With the proliferation of small presses, more and more chapbooks are coming onto the scene. And if you’ve been wondering how to create a chapbook of your own, I’m here to help. What is a chapbook? But before we dive into how, let’s define what a chapbook is. A chapbook is a small collection, anywhere between 15 and 50 poems, or 3 to 10 short pieces of fiction. It’s usually soft covered and can be stapled (if it’s very short), … Read More »

January is about beginnings—new resolutions, new ideas, and hopefully, new first drafts. While thinking about beginnings, I thought about one of my first writing classes, high school journalism. I don’t remember much from the class except that a good lead should always include the answers to four important questions: the 4 Ws. These are; who, what, where, and when. After a good lead, we were taught the story could move on into the meaty details of how, or why. Good … Read More »

They say it’s the little things that matter. I couldn’t agree more! Recently, I was in an open mic Zoom session in which one of the readers read a poem that excluded every “the” possible, and several other small words like “an” and “a.” These are known as articles. Sometimes this pruning is done in the mistaken belief that to do so will make a piece feel more poem-like. (Though I don’t fully understand this reasoning.) Sometimes, it’s to cut … Read More »

Don’t get me wrong. Journals are lovely, and I have a drawer full. But there are other, and often better ideas for gift giving to a writer. If you have a writer stowed away in your attic, in a closet, or other suitably tight, dark place please consider some of the following ideas for this holiday season. And feel free to check out last year’s post on gifts for writers. Some gifts are timeless (like the gift of time) and … Read More »

So you’re zipping along – doing your thing – and below the radar one, or more, of your traditionally published books goes silently out of print. Often, you’re not told this by the publisher – you just stumble upon the fact when a teacher or school reports that they can’t get books. When a book goes out of print. it always hurts – it’s a death in the family. You’ve spent a significant portion of your life living with it, … Read More »

One, and done should not be the case for many poems. Why waste such a wealthy resource as a poem by only publishing it once in its entirety, or reprinting it whole? The truth is, like any good non-fiction writer who mines their research and articles for possible other perspectives on the material—poets can do the same. If you’ve got a longer poem, is it possible to pull out bits and pieces of it for a micro-poem? Can you reword … Read More »