Words Fly Up

Books and writing are the core of my life. I edit books, write books, and teach writing. I love this work, and will be happy to provide any editorial or writing service you need.

By 1 Comment

I Haven’t Written for a While

I’m writing this as much for me as for other writers. Because, no, I haven't written for a while. Anyone who regularly visits this blog or the blog on my book website--that website is here--knows that I haven’t posted for several weeks. First there was a large editorial project that ate up all my time from mid-November into early December; and then another project in December that I finished just … [Read more...]

By Leave a Comment

Hard Time for Good Characters

In her endlessly quotable book, Bird by Bird, Anne Lamott advises that we cannot give our characters an easy time of it. Specifically, she writes: But no matter what, you are probably going to have to let bad things happen to some of the characters you love or you won’t have much of a story. Bad things happen to good characters, because our actions have consequences … The poet Kathleen Flenniken … [Read more...]

By 1 Comment

Create in Solitude

I’m going to start there: Create in Solitude. I doubt there is a successful artist who wouldn’t agree that solitude is essential if you are going to paint or sculpt or compose or write. If your immediate space is filled with distractions—other people, e-mails and texts and phone calls, unrelenting noise—how can you connect with the muse that dwells inside? (I don’t normally reach for euphemisms … [Read more...]

By 1 Comment

Proofreading

Humans are endlessly fallible. We are never going to be error-free, all the time, no matter how careful we are. Some mistakes in stories, essays, books, etc. are because a writer (and editor and proofreader, if they’re involved in the process) doesn’t know any better. For instance, all the times I’ve read “The data is …”, I know the writer simply doesn’t know that data is a plural noun and that it … [Read more...]

By Leave a Comment

Kairos

In the August 30, 2015, issue of the New York Times, an essay in the Magazine section caught my attention. Called “Standstill,” by Sam Anderson, it is an essay about “the political world’s obsession with the moment.” Acknowledging that modern humans weren’t the first to consider “the moment,” Anderson looks back to the Greeks to explain two different kinds of time: … chronus (the vast, inhuman, … [Read more...]