Let me tell you about Newt, a shy young man in Larry McMurtry’s Lonesome Dove. Newt adores Lorena, one of the saloon women. The narrator says Newt “was painfully aware that if the chance for personal speech ever did arise he would have no idea what to say. On the rare...
I’ve been thinking about literary citizenship the last while. Probably because I recently spent ten days on Whidbey Island, hobnobbing with writer buddies, sitting in on the afternoon Profession of Writing sessions that are so popular during the NILA residency,...
Before I learned I had celiac disease, I was addicted to St. Honoré Cake, a delectable combination of puff pastry, rich custard, cream puffs, caramelized sugar and whipped cream. It’s not a dessert that can be slapped together; it takes the skilled hands of a pastry...
Mae West knew a thing or two about characters and characterization. She said, “It isn’t what I do, but how I do it. It isn’t what I say, but how I say it, and how I look when I do it and say it.” I believe she was talking about attitude....
Hood River, Oregon is a cool little town on the banks of the Columbia River, just an hour east of Portland. It’s home to wind surfers, skiers, snowboarders, and mountain bikers. It was also the home, for a week at the end of March, to 32 fiction writers who joined...
