I have been thinking about changes I’ve gone through since I decided to follow (far, far behind) in my brother Jann’s footsteps and become a published writer. Part of the impetus was my move to Calgary to help care for my mother, but a larger consideration was the fact that I was fast approaching retirement and wanted something that would keep me busy and generate extra income. Jann had been writing for a few years and his choice had…
Christmas 2022 is a matter of history and with New Year’s celebrations coming in a few days, I decided not to tax anyone with anything that might be construed as thought provoking. If you’re like me, the post Christmas let-down has you in cruise control right now and you almost recoil at any task that requires more than a few brain cells to complete. In that vein I present an excerpt from book 5 of my Elizabeth Said, Darcy Said…
Christmas is past and now we move into that week between Christmas and New Year’s. I don’t know if anyone else feels this way, but this has always seemed like a week in limbo to me, with little happening other than waiting for the year to end. I am also not much of a fan of New Year’s, for I have never seen the movement of one year to the next as anything exceptional. Maybe I am a bit of…
As some of you know, I am in the midst of writing a series titled Elizabeth Said, Darcy Said, where I take well known portions of Ms. Austen’s Pride and Prejudice and expand on them. Each book tells the story first from Elizabeth’s perspective, then reexamines it from Darcy’s point of view. The first two novellas told the story of Our Dear Couple’s initial meeting at the Meryton Assembly. Books three and four explore Elizabeth’s introduction to Mr. Wickham in…
I confess. The details in my fiction are open to interpretation by readers, as well as other authors. In my defense, though, my stories are set in a period more than two hundred years in the past, so many of the situations I put my characters into are dreamed up as I write. That is not to say the conversations and actions I thrust these men and women into are made up of whole cloth. Their words and manner of…
As an author who writes historical fiction, I try to write in the common vernacular of the time and place my story is set. There are many tools that help authors to do this, and my experience in writing many books has given me a general sense of what is usable and what is not. For anything of which I am uncertain, I can go to resources on the net that will give me a good idea of whether a…
It’s my distinct pleasure to introduce you to What’s Up Wednesday, a regular theme day where we post something of our doings, updates, and other items that might be of interest to our readers. Christmas is approaching, and most of the major things that are happening in my life revolve around music and writing. Many times I have referenced my love of music and my activities therein. I am a member of a barbershop quartet group, and we’ll be active…