The World’s First Tik Tok War

War has once again broken out. And Mike Elgan has an excellent report on what makes this one so different from all previous ones. As he points out, when the US invaded Iraq twenty years ago with the intention of removing Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein and installing a...

Looking in the Mirror

I came across a great thread on Facebook the other day and it got me thinking. A (male) writer was asking the following question: I have a female character looking at herself in the mirror. First naked then in a white nightdress which shows her figure. She is a very...

Beware Misguided Writing Advice

Author Anne R. Allen published yesterday a great post titled, 10 Dangerous Critiques: Beware Misguided Writing Advice. In it, she explains how trying to please everybody who beta-reads or critiques your WIP can turn a novel into a kind of jackalope of unrelated parts....

Interview with Tylluan Penry

Remember my interview with Pamela Turner, one of the authors of Among the Headstones, an anthology of Gothic horror stories? Today, I’m interviewing Tylluan Penry, another one of the anthology’s authors. Interview with Tylluan Penry Hi Tylluan, it’s great...

Talking Without Words

No, I’m not talking about non-verbal communication, i.e. shrugs, facial expressions, etc. I’m talking about emojis and, specifically, a new form of communication: “fake typing.” As Mike Elgan explains in his newsletter (which I highly recommend to anyone...

Are Animals Multilingual?

I am multilingual and consider myself a native Greek and English speaker. People like Ziad Fazah, born in Liberia, famously speak a total of 59 world languages. Can other creatures share that ability, though? Specifically, can dogs understand more than one language?...

Interview with Pamela Turner

You may remember Rayne Hall from our recent collaboration: we wrote together a book on Copy Writing. Now, Rayne has edited an anthology of graveyard tales called, appropriately enough, Among The Headstones: Creepy Tales from the Graveyard. For today’s post, I...

Happy 2022 with Good News

2021 is almost over but 2020 casts a long shadow: So, you are excused if you feel that 2021 was a bit of a bummer with nothing much to show for it. Thankfully, The Happy Broadcast and Modern Met have got you covered. Illustrator Mauro Gatti is happy to balance things...