Are You Reading To Become a Better Writer? by Jude Hopkins, 2/3/23
Photo by Victoria Rodriguez from Pexels One of the most compelling articles I read last year was titled “on the inability to create...
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J Hopkins
Perfect Style: Whether She's Icing a Cupcake or Writing a Sentencing Plea, by Jude Hopkins, 9/11/22
Let’s face it: Martha Stewart makes perfect cupcakes. But that’s not the only thing she’s good at. Until it lost its news value, Martha...
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Is Your Writing As Nuanced as the Colors of a Pigeon’s Feathers? By Jude Hopkins, August 29, 2022
In my last blog, I mentioned “too much” girls, ones who were too loud, too this, too that. And I saluted them for their passion, their...
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My Book, My Cover, My Gosh—It’s Real!, August 12, 2022, by Jude Hopkins
When you’re a writer, the most wonderful feeling is getting your manuscript accepted by a publisher and seeing it take shape as a...
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What are Patterns For? July 16, 2022, by Jude Hopkins
In the children’s story “The Runaway Flying Horse,” a carousel horse tires of the restrictive Merry-Go-Round, longing for the freedom...
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Say "Yes Yes Yes" to the Creative Person Within You, June 30, 2022, by Jude Hopkins
What I love about Kaylin Haught’s poem above, “God says yes to me,” is the message of assurance it gives to girls who question...
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Music for Aches and Angst: Healing YouTube Instrumentals for Women, June 29, 2022, by Jude Hopkins
—Ethereal drone music to make you believe you’re wandering around an exoplanet that, unlike the one you’re on, requires no dusting,...
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“A Ghost of a Chance,” June 2, 2022, by Jude Hopkins
Have you ever been ghosted? I don’t mean have you ever come face to face with a vanishing figure in an abandoned Victorian mansion after...
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The Heart of the Matter, May 23, 2022, by Jude Hopkins
When I read about young people today beset by mental illness in these challenging times, I am so very concerned for them. Certainly,...
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What I’ve Learned from My Modern Love Rejections, May 10, 2022, by Jude Hopkins
A tongue-in-cheek rationalization for my Modern Love rejections, leading me to believe I'm neither modern nor loved!...
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Let Us Now Praise Ex-Boyfriends, May 4, 2022, by Jude Hopkins
I’m here to praise ex-boyfriends. To continue the ironic analogy to the title of James Agee’s book about Depression-era tenant farmers,...
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The Day I Met Paul McCartney (spaghetti is involved), April 23, 2022, by Jude Hopkins
“Paul McCartney is downstairs and will do a quick meet-and-greet with photos, if you hurry.” That’s what I heard one day when I worked...
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Pipe Dream, April 20, 2022, by Jude Hopkins
Here's a remembrance from a time I spent a "big birthday" at a Beverly Hills spa, a day in which I was mostly broke and brokenhearted. I...
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What's Your Writing Style?, April 13, 2022, by Jude Hopkins
What defines your writing style? I rarely revert to Wikipedia for the best definitions, but I do like the simplicity of this: “Beyond the...
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“I Will Always Love You" - Maybe Not, April 10, 2022, by Jude Hopkins
If you’ve ever sent out query letters to agents, you know the pain you feel when you get rejection letters back. It’s similar to the pain...
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Persistence — April 6, 2022, by Jude Hopkins
Persistence. Quite a word. The website etymonline.com tells us that the word originated in the 1540s from the French and Latin, meaning...
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Reading My Poems for National Poetry Month, April 1, 2022, by Jude Hopkins
The wonderful editors at Gyroscope Review gave their published poets a chance to read three poems that had been published anywhere, not...
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Is There a Leopard in Your Life? — March 31, 2022, by Jude Hopkins
What happens if you don’t follow your dreams? Researchers from Cornell University and the New School for Social Research found that...
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Don’t Abandon Your Dream, Part III – March 24, 2022, by Jude Hopkins
Months passed. I published a personal essay in The Los Angeles Times, as well as poems in various journals and was a runner-up in a...
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Don’t Abandon Your Dream, Part II– March 23, 2022, by Jude Hopkins
In another year or so, I exhumed my book proposal and thought it good enough to send to another New York agent. It worked — again....
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Don’t Abandon Your Dream, Part I – March 22, 2022, by Jude Hopkins
One day, long ago, I sat on the floor in my apartment in Tempe, Arizona, surrounded by notes, outlines, and a copy of a well-known novel...
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