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Baring one's soul in a memoir is hard work. Convincing others to care is one thing, but to engage in your life story? That's a whole other beast. In...
We’re starting a NEW BOOK - Judith Barrington’s Writing the Memoir. And what better place to start than by discussing what a memoir is, what memoir isn’t, and just...
How do you tackle one of the most famous writing craft books, you take it “Bird by Bird.” That’s what we’ve done with Anne Lamott’s book over the past...
Well, why do you? The answer for most authors is to get published. But is that the only reason, or even the best reason? As we near the...
Anne Lamott (in her Bird by Bird book) says the dreaded writer’s block isn’t about being blocked, it’s about being empty. In today’s podcast we discuss Lamott’s approach to...
Behind most successful authors there is a writing group (at least according to their novel's acknowledgment section). But how does one find a writing group, and how do you...
Some advice is timeless, some is not. In this episode, we evaluate writing techniques from Anne Lamott's book Bird by Bird and see if they still have value...
In this podcast we give our first impressions of our new book, Jack Bickham's Scene and Structure, and, being the...
In this episode we bid a fond farewell to Bradbury with one last conversation about his book, Zen in...
In this episode we dive into the final chapter of Ray Bradbury’s Zen in the Art of Writing, titled:...
In todays episode, Bradbury tells us how loathing Ireland pushed him to becoming a playwright/screenwriter, why these absurdest plays...
No one succeeds all by themselves, and that includes Ray Bradbury. In his book Zen in the Art of...
According to Bradbury’s retelling, it took him nine days, a library typewriter, and a pocketful of dimes to crank...
Oh Muse, well-spring of creativity, why are you so unreliable? How can we entice you? In this episode, we...
Ray Bradbury shares his secrets for how he wrote so many unforgettable short stories in the first two chapters...
Thinking of reading The Art of Fiction, "Young Writer?" Listen to this podcast first. Despite dying in a motorcycle...
Wow! We've gotten to the final chapter of John Gardner's book, The Art of Fiction and it's all about...
Gardner promises to show us the proper way for the young writer to achieve artistic mastery. Doesn’t that sound...
Enough with the theoretical, in this episode we get some practical advice out of Gardner's book, The Art of...
After last episode’s mother of all chapters, we get a reprieve – a much shorter and lighthearted chapter...
Moving along to Chapter 3 in The Art of Fiction. We go to war over the various dichotomies that...
Onto Chapter 2 of John Gardner’s The Art of Fiction. We begin with Gardner’s opinions about grammar, and our...
Finding Your Memoir’s Form
Chronological, essays, skipping through time, interspersed non-fiction — there are so many forms that memoir can take. Judith Barrington covers several in her book, Writing the Memoir, and in...