Noted music writer Michael Lydon explains how to apply the rule "Let the little come out of the big" to the art of writing.

Several years ago I wrote a short book about guitar playing, Let the Little Come Out of the Big, my approach to the ancient and beautiful instrument.  Continue reading...

The essence of writing's value to humanity is this: the art can convey thought from one human to another. As in gift giving, in writing it's the thought that counts.  Continue reading...

Delta Girls is a book born from rejection. When Ballantine Books bought my novel Self Storage, they offered me a two-book deal, which of course was thrilling and affirming to me as a writer. I wrote a novel with a 12-year-old narrator, My Life with the Lincolns, and turned it in, thinking I had fulfilled my contract and would have a new book in the world soon.  Continue reading...

Last fall, Visual Thesaurus editor Ben Zimmer wrote here and in his New York Times column about writers who use a we voice when truly they are I's writing personal opinions. In a few cases, Zimmer wrote, he'd accept using the plural pronoun for the singular, officially called nosism, from nos, we in Latin, but in general he deplored the practice. Using we for I opens writers up to "charges of gutlessness and self-importance," Zimmer wrote; "the we disease...continues to infect many written genres."  Continue reading...

When Tillie Harris goes into premature labor, she has no one to turn to but her estranged father. Their relationship has been strained since Tillie was eight years old and her mother mysteriously vanished. Up From the Blue follows young Tillie's startling discoveries about what happened to her mother, as well as grown Tillie's struggle with a relationship that’s stuck in the past.  Continue reading...

Is the bloom off your New Year's resolution rose? If so, you’re in good company. Four out of five people who make New Year's resolutions eventually break them. And 33 percent don’t even last till the end of January!  Continue reading...