The wrong way to communicate during a crisis is to not communicate at all. Hootsuite demonstrated this last month. I think it’s an opportunity for all of us professional communicators to learn how to communicate during a crisis — especially when it’s a crisis that most observers will blame on you. Hootsuite is a service […]
Who can tell me where to turn off the setting on the computer for “Cause random problems” or “Unpredictably shut off critical functions”? Have you ever noticed that your electronics will suddenly stop doing what they have been doing, more or less reliably, for months or years, when you haven’t changed any settings? My earbuds […]
Image source: writeshop.com I have been wrestling for years over how to organize my work-in-progress, Walking from the USSR. An almost casual comment from a friend over dinner presented a solution. Now I feel I can wrap this baby up! The book is the story of my father-in-law, Maurice, who served in the Red Army […]
What is style? Written Words continues to explore the issue of style among independent authors. This time, I’ve asked historical novelist Zoe Saadia to weigh in. Saadia is unique among writers of historical fiction. Her novels, like At Road’s End, The Warrior’s Way, The Highlander and her latest, Two Rivers, are set in pre-European contact […]
I can’t keep it in anymore: I’m completely grossed out by Charmin toilet paper’s ads. You know them, the series featuring cute talking bears who use Charmin toilet paper to shit in the woods. (Bill Maher claims the current Pope really isn’t Catholic, so I guess Charmin completes the trope.) The ad campaign was stupid […]
Today, I am proud to say that I take on the Presidency of BestSellingReads, a collective of “new fiction” authors. My thanks to Frederick Lee Brooke for being such an inspiring and capable President and blazing a path for me. BestSelling Reads is an organization of writers of fiction and non-fiction who know the value […]
I nearly missed this story last week: Kobo, the e-book reader manufacturer and publisher, went through an exercise of weeding out “offensive” books and removing them from its catalog. Of course, “offensive” means books about some forms of sex. Apparently, books that glorify stock market manipulation or various forms of fraud against the middle class, […]