Wed, 08 Apr 2015 19:57:29 +0000 In early 2014, I grew frustrated with the lack of time I had for doing visual art. I'm a novelist and run a book coaching business. I gave up an international journalism career to pursue a literary and artistic life, and felt like a child stomping my foot when it came to not having time to do visual art. How could I be an artist if I…

Tue, 14 Apr 2015 23:45:06 +0000 Today's guest blog is by Editor Caroline Clouse. Caroline joined the Art of Storytelling team last week. Here she breaks down the five steps to editing your manuscript. Long gone are the glory days in which publishers saw potential in writers and cultivated them into bestselling authors. Acquisition editors and literary agents are faced with overwhelming slush piles, and sloppy writing or blatant errors make…

Fri, 17 Apr 2015 06:00:24 +0000

Tue, 28 Apr 2015 18:16:38 +0000 As an artist, both visual and literary, I'm fascinated with how artists are dealing with the current chaos. Ecological disturbances, global violence, the digital revolution that has opened us up to the entire world in an unprecedented way -- how is this affecting artists? After the downing of a plane over Ukraine, I dreamed of people falling from the sky and painted them. What is our role as…

Fri, 08 May 2015 19:05:24 +0000 I'm so excited and honored to receive the Independent Publishers gold medal for Best Midwest Fiction for my literary novel Earth. http://www.independentpublisher.com/article.php?page=1937#.VUp9znazGNY.facebook

Wed, 20 May 2015 21:27:32 +0000 I have a stormy, rocky psyche, thrashing prophetic dreams, tumultuous crashing waves in the soul, wild moments of beautiful artistic abandon, spontaneous crazinesses. I'd rather be by the ocean or in the woods or around a bonfire at night than anywhere else in the world. My intense moods don't happen often enough or with enough severity between the ups and downs to be diagnosable -- believe…

Fri, 29 May 2015 17:07:51 +0000 A couple of days this week, I woke up after 8 hours of sleep feeling like someone took a baseball bat to the back of my head. I really cleaned up my act a few years ago, went vegetarian, then vegan, got rid of almost all chemicals like dyes and preservatives from my diet, stopped eating processed foods. For a couple of years, I've felt re-born, healthy…

Thu, 04 Jun 2015 01:11:25 +0000 An American woman this week was killed by a lioness at a South African private animal park. Against park rules, she and her husband were driving through the park with their windows down. The lioness came up to the passenger window, attacked the woman and killed her. I was at a friend's house when the news came on the television. I turned and said: "I grew up around wild nature…

Wed, 24 Jun 2015 01:46:48 +0000 I am in my counselor’s office in Portland, a pretty room on the top floor of a house. The slanted ceiling reminds me of my childhood room. You know how when some therapists do inner child work, they put a chair across from you and have you talk to your inner little girl? Well, I am having a conversation with a man’s crotch. Specifically, a man’s crotch…

Thu, 27 Mar 2014 22:50:21 +0000You haven’t set a scheduled time to write. I know, I know, you only write when you’re inspired. Inspire yourself by setting a regular writing schedule. With the hundreds of people we’ve taught at Art of Storytelling and the dozens we’ve coached on their books, we find again and again that those who finish and publish their books are those who have a regular writing schedule.…