We have all heard and seen the ramifications of derogatory comments in today's world. Classic movies and novels have been targets for their portrayal of marginalized and discriminated groups and word usage - many have been 'edited' or simply removed from public...
The latter end of last week, I suffered a tooth abscess, which led to half my face swelling to three times it's size. Not a pretty sight and agonizingly painful. As I lay with a succession of ice packs on my poor face, I reflected on the popular 'freak' or 'creep'...
When did you start writing poetry? What was, and is your inspiration?I began in high school, not long after my parents’ divorce. Looking back, I see that I turned to writing to sort out my confusion at the time. My world was upended when my parents sold the family...
This is a character interview with Owena from my steampunk novel, The Commodore's Gift. 1. Tell me a little about yourself (where you live, who you are, what you look like.) Currently, I am living within a rebel stronghold, deep in a cave complex in a forest in...
Photo by Tirachard Kumtanom on Pexels.com We all want to immerse our readers into our story as much as possible. To this end we need to 'carry' them through the experience with as little actual word usage as possible. An overly complicated or wordy sentence or...
We were set a prompt at our writer's meeting, and I thought you may enjoy the story I created from it. This was the prompt: What's in a Name? Build a character's traits based on the meaning of their first or last name. Look up name meanings. Write a scene or story...
My guest today is Calgary author Simon Rose, who has published eighteen novels for children and young adults, eight guides for writers, more than a hundred nonfiction books, and many articles on a wide variety of topics. Today, we’re looking at his latest release,...
If you have ever watched the movie Cloud Atlas, you will have struggled to keep up with the reincarnated characters and their separate journeys in each life. For example, Tim Hanks plays these multiple roles: a doctor, a hotel manager, a physicist, a roughneck author,...