All fictitious stories, short or long, have five elements in common. Without one of these five foundations, your story will fall flat, like a house built on sand. It’s important to know and use these so your story will make the reader satisfied, wanting to read more. ~ Character ~Setting ~Conflict ~Plot ~Solution When writing […]
Every story begins with an idea. Where do Ideas come from? Where do I begin with a short story or novel? Ask “What If?” questions. What if your hero (main character) hopped a horse, taking only his/her bow, and when your hero stepped off the train he/she went back in time, forward into the […]
A name. I needed a name for my next book. Actually, I didn’t need 1 authentic name, I needed 12! After my first 2 young adult books that included one girl, Spupaleena, I got a harebrained idea to have her race horses like Native men have done for years during our Ferry County Fair––Indian Relay. […]
Three weeks left until Hannah’s Journey is released! October 1….Save the date! Does fashion mystify you as much as it does me? Especially the mid-1800s. I love wearing shorts and sandals in the summer and jeans and sweatshirts in the winter. I’d love to live in the same era as Hannah and Spupaleena, but…only if […]
Welcome friend and fellow author Mary E. Trimble. I’m excited to help her launch her new release, Maureen. So without further ado, here we go! The inspiration behind Maureen: In my first book, Rosemount, a Young Adult contemporary western, sixteen-year-old Leslie Cahill rebels when her widower father announces he’s sending her to a private girls’ school in […]
Happy Monday friends and readers! I’d like to introduce the Hannah’s Journey book cover to you. This is the second book of the Gardner Sibling Trilogy, a young adult story of one headstrong girl becoming a woman of character and vision. Hannah is Delbert’s older sister and was last seen in Heart of Passion as a five-year-old […]
I was born white. It’s my heritage. Yet I write main characters from another ethnicity––Native America. My grandmother always told us we were part Indian, but the proof never came. It still hasn’t and probably never will. I never intended to write let alone write books that have the protagonist from a different heritage. I […]
Welcome to Maria Inés, an aboriginal woman who struggles to survive while she reclaims her family, her faith, and her ancestral identity by Anne Schroeder. Today I have the pleasure of introducing award-winning author and Women Writing the West member Anne Schroeder and her novel Maria Inés. I find the Salinan people from the […]
It was six weeks when I heard back from a publisher about my latest work-in-progress. Waiting to hear back from a publisher tests not only one’s patience but self-esteem, too. While waiting and soaking in my lesson in patience, biting my fingernails, I was hunkered down under my fair tent as rain tumbled down during […]
I recently wrote a fiction book about the World Famous Suicide Horse Race in Omak, WA––the second full weekend of August. This event is part of the Omak Stampede, but its own entity. I’ve attended the stampede off and on since I was a little girl. But this year I watched the race from a […]