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SHIFT TALKERS WORK OVERTIME

January 26, 2024 by

Shift talkers like to mix it up, change things. Some do it for the better, some for the worse. They all have one thing in common: Not knowing how and when to shut up. For that we should be thankful?

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WRITER ENCOURAGEMENT: WHY IT MATTERS

May 23, 2023 by

Writer encouragement works like this: “I just read a book so good I will stop writing forever.” That’s encouragement if you read between the lines. Read a book that moves you to feel something. My favorite book?

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BEACH MUSIC BY PAT CONROY, A REVIEW

April 12, 2023 by

Beach Music sat in my TBR pile for years while I passed by. At over 700 pages it intimidated me. I like novels around 200-250 pages. The Great Gatsby clocks in at 208 paged; Catcher In The Rye runs 234 pages, more or less. Beach Music at 800 pages? I got a Harry Potter vibe […]

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WRITER WORKING ON CASU-11

March 9, 2023 by

The writer working on Carrier Aircraft Service Unit 11 is William Little. The official title of his book is MECHANIC ON THE WING, The Untold Story of Carrier Aircraft Unit Eleven (CASU-11) 1943-1946. I first heard about it in 2019 during a Rick Steves tour of Paris. There was something about meeting a former Navy […]

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DON’T CARE, OR CARE, THERE IS NO TRY

January 28, 2023 by

If you don’t care about something, stay off the soapbox. Save your big talk for something you care about, we’ll figure out the rest. Once you’ve been around the block a few times it gets easier to care than not care. Why, you ask?

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WRITERS SOCIALIZING WITH WRITERS

January 10, 2023 by

My aunt warned me about writers socializing. I’d taken the train from Philadelphia to Princeton, New Jersey for a visit. She was studying at the Princeton Theological Seminary to be a preacher; I was in the Army learning to be a writer. Since she had a degree in literary criticism she had a lot to […]

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UNGROUNDED LIFE IN TIGARD

December 6, 2022 by

An ungrounded life is for people who wish they were somewhere besides where they are, where they live, where they spend their time. I met one of them in the local Walgreens. I could tell he was ungrounded by how he looked. He was wearing a suit, which from my experience, was his work clothes.

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RECOMMENDED READING: T.C. BOYLE’S ‘GOING DOWN’

October 29, 2022 by

Recommended reading for writers? Common advice is to read everything, whatever that means. Do I read everything? Everything in a bookstore, or library? No, I read for inspiration, I read for cause, and my cause is writing.

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TENDER BAR, A PLACE EVERYONE NEEDS

October 27, 2022 by

The Tender Bar is a book, a memoir, and a movie. A book and a movie, for the deuce. But it’s more than a book or a movie, it’s a destination I stopped in for a drink yesterday, but it was the wrong bar.

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BOOK HOARDING ADVICE FOR BEGINNERS

July 12, 2022 by

Book hoarding is not a disease. If that makes you feel better, you might be a librarian. Not a librarian, but still have loads of books? Still not a disease, and here’s why:

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