, undead French pirates from the early 1800s…. Read More
Begin Again
by Lisa Renee Jones With every new series an author starts from scratch. A new world to mold, new characters to create and acquaint yourself with, and in my case an intricately twisted plot to plan out. Yet, with the daunting task of a new series comes the thrill of weaving in the new elements… Read More