The Police
Sometimes I’ve been labeled the “exposition police” in writing groups—and I wear that badge both proudly and humbly:  proud to be of use to my fellow scribblers, humbled by the knowledge that I learned it from talented peers.
So I’m going to attempt to give back what was so generously given me.  Dialogue and exposition are two of the most important craft issues a fiction writer faces. Please join me on Saturday, March 2nd, from 2-4:00 p.m. at Wright Memorial Public Library in lovely Oakwood, Ohio, 1776 Far Hills Avenue, for a free workshop on The Art of Exposition and Dialogue.
Advance registration […]

Want a great antidote to holiday stresses and strains? Need a good opportunity to feed your soul and relax with nature?
Look no more! “In the Spirit of the Glen,” a poetry reading featuring some of the area’s best writers performing work inspired by Glen Helen nature preserve, will take place in the newly refurbished Glen Helen Building auditorium on Friday, December 14, from 7-9:00 p.m.
An Invitation
The reading will take place at the ecologically state-of-the-art Vernet Ecological Center (formerly the Glen Helen Building ) at 405 Corry Street directly across the road from the Antioch College campus. Recently the Glen […]

Familiar Story
We who play the writer’s sweepstakes game know the feeling. You find this contest that seems to have been conceived to reward your kind of writing.  You enter with high hopes, beating the deadline by at least ten minutes. Then you wait. And wait some more. Finally you fire off a query, and the sponsors send you an e-mail with the winners’ names (yours conspicuously absent). Not only did you not win, but the sponsors didn’t even bother to inform you! You receive exactly nothing for your investment of time, money and hope.
Ah, contests:  the pain and the glory. I’ve entered […]

“Trees are sanctuaries. Whoever knows how to speak to them, whoever knows how to listen to them, can learn the truth.”
—Herman Hesse
Tree School
As we went around the circle and introduced ourselves, explaining what we were doing here at the Arc of Appalachia’s Forest School’s week-long Tree Identification Workshop, I suspected I was in the right place. But when the soft-spoken young naturalist from Cleveland said, “I believe trees are sentient,” then I knew I was. You see, the protagonist of Heartwood, my novel-in-progress, has been trying to convince me for some time of the possibility that trees not only can […]