Hey, today I’m over at Sarah Laurence’s blog talking about What Can’t Wait, writing, and my nerdiness. Sarah also reviews What Can’t Wait today. Stop by and show some love in the comment section!

Check out this guest post I did on women writers of the Caribbean for Color Online. Read the post and then cruise around the site to find amazing resources and perspectives.

Full disclosure: I’m one of those people who obsessively looks up every little reference in a novel. In the old days, this meant (gasp) looking at the footnotes and using actual reference books. The Internet has made this much, much … Read more

Here’s a poem that will make you feel better about whatever’s come in your mailbox today. I actually heard Carl Dennis read when I was at UT. He was funny, darkly ironic, and just about the most unassuming-looking person you could … Read more

This is a page from my writer’s notebook back before the story for What Can’t Wait even existed, back when I was just doing exploratory writing to find my way into the characters. 

People often ask me, “how much of … Read more

Yeah, yeah, you know you wanted to see my list after that tantalizing post about the must haves and the can’t stands. So here it is. BTW, Arnulfo is wonderful in about twenty gazillion more ways than I could ever put … Read more

This is a rant. So forgive me for putting aside my usual lovable self to be a horrible cranky pants.  I think I’d be forced to either quit writing or disown “The Road Not Taken” if I were Robert Frost. … Read more

It turns out that April is both poetry appreciation month and sexual assault awareness month. This conjunction made me think of a Barbara Kingsolver poem that maps reflections about sexual assault onto a description of the aftermath of a burglary… Read more

While we go about our business, life is still very broken for many in Japan. The Kidlit4Japan auction is the product of many authors teaming up to offer signed books and services for auction to raise money (UNICEF receives all … Read more

I do certain things hoping that they will make the world a little better, or at least… less bad. But I also worry a lot. For example: if it takes a lot of water for me to wash a peanut … Read more