I got home late last night from a super rad evening of music and spoken word (thanks Gray Skies Reading Series) and noticed a sour, gross smell in my office as I was checking my email. I thought maybe it was my own sweat I was smelling, which has a

Gardening isn’t my thing. Not because I don’t like it, but because I forget to do important tending activities. Watering, for example.

In my house, only plants like spider plants survive because they can live on air for weeks.

But every spring I get the same itch that the rest of you

I know what the Bean is now. The Sears Tower is the tallest building in North America and has, I found out, been called the Willis Tower since 2009.

This is me feeling very afraid to step out into glass boxes hanging on the sides of Willis Tower (formerly

My last post was about my choice to pursue on MFA in creative writing. This one’s about which MFA program I chose and how I chose it.

But first I’d like to echo the article Poets & Writers wrote on the topic this past fall and say that my decision to

Two more months and I’ll have completed my first year in Pacific Lutheran University’s low-res MFA program in Creative Writing (fiction). Super excited.

I often get asked about the program–What’s it like? Why’d you choose it? Why low-residency?–all the questions I asked when I was trying to decide 1.) if I

Diagram of Joseph Campbell’s Hero’s Journey

This week I’ve been obsessively searching for the magical ingredients of successful story writing. Not like the obvious stuff that we always talk about–character, theme, plot, blah, blah. And please don’t suggest I go read Joseph Campbell.

I’m talking about the magic! Secret somethings that

As a rule I like kid narrators.  I read a lot of them. An embarrassingly high percentage of the books I read are YA and most young adult novels feature a first-person narrator between the ages of 14 and 17.

This week, I met sixteen-year-old Jacob whom I accompanied on a quest to

On the heels of consuming several smarty pants books, I’m hungry for plot candy. Now feed me a story with action, imagination, and maybe a little sweet romance, please.

Don’t get me wrong. I love good character-driven literary fiction, too. I mean, I just finished a marvelously lyrical memoir by Sonja

I made the transition from working 40+ hours a week as an executive manager in a public agency to becoming a full-time writer and graduate student over a period of several years.

Joining or starting a writing group can provide focus, direction, and writing support. Also deadlines help motive

*big sigh* Monday begins.

But my head is still back relaxing in my computer-free weekend in Sequim, Washington.

In addition to celebrating (belatedly) the birthday of a family member, I caught up on some reading.

Right before driving out on Friday night, I pulled from my “almost overdue” pile of library books  MariNaomi’s

I’m taking a break from the hideous story I’ve been posting so I can capture what it’s been like to write like an insane killer: serially. Okay, that’s dramatic.

But writing a story in chunks and putting those drafty chunks out there for others to inspect feels as if I’m barfing on