Poetry Angel of the Glen

February 5, 2025

Glen Gift Shop Shocker

This is a story of magic, poetry and Glen Helen, that mystical preserve of forest, stone and water existing at the edge of the Village of Yellow Springs, Ohio. A place of sacred surprise, as I recently found out.

On February second, my wife and I decided a hike in the Glen was just the thing to celebrate the unseasonable temperature of sixty degrees. But first we stopped at the Vernet Ecological Building on the Glen’s rim, where I visited the gift shop. After entering, I looked left and saw my poetry collection … Read the full article

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The Review from Hell . . . or Heaven?

January 25, 2025

“Exposition forced, heavy-handed . . . theme difficult to pin down . . . language workmanlike but not evocative . . . never drawn in by the style [which] . . . on several occasions felt awkward, careless.”

Yikes!! Was the above a review of a novice writer in an introductory creative writing course? Alas, the phrases are excerpted from a letter written by the anonymous reviewer of my current novel-in-progress to an editor of a press considering it for publication. (At least he liked the plot, which, he said, is “going to keep readers interested.”) So how does one … Read the full article

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True Stories II (& Poetry)

December 3, 2024

So did I send my childhood pal, terminally ill with a brain tumor, the memoir I’d written describing a traumatic event that happened in 1965 when we were adolescents growing up in southern West Virginia—an event that tore apart our previous friendship and sent him into hiding and aligned me with our peers against him? (As I wrote in my previous blog post.)

Not at first.

I was reluctant to bother my friend with a memoir that was more about me—my role and my guilt—than about his reaction to public humiliation. And yet I found myself ready to face … Read the full article

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True Stories

November 17, 2025

Recently I wrote a short memoir, unusual for me, since I’ve written fiction and poetry almost exclusively for going on four decades; plus, it’s a sort of confession with real stakes: if I ever showed it to my childhood best friend, recently diagnosed with terminal brain cancer, I thought it might hurt him, maybe a lot. Yet I was driven, having hung on for half a century to the story of my friend who, humiliated by a bully before witnesses, afterward hid indoors for an entire summer. And another boy (me) who, along with his peers, assassinated that boy’s character … Read the full article

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Messy Inefficiency: Writing a Novel

October 23, 2025

A Mystery

“Good,” my wife said. “Now you’re free to write the real book.”

I’d just described an interview in which I’d received information that would require an entire re-envisioning of my latest novel-in-progress’s plot—a rewrite that might require another year to produce a second draft. She then asked me why I hadn’t conducted the interview before writing my first draft? A really good question which should’ve been easy to answer but wasn’t—and got me thinking about my messily inefficient novel-writing process.

Faith

While I did significant research on hydraulic fracturing and learning disorders, both of which play … Read the full article

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Meli’s Way: A Review

September 10, 2025
Thumbnail image for Meli’s Way: A Review

Finding Her Moral Compass

Several years ago when I was contemplating writing a young adult novel myself, I read widely in the genre but found nothing like Meredith Sue Willis’s new young adult novel Meli’s Way. I think it’s a masterpiece: a profound exploration of the technology-driven, terrorist-threatened, family-fragmented world in which young people today come of age.

The book is an up-to-this-moment contemporary depiction of a young high school student in New York City finding her way with very little guidance (but a lot of love) from her single parent mom with a mysterious past. It’s fast-paced with meaningful … Read the full article

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Lit News: Lewisburg, CCC Reading & New Poetry Market

August 11, 2025

Lewisburg (WV) Lit Fest

Would you believe it if I told you that a tiny West Virginia town with a population around 4,000 had Kathryn Stockett, author of The Help, as the keynote speaker at their fourth annual Lit-Fest last weekend, August 7-8, 2015?

Me, either—but there she stood in all her Mississippi splendor before an excited packed house in little Lewisburg’s Carnegie Hall. Stockett was very funny: “What do you say to your best childhood friend when he begs you for the movie rights to your best-selling novel?” (Pause.) “Hell, no!” But she did give him the … Read the full article

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Antioch Writers’ Workshop Returns!

July 8, 2025

Invest in Yourself

Beginning this Saturday, July 11, 2015, the Antioch Writer’s Workshop (AWW) begins and continues through Friday, July 17. Including all genres—fiction, nonfiction and poetry— the workshop in Yellow Springs accommodates all levels, from beginner to professional. However, I believe it’s most useful to those who’ve been writing at least for a year or two, meaning they have work-in-progress to share, along with many questions needing answers, such as “How do I move to the next level?” or “How do I get published?”

Options Abound

By going to the workshop’s website, you’ll see that participants have options … Read the full article

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Honoring the Glen: A Concert & Art Show

June 12, 2025

Sacred Space

For so many in the Miami Valley, Glen Helen in Yellow Springs is one of the area’s best nature destinations if not a sacred site. For me, it’s both; some days I need an aerobic walk; on others, I need to wander, dream and write poetry. But I always feel Helen’s healing power.

On Saturday, June 27, 2025, Honoring the Glen: A concert and Art Show (and fundraiser for the Glen) will be co-hosted by Antioch University Midwest and Tecumseh Land Trust, beginning with an art show and simultaneous kids’ activity from 5-6:45 p.m. Attendees will also … Read the full article

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Editing 102: Ownership

May 26, 2025

May 26, 2025

To truly benefit from someone’s critiquing/editing of your fiction, you need to be extremely open and receptive but not to the point where you lose ownership of your writing. But, you ask, how can you make sure you’ve not ceded ownership to another person, even unconsciously?

Using your innate writerly instincts for what does/doesn’t work in a story, try hard to develop greater intuition: inner voices that suggest you’re on- or off-track. After a while, you should be able to do this not only as you’re revising your fiction but even as you write!

As you listen … Read the full article

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