Ernest Hemingway led a famously adventurous life, going to wars when he did not have to, hunting big game (and getting a great nonfiction novel, Green Hills of Africa, out of it), becoming an afficionado of bullfighting, boxing in his…
On Styles by David Massey
I’ve been thinking about styles in writing. Narration, dialogue, description, syntax—all these things. By far my favorite American fiction writer is William Faulkner, and if I had it in me, I would probably write like him; but I like sparer…
Writing Advice from the Murder Hornet by PS Nolf
I look at the newspaper photo of the latest invader of the Pacific Northwest, where I live. The yellow ruler with its black calibration documents the two-inch “Murder Hornet.” A thing of nightmares, the Asian Giant Hornet sports huge, black,…
Character Fill-In-the-Blank by Rod Martinez
Our love for the written word may have been generated from any number of avenues growing up. We, as artists and students of our beloved art, yearn to learn as much as possible about our craft. That is where the…
What Do Writers Need? Sitzfleisch! by Lev Raphael
That’s the term my European-born mother used about doing anything and seeing it through. It comes from German and means the “power to endure or to persevere in an activity.” Literally, though, it’s your butt: the flesh that you sit…
A Conversation with Angela Brown
An interview by Alicia Cole. Angela Brown was born in Meridian, Mississippi on January 5, 1969. Angela works as an assistant for the Department of Hospitality Management at the College of Southern Nevada. She found her voice through writing poetry….
Book Review by Angela Mitchell: “Thank Your Lucky Stars” by Sherrie Flick
Reading Sherrie Flick’s new collection of short fiction, Thank Your Lucky Stars (Autumn House, 2018), is a kind of literary feast, with its gathering of characters, all hungering for love and connection and a desire to better nourish both their…
After Turning the Graduation Cap Tassel to the Other Side by Alan Ferland
I didn’t go for my MFA after graduating from college almost seven years ago. A handful of my classmates went down that path with heads held high and the talent they’d developed during our times together. I didn’t follow them,…
More on the Suspension of Disbelief by David Massey
I previously wrote a few words on the importance to the writer of the suspension of disbelief. I would like to say a little more because I did not say all that I feel on that topic. Samuel Taylor Coleridge…
Second Person: Write down, not up by Adam Dove
Second person is like the lonely middle child of writing perspectives. Everybody knows first person, because it’s always talking about itself. It just feels kind of natural, like it’s always been there. And third person – everybody wants to be…
Discontinuity in Fiction by David Massey
Morse Peckham, a professor under whom I took a class in graduate school, had a theory that the role of the arts in a complex, stressful society is to provide discontinuity, so that people might rehearse the experience of it…
Book Review by Lauren Sartor: “Life on Mars” by Tracy K. Smith
The poetry in Tracy K Smith’s book, Life on Mars, examines the limitedness of the human species. The poetry speculates on the smallness of humankind, the incapacity of human intellectuality, and the irrationality of human emotions. The language is accessible…