We go to movies or stage plays to be entertained. Sets and stages are created as backdrops for the story, and actors are chosen to portray the characters, delivering lines the scriptwriter has written and engaging in actions called for in the script and/or by the director. Story-appropriate sound effects complete the desired ambiance to complete the story. Viewers then can fully engage the senses of sight and sound, as well as emotions, to bring the story to life exactly as the writer(s) and director intended. Of course, taking a script to screen or set is more complicated than the overly simple description above, and one or several variables may come into play along the way that complicate the process even further. Still, the end result will hopefully accomplish its purpose, whether to entertain, educate, terrify, or otherwise affect the viewer. While stories often entertain, there much of the similarity between story writers and screenwriters and playwrights ends. Because nove...

When considering whether to put an animal in a story, it is probably wise to decide what role the animal is going to play. Is it just to be there because you happen to like dogs, or cats, or rabbits, or birds? Or because you are trying to attract all the dog and cat lovers to buy your book? The books in the popular K9 series mentioned on May 8 by Patricia Stolty are good examples of animals being an integral part of the plot and characters in their own right. Not just a ploy to increase sales. Being a firm believer that all elements of a story need to be organic to the story, not just plopped in there, that is what I thought of when my co-author, Margaret Sutton, wanted to put a cat in Doubletake . I asked her why. "Because we both love cats," she said, as three cats wandered across her desk and bookcases in her office. My instinct was that that was not reason enough, but had a hard time articulating that to her at the time. It was later, after reading enough books ...

Memoir can get a bad rap. It’s been likened to reality shows, panned for TMI, pigeonholed as mere publicity for politicos. My favorite peeve is the ghostwritten celebrity memoir—or, worse, the simpleminded recovery story in which the protagonist falls into drink or illness and, inevitably, regains health by page 300. It’s the "inevitably" that bothers me. These memoirs, written according to formula, often gloss over the real difficulties of people trying to make and keep their lives better. The “my cat saved my life” story bugs me no end, as you can imagine. So why did I write a memoir about a feral cat who helped ground me emotionally in an uneasy period of my life? The most important answer is that Henry, the ginger cat I rescued one night after someone’s car had hit him on a busy road, turned out to be one of the sweetest creatures ever. Oh, he hissed and spat at the beginning and hid under my spare room bed for six months. But when he finally began to trust ...

Years ago I used to fight with my kids for my sacred space to write in. I had a room that was called my study where I had a desk and a typewriter --- yeah, I started writing in the dark ages. Problem was, the study soon became the room where stuff was stored when nobody knew where else to put it. So I would have an odd assortment of boxes and bins and things stacked in and around the desk and filing cabinet that made finding my space a challenge. Then if we had company, either the company stayed in the office and slept on the sofa bed or one of the kids did. First obstacle to overcome was finding the sofa bed under the piles of things "stored" in the office. Then came the challenge of figuring out if it was an invasion of a guest's privacy if I went into the study now and then to work. Now that the kids are grown and out of the house, I have an office all to myself. Or at least I thought I did, until the cats decided they would like to share the space ...