There are many versions of Cinderella. I’m fond of the Brothers Grimm version, which includes severed toes and heels and an army of birds who peck out eyeballs. After long hours of toil and trouble, Cinderella weeps and prays at the tree growing on…
In September 2013 I travelled to Texas to research my novel featuring women flying in World War II. Despite reading nearly every account of The WASP (Women Airforce Service Pilots) in print, including memoirs and biographies, newspaper clippings, histories of…
Life happens. And sometimes life happens in the big middle of your best writerly intentions. A work project explodes and takes all your spare time with it. A family crisis turns you inside out emotionally. Your kid finally makes that traveling hockey…
My primary association with Friday the 13th — as is the case for many of us, I suspect — is Jason Voorhees. But there are also those who are superstitious about making travel plans on this unluckiest of Fridays. Many…
As I got older, I thought life would get simpler. I’d go to work. I’d come home. I’d read away the hours. In my thirties, I discovered writing (well, rediscovered it after a particularly unhelpful, James Joyce-loving professor told me…
How Not to Write I used to keep a book on my shelf to remind myself how not to write. The book, call it Stricken, consisted of a collection of essays on the author’s recent widowhood. She had written it perhaps…