Lizzie Harper. Botanical Illustration – Tips on painting sketchbook-style studies of leaves – May 4th 2013

J.R.R. Tolkien, the father of the fantasy genre, wrote a short story called “Leaf by Niggle” (look for it in The Tolkien Reader). When I was a teen, just beginning to write my own stories, this story struck me as “true,” and it resonates even more strongly now. The first half of the story is about an artist named Niggle whose only work is a massive painting of a tree. The painting is never finished, and he continues to scrape away parts of it and paint them anew, because they never quite reflect his vision. Niggle’s neighbor sneers at Niggle’s lack of industry (as he spends his time painting a plant and neglects the real ones in his garden) and plagues him with requests for help running errands and doing home-maintenance projects. Niggle…

3/18/15

Convictions, Courage, and the Internet

While browsing through my Facebook newsfeed this weekend, I came across a post that made my blood boil. We’ve all experienced this: a Facebook friend posts an inflammatory message that demands a response. Heart pounding, we pounce at the keyboard and hammer out an appropriately scathing—or archly informative—reply. Perhaps we hunt for an online article to prove our point, or perhaps we merely offer a withering scold. And then we hit return.

Or, we don’t.

I stopped hitting that key a few years back after realizing the blood pressure elevations prompted by arguments with strangers weren’t worth it. But I also doused my collection of firebrands because I’d started promoting my fiction through social media, and to be frank, I feared offending potential fans. While I occasionally post a link or “like” a page some might find controversial, I do so far less often…

3/4/2015

Dear A:

How often have you passed a shop window, caught a reflection of an old, jowly broad out the corner of your eye, mutely snickered at her, then realized it’s your own reflection? How many times have you stood up, turned your head, crossed your leg, or picked up your purse and felt pain streaking through your nerves as a no-longer supple muscle seizes up? How often have you not written down that task or that message, confident your steel-trap memory will retain it, and found yourself in trouble later, because the trap has morphed into a sieve?

Acceptance is the first step toward recovery, right? So maybe you need to accept that you’re getting old. Ignoring the decline in your physique and faculties isn’t helping you prevent it. In your mind’s eye, you see yourself as a fit and fine fifty-year-old, like your neighbor who runs marathons…

by Chantal Boudreau
When someone mentions female characters in fantasy, some stereotypes come to mind. There is the damsel in distress, the plucky princess, the matronly queen or the bawdy tavern wench, just for a few examples. These seem to show up everywhere, unfortunate tropes who sometimes serve as sidekicks and who often give the male hero extra purpose to their cause, but don’t have much purpose in their own right.
Then there’s the flip-side – the “strong female” character: the man-hating amazon, the stoic and noble female warrior who is an exception to the norm, the experienced sorceress or priestess who often proves self-sacrificing. While they may have a prominent role in the story, they tend to be loners and atypical of the women in that particular fantasy culture. Most of the women in the story other than that one outstanding character fall into the traditional medieval female roles:…

by Bruce Blake

The time has finally come…the return of the Guild of Dreams.

After a lengthy hiatus (if you choose to read that as ‘Bruce got lazy for an extended period of time’, I would probably be hard pressed to argue the point), the motley blog crew have returned to entertain and enlighten. Returning to the Guild are myself, Autumn Birt, Chantal Boudreau, Scott Bury, Joshua Johnson, AM Justice, Steven Montano, and Benjamin X. Wretlind.

So here’s the set up: we’re paring things down a little, with regular posts scheduled for Mondays and Fridays. That’s not to say you won’t see the occasional post on other days…special guests, book announcements, cover reveals, and the like may pop up at any time, so be sure to sign up for email updates over there on the top right if you haven’t done so…

2/4/2015

Dear Amanda

This can’t go on. Really, it can not go on.

You say this to yourself every time you flush the toilet in your bathroom and find yourself pulling the lid off the tank, pushing up your sleeve, and reaching in to adjust the stopper so the toilet won’t run. That stopper has failed to properly seat itself upon flushing for over a month now.

A month. Maybe two.

There’s no excuse for letting it go so long. There’s a plumbing supply store and 2 hardware stores around the corner from your apartment. You wouldn’t even have to cross the street to buy whatever you need to fix it. Of course, it offends you that you cannot figure out what’s causing the stopper to fall askew and let water leak into the bowl (it’s not a faulty chain or balloon, all you plumbing experts). You want to fix…

To end the year, I’ve decided to spotlight my top 10 blog posts from 2014. I went into my stats page and looked up those articles, stories, and other published pieces that had the most number of views. Some surprised me, others did not.

We’re almost there! Here’s #2: How Do You Share Backstory Information

This is a post that blew up a couple of weeks after I posted it. I still remember opening up my blog to write an article and gasping in surprise when I saw my stats. They were booming out of control! I laughed when I saw the article drawing so much attention. It wasn’t one I’d published recently–at all. But, I guess that’s what’s so cool about social media, huh? One person can get a hold of an article on your blog and boom! It takes off.

So if you missed this popular Twitter Treasure Thursday, here you go!

Welcome to Twitter Treasure Thursday! So, as…

Dear Reader-

12/21/14

I awoke this morning with dreams of visiting a tropical island paradise with sand under my feet and a cocktail in hand. I snuggled deeper into the warmth of my blankets hoping to prolong the dream and avoid another monotonous day, but the squawk of my alarm clock shatter any illusions I had of paradise.

“Would you start the coffee,” came from the other side of the bed and a cold, wet nose and whimper greeted me from mine. I threw back the covers; the day had begun whether I was ready or not. I stumbled down the hall, turning on lights and opening bedroom doors. I called out a morning greeting to my slumbering boys hoping the light and my voice would begin to rouse them.

I pushed the button on the coffee machine, opened the door to let the dog out, waiting to make sure…