Word by Word

Practical insights for writers from Jessica P Morrell

Archive for the 'writing inspiration' Category

Quoting Margaret Atwood

“When you are in the middle of a story it isn’t a story at all, but only a confusion; a dark roaring, a blindness, a wreckage of shattered glass and splintered wood; like a house in a whirlwind, or else a boat crushed by the icebergs or swept over the rapids, and all aboard powerless […]

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In case you missed it….

     Writerly  gatherings from  the internets: 1. 20 Amazing Writing Residencies  You Should Apply for is here.  (This list is from 2014, but the residencies are still viable.) 2. Sadly, the final Scratch magazine is online. The topic, fittingly, is The End. Sigh. 3.  How to Master Anything, at Any Age. The 9 concepts […]

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From Michael Cunningham: Literature is an act of seduction

The writer of fiction, no matter how edgy or unorthodox, is stuck with a simple and an unalterable truth. Literature is, inescapably, an act of seduction, whether the writer hopes to seduce millions with a story of an adolescent vampire in love, or a handful of readers, who are willing to take a darker, strange, more […]

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Crutch Words

Check out my article about crutch words over at Insecure Writers Support Group.  Sleuthing out your crutch words will make you more secure. Promise!

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In Case You Missed It

Gathering of writerly tidbits from the internets Did you miss BEA this year? Think inspiring writers need to attend? Think again…here’s agent Janet  Reid ‘splaining things.  Last month I attended a luncheon at the Pennwriters Writing Conference. Lucky me, it was the amazing Jane Friedman talking about using social media to sell books. She’s a […]

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No regrets

Every day we slaughter our finest impulses. That is why we get a heartache when we read those lines written by the hand of a master and recognize them as our own, as the tender shoots which we stifled because we lacked the faith to believe in our own powers, our own criterion of truth […]

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Children with Eyes Wide Open

“Adults look at colors, yet do not see them. Adults perceive shapes, yet do not understand their speech. Adults live in light and from light, yet do not notice it at all. Adults cast long shadows, yet do not play with them. Adults take up much (indeed too much) space, yet never just for once […]

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Ted Hughes on the power of words

“Because it is occasionally possible, just for brief moments, to find the words that will unlock the doors of all those many mansions inside the head and express something – perhaps not much, just something – of the crush of information that presses in on us, from the way a crow flies over and the […]

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Cristi Corbett interview

Folks, I’m happy to say that I’m adding new interviews to the site. Here’s the latest one with Christi Corbett talking about her writing process and her new novel Tainted Dreams. You can find more about Christi here.    Keep writing, keep dreaming, have  heart

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Thought for the day

“Human vocabulary is still not capable, and probably never will be, of knowing, recognizing, and communicating everything that can be humanly experienced and felt. Some say that the main cause of this very serious difficulty lies in the fact that human beings are basically made of clay, which, as the encyclopedias helpfully explain, is a […]

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