Every serious writer knows the endless rules to writing a good book. But I’ve always wondered: Who makes up all these rules and why do we slovenly follow them? A lot of them are boring. That’s why I relished writing The House on Haven Island, my first romantic suspense novel, a murder mystery. Rather, an…
Many years ago I was doing a community building workshop for Toyota at a conference they held for their female employees. There were thousands of women there. One of the keynote speakers was Carrie Fisher. I thought her speech was fantastic. A bit wacky, a lot funny, and very touching, she talked about…
I almost didn’t go. After all, until her death twelve years ago, my mom kept me up on all the hometown gossip about people I knew (and didn’t know). West Branch, Michigan, has about 2,000 people and my class at West Branch High School graduated 105 kids in 1966. I figured I’d kept in touch…
I knew I liked Myra Lewis Williams 27 years ago when we went to lunch together for the first time. We were in a Mexican restaurant enjoying our meal when a cockroach crawled up the wall at her shoulder. Without breaking her stride Myra took off her shoe, smashed it, put her shoe back on,…
With the two new biographies just out about Rosemary Kennedy, I decided it’s time to share a story about my experience working for her sister, Eunice Kennedy Shriver. Yes, they were sisters in the Kennedy family, thus sisters to JFK, Robert, and Ted. It was 1974 when I volunteered to work at the Special Olympics, which…
Everybody has a story. What’s yours? You may think your story isn’t worth telling, but all of us have had disappointments, triumphs, and comedy throughout our lives. Somebody out there is likely to enjoy your tale and to get something out of it, if it’s told in an engaging way. That’s why Katherine Gray White…