EVELYN KRIEGER

6 Great Websites for Writers (Plus new interview)

How to get published.

writing_websites

Whatever kind of writing you aspire to, there’s a website or blog out there to help you get there. Here are 6 of my recommendations.

Pro Blogger

If you’re serious about blogging, want to grow your audience, and monetize, this website offers guidance, podcasts, extensive resources, and classes on every angle of professional blogging.

DIY MFA

Great for serious life-long learners of writing craft. Do It Yourself MFA helps you “write with focus, read with purpose, and build community”–all essentials for growing as a writer. Offers articles, podcasts, resources, and classes.

Writer Unboxed

Want to get published? A host of contributors, best-selling authors, and industry professionals and a robust comment section all add up to a powerful guide to the business and craft of writing fiction.

The Positive Writer

Feeling stuck or discouraged in your writing? Bryan Hutchinson’s Blog is devoted to “encourage, inspiring, and motivated” writers at all stages of the game.

Funds for Writers

I’ve been a fan of Hope Clark’s website and newsletter for years. Hope is a full-time freelancer and novelist. Her vibrant site includes markets, competitions, awards, grants, publishers, agents, and jobs for your writing abilities at every stage of the game. Show me the money!

WOW! Women on Writing

“An ezine promoting communication between women writers, authors, editors, agents, and readers” offers articles, contests, a blog, online courses, and industry news. Although aimed at women writers, there is a great deal here for all to learn from. Enjoy their award-winning flash fiction and essays. Their blog, The Muffin, offers daily writing tips and inspiration.

Here’s a short interview I did last month with WOW! after my essay, “The Geometry of Grief,” was a runner-up their recent contest.

What are your favorite online writing resources?

How Do You Write About Grief?

“Where you used to be, there is a hole in the world, which I find myself constantly walking around in the daytime, and falling in at night. I miss you like hell.”

~Edna St. Vincent Millay

Heart_Candle

We all experience grief and loss. Some of us more than others. There is no escaping its grip.

The longer we live, the more we lose.

The grief of losing a thing, and the fear of losing it,

are equal.”

~Seneca

In trying to comfort others, or share our grief experience, we get stuck in the sphere of emotion and physical sensation. How do we speak about grief?

We turn to metaphor and imagery.

A black hole. A sinking ship. A shredded heart. Time stands still. Grief eats like acid.

Sometimes, grief can be described in the same way as love.

“Grief is like the ocean; it comes on waves ebbing and flowing. Sometimes the water is calm, and sometimes it is overwhelming.”

For is there grief without love?

“All you can do is learn to swim.”

Author Anne Lamott writes, “You will lose someone you can’t live without, and your heart will be badly broken, and the bad news is that you never completely get over the loss of your beloved. But this is also good news. They live forever in your broken heart that doesn’t seal back up. And you come through. It’s like having a broken leg that never heals perfectly—that still hurts when the weather gets cold, but you learn to dance with the limp.”

IMG_E8105 — Siesta Keyes Beach, Sarasota, FL. March 2019

Happy Pi Day!

In case you’re scratching your head…Pi Day falls on March 14. It’s as a celebration of the first 3 significant numbers of the math constant represented by the Greek letter π—3.14

Remember calculating the area of a circle?

Divide any circle’s circumference by its diameter; the answer (whether for a pie plate or a planet) is always approximately 3.14.

Pi has a rich history beginning in the ancient world. Some attributed magical meaning to π. For a few thousand years, mathematicians have been scratching their heads over its properties.

Pi Day is celebrated around the globe with pie eating, math chats, contests, and related activities. MIT has been known to send out its admission decisions on March 14. San Francisco’s Exploratorium has an entire exhibit devoted to this mysterious number.

Could you compete in a Pi memorization contest?

This is a particularly impressive feat as there appears to be no repeating pattern in the constant.

Kids (and grownups, too) are fascinated by the idea that Pi never ends! In other words, if you write it out as a decimal, you’re going to need a ton paper.

3.1415926535897932384626433…

Maybe your children, or grandchildren, are lucky to have a school celebration today for this irrational number.

When my kids were home, I baked a pie on March 14. We explored circle art and puzzles.

Pi Day Cherry and Apple Pies — From 74million.org

As an educator, I’m passionate about helping kids see math as more than arithmetic. As a private tutor, I’m often dismayed by the dull and relentless worksheets kids get for math homework.

And don’t get me started on the state of math education.

I advise parents not to leave their child’s math learning to school. Supplement and augment.

Kids need to develop a strong number sense. Make math a part of your daily life together: cooking, building, measuring, counting, estimating, banking, graphing, calculating, sorting, scoring, and shopping.

Introduce the language of math to little ones. No need to keep negative numbers a secret until sixth grade. Hey, it’s minus ten degrees in Boston!

Play with polygons and trapezoids and tessellations.

Read your kids and grandkids fun math-related picture books:

Sir Cumference and the Dragon of Pi by Cindy Neuschwander

Sir Cumference and the Dragon of Pi (A Math Adventure) T

The Grapes of Math by Greg Tang

Circle, Square, Moose by Kelly Bingham.

Count the Monkeys by Mack Barnett

Counting on Katherine: How Katherine Johnson Saved Apollo 13 by Helaine Becker

My favorite, for older readers–The Number Devil by Hans Magnus Enzensburger

In my middle-grade novel, One Is Not A Lonely Number, Talia, the 13-year-old narrator, is a math whiz who sees numbers in color with distinct personalities. While the story is about friendship, family, and faith, math plays an important role. I wanted to offer young readers a good story while presenting a girl’s love of numbers in a unique way. Kids write to me saying they enjoyed this aspect of the book.

. One Is Not A Lonely Number

How do you feel about math? What color is your favorite number?

The Geometry of Grief

I turn on the local Saturday evening news after 24 hours of being unplugged. Lead story is: “Cambridge woman killed Friday afternoon while biking in Boston.” A beloved, longtime Brookline librarian. Her photo flashes across the screen.

That’s my old friend! That’s Paula. No, it can’t be.

I stand there trying to absorb the story. Police. Accident scene. Hit by a cement truck. Friends giving tribute. Boston cyclists mourning, calling for safer intersections…

Now I’m crying.

Paula_Sharaga_Librarian — Pubic Library of Brookline

I met Paula Sharaga when my kids were young. She was the new children’s librarian our local library. I liked her quirkiness and warmth. Paula and I were both early childhood educators, active in the Jewish community, and, of course, book lovers. We had lots to talk about. Sharing our family Rosh Hashana dinner with Paula just after the tragedy of September 11 is a special memory.

Later, Paula moved to Cambridge and took a job at the Brookline Public Library. This meant we didn’t see each other much. Our friendship, like many others, shifted to email and Facebook. And then, gradually, our contact lessened.

Strangely, just a few weeks ago, I thought of Paula for some reason. I realized it had been a long time since we chatted. I made a mental note to reach out.

I never did.

Now Paula’s Facebook page is filled with expressions of sympathy, sadness, and memories. I’m awed by the outpouring of love.

Scrolling through her page, I’m quickly updated with all she had been involved with the past years. Environmental activism. Politics, protests. Nature hikes. Cycling.

Paula_Sharaga_activist

I see that she married her long-time boyfriend. I read his words of shock and disbelief. Paula’s husband is now in the After.

I know that place well.

You are thrust into that place with a simple phone call.

Now I pray that Paula’s husband is surrounded by love in the After. That the intense grief from losing his wife and her abrupt, tragic ending will not shadow the eventual light.

I hope no one will say to him: “It was G-d’s will,” or “She’s in a better place,” or “Let me know if I can do anything.” (Just do something!) I hope no one will count the months or years of his grieving and tell him “it’s time to move on”.

No one ever knows the right thing to say to someone in mourning. The Jewish custom provides a simple script: “May you be comforted among the mourners of Zion. May her memory be a blessing.”

I leave you, dear readers, with my newest essay published by Women on Writing, which seems fitting at this moment—The Geometry of Grief.

Listening to Silence

A poem about silence by Evelyn Krieger

“In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.”

~ Martin Luther King Jr.

Silence hurts. Silence comforts. Silence teaches. Silence breathes.

City dwellers, parents of young children crave silence like a drug.

The loud silence of a newly empty nest screams through the hallway.

Silent night, holy night.

Middle of the night silence wraps too tight around your wakeful soul.

The painful sound of a lover’s long ambiguous silence never quiets.

Silence stretches between two longing hearts, connecting them no matter how far.

Sit in the silent space a loved one once occupied. Let it envelope you.

Silence sometimes speaks louder than words.

Silence stands in when there simply are no words.

Silence feels heavy when it carries the weight of unspoken words.

Silence whispers, I need you.

Silence is golden when you hold a special secret.

The silent treatment feels powerful yet treats no one.

Silence vibrates at a frequency only our bodies perceive.

Debussy said, “Music is the silence between the notes.”

Creation emerges from silence. ~

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“Where you used to be, there is a hole in the world, which I find myself constantly walking around in the daytime, and falling in at night. I miss you like hell.”

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Happy Pi Day!

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“In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.”

~ Martin Luther King Jr.

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