Yesterday, as I sat down to write some brilliant words in my WIP, I did what any writer does before starting. I got onto Facebook. For research. I swear. Okay, maybe not, but I did see a couple of posts that inspired the words you’re reading now, so it wasn’t all a waste of time.…
Yesterday, I read a well-known book with my first-grade group called Is Your Mama a Llama? It’s about a llama looking for others like him, who would have a llama for a mama, told in a fun and predictable rhyming pattern. “Is your mama a llama?” I asked my fried Dave. “No she is not,” is…
The title is a question I get asked fairly often, and after writing out what I’m about to write out here several times I said to myself, “Self, you know that blog thingy we have? Maybe write it all there and then share the link when someone asks.” Myself can be pretty smart sometimes. It’s…
Learning to read is a magical process: we recognize letters and assign them sounds and then smash the sounds together into words. Then we read many words in sentences and in paragraphs, not only decoding the them but extracting meaning from them. It’s pretty trippy if you dwell on it too long. Seeing as learning…
My birthday is in a few days, and I only want one thing. Seeing as it conveniently overlaps with everyone’s reflecting on the past year, this should be easy. Here goes. If you read a book you loved this year, go to its Amazon and/or Goodreads page and write a review for it. That’s it.…
In the writing community, there’s a saying that there are no new story ideas – there are around 12, and every “new” story is one of those 12 told in a different voice and from a different angle. The Orphaned Chosen One and the Unasked For Journey are two common ones. Another “branch” of these is…
Sometimes, I work with writers who make me wonder certain things. Maybe they’re insomniacs and write about stuff happening in dreams, or they’re doctors who write stories about organ harvesting. Or something. One such writer is Dana Griffin, a pilot who happens to write airline thrillers. His newest release is Blamed, which I had the…
When I was just a reader, meaning I didn’t create my own word babies, I didn’t have a clue what went into making books or how my being a reader mattered to anyone. Now that I’m on both sides of the fence, the picture is much clearer – and I try to be a “better”…
I’ve read a lot of books. A LOT of books. When I was a kid, I’d get sets of books and be thrilled at the promise of spending countless hours sitting upside-down in my mom’s recliner with an open book. Reading and appreciation of a good story is part of who I am. But in recent…
Before Project Liberatio came out, I published a Five Authors You Need To Meet Right Now post, through which you met some talented authors who have been kind enough to support my work. With Project Ancora just weeks away from release, I want to introduce you to seven more such authors, who have critiqued, written…
Allison Maruska 