Posts by Lee Martin
Everyone Talks about the Weather
We’ve had a stretch of hot temperatures lately, which has me thinking about how writers can use weather in their work. Let’s say a narrative takes place during a time of extreme heat, cold, rain, drought, etc. What might that weather do for the story at hand, and what should the writer be aware of…
Read MoreSmall Irritants and Narratives
I’m going through a time when things just seem to be out of kilter—nothing major, just little things that frustrate me. This morning, for instance, I was cleaning my glasses when the top of the little spray bottle rolled off the top of the dresser, never to be seen again. I looked under the dresser…
Read MoreA Prompt for Writing about Troubled Times
My blog post is late this week because I came home yesterday evening from giving three craft lectures at the West Virginia Writers annual conference and couldn’t bring myself to face the blank page. I’d given what I’d had to the good folks in West Virginia, and all I wanted to do was watch a…
Read MoreTips for Writing Scenes
I just returned from Louisville, Kentucky, where I presented a craft lecture at the spring residency of the Naslund-Mann Graduate School of Writing’s MFA program. I offered some tips and techniques for writing scenes in any sort of narrative with a particular emphasis on creative nonfiction. Maybe it’s just me, but I seem to notice…
Read MoreAbsent Partners: A Story and a Writing Prompt
Seven years ago, Cathy and I pointed her Mustang GT westward, our sights set on Lubbock, Texas. We were at a time in our lives when we didn’t quite know where we were going to end up. I’d just walked out of a long-term marriage. Cathy had left her own marriage five years prior. We’d…
Read MoreWriting Lessons from the Garden
Our plot at the community garden is beginning to produce. I’m enjoying lettuce, spinach, and radishes. Blooms are about to come on our bush beans. Onions are growing. I see the beginnings of blossoms on our tomato and pepper plants. I love this 4 x 12 foot raised bed. I love working up the soil…
Read MoreA Writing Prompt on Mother’s Day
The writing prompt for this week is to write about a feature of someone’s body that seems contrary to the inner essence of that person. You can use this for creative nonfiction or fiction. Imagine the way that feature would be if the person had lived the life they should have lived. As an example,…
Read MoreComing Home: A Writing Prompt
I start today with these lines from Robert Frost’s narrative poem, “The Death of the Hired Man”: Home is the place where, when you have to go there, They have to take you in. We know this isn’t always true. Families turn their own away all the time, and sometimes for good reason. In a…
Read MorePet Peeves: Story Starters
We all have them, our pet peeves that raise our blood pressure and put us on edge. Here are a few of mine: overpriced restaurants that crowd tables together so you actually feel like you’re dining with the people on your left and right, noisy restaurants where you have to shout to carry on a…
Read MoreSuccess Comes in Many Ways: A Wish for My Students
I’m approaching the end of another school year. Right now, I’m in the midst of reading the wonderful revisions my fiction and creative nonfiction writers have done. It’s a time to celebrate the victories each writer has had as they’ve moved their original drafts further along and a time for me to make any suggestions…
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