I Keep On Writing – Writing Journey #16

Ann H GabhartAnn's Posts, One Writer's Journal 18 Comments

  “You never climb the same mountain twice, not even in memory. Memory rebuilds the mountain, changes the weather, retells the jokes, remakes all the moves.” –  Lito Tejada-Flores No, I’ve never had the urge to climb mountains. I like to hike up trails into the hills, but I’ll leave the actual mountain climbing to others. But when I saw this …

And Then There Were Cats – Writing Journey #15

Ann H GabhartAnn's Posts, One Writer's Journal 22 Comments

And happily, in addition to that little bit of sinister, there are cats in Hidden Springs! Specifically Two Bits, Grimalkin, and Miss Marble to help save the day at just the right moments in the stories. If you’ve got a cozy mystery, and a dog is introduced, readers’ first question is, ‘Does the dog die?’ They never ask about a …

The Work of Writing – Writing Journey #14

Ann H GabhartAnn's Posts, One Writer's Journal 20 Comments

The three great essentials to achieve anything worth while are: Hard work, Stick-to-itiveness, and Common sense. ―Thomas A. Edison Tomorrow is Labor Day. Hope you are having a good holiday weekend as we near the end of summer. When I was a kid and after I married too and we raised a crop of tobacco, labor day usually lived up …

The Story I Wanted to Write – Writing Journey #11

Ann H GabhartAnn's Posts, One Writer's Journal 28 Comments

Write what you know. The above advice is attributed to Mark Twain. At least he may have been the first person to actually write it down when someone asked him how to become a writer. It could be that someone once told him the same thing when he was a young writer. He followed that advice and wrote about the …

Writing Journey #9 – Another Dip in the Road

Ann H GabhartAnn's Posts, One Writer's Journal 29 Comments

And then there were two! When you find the end of one story, then it’s time to move on to the next story. That’s what I did. You already know that The Forbidden Yearning was actually the third novel I wrote, just the first one to find a publisher. Shamrocks, my working title for the first book I wrote and my cattle …

Writing Journey #8 – Persistence Pays Off

Ann H GabhartAnn's Posts, One Writer's Journal 34 Comments

  A rejection is nothing more than a necessary step in the pursuit of success. – Bo Bennett If you read my last post, you know that I shared about a rejection that hit me hard just when I thought I might be moving toward success. Isn’t that the way of it sometimes? Just when you think things are going …

Writing Journey #7 – What Next?

Ann H GabhartAnn's Posts, One Writer's Journal 26 Comments

  “Dripping water hollows out stone, not through force but through persistence.” ― Ovid Persistence. Perseverance. Those two words had to be the ones I needed most along my writing journey. I could believe I had some talent at putting words together. I could string enough together to make a story. I had even managed to string 70,000 or so words …

Writing Journey 5 – Outline Assignment Inspiration

Ann H GabhartAnn's Posts, One Writer's Journal 13 Comments

Start writing, no matter what. The water does not flow until the faucet is turned on. ― Louis L’Amour Last post I shared my first sale. It wasn’t exactly the first thing I had gotten for writing. When I was in sixth grade I wrote an essay about wanting to raise chickens and won 100 chicks. When I was in 8th grade …

Writing Journey 3 – The Next Step in My Writing Journey

Ann H GabhartAnn's Posts, One Writer's Journal 13 Comments

“Long patience and application saturated with your heart’s blood—you will either write or you will not—and the only way to find out whether you will or not is to try.” —Jim Tully, Writer’s Digest I’m not sure if you all are ready to keep following me down my writing road, but in case a few of you are still interested, …

My Journey to Hollyhill – Part 2

Ann H GabhartAnn's Posts, One Writer's Journal 32 Comments

I’m continuing from Sunday’s post about my writing journey to Hollyhill. To get there I had to mine my memories of and experiences in my hometown and my little country church. This is a picture of that church and the congregations in 1962. That was before I attended there, but a lot of these people were still there when I …