12 Days of Holiday Movies | Going My Way

Movie #8 – Going My Way Bing Crosby’s Father O’Malley is an unusual but not unreal priest who sings, jokes, listens, and is unfailingly patient as the people around him act like… well, human beings. I don’t have any religious affiliation and yet have met two...

No Writing? No Guilt!

“So, what are you working on now in your writing?” When I was asked this question early in January, my first reaction was a frisson of guilt. I’m a writer, I SHOULD be writing. I hadn’t sat down at my computer and turned out any essays, short stories, or memoir pieces...

The Lure of a Place

Writers have been taught to fully establish the characters in our books. Who is the main character? What makes them different from the others? What draws us to them? They’re not perfect. They may not even be likable, yet we still root for them. And the same can be...

A Place as a Setting—and a Character-Normandy

Have you ever walked into a place—even as ordinary as a post office, and there is a distinct atmosphere or mood? It’s true that many places have a history, and that certainly influences the mood. But some are almost as if the place still harbors the spirit of its...