Books

I have never wanted to join a book club. Oh, I know there are many excellent groups out there, whose members cherish their time together, but there are just as many dysfunctional book clubs that could turn any warm book-lover’s heart stone cold. So how do you find a good book club?

I can’t and don’t intend to tell anyone how to write a book. Every writer goes about their task in a different way, and while rules do exist – readability is key, for a start – they are also there to be broken. I had never written a book before…

I love it when a friend or family member gifts me a book. With so many choices in bookshops and online stores, it’s a fun way to discover new authors or subject matter that might not otherwise appear on my radar. Here are a few favorites I’ve read recently…

Where did October and November go? Disappeared into 11 books, most of them worth considering for your book stack. Enjoy and Happy Holidays!

Whenever I counsel fiction authors about getting started in self-publishing, and they ask what they should concentrate on to become a success, I always advise them to be great storytellers. If you can’t tell a great story, no amount of marketing will make…

It’s raining and warm, yes warm, in Chicago this first week of November. Does this mean that the coming winter will be as warm as last year? I never wore my sub-zero coat. Regardless of the weather, books keep us venturing into other worlds. The following books…

Over the years, self-publishing has evolved, but what hasn’t changed is the accessibility for the average person to become a published author. Not everyone wants, or needs, to write full-time like I do, so below I’ve listed a number of ways you can use the phenomenon…

A current best-seller – interesting book about nurses in Vietnam. Hannah does an excellent job of spinning a plot around three nurses who bond in the triage centers and then follow each other’s lives post-war. The Army claimed there were never…

Get thee behind me summer! In the U.S. we’ve been bombarded by political conventions, extreme heat, and lots of big, fat books. It’s 93° in Chicago as of this writing, but I’m off to the Inside Passage on Thursday for my first visit to Alaska. Rain and 50° are promised…

Reaching the end of a great book is a bittersweet moment. If the story was fiction, and the characters spoke to your heart, then it’s an emotional high to complete their journey with them. For nonfiction, you’ve either gotten to know…