“The incurable itch of writing possesses many.”
–Juvenal, Satire, 1st Century A.D.
Publishing Paula anchors my team of teaching aides. She recognizes that “incurable itch” that people have been scratching since they carved images on stone.
I’ve given this cartoon character – one of the Triplet Teaching Aides” – the “Publishing Paula” nickname to call attention to the best tips for writers.
She’s here to signal the End is near for the plot, your characters…this story like “don’t give it away too soon,” she’ll say and then…”what’s next?”
PUBLISHING PAULA, your guide for the ending, will take you home and guide as you launch on Publishing’s high seas.
These classes, the weekly Writers’ Circles, sprouted from seeds sown while researching and writing my Texas Women columns and then A BOX OF AUTHOR books…’THE PRIZE’ arrives.
Just so you know a bit about me…besides that Sailing is “my thing” and writing and teaching writing I love to do…
I’ve written. I’ll spare you the early days of obituaries and car wrecks – all part of growing up as a Texas journalist – and turn to later works… this century’s, recognized by many as the top-selling author of Texas’ heroic women’s stories. I researched and wrote about dozens of women who changed Texas – its land, its culture, added traditions and family and broke through barriers real and artificial.
Largely unknown or little remembered these Texas women across the centuries and landscape of Texas needed their stories told. Or so I thought. Research and writing, 15 years in the making confirmed “my itch” to write their stories.
The travels and the tales (true ones) resulted in Texas Dames: Sassy and Savvy Women Throughout Lone Star History and Texas Ranch Women: Three Centuries of Mettle and Moxie.
They have shown up in anthologies, columns, and magazines such as: Fort Worth Texas, Persimmon Hill, American Cowboy, etc.
Books and Anthologies
FINISHED AND PENDING while “she” preens for a spot on an editor or agent’s dance card is Whispering Spirits. Needless to say, I’m excited about the historical novel, finally finished. In Whispering Spirit I’ve woven strands of old family Huguenot tales about a couple of orphans coming to Charleston with the 1817 history of the port city, the Cherokee and the youngsters’ survival. Life alone in a new country was no easier then than now.
TEXAS RANCH WOMEN: Three Centuries of Mettle and Moxie
True stories of women who settled Texas and settled in Texas, often forgotten in history’s lore; time to tell their stories that stretch from one end of this state to another. Stories of women holding off hostiles with cannon; or a loaf of bread. Whatever they had, whatever it took. From The History Press of Charleston. ISBN-10: 1626195986
Visit History Press at www.historypress.net (Arcadia Publishers), Amazon or where you do your book shopping.
Texas Dames: Sassy and Savvy Women Throughout Texas History
The “dames” in this book notched victories in Texas’ history from early Indian and French to a Fifties golf star. In between roam tales of women who succeeded in business and banking, science and medicine, politics and government, education and religion. These early stories range from the 17th C. through mid 1950. They were forging a country, a state and then civilizing it.
Visit History Press at www.historypress.net, Amazon or where you do your book shopping. ISBN 978.1.60949.812.2
Let’s Write…and Have Fun by Carmen Goldthwaite that I wrote last fall for our 15th Anniversary of Writers’ Circles.
This small e-book is chock full of writerly tips from the basic how-to of story to the wisdom of a plethora of writers about various strategies from breaking free of “writers’ block” to fine-tuning your writing, so that it sings, not stumbles across the page. Consider it a short and snappy “how to” or an easy stroll through writing review.
An E-book on how to write…better: Let’s Write…and Have Fun, $12.99
“Burgers ‘n Butterflies” is the personal essay I wrote (on the boat) during a healing time on the water while grieving the death of my mom. This essay in The Magic of Mothers and Daughters starts with the “this is it” message from the doctor, my mom’s strength, and ends with a symbolic visit. From CHICKEN SOUP OF THE SOUL, ISBN 13:978-1-935096-81-8.
“The Yellow Rose” is the piece I wrote for Fulcrum Publishing’s anthology, WILD WOMEN OF THE OLD WEST. In this article I got to explore the rumor, the legend, and the woman behind the saucy song of that name. ISBN 1-55591-295-8.
In “Dancing in the Eye of the Storm,” in The Way West, a WWA and Tor/Forge anthology, I wrote about one of my favorite North Texas women. I learned about her first from my Mom, handed down from her mother and noted in the family Bible. “Sophia,” a “tart” as my grandmother would have called her, became known as the Confederate Paul Revere.
In an essay, in this CHICKEN SOUP OF THE SOUL volume, Miracles Happen, tells of “Night Bull,” a life-saving character met on a late night emergency drive from Houston to Fort Worth. ISBN 13:978-1-61159-932-9
ALSO: WRITERS’ GUIDES, 2010 through 2014, published annually by The Writers’ Institute of Redding, Connecticut. Articles on point of view, author’s voice, dialogue, narrative (creative nonfiction), etc.
For more information on Carmen including a full author bio and links to booksellers, please see below: