writing process

3,697 Days (and Counting)

For over ten years, or 3,697 days to be exact, I’ve been work­ing on a nov­el about teens in the 1980s. The nov­el even­tu­al­ly became…

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Climbers on Mt. Everest at the base of the Hillary Step.

It Always Seems Impossible Until It’s Done

Greet­ings, Dear Read­er. I’m dic­tat­ing this blog entry while walk­ing on my tread­mill, so please excuse me if I ram­ble or my “smart” phone sub­sti­tutes…

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The Nuclear Submarine U.S.S. Bodacious Resurfaces After Six Months of “Deep and Silent”

About five months ago, I bought a count­down clock that sits direct­ly below my com­put­er mon­i­tor, and for 157 days it’s been tick­ing down. It’s…

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Backstory: The Story Behind Perpetuating Trouble

The open­ing sen­tence of Per­pet­u­at­ing Trou­ble is absolute­ly true: “I was told to write this book by a pair of alien girls.” That inci­dent with…

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Being a Novelist Isn’t a Job, It’s a Lifestyle

Back in Decem­ber, after hav­ing com­plet­ed the first draft of a 550,000-word, 1,600-page nov­el, I took a near­ly month-long vaca­tion (my first in years). For…

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