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My Romance Writers of America (RWA)® conference 2015, from A to Z
As some of you know, I was in New York City last week for the 35th RWA® conference. This annual event is the biggest gathering of romance writers in the world. As a first-time attendee and 2015 Golden Heart® finalist, it was an exciting, overwhelming and...
Moving away and moving toward
Migration has been a recurring theme in my life and family history.My mother's ancestors left Ireland in the nineteenth century to seek a better life in what was then the frontier of Canada's Ottawa Valley.Her lone Scottish ancestor, my great-great grandfather, left a...
“Viva la Dragonfly”
Before the Golden Heart® class of 2015 named itself the Dragonflies, I hadn't thought much about that particular insect. I hadn't had a positive experience with dragonflies, but I hadn't had a negative one either. Dragonflies were simply peripheral to my life.Much has...
Celebrating heroes (and dads)
Sometimes it seems anti-heroes are everywhere.Many are in our workplaces, as the recent #DistractinglySexy Twitter campaign in response to sexism in science illustrates.Anti-heroes also appear on public transport. Like the man in a suit and carrying a laptop bag who,...
Hope…in life and writing
I've thought a lot lately about my mission as a writer. What do I want readers to take away from my work? To answer that question, I keep coming back to the angel teddy bear perched on the bookshelf beside my writing desk.The bear was a gift I gave myself many years...
Ten things I wish I’d known about the writing life
A friend working on her first fiction manuscript emailed me this week to ask if I had "any words of wisdom" to share. I answered her privately, but her questions made me think about the things I wish I’d known when I started writing in pursuit of publication.Find your...
Finding goodness
As regular readers of this blog know, goodness is my word for 2015. My last post focused on a bend in the road, and how hard it was to find goodness in a difficult life situation.The response to that post overwhelmed me and, just when I thought goodness was scarce, I...
Wisdom for a bend in the road
Sometimes the path of life stretches in front of me straight and smooth. I know where I’m going and how to get there. Far more often, though, that path twists and turns. It has stones, even boulders, which seem insurmountable. I stop, worry and wonder. Then I take a...
‘Alice down the rabbit hole’ days
Alice in Wonderland, by Lewis Carroll, was one of my late dad’s favourite books. As a result, many ‘Alice’ expressions became part of our family’s life. I've thought of my dear dad even more than usual recently, as the past two weeks have had a decidedly 'Alice down...
Photo by Robin Spencer, Spencer Studio