Taven Moore

As always, beware the comments section if you plan on writing something, so as to avoid being influenced. I look forward to seeing your responses! The yellow lines on the highway sped by in a blur, and we flew through the night, and we felt free. But we weren’t, and we knew it. We were running away from something, and running away was never the path to freedom. I thought about asking John to turn back. I thought about suggesting…

I'm cheating a little and posting a book AFTER I've read it ... but I wanted to make sure it was a good one. The fun thing about this one is that it's a book of short stories! So even if you don't like all of them (which I did not) you are almost certain to love some of them (which I most definitely did!). Many many thanks to Faith Williams for rising to the challenge of suggesting it for me. The Starlit Wood Packed with award-winning authors, this anthology explores an array of fairy tales in startling and innovative ways, in genres and settings both traditional and unusual, including science fiction, western, and post-apocalyptic as well as traditional fantasy and contemporary horror. The first and last stories were predictably my favorites, but it was super fascinating to read through all of the different genres, styles, and interpretations. Even if a particular story wasn't to my liking, I still learned a lot from reading them. My favorites included

As always, beware the comments section if you plan on writing something, so as to avoid being influenced. I look forward to seeing your responses! Reporters are trained to develop a sixth sense, a nose for when a story smells fishy. And something about this one wasn't right. First of all, ...

I'm not gonna hide it. I'm super addicted to this Netflix show called Samurai Gourmet. It is gentle and funny and calming and beautiful. It is partly food appreciation, with gorgeous cooking cinematography. It is partly auditory pleasure, with a combination of perfect background musics and internal dialogue from the hero, whose deep Japanese patter paints gorgeous portraits even without the accompanying subtitles. It is partly guilty pleasure, as the hero (a recently-retired Japanese businessman aided by a Samurai spirit guide) revels in the knowledge that he can have beer in the middle of the day, or agonizes over whether or not he looks silly in the sunglasses he bought. Seriously. This guy worries about everything. I relate to him so much -- should I say something to the rude person, or keep quiet? What will people think if I eat spaghetti with the wrong utensils? Watching him grow stronger as a person (to the point of actually standing up to someone by the end

Writing Alone So you want to be a writer. But it's difficult. I get it. I'm not making fun, because I 150% get it. Finding the time to do it is difficult enough even before adding in feelings of self-doubt and loneliness. Maybe you don't have any writing friends. Maybe you DO, but they all live far away or have their own super busy lives that don't mesh with yours. If you've ever done NaNoWriMo, you understand the true value of a strong writing community. The camaraderie, the readership, the companionship -- it's heady. It's like going from a world of black-and-white to technicolor ... and when it's gone it's like watching the last leaf fall from a tree and fly off in a chilly breeze. Even those who are very self-motivated can find it difficult to maintain writing when it seems like you're spilling words out into the darkness. I get it. But there are solutions. And they don't involve moving to Canada or Florida to live close

As always, beware the comments section if you plan on writing something, so as to avoid being influenced. I look forward to seeing your responses! The wind whispered through the dark, empty trees like a warning in a foreign language. Winter was coming, and with winter …