White Orchid
White Orchid : Flourishing in tropical heat, petals pink, splotched, violet, pale or bright, none can compare to simply white.
100 Words on Travelers with no shoes
100 Words on Travelers with no shoes : Skin stretched against concrete where normally shoes stride protecting feet from all sorts of things like gum & street debris. These brave soles are travelers with no shoes for a good cause in Amsterdam as Participants of the One Day Without Shoes event. Sponsored by Toms shoes,  “One for One” global giving program, they have donated 2 million pairs of shoes to children in over 50 countries. One has to admire those up for the challenge of barefoot walking & the company that gives. Which is why this 100 words is dedicated to all those little feet, here’s the link!
Stained – a novel
Stained – a novel : Had I of known each woman would forever leave her mark, change me with her sorrows and joys I might have passed. After all I have been a therapist for twenty years. Little could be said that I had not already heard in some form or another. And yet, with them each revelation touched my heart as though for the first time. Of course I am getting ahead of myself. I sometimes do. – Idona (A Character)*  *Snippet from Stained by Teresa Little
Angelic Fire
Angelic Fire : If ever one needed proof that we are just a cog in the greater wheel of the Universe, just look up. The stars say it all.    

100 on Pantsing

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Character drops word bomb. Roll with it or not? Check gut. Roll with it. Think this is stupid. How can this possibly make it to the final edit of the book? I’m only wasting time writing these words. Pour heart out on the page. Don’t hit delete. Just leave it to marinate overnight on the page. Come back, debate. Let it marinate some more, tweak and find I’ve been pulling this thread the entire time since before I ever put a word down on a page. This is good. Continue with plot and character arcs. Got a new word bomb.

Benji love

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I love Ben. I think I love him more than Rachel. She’s his wife. I love him for all the reasons she does not. He’s complicated, a bit of a wuss, and really confused. Not listening really seems to be his thing. I love how he devolves. How he tells me in acts 1 and 2 that God does not exist. And then in Act 3 change his mind. I love how he notices the little things.How he relies on Bry and Nick until he is suddenly done with them. I love how he thinks he has it all planned out. As if this is really possible. And I love how much he thinks he is changing when he really has no clue. Okay. I’m Continue Reading →

The Nutritional Benefits of Cardboard

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Yep, that’s right folks. Step right up, we are talking about that elusive cardboard beast. The one that creeps into our writing no matter what draft you are one. The good ol’ Show versus Tell. If anything I have figured out in writing, critiquing and editing my work and others it is that writers want to tell stories. We need to tell a story. Which is great because readers want to experience them. We have already established that in Something’s Gotta Give. I read a lot of cardboard. I call it homework. It varies in style and genre. If I had to define cardboard writing, I’d say it comes in many forms (bland in need of creative/craft spices usually) and results in a story that Continue Reading →

Prickled Underbellies

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It starts with this: put your desk in the corner, and every time you sit down there to write, remind yourself why it isn’t in the middle of the room. Life isn’t a support system for art. It’s the other way around.  – Stephen King Life, the grand poohbah on high, offers us the guts of humanity to examine and explore every day. It is also a communal ride regardless of how singular we may think it to be. No man is ever an island or how else would we get our morning coffee? We bounce off each other forming thoughts and ideas every second, all across the globe, affecting our world simply by being our unique and individual selves. Life is the greatest art we all create and Continue Reading →

Something’s Gotta Give

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Any story worth its weight carries emotion of some sort. I don’t care if it is about a Jack in the Box, there better be emotion buried inside. Readers dream of stories marinated in feeling. Season it with whatever theme/genre you want, action, romance, adventure, whathaveyou, but the true flavor, the lasting bone deep hit you over the head goodness resides in an emotion filled bite. Great authors not only know how to do this, they give you the VIP all access backstage pass. The up close, skin on skin – in the story side seat – behind the eyes and in the brain, moment by story moment, living the buildup and the breakdown. I am turning pages almost faster than my own eyes can Continue Reading →

Friday Writing Prompt # 2

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If you fell down a rabbit hole, what do you think you’d find? A little bunny in his home, all snuggled in for winter. He’d be drinking hot carrot soup and reading about Peter Rabbit. Maybe he would invite me to stay. He has lots of books lining his wall. Plus the house looks really cozy with its quilted Easter egg lamp shades and pastel wallpaper. Okay, not really. I’ll be serious now… I tripped. Isn’t that how all good thing begin or was that bad? I can’t keep things straight when I am three inches tall. No I did not drink any potions or eat any magic mushrooms. Nor was there some disaster. I am naturally this tall. They call me a sprite, a Continue Reading →

New Year – New you

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Or rather New Me. 2018 is the year of action manifested. It is a year of doing what you love and loving what you do. In our crazy world such a simple thing may not seem like much but it matters. Which is why my word of the year is DO! As in: Yes, I do have a book in print. Yes, you will find it on Amazon (further on down the road in 2018). There it is my people of the page, my intention for the year. I have high hopes and the excitement of a two-year old on a caffeine sugar high considering said book is knee-deep in the “work in progress” stage and must crawl through editing then walk hand in hand with happy beta Continue Reading →

100 on Cold

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It runs in your veins creating ice trails through that splintered heart. I didn’t see the crystal shards embedded in your blue blooded, pale hand or the deep-freeze under ninety degrees that never thaws. It lingers in your voice, the cold, detached goodbye, the frosted turned cheek, and the dismissal with your eyes. How I wish we never got involved. I’m tired of the hardened heart, the chill of this empty bed, the heat misplaced and displaced. How simple things roll off your banks and careen down mountainsides laden with snow. Caught in the avalanche and buried in your cold.

Book Review: The Tiger Rising By Kate DiCamillo

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I could gush about Kate DiCamillo like a young fan girl. There I said it. She has a knack of hooking me on page one and I slip into her world forgetting mine, the bills, the dog, and am transported back to my youth. A place and time devoid of Kate DiCamillo. For if her books were around when I was a child, I’d of found my best friends in the pages of her works. The Tiger Rising is no different. Well maybe a little. What person is not fascinated by a wild creature, a tiger no less? From the first words we are off and running on an adventure. The characters are real, and while I might have found Sistine or Rob my heroes Continue Reading →

Friday Writing Prompt # 1

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In a recent trip to Five Below I unearthed this little book gem – 400 Writing Prompts by #piccadillyinc and figured I’d share the prompts on Facebook and then put my brainstorming attempts here. 500 Words is the writing goal, but attempt # 1 weighs in at a lean 300. That’s life. Enjoy the rambles. While at the beach you decide to write a message in a bottle. What would it say? Who would you like to find it? Sitting in the sand, my hand digging against broken shells I feel the smoothness of sea glass not quite ripe. Pulling it up I find it is not a broken shard but a bottle sealed shut. Canned air from god knows where hits sky. I stick my Continue Reading →