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Writing through the seasons of life
In my last IWSG post (2 months ago! Bad blogger!), I mentioned that there are seasons in life–times when we focus on career, family, side gigs, hobbies, or just taking care of ourselves. I also mentioned that I was and would continue to pull back from blogging for a little while because of exhaustion, work, and health challenges. All of that is still true two months later, only now I’ve jumped feet-first into a new adventure: I’m moving to California. Yep, you read that right. I’m saying goodbye to cactus and desert and monsoon storms and returning to the San Joaquin Valley where I grew up. And I’m learning that…
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20 years of blogging: a look back
As if I don’t feel old enough, I just realized I’ve been blogging for 20 years. 20 years! Now bring me my cane and get off my lawn. Wait, I live in Tucson. I don’t have a lawn. Dammit. Now, where was I? Oh, yeah–blogging. What prompted the painful observation that I’ve been blogging since Bush 2 was president? This month’s IWSG question (thanks so much, Ninja Captain Alex J. Cavanaugh). In case you’re new here, the IWSG (Insecure Writers Support Group) is a monthly blog hop. On the first Wednesday of every month, we IWSG-ers share our doubts, fears, struggles, and triumphs. Our awesome co-hosts this month are T. Powell…
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Two ways fiction writers can use AI ethically
I’m going to do something I rarely do–make a prediction. I predict that AI is going to revolutionize our lives on a level nearly comparable to the internet and smartphones. And I’m going to go even further and predict this revolution will be (mostly) a good thing. Trust me, I hate the idea of AI-generated fiction and art as much as the next creative, and I don’t believe AI will replace writers and artists (though I do think plenty of AI-generated crap will get made and sold by unethical people). I do think writers (and maybe artists too) can find ethical ways to use AI to help them work more…
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What makes an author website great?
One of the first pieces of advice new authors get is to create a website. Our websites are our homes on the internet, a space we control and can use to promote ourselves and our work (unlike social media, over which we have little control–ask anyone who spent years building a following on the Site Formerly Known as Twitter only to see engagement plummet under He Who Must Not Be Named). But what makes an author website great? One way to answer that question is to provide examples of great websites and talk about what makes them work well–and that’s exactly what I’m going to do in this post. But…
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2024 is off to a strong start: the January recap
Welcome to my first What’s Been on Your Calendar post of 2023! I went into my holiday break last month recovering from COVID, exhausted, and struggling to figure out how to rebalance my life so it wouldn’t grind me into fine powder by April Fool’s Day. Then I rested, took a short road trip, spent some time in nature… and felt renewed. January has been the best month I’ve had in awhile. I’m not sure what made the difference but my money’s on rest and spending time really thinking about how best to prioritize the many demands on my time and energy. I’m also not sure how long this new…
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2023: My Year in Books
In this third and final of my 2023 lookback posts (read the first 2 here and here), I’ll take a quick look at my year in books (because nothing is more popular on the internet than a middle-aged librarian’s navel-gazing about her reading list). But first: this post is part of the Weekend Coffee Share, hosted by Natalie the Explorer, and What’s on Your Bookshelf, hosted by Sue, Donna, Jo and Deb. Have a seat, grab a treat, and let’s get to it. My year in books As with writing, I struggled a bit with reading in 2023. Basically, I struggled to be productive in 2023 outside of my day job. I don’t know if…
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2023: my year in writing
I covered the highlights of my year in writing in my last post, but I’ll add more detail here, in my first post of 2024 for the Insecure Writers Support Group. My IWSG posts attract a different audience from my routine weekly posts, so I think it’s OK to repeat a little. If you read my last post, feel free to skip to the memes (I’m pretty sure half my readers skip to the memes anyway, but don’t tell me that–you’ll hurt my delicate writer fee-fees.) Before we proceed to my authorial navel-gazing: The first Wednesday of every month is Insecure Writers Support Group day, on which we insecure writers…
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The 2023 Highlight Reel: Writing, Travel, and More
I’m one of those weird people who enjoy reading everyone’s annual navel-gazing posts: what I accomplished this year, cool things I did/places I went this year, etc. So as I usually do this time of year, I set out to write mine. I’ll start with my first post of 2023, I said to myself. What were my intentions for the year? How did last year’s accomplishments stack up to this year’s? And now I need a stiff drink. And it’s only 7 AM. And I don’t even drink. When I wrote last year’s post, I complained that 2022 wasn’t one of my more productive years and selected persevere as my…
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Merry Christmas! Happy Holidays!
No exciting news in this post, no travel pics, probably not much snark (but fear not–there will be memes). So if there are no announcements, no travel pics, and no snark (!!), what will be in this post besides memes? My sincerest wish that you and yours have the happiest of holidays. You, dear reader, are the reason I devote the better part of a weekend morning attempting to be amusing on Al Gore’s internet. Your time and your comments mean the world to me. So, from my house to yours: Those of you who know me through the Weekend Coffee Share (hosted by Natalie the Explorer) may have noticed…
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“The Fourth Man” won a prize!
My short story, “The Fourth Man,” won second prize in the Arizona Mystery Writers annual short story contest! The Jim Martin Memorial Short Story Contest recognizes short mystery, suspense, and thriller fiction up to 2500 words. “The Fourth Man” was inspired in part by my desire to see more older women in crime stories that aren’t cozy mysteries (not that there’s anything wrong with cozy mysteries). I fiddled with the idea of an elderly main character, and Victoria Patrick–former darling of B-movie Westerns who describes herself as “Annie Oakley with double-Ds”–marched onto the page, struck a pose, and proceeded to embarrass the hell out of her daughter. Here’s the opening:…
Janet Alcorn
Suspense | Horror | Romance
