About Steve Hooley

Steve Hooley is the author of seven short stories published in four anthologies, a Vella serial fiction, and is currently working on the Mad River Magic series – a fantasy adventure series for advanced middle-grade to adults. More details available at: https://stevehooleywriter.com/mad-river-magic/

Story Idea, Soul, or Personality of the Writer – What Makes a Book Successful?

Some great thoughts on pursuing a story idea that you know is good, putting your soul into the story, and how your personality affects your chances of success. Below are excerpts from three great articles from the archives on what makes a book successful. Links are provided to the articles. Consider reading them. Then give us your thoughts below in the comments. Feel free to comment on other’s comments and strike up a discussion.

When I first met Kurt Muse about eight years ago, and he told me the story of his clandestine efforts to topple Manuel Noriega, and of his subsequent arrest and escape at the hands of Delta Force, I confess that I didn’t believe him. The story was too spectacular—too big—not to have been written about already. But it all checked out.

After Kurt and his wife, Annie, met with my wife, Joy, and me at the always-wonderful Café Renaissance in Vienna, Virginia, we shook hands and a pact was made. Together, we would write a book about courage and patriotism; about success over outrageous odds. It would be a story of public servants who truly serve the public, about people who risk everything for strangers with no expectations of recognition or thanks.

No one would touch it. – John Gilstrap – January 30, 2009

 

On a recent writer’s forum, someone asked the basic question: “what makes a good book?” Or, better yet, why is it that some books are hard to put down while others are easier to put down than a bucket of toxic waste?

From a technical standpoint, we could analyze the grammar, punctuation, sentence structure, command of the language, and a dozen other things we studied in school. (Which begs the question: why aren’t all English professors bestselling authors? But that’s something for another blog post.)

We could also discuss the book’s premise, theme, plot, voice, style, pacing, point of view, accuracy, and all those issues that were topics at the last writers’ conference workshop.

But my answer to what makes a good book is simple: soul. By that, I mean the soul of the writer. The more a writer involves or reveals his or her soul in the writing, the more the reader can and will relate to the story. Since soul is what separates us from the chimps and fish, it’s the element of a story for which we can all connect. – Joe Moore – January 28, 2009

 

I have been pondering the sticky issue of looks, personality and success and how this translates in the world of publishing.

I remember reading a story in the New York Times a few years ago on the anatomy of a bestseller and it compared two books coming out that year that had received huge advances and marketing budgets – one was The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova and the other was (and this is prophetic…) something I can’t even remember. Anyway, the gist of the article was that the author of The Historian had been willing to do a great deal of publicity and ‘be out there’ while the other author was virtually a recluse. While The Historian went on to make millions the other book sunk like a stone despite all the publisher money thrown at it. The moral of the story (I think) was that to be a bestseller a writer had to throw aside introversion to be successful. Basically, this article suggested, a writer could no longer afford to sit behind a typewriter or a computer. Nowadays that’s a no-brainer but still it got me thinking about the thorny question of writer personality (and let’s face it looks) and success.

So, throw aside your political correctness and ponder this question…is it easier to be an attractive outgoing writer than a shy, ‘more homely’ one?

Perhaps it’s a crass question but not one I think that is without foundation – especially when photographs are on book jackets and websites and your personality is judged in a range of venues – from online blog entries to in-person panel presentations. How would some of the literary stars of yesteryear fare in our current media-centric environment? Can a writer even afford to be introverted these days? How much is publishing success like a throwback to high school – when many yearned to be the prettiest and bubbliest of them all? – Clare Langely-Hawthorne – January, 12, 2009

Please give us your thoughts.

Magic Box of Story Ideas and Character Creation

When browsing the archives of TKZ, I sometimes find two or three blogs on the same or complimentary subjects. Today we have three articles on story ideas and character creation. The link at the end of each section will take you to the entire post, which I encourage you to read.

Please feel free to comment on other reader’s comments and strike up a conversation.

One of the questions writers hear often is where do we get our ideas. Depending on the situation, my standard answer is that I subscribe to the Great Idea of The Month Club. And when someone asks how they can join, I have to tell them that members are sworn to secrecy and forbidden to divulge that information.

If I’m pressed for an answer, I say that I can give some sources away, but only if they don’t tell where they got them. If they want to write murder mysteries, for instance, I aim them toward THE MURDER BOOK 2008, a blog by Paul LaRosa that records all the murders in New York City during 2008. There’s enough material there to keep a writer going for years.

But in reality, our ideas can come from almost any source at any time. Writers’ minds are in-tune with their surroundings ready to see the telltale signs of that little spark that could be used in a story or even become the basis of a whole book. – Joe Moore, 8-27-08

 

Often, when I speak to book-loving groups, I tell the Klansman-in-the-store story to illustrate why I write thrillers. As an author I am always trying to make my readers feel some of what I felt when real villains crossed my path, and I realized that they could do me serious harm. And I also realized at some point that my father wouldn’t always be there to make the world safe again. I have met more villains than I can count, and I do my best to protect myself and those I love from bad things and evil people to the best of my ability. Some evil is obvious, but most of the time it lies just beneath an innocuous and seemingly harmless surface. And sometimes the most dangerous things come to us with open arms and a smile. But seeing evil first hand allows me to write about threat and fear. Evil isn’t usually all that well defined, and it certainly is not simple. Villains should be complex, and human, and understanding them well enough to adequately portray them (in words) remains the ultimate challenge for writers. – Joe Moore, 8-23-08

 

John Mortimer, creator of Rumpole, wrote that “most of the interest and part of the terror of great crime are not due to what is abnormal, but to what is normal in it; what we have in common with the criminal rather than the subtle insanity which differentiates him from us.” I couldn’t agree more – for me, it is the commonality rather than the abnormality that makes a villain truly villainous.

Take Doctor Crippen – an unremarkable man in real life, the least likely man perhaps to have poisoned and dismembered his wife or to have been pursued across the Atlantic with a young mistress in tow disguised as a boy. Part of the fascination with this case is the sheer ordinariness of the supposed murderer – and now, with DNA evidence casting doubt on whether the woman whose body was found was that of Doctor Crippen’s wife, Cora, the mystery of what actually happened may never be solved.

In fiction of course, some of the most fantastical crimes that occur in real life can never be used simply because readers would never believe them. Take for example the man who murdered his wife over an affair that happened 40 years before and then left her body as a gift beneath the Christmas tree. Writers have to walk a fine line with villains too, making them both believable as well as intriguing. Are they merely the flip side of the protagonist? Are they an ordinary person pushed to the brink? Or does some deep psychological wound create the monster within? – Clare Langley-Hawthorne, 8-18-08

What is your favorite place to find story ideas?

How do you approach character creation?

What are your thoughts on the subject?

What is the craziest story you have ever heard about how an author got an idea for a character?

Holidays, Celebration, and Special Bonds

Whether it’s The 4th of July, Canada Day, or Labor Day, this holiday weekend is an opportunity to reflect on how we celebrate, how we take a break from writing, or even how a special bond is at the tips of our fingers.

Below are holiday posts from the past. Please join in the discussion and feel free to respond to other people’s comments.

 Joe Moore – The Parade of Life

 It’s easy to forget about the outside world when we’re immersed in our story, thinking up blog topics, or working on promo for the next release. Time can slip by. We have to remind ourselves to step out and smell the flowers, to watch the clouds scud by, and to cherish that moment as it will never come again. Imagining people and places in our minds is no substitute for the real thing, but it’s natural for writers to become isolated when we’re more at home with our characters than the outside world. But once these hours at our desks crawl past, we can never experience them again.

Really, we full-time writers should get out more often. What do you do to push yourself out the door? Joe Moore – July 6, 2011

Kathleen Pickering – The Fourth and Celebration

So, for those of us with troubled times crowding our thoughts, I suggest taking a moment to let the kid in you enjoy the fireworks and celebration July Fourth offers. Heck, let the fireworks last all year long! After all, The Fourth celebrates our great nation overcoming oppression in pursuit of freedom to follow our dreams. For that I feel gratitude, right down to my toes. The child in me wants to ooooh, and ahhhh and remember never to forget how lucky we truly are!

Won’t you join me in celebrating? How did you spend The Fourth of July? Kathleen Pickering – July 5, 2011

Sue Coletta – What Do Apes, Humans, and Koalas Have in Common

 Genetics form the base of a fingerprint, but they are personalized when the baby touches the inside of their mother’s womb, resulting in unique whirls, deltas, and loops. Hence why identical twins don’t share identical fingerprints. Each baby touched the womb wall in his or her own unique way, swirling and drawing like finger paints on a bathtub wall.

Maybe it’s me—I do tend to get overly sentimental around holidays—but I find it heartwarming to think the tips of our fingers forever preserve the unbreakable bond between momma and baby, imprinted for eternity.

I hope my discoveries kickstart your creativity in new and unsuspecting ways. Happy Labor Day to our U.S. readers! May your burgers be sizzlin’, the buns toasted to perfection, and your beverages be cold. Sue Coletta – September 6, 2021

Reader Friday: Music to Your Words

 

Reading for the Pleasure of Reading?

Looking for Lyrical?

 

 

Definitions:

  • Lyrics – words of a poem, words to a song, from ancient Greek poetry accompanied by the lyre – a portable harp
  • Lyrical style (literature) – expressing the writer’s emotions in an imaginative and beautiful way

I recently read in Dean Koontz’s How to Write Best Selling Fiction, “The average reader demands eight things…” Number 8 was “…a style which embodies at least a trace of lyrical language and as many striking images as possible.”

John D. MacDonald was quoted in a Writer’s Digest, 3/15/16, interview, that he wanted “a bit of magic in his prose style, a bit of unobtrusive poetry. I want to have words and phrases really sing.”

Constance Hale, in Vex, Hex, Smash, Smooch, quoted Joan Didion: “Grammar is a piano I play by ear, since I seem to have been out of school the year the rules were mentioned. All I know of grammar is its infinite power.”

  1. When you are looking for an enjoyable read, just for the pleasure of reading, do you have a favorite poet or a favorite author with a lyrical style?
  2. Who are those favorite poets and authors?

 If anyone would like a list from today’s discussion, I will compile a list and post it at the bottom of the comments (late tonight or tomorrow morning).

TKZ Words of Wisdom – Ladies’ Day at TKZ

Emotion, Beginnings, and Anti-heroes

Ladies’ Day at TKZ

 

Emotion in fiction

Why doesn’t fiction evoke the same response as film? I don’t believe it is because movies are more visual. What is more powerful than the blank screens of our own imaginations? I think it might be because today’s crime writers are leery of being labeled as soft when we go into matters of the heart.

I had a conversation with a high-placed editor a while back. She told me she has noticed two trends in crime fiction recently: the decline of hard-boiled “guy books.” And the continued strength of romantic suspense. Now, let’s not kid ourselves. There is some terrific hard-boiled stuff being written right now, books that don’t turn up their noses at emotions. Likewise, there is some utterly putrid romantic suspense on the shelves these days, stuff that gets everything about police procedure and forensics wrong and gets really treacly about the romance part. Maybe I’m just reading the wrong stuff. What has gotten to you? What has made you cry? Movies are easy. But give me some books as well.

Or am I wrong in my belief that there is still room for well-wrought (as opposed to over-wrought) emotion in today’s crime fiction? – P J Parish – February, 28, 2017

 

Beginnings

Which brings us to today’s topic: Great Beginnings.
For an example of a great beginning, let’s reach WAY back to a sort-of thriller, Rebecca, and its simple but great first line:
“Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again.”
That line launches the spellbinding tale of its protagonist, who is haunted by the ghost of her husband’s dead wife. And there are many other great openers we could cite.
Here’s a link to the best 100 opening lines of novels, as chosen by the editors of American Book Review.
But those are mostly first lines of…ahem, “literary” novels. For Right now, let’s limit our discussion to the first lines of thriller novels.
You know ’em when you read ’em. They’re the ones that make the hair stand up on the back of your neck on page one and you don’t go to sleep until THE END.
So I’m wondering…what is the BEST grab-you-by-the-throat opening line (and para) you ever read in a suspense book? And what made it so good for you? – Kathryn Lilley Cheng – February 23, 2017

 

Why are we drawn to anti-heroes?

For me, I see them as flawed. They’re not perfect, like classic heroes in Hollywood or in literature were portrayed. I can relate to them better because it makes me feel as if, given the right circumstances, anyone can rise to the level of hero if they have a cause worth fighting for. We also want to see if they are redeemable. Give your anti-hero a chance to grab at redemption in your book and see if he takes it. Or will he find love from a strong woman? Once we get hooked on an anti-hero, we root for them and feel their pain more when they fall. We want them to get back up, because they’re “every man.” And the fact they are not cookie-cutter, and do surprising things and are unpredictable, they make the storytelling fun.

Who would have rooted for a high school teacher turned drug dealer if we hadn’t learned of his cancer, his concern for his family in the face of his financial meltdown, and his rising medical bills. He’s bucking a broken health care system like David standing before Goliath. He’s more worried over his family than his own recovery. He’s got nothing to lose.

Anti-heroes change our way of thinking about confrontation and empowerment. The right anti-hero can give voice to our frustrations and give us an alternative reality to find justice. – Jordan Dane – March 2, 2017

Please comment. What are your thoughts on emotion, beginnings, and antiheroes?

Reader Friday: How to Find Treasures in the Public Library

We normally have a short-form question and discussion on Reader Fridays, but today we have a special contribution by Dale Ivan Smith, a discussion of the pro tips and tricks to navigate the vast resources of the online library. What could be more appropriate for readers?

Thanks, Dale, for this post!

 

Dale Ivan Smith 

 

What to do if your public library is closed evenings, or Sundays, or any other time when you might need to access their resources? How do you find what you seek? 

 The 24/7 Online Library is the answer 

  • Your library card is the key to unlocking treasures online
  • You can do this 24/7
  • You can visit the online, always open library from anywhere you have internet access, not just at home
  • Be sure and pack your library card when you travel

 What You Will Find at the Public Library’s Website 

  • The web address may be on your library card
  • Once at your library’s home page, take a moment to look around
  • There will be a variety of links, perhaps a search box for the catalog and other library resources, perhaps current library events, hours etc.
  • You may find links in a drop-down menu and/or displayed directly on the home page

 What Treasure Do You Seek? 

  • Know what you are looking for
  • What aspect of this area of knowledge do you need?
  • Be as specific as you need, but also be willing to go general and then dive down
  • What areas of research does your story require?

 A Real World Example 

A patron came to me and asked for help in finding books on the U.S. Civil War. I took the patron to the section and did a short “reference interview,” asking questions. What aspect of the Civil War did they need? Military, social, political, economic, or something else? The answer was “economic.” I then asked if there were anything that they needed specifically in terms of economics of the Civil War. They said, “Currency.” After a little more back and forth, it turned out that they were looking for was a book that listed Confederate Paper Money, with current market valuations and condition grades. I love this example of a library search because it shows how starting out with a general subject / topic can put you on the wrong track, but , at the same time how to start general and then zero in on a topic by asking questions. 

 Your Guide 

  • Librarians are here to help
  • They can show you the lay of the land
  • They can teach you how to search on your own, which is especially useful when you are not inside the library building
  • You may be able to chat with a librarian online, too
  • Let them know that you are writing a book or article. Knowing that you are helps them help you
  • Plus, libraries love writers and authors.

 All-Purpose Library Search Tips 

  • Many online library resources such as the card catalog, databases, NoveList, and WorldCat, have a search box where you can type in what you are looking for. That “basic search” casts a wide net and won’t produce focused results like the “advance search” option will, which is where you can search by title, author, or subject, or even combinations of those. Typically, there is a toggle or link for advance search near the search box, or it might display once you’ve done a basic search.
  • A book’s catalog card (“records” in library speak) will display the title and author of the book in question, and then will show subject listings below, which is a very useful way of locating which topics a book might fall

 The Online Library Catalog 

  • Your first stop when looking for a book
  • Check from home to see if your library system owns a copy of the book that you seek
  • If the book is checked out, put yourself on the waiting list

 Research Tip: Evaluating Sources 

The University of Berkley has a very helpful checklist for evaluating published sources, especially books, for when you are doing research on a subject for a book or article of your own: https://guides.lib.berkeley.edu/evaluating-resources 

 NoveList (AKA Novelist Plus) 

  • A searchable database of fiction and non-fiction books
  • Each title will display any reviews about that book, as well as read-a-likes / similar books
  • You can search by title, author, or even subject
  • Recommended reading lists by subject are listed on the starting page
  • Useful if you are looking for non-fiction books on a particular topic, or wanting a good novel to refill your own creative well
  • You can also use it to find comp titles for a pitch or a query letter to an agent or an editor, or to use in a book description if you self-published
  • NoveList is available online at many public library websites

 In case you need more information check out this article at Reedsy’s blog: https://blog.reedsy.com/guide/how-to-write-a-query-letter/comp-titles/ 

  WorldCat and Interlibrary Loans 

  • WorldCat is a global library catalog
  • Your own library very likely has a link to it on their website. You may have to search for “WorldCat” or “Interlibrary Loan”.
  • It allows you to request books and articles from other library systems, both other public libraries and college and universities
  • Interlibrary loan is the library term for borrowing books and requesting articles from other libraries.
  • Typically, a book request will take a few weeks
  • You will need to create an ILL account so that you can request items. Check with a local librarian if you have any questions.

 Overdrive 

  • Overdrive is a major provider of eBooks and audio books to libraries around the world
  • You can borrow and read eBooks on your smart phone, tablet, Kindle, even your computer
  • Overdrive books will likely be listed in your library’s online catalog, and there will be link that takes you to the separate Overdrive catalog
  • Libby is now a widely available app for smart phones and tablets, which Overdrive created for patrons as a “one-stop” search and borrow experience.  Search for an eBook or audio book, borrow the book in the app, and then read or listen to that book in the app. 
  • Note: eBooks borrowed for Kindle work differently. Check with your local librarian for details
  • If you need help with this service, I recommend scheduling a visit to the library to have a staff member walk you through the process of searching and borrowing eBooks

Online Databases 

A host of electronic databases are available for libraries to subscribe to, and thus give librarians and patrons alike access. Budgets will determine which ones a library might be able to provide access to. Gale Databases are one of the most widely available, covering a host of topics from Academic articles to Health, Law, History, Science etc. You’ll need your library card to access them. 

  

I hope these tips come in handy. What library tips do you have to share? 

TKZ Words of Wisdom

Now and again we reach back into the TKZ archives for some timeless advice and offer them to you for discussion. Please reply, riff, or rant in the comments and interact with each other!

 Today our topics are self-publishing flexibility and options, themes and life lessons, and chasing trends. Let the discussion begin.

 

This is one reason I love our self-publishing options. We can play. We can go where we want to go without being tied to one brand or type of book. We can write short stories, novelettes, novellas, novels and series. When I’m not working on suspense, I like to challenge myself with a different voice for my boxing stories, my kick-butt nun novelettes, my zombie legal thrillers. I’m currently planning a collection of short stories that will be of the weird Fredric Brown variety. Why? Because I can, and because it keeps my writing chops sharp.

 Do not go gentle into that good night!

Write, write against the dying of the light! (apologies to Dylan Thomas). Refuse to believe you have diminished powers or have in any way lost the spark that compelled you to write in the first place. If they tell you that you just don’t have it anymore, throw your teeth at them. Who gets to decide if you can write? You do. And your answer is, I’ve still got it, baby, and I’m going to show you with this next story of mine!

So just keep writing and never decompose.

What about you? Are you in this thing to the end? – James Scott Bell, January 2014

***

However, I do know what life lesson my main character has to learn by the end of the story. This is essential for character growth and makes your fictional people seem more real. Usually, I include this emotional realization in my synopsis or plotting notes. It doesn’t always turn out the way I’d planned. Sometimes, this insight evolves differently as I write the story. Or maybe a secondary character has a lesson to learn this time around.

How about you? Do you deliberately devise a theme and the symbolism to support it before writing the story, or does it evolve from the storytelling itself? How do you even tell if a theme is present? Or is it the same as the life lesson learned by one of the characters? – Nancy J. Cohen, January, 2015

***

I mention this because I don’t think that it’s a good idea to aim at being the “next” of something. I understand that the “next” Gone Girl or The Girl on the Train is precisely what editors — some editors, anyway — are looking for. The entertainment business is reactive, not proactive. The gatekeepers don’t get in trouble for missing a hit; they get in trouble for pushing a project that winds up dead on arrival. The theory is that if a book has a troubled female protagonist who is an unreliable narrator, then readers who bought The Girl on the Train will buy and read that, too. At some point, however, that demand is going to run out, and you don’t want it to run out just before your book gets published.

I’m starting to see a number of Jack Reacher-type books, wherein a strong, silent type with an extraordinary skillset wanders into a town and reluctantly becomes involved in someone’s troubles. They’re not all bad books, but it’s almost impossible to read them with comparing them to Lee Child’s offspring, and to find them at least somewhat wanting. I would submit that one is better served by taking an element here and an element there from stories or series that you admire — whether successful or otherwise — and changing the narrative. P.G. Sturges does an excellent job of this in his “Shortcut Man” series. Dick Henry, the Shortcut Man, is an ex-cop who stays in one place, helping people with everyday problems by utilizing extra-legal means. Henry is Robert McCall, without the gravitas. Tim Hallinan pulls off a similar trick in his Junior Bender series, which features a cat burglar who works for criminals. Bender is Richard Stark’s Parker turned inside out.  Both protagonists are criminals, but likeable guys; they’re anti-heroes without the “anti-”, if you will.

What I would like to know is: what authors — or series — do you go to for inspiration? And I mean “inspiration” as a spark, not a model. – Joe Hartlaub, January, 2016

***

I will answer comments this morning, but will be away from my computer during the afternoon and will respond to those comments this evening. Thanks.

Reader Friday – 200,000 Scenes – 40 Chapters

Three days ago (Tuesday), my wife and I sold an office building where I had practiced medicine for thirty-five years of my 40-year career.

After a year of foot dragging and wanting me to give them the building, our local hospital finally got serious when they learned another hospital was interested in the property. Within two days we had a signed contract. Now the hospital can demolish the building and enlarge their parking lot.

Tuesday night I lay awake reflecting on what had occupied more than half of my life. I began tallying the number of patients I had seen: 100+ patients /week. 5000+ patients/year. 200,000+ patients in 40 years.

Each of those patients had a story to tell of their pain, suffering, injury, or aging. Each was ready to take on the conflict with the antagonist, and invited me to join the battle. And each visit resulted in a record of their story being entered into their chart – 200,000 stories (scenes) over a span of 40 years (chapters).

I started a new book 13 years ago when I began studying and writing fiction. It’s now time to write “THE END” at the back of the earlier book, those forty chapters of life, and close the book.

Thanks for allowing me to reflect.

Today’s discussion is endings:

  • What is your all-time favorite book ending?
  • What is your favorite ending you have crafted for one of your books?
  • Do you have a dream ending that you plan to work into a future book?

TKZ’s Words of Wisdom

Now and again we reach back into the TKZ archives for some timeless advice and offer them to you for discussion. Please reply, riff, or rant in the comments and interact with each other!

Today, we have discussions on violence and desensitization, reading reviews, and messy desks. Here’s to a spirited discussion.

In movies, books and television, I wonder sometimes if the downplayed violence–the off-screen murder that drives the meat of the plot–isn’t more of a disservice to society than their counterparts which take you and your senses into the true horror that violent crime inflicts. The dead butler in the library didn’t just arrive there to provide a puzzle for our sleuth to solve. He was a person whose last moments were anguished and wracked with agony. I’m not sure it’s good that the likes of Miss Marple, Jessica and Hercule are so able to push that aside.

Obviously, tastes vary. I respect that different forms of suspense attract different readers, but when it comes to desensitizing people to violence, I do wonder which form erodes the social fabric more. Or, as an alternative, does fiction have a measurable impact at all on such real-life sensitivities? What do you think? What are your violence thresholds? – John Gilstrap, January 2010

***

I know this is going to sound counter-intuitive, and for many authors, nearly impossible, but here’s my advice: don’t read your reviews, ever. Turn off that Google alert. Skip the Amazon reviews section. Ignore your GoodReads ratings. And if you must know what a blogger or traditional media reviewer is saying about your book, enlist someone you trust to skim the contents and give you the highlights.

This applies not only to negative reviews, but positive ones. Because here’s the thing. As we all know, a reader’s opinion of a book is enormously subjective. The way they approach a story can vary at different points in their lives, or even their day. They read things into it that you might never have intended–and they’re all going to have vastly different opinions about what worked and what didn’t. – Joe Moore, January 2013

***

I was pleased to read that this phenomenon is borne out in a book called The Perfect Mess by Dave Freedman and Eric Abrahamson which contends that those with cluttered, messy desks are often more efficient and creative than their neatnik brethren. Since my desk always looks like a disaster zone, I think I am going to stick with the Freedman/Abrahamson interpretation…but nonetheless I have to wonder whether most writers are like me – or whether I am just deluding myself that disorder is merely a sign of a great author in the making.

So, what about my fellow writers? Do you, like me, have a messy desk full of piles of paper or are you a neat freak with everything organized and de-cluttered for the sake of productivity and sanity? What do you think, is a messy desk a sign of creativity or just plain slovenliness? – Clare Langley-Hawthorne, February 2011

I will respond to comments this morning. This afternoon I will be away from my computer for a family gathering, and I will respond to your comments later this evening.

Reader Friday: Crossword Puzzles

The first crossword puzzle was published December 21, 1913, in The New York World by British journalist, Arthur Wynne. 109 years later, crossword puzzles remain wildly popular. A Google search revealed 10 free online crossword puzzles on the first page.

Being slow on these matters, I wondered, Are there free crossword puzzle builders? And, yes, there are. Here’s an article that lists “the best,”

What could be the benefit of using crossword puzzles for businesses or creatives? Well, here’s a link to that article:

And, being trained to keep asking, “What if,” and to think outside the box, I wondered if anyone is using crosswords on their blogs to engage readers.

So, I thought I would ask you, the TKZ community:

Here are today’s questions:

  1. Do you do any crossword puzzles?
  2. Why do you do them?
  3. Which ones do you like best?
  4. Have you ever thought of using crossword puzzles in your blogs to engage readers?