Linda K. Sienkiewicz's Blog, page 22

What, Why, How: Patricia Clark

What?

I write poetry. Well, I’ve also written a few short stories and published them. But poetry is my main genre.

Why?

I’m really compelled by two things with poetry: its emotional undercurrents and its musical qualities. Both keep me interested, and I just published my sixth book. There is always something new to do with sentences and with sensory details. Why do I keep writing? Poetry is my spiritual practice and it’s the way I make sense of what happens in the world and what h...

Writing Historical Fiction

Researching The Girl from the USO:

Author Barbara J. Rebbeck grew up listening to the stories of how her mother, a USO hostess had met her father, an RAF pilot during WWII when he came to Grosse Ile, Michigan for training. She uses their courtship as the basis for her suspense novel, The Girl from the USO, although the book goes a very different direction from their relationship.

So I asked Barbara about the inspiration for the book. How much research did she need to do? And did she learn...

Creative Pursuits

My friend Desiree Cooper shared this post on Facebook. What memories it brought back to me! Without doubt, my creative pastimes as a child shaped who I am today.

How about you? What games or pursuits did you partake in that helped shape who you are today?

Solitary Play

For hours, I would lay on the living room floor and stare at our stucco ceiling. I conjured an old man’s face, a horse’s head, a fish jumping out of its bowl…. It’s a wonder my mother didn’t ask me what I was doing, ...

Please welcome Cynthia Harrison to my blog!

I was immediately drawn to Cynthia when we met because she’s open, generous and so down to earth. A few years ago, she asked me to join her in a two day book festival in Alpena Michigan, with our husbands too, and it ended up being one of my most memorable experiences, complete with a big elk tour in a horse drawn carriage at Thunder Bay Resort!

Both of us have a new book release in November (and they are both beach-themed!!) so we decided to swap blog posts today. Please welcome Cynth...

Book release in a pandemic

Authors with a forthcoming book need to look at many different promotion strategies during a pandemic. I’m learning as I go, since a lot has changed since my first novel was published. Here’s a few tips of mine. If YOU have any, please share!

Write it and Zoom…

Forget book tours. The biggest advantage to Zoom is that authors can appear anywhere without having to leave their living rooms, and anyone from coast to coast can watch. Just be sure to get dressed (right?) and plan ahead wher...

Meet the Fish Family, 1955

The Big Joke:

Written in 1955, the story depicts a typical fifties household with a stay-at-home mother, working father, two school-age kids and a baby, except they are goldfish:

Mr. and Mrs. Fish, Walter, Arabella, and last of all, Baby Clarissa. Baby Clarissa wears a white gown and little hat, drinks from a bottle and sits in a high chair. Mama knits ear muffs for Papa. Papa gardens fresh-water ferns. Walter and Arabella play hide and seek in the tall grass on their way to schoo...

What’s so special about Howard Street?

This year, riding a bike on unpaved Howard Street was precarious because of the deep ruts. Many homes on Ocracoke are still under reconstruction after Hurricane Dorian devastated the island in 2019, so I’m sure the truck traffic doesn’t help the condition of the street.

Calling it a street is misleading, though. It’s really a one-way lane, and it holds a rich history.

Howard Street turns to the right here. A collection of road signs hang on this live oak.



Ocracoke

For more than 300...

New Release: Children’s Picture Book

The inspiration

Many times my late mother suggested I write and illustrate a children’s book. Every time, for whatever reason, I resisted.

Until inspiration hit me.

The scurrying ghost crabs spooked my grandson, Oliver, then three, when we were vacationing at Cape Hatteras on the Outer Banks of North Carolina several years ago. My daughter and I unsuccessfully tried to find him a book about ghost crabs, or even a book about crabs in general, at the local bookshop, Buxton Books.

...

What, Why, How: Kevin St. Jarre

What:

I have two novels under contract with Encircle Publications.  The first one is literary fiction, with humor/absurdism, titled Aliens, Drywall, and a Unicycle, due in bookstores November 6, but available for pre-order now.  The other is a YA crossover novel titled Celestine and is scheduled for publication in May 2021.

Why:

Like so many other authors, I have always written, ever since early childhood when I was writing little books, illustrating them, and binding them with a st...

Nancy Drew Shocker

I have to confess, I’d never read a Nancy Drew book until recently, even though I’ve been crafting the hardcover books into clutch purses for years. My granddaughter and I decided to read one together on the nights when she slept over. I’d saved the text from The Secret of Red Gate Farm, so that’s what we started with a few months ago. We just finished it.

It was… interesting

Right away, my granddaughter was incredulous at how nosy the titian haired sleuth was, even rude. Lil asked, “A...