R.A. Nelson's Blog, page 7

Fasting and Other (Not) Fun Things

Lent is hard. Fasting is hard.

Add that to the list of historical “No kidding, Captain Obvious” quotes – right up there with Legolas’s “The horses are restless” gem from the film version of The Return of the King.

(The hubs and I mock Legolas mercilessly, I’m afraid. They really did give him one too many “Well, duh” things to say – and he has to say them all so nobly, like every word is erudite and poetic. I digress…)

The difficulty of fasting for me is that I usually equate it with...

Return of the King: An Ash Wednesday Reflection

We just finished our annual (sometimes semi-annual) pilgrimage through Middle Earth via the epic film trilogy The Lord of the Rings. (Extended editions, of course.)

A thing of beauty is a joy forever.

I have now seen these films many times – more times than I have bothered to count, certainly. Add that unknown number (it’s high, whatever it is) to the number of times I’ve read the books (also unknown; also high), and you have a vast portion of my life spent with this s...

New Musical Interludes – Part 1

Who here remembers my post from May 2018, On Giant’s Shoulders: The Power of Music in Writing ?

(There’s no prize if you do. Though if you happen to be near the Hudson Valley any time soon, I’d be glad to make you a special batch of cookies and sit down for a music/literature chat over tea.)

I love music, and I love Story. These two loves play nicely together and always enhance my enjoyment of writing or reading.

You see, I hear all music through a “Story filter”: whenever I listen t...

Building Home: A Poetical Rant

I’ve been thinking about “home” quite a bit lately, and about “building home”.  The view from my current "home". Not too shabby.

Hail to the King, Part 2: The Battle of Theme

This week, I bring you the next episode in
“R. A. Nelson vs. Stephen King: A Showdown for the Ages!” And the winner is . . . Doc!

This isn’t really a showdown, I guess, unless a novice trying to learn from a master without losing her identity within the master’s counts as a showdown. As I discussed in episode one, Hail to the King: Stephen King on Writing Right, I am reading through Stephen King’s On Writing and finding it both illuminating and enjoyable. Yet, I am als...

The Other Side

I give you fair warning, friends: it’s about to get all biblical – and poetical – up in here.

*NOTE: If “biblical” isn’t your thing, fret not! Methinks you will still find plenty to enjoy in this post. Much of my poetry flows from prayer and scripture, so I just wanted to give a peek behind the scenes.

Hail to the King: Stephen King on Writing “Right”

I’ve been spending some quality time with this book lately:

Oddly enough, this is the first Stephen King book I have read – though it is not my first encounter with “the King”. That occurred accidentally in the summer of 1995. Ten-year-old Ruth was watching TV by herself; her parents were away, and her three older siblings were going about their business. Flipping through channels, she found a movie about a writer who, breaking his leg in a car accident, finds himself re...

Trains, Planes, and Cathedrals

I got to ride on a train this past weekend. Trains are wonderful. Train stations can be great also - especially in England.

No, the train wasn’t in England, but it was still delightful.

Trains are, by far, my favorite mode of transportation. I find it far easier to relax and enjoy the journey when on a train. Cars are great, and I am a seasoned road trip veteran, but car travel has been a bit of an anxiety struggle since my accident in 2016. (I’m getting better, but st...

The New Book; or, It Begins

Well, I finished a VERY rough draft of the first chapter of my new book this week.

So, that’s pretty cool.

I am beginning to notice a pattern in what inspires my books. With Gatekeeper, the first idea sprang from the vivid image of a purple flower amidst desolate grasslands. The Ancient flowed from an image that popped into my head while listening to Gregorian chant: I saw a line of monks singing, and knew instinctively that one of them wasn’t human. C. Writ 101, my first...

New Year “Adventures” and a Strange Gift

I don’t know how things are at your house, but in the Nelson homestead, 2019 has begun with a whimper rather than a bang.

A busy holiday season with lots of traveling, trying to jump right back into the swing of things with very little break, and violent shifts in weather all conspired to produce several days of this, in varying stages:

Thankfully, I’ve been dancing ’round the edge of this malady. The hubs has not been so fortunate, alas. So it’s been a rather quiet week...