Writing

Sep 12, 20164 min

What I learned while teaching inmates to write

SALEM — An hour before I’m to present a three-hour writers workshop at the maximum security facility of the Oregon State Penitentiary,...

Mar 5, 20143 min

Entertaining angels

I’ve been marketing books of mine now for more than 20 years but only recently realized a big mistake I was making: Thinking it was only...

Feb 12, 20143 min

Living a Yahtzee life

They say if you want to make money in the writing business you find a niche and go to that place again and again. In other words, if the...

Feb 12, 20143 min

Mother of Rain outstanding

Mother of Rain, about hardscrabble life in the hills of Tennessee in the 1930s and ’40s, is the most intriguing read I’ve experienced in...

Jan 30, 20133 min

Why I don’t believe in writer’s block

It’s one of the most oft-asked questions I get as a writer and teacher: “What can I do about writer’s block?” “Write,” I say. (I was...

My final thoughts on Foz

When Dick Fosbury’s agent told me Monday morning (March 13, 2022) that lymphoma had claimed the 76-year-old man who’d won an Olympic gold...

Jim Bartko: 1965-2020

Editor’s note: This is the Jim Bartko obituary that appeared in The Register-Guard March 19, 2020. Jim Bartko, a former University of...

Two foul balls go gently into Dylan Thomas’ ‘good night’

Daughter-in-law Deena, here with our son, Jason, and their three boys. When a foul ball flies toward you, a spectator, there’s not much...