Reading time: Less than 3 minutes Have you ever faced the challenge of serving different audiences with your writing? Here’s how I handle that… When our children were about five years old, we started priming them for a key duty. We wanted them to throw us a party for our 25th […]
How to give readers their just desserts Read More »
Reading time: Just over 1 minute This is my weekly installment of “writing about writing,” in which I scan the world to find websites, books and articles to help other writers. Today I discuss an infographic about how long it takes you to read a variety of popular books….. My husband recently
How long does it take you to read… Read More »
Reading time: About 1 minute If you were asked to come up with a creative way of communicating about a deadly virus would the idea of an ebola song ever have occurred to you? The hottest pop song in Liberia right now goes by the title “Ebola is Real.” Not surprising, perhaps, given
Ebola song is real… Read More »
Reading time: About 1 minute I like to share interesting pieces of figurative language I encounter in my reading. I write today about two similes from Lizzie Widdicombe… Call me naive, but I had never before heard of what’s called a Tough Mudder, which is a 10-to-12-mile obstacle race including fire pits, tightly
The figurative language of Lizzie Widdicombe… Read More »
Reading time: About 1 minute Increase your vocabulary and you’ll make your writing much more precise. That’s why I provide a word of the week. Today’s word: quisling. I’m a trailing edge baby-boomer, born in the late 1950s. My parents, both Canadians, were deeply marked by the Second World War. My father
What’s a quisling? Read More »
Reading time: Less than 3 minutes Last week I wrote about the benefits of the word yes. Today, I reflect on the advantages of just saying no. I have a bad back. I know I’ve created this back myself, after 30 years of stooping over a computer keyboard and hunching
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Reading time: Less than two minutes This is my weekly installment of “writing about writing,” in which I scan the world to find websites, books and articles to help other writers. Today I discuss an article about Italo Calvino… I once worked for an editor who believed that Italian journalist
Are you a hedgehog, fox, eagle or hummingbird? Read More »
Reading time: About 2 minutes Do you know how to manage your communications suppliers? Here’s some advice that will get them working FOR you rather than against you…. As someone who works in communications, I end up managing a host of suppliers. Maybe you do, too. Writers, copy editors, proofreaders, graphic
How to stop aggravating your suppliers…. Read More »
Reading time: About 1 minute I like to share interesting pieces of figurative language I encounter in my reading. I write today about a series of metaphors from Elizabeth Renzetti. I’m a big fan of the journalist Elizabeth Renzetti who writes for the Globe and Mail newspaper. She’s funny, opinionated and articulate
The figurative language of Elizabeth Renzetti… Read More »
Reading time: Less than 1 minute Increase your vocabulary and you’ll make your writing much more precise. That’s why I provide a word of the week. Today’s word: ambuscader. One of my readers, Richard Holden, has published a collection of short stories in a genre he calls “Elderlit.” I hadn’t before
What’s an ambuscader? Read More »
