by kristinoakley | Aug 17, 2018 | Creativity & Craft, Newsletter
This summer I’ve lived on the moon, met an autistic man who finds the love of his life, followed the investigation of a sports coach who’s suspected of murder and then turns out not to be human, visited a Scandinavian town torn apart by scandal,...
by kristinoakley | Aug 3, 2018 | Newsletter
I don’t know if this happens to you, but when I binge-watch a television series I start to talk like the characters. For instance, when my daughter and I watched hours of The West Wing, we found ourselves talking in rapid-fire quips just like the actors – “You think?”...
by kristinoakley | Jul 20, 2018 | Creativity & Craft, Newsletter
I recently submitted the first 53 pages of The Devil Particle manuscript to writers Shannon Anderson and Tricia Wagner and my two twenty-something daughters for feedback. Shannon couldn’t believe those pages were from the same author who’d written Carpe...
by kristinoakley | Jul 6, 2018 | Creativity & Craft, For Readers, Newsletter
I stayed up way too late last night and am having a hard time concentrating on my work today. It’s all Fredrik Backman’s fault. Mr. Backman is the author of the critically acclaimed novel A Man Called Ove which was made into an Academy Award nominated...
by kristinoakley | Jun 22, 2018 | Newsletter, Writing Life
In the summer of 2007, as I drove around northern Illinois, I listened to Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451 and wondered why novels with futuristic societies portray those societies as evil, dystopian. I thought, why don’t I write a book about a culture...
by kristinoakley | Jun 8, 2018 | Newsletter, Writing Life
Authors are often told that they should write every day. This seems obvious. Daily creating helps us hone our craft, develop new stories, and finish our works in progress. It’s part of the reason why NaNoWriMo, National Novel Writing Month, began. NaNoWriMo...
by kristinoakley | May 25, 2018 | Creativity & Craft, Newsletter
I’m sure many readers imagine novel writing as a solitary pursuit. First thing in the morning, the novelist grabs a mug of coffee or a cup of tea on her way to her computer wearing pjs and fuzzy slippers and writes until noon. Followed by a shower, lunch, maybe...
by kristinoakley | May 11, 2018 | Creativity & Craft, Fictional Research, Newsletter
While editing the second book in my Devil Particle Trilogy, I’ve been thinking about how to craft the third book. I have an idea of what protagonist Jaelyn Bellamy’s struggle will be, but not much else and it’s gnawing at me. It’s as if...
