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Gazing into the flames
Flames dancing in the hearth. Drawing the eye, dominating the room. Softening conversation, making it more reflective. Bringing fellow-feeling down the ages, right back to cave-dwellers.
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Caterpillar circuit
I found this caterpillar in the cauliflower – hardly camouflaged at all. After the meal it climbed onto the oven dish. There it trudged round and round the rim, possibly all night except I wasn’t...
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Apartment living
This is a monument to the industry of the mud dauber wasp. Unfortunately it can’t stay there, on the lid of our pool motor filter. In any case the empty holes suggest some of the larvae have grown up,...
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Wasps waste nothing
Wasps are quick to profit from a quince smashed open by a wild boar. They attack a stricken butterfly in seconds and suck it dry. Here fennel flowers provide a rare source of autumn nectar. Wasps waste...
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Not making quince jam
“I think to have a quince tree and not to make quince jam shows such strength of character.” So remarks Vera in the short story ‘The quince tree’ by Saki, satirical writer of the early twentieth...
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Breakfast flowers
This is butter-and-eggs, more soberly known as yellow toadflax. It should be distinguished from bacon-and-eggs, the nickname of bird’s-foot trefoil, which has red tips to the buds. These flowers must...
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Futuristic
A futuristic bicycle? A lean and mean robotic steed of fibreglass? No, just a praying mantis displaying its angularities.
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Carabinieri
The red and black bugs we call fire beetles are nicknamed ‘Carabinieri’ in Italy. This is because the uniform of Italy’s national police force is red and black. One CarabinierE, or many CarabinierI (as...
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Rosy view
Viewed from afar Bordered by pink Autumn roses, our town nestles in the valley below. From here it looks idyllic. The Carabinieri never give parking fines; the butcher doesn’t overcharge for his...
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Golden apples of a dream
I once wrote a poem about picking apples and likened the topmost, unreachable apples to the ‘golden apples of a dream’. The fruits in the photo are smooth, golden, dreamlike – and reachable since the...
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Fiddler on the roof
Actually not a fiddler but a wagger. This is a Pied Wagtail, a frequent sight by the house. It wags its tail up and down to regain its balance after landing. An apt name, which actually describes what...
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Whisking the Reader Away with a Historical Setting
From the ancient streets of Babylon to the smoky speakeasies of the Prohibition Era, historical settings are a favorite of readers and writers alike. Whether a story is built around a significant event...
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How Productive Is Your Writing Group?
Workshopping your stories with your peers is an essential part of developing your skills as a writer. By sharing your work with others and offering it up for critique, you can get a great sense of your...
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Using the Subjunctive Mood Correctly (and Incorrectly)
One of the nice things about verbs is their flexibility. Different verb forms can convey a wealth of information about both the subject and object governed by the verb. Tenses, for example, give you a...
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Getting Started on Sonnets
Although prose and poetry are two very different kinds of writing, becoming more proficient in one can help you become more proficient in the other. There are many ways for prose writers to improve...
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Adding Depth with Dialect
Although it’s possible to write in perfectly correct APA or MLA style, it’s difficult to define “correct use of English” on a broad scale. Due to regional and cultural variations in syntax, vocabulary,...
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Helping Your Sentences Stand Up for Themselves
There are two types of clauses that we use to build sentences in English. There are independent clauses, which contain a complete statement of subject, verb, and object; and there are dependent...
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Getting in the Write Place
When I was younger, I could and would write anywhere – much to the chagrin of my schoolteachers and well-meaning relatives. As long as I had my notebook and a working pen, I found that I could drown...
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Perfect Parallelisms
In many ways, a sentence serves as a storage structure for information. A well-written sentence keeps information neatly organized so the reader can find it and use it with ease. Parallel structures...
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How Does Your Inspiration Grow?
Any conversation about the art of writing will eventually turn to the topic of inspiration. Finding something compelling to write about can be almost as hard as writing about it compellingly. Many...
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