Lisa Cron author of Wired for Story, talks with Barbara DeMarco-Barrett about hooking the reader from the start, regardless of genre. If you’re writing a novel or memoir and want to make sure to engage your readers (beginning with a literary agent), don’t miss this one.
(Broadcast date: Dec. 31, 2014
Pulitzer Prize winning author Robert Olen Butler joins Marrie Stone to talk about his latest Christopher Marlow Cobb novel, The Empire of Night, and how to utilize the “compost of the imagination” to create art.
Licensed mortician Caitlin Doughty joins in the second half to discuss her memoir, Smoke Gets in Your Eyes and Other Lessons from the Crematory. Caitlin gives advice on how to talk to children about death, what attracted her to mortuary science, and options for after-life care most people don’t know exist.
(Broadcast date: November 12, 2014)
I posted this recipe two years ago. Here it is again. I know Starbucks pumpkin lattes are delicious–I’ve had them–but they are full of sugar and other junk. This recipe can be made as pure as you like. I haven’t tried it with soy or almond milk, or another nondairy milk, but I plan to. Let me know if you do, and what the results are.
For the recipe, you’ll need:
coffee
milk
pumpkin
honey or whatever sweetener you like
pumpkin pie spice
vanilla extract
Brew a cup of coffee, however you do. I use an espresso maker from IKEA and a frother, from IKEA.
Then, mix 1/2 cup nonfat milk, 1 tablespoon pumpkin (I use Trader Joe’s organic pumpkin in a can), 2 teaspoons honey (or brown sugar), 1/4 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice, and 1 teaspoon vanilla extract. Mix and heat on the stove (or in a microwave; I don’t have a microwave), then froth with a frother. Pour onto the coffee, sprinkle with cinnamon, if you like cinnamon, and major yum.
Yum.
Elinor Lipman, the author of the novel, The View from Penthouse B, and the essay collection, I Can’t Complain, spent an hour on the show talking about her work and writing and so much else with Barbara DeMarco-Barrett.
(Broadcast date: May 15, 2012)
I don’t much believe in traditional outlines, but I do believe in devising methods to keep track of the goings on in your novel. Here’s the link to what Rowling did. You’re going to have to copy and past since I can’t get it to link up within this post. And if that doesn’t work, google “JK Rowling plot” or visit openculture.com and it’s there, somewhere.
How J.K. Rowling Plotted Harry Potter with a Hand-Drawn Spreadsheet
This morning I remembered something my friend and colleague Neal Shusterman, who writes YA novels and does quite well at it, said some years back. It was either when we were in Fictionaires together (an Orange County-based writing group where I also got to know T. Jefferson Parker, Elizabeth George, Jo-Ann Mapson, Maureen Taylor Smith, and Don Stanwood), or during an interview when he was on Writers on Writing, or for an article I wrote for Poets & Writers, but he said rather than writing a number of words or pages during any given day, he had a number he had to reach for the week. So if one day he wrote one, and another day, two, the next day he might write eight, to make up for not writing much previous days. Lately I’ve been doing just that.
For me, the number per day, five days a week, is four pages. So every week, I need to write 20 pages of the novel I started a little more than two months ago. I’m up to page 200. I’m aiming for 240.
If you’re having trouble with a certain number of words or pages a day, give this a try. A certain number every week offers a certain flexibility and latitude that works for writers like me, and maybe
Palm Springs Noir, an anthology published by Akashic Books, edited by Barbara, also features her short story “The Water Holds You Still.” Order anywhere you buy books.
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