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Post #9: My Villain Has a Backstory I Just Don’t Know What It Is
My villain was supposed to be simple: ancient, intimidating and safely mysterious. Then he started asking questions. Somewhere along the way, my evil force developed grief, a philosophy and a backstory he apparently has no intention of telling me yet.
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What the Roots Knew: A Poem on Turning 60 & New Beginnings
I’ve always loved autumn—perhaps because it reminds us that letting go and beginning again can happen at the same time. On my 60th birthday, I imagined my eighty-year-old self looking back across twenty Septembers. What the Roots Knew grew from that thought.
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Post #8: Finding My Voice (Again)
Sometimes a writer’s voice doesn’t disappear, it simply goes quiet. After time away from the page, I’m discovering that finding my voice again isn’t about returning to who I was, but listening to who I’ve become.
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Post #7: When My Characters Ignore Me
There’s a moment in writing when a character stops following the shape you’ve planned. Not dramatically, but quietly through hesitation, resistance, or a line that doesn’t quite land. This entry reflects on how a single scene shifted when something underneath it refused to settle.
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Post #6: My Muse Is a Liar and Other Comforting Truths
I met my muse in a bookstore. She drinks tea, questions everything, and has a habit of pointing out exactly what I’m avoiding. She tells the truth—just not always at the right time.
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Post #5: The Story Had Other Plans
What began as a tidy fantasy with obedient plot points quickly unraveled. Characters rebelled, villains became philosophical, and the story wandered far beyond my outline. Somewhere in that chaos, I realized the uncomfortable truth: sometimes the story knows more than the writer.
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Post #4: From Someday to Manuscript
“Someday” is a comfortable place for a story to live. Safe. Untested. But eventually, I had to choose: keep imagining it—or write it. The moment I began was the moment everything changed.
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Post #3: Love Letters to the Story
I’ve started writing love letters again—not to people, but to stories. To the drafts that haunt and quietly save me. To the characters who resist my plans. Loving a story isn’t about control. It’s about devotion—especially when it refuses to behave.
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Post #2: Reading Calvino While Editing My Book
Reading If on a winter’s night a traveler while editing my own novel reminded me that stories don’t always want to behave. A reflection on Calvino, creative interruption, and what happens when a book teaches you how to keep writing—by refusing to be straightforward.
