Everyone loves new toys at Christmas. Mine is a new fitness tracker, which will tell me, down to the very step, just how lazy I am. I’ve no doubt I’ll be ripping it off my arm by mid-March as I complain about the thing’s negative attitude. Along with the Fitbit, I found another new toy, and this one doesn’t cost a thing. I maybe behind the curve on this, and Millennials may tell me it’s already passé, but for this curmudgeonly old writer, it’s a fun and remarkably useful tool

Do you ever feel like giving up? I guess we all do at some point in our lives. Hell, I’ve even given up on giving up in days gone by! This week Debbie Downer has taken over my body, and I’m feeling like I should quit the dream of being a short-story writer. On top of my insecurities about the quality of my work, I don’t seem to find the time needed to make it happen. Yes, I know Christmas is just a few days away, and yes, I’ve been putting in 12+ hours-a-day at the job that c

In a previous post, I shared one of my favorite websites. Aeon.co publishes excellent articles written by academics on a variety of subjects relating to science, philosophy, society and the arts. I have its news feed pumped into my email inbox every morning, as there’s invariably an article or two that get my analytical juices flowing. It was while perusing the site the other day that I discovered an excellent article by Anna Wilson, PhD, who lectures at the University of Tor

Is the writer’s life one that will always be miserable? This thought came to me after I happened upon a two-part Ten Rules for Writing Fiction article published by British newspaper The Guardian in 2010. In it established authors from a variety of genres were asked for their top ten tips for successful authorship. Some suggestions are hilarious. Some are daunting, and one in particular I found quite profound. English novelist and short story writer Zadie Smith, who is one of