All art forms are powerful – visual, tactile, auditory, verbal. Art decorates, entertains, sets moods, and inspires deep feelings. And if you learn how a particular work came to be, you’ll discover new levels of resonance. Artists have been moved by beauty, elevated by love, torqued by madness, and changed by life events. Is it any surprise that one of these powerful motivations is revenge for real or perceived injuries or insults? Drop the words “art” and “revenge” into th

Many artists feel mysterious power, readiness, or connection with the tools of their craft in hand. For me, it’s about touching the tip of a ballpoint pen to a sheet of unlined blank paper. I bring intention, and ideas take shape in words as pen glides on paper, opening a creative channel. The Pen Is Mightier Than the Keyboard? One reason why writing by hand works for me is that my pen-to-paper connection feels more organic than poising my hands over a keyboard and raising my

I’m a sucker for those moments when people ask me, “Why?” I like it even better when they say, “Tell me all about it.” However: They pretty much always want the 411, the takeaway, the bulleted executive summary – while I think I’ve just been invited to lead story time at the library. Not sure which is worse, their disruptive cut-to-the-chase questions after my first few sentences or their eyes glazing over when they realize I’m just getting started. Photo by Daniel Forsman

Say it: “Snake oil.” Can’t you just feel the hissing, coiled power of venomous contempt? “Snake oil.” That two-word phrase packs more punch than “it’s a scam,” “fake news,” and “total B.S.” combined. Everyone knows that snake oil is just a placebo masquerading as a legitimate cure, peddled by a charlatan who cares more about your money than your health… …But actually? Placebo and charlatan more accurately describe something once called “patent medicine.” The real snake oi

If you live in the U.S. or are familiar with American culture, you know that we became a super materialistic society in the mid-20th century. For this we can thank the post-WWII trends of rising income (for some), industrial expansion, and increasingly sophisticated marketing. We’re obsessed with things we want, with upgrading things we have, and – inevitably – with offloading stuff we don’t care about anymore. Way too many of our castoffs end up in landfill. But those of us

Surely you've seen this phenomenon in a suburban neighborhood: • A glass-fronted box on a post • An odd assortment of books inside • Somewhere on the structure, a small plaque proclaiming "Little Free Library" There are lots of these in my neighborhood, each one a favorite place to visit when I’m out walking. How much do you know about them? I was curious, so I did some digging. Our Story Begins… The first Little Free Library was created in 2009 by Todd Bol, a residen

Ghostwriting is a difficult skill to feature in a professional portfolio. Like the “silent corrections” that we editors make when we’re...

I’ve been a science fiction reader for much of my life, and I’m fascinated by the possibilities of artificial intelligence. However, as a...

For the same reasons that it would be difficult training an AI tool to edit something as human and nuanced as written language, I can’t tell you every little rule and trick in my toolkit. The use cases are endless, intricate, and might put you to sleep. Instead, here are some of the more obvious examples of things I’m looking for and how I address them. Photo by Mark Casey on Unsplash 1) Repetitive Frameworks and Structures a) Turning a finite list into a loose “from/to” r

When you hire an editor, you’re getting a very specific stack of skills. Each of those skills can certainly be taught to the AI tool of your choice, but the human element of editing is knowing what to use, when to use it, and all those case-specific how-and-why conditions and nuances (in all their permutations) that just aren’t practical to include when training up your LLM. Even more so than with writing, the devil is in the details of editing – especially if ChatGPT wrote y

A few years ago, browsing in a used bookstore in a town where I don't live (which, by the way, is a great strategy for finding titles...

One thing that makes the human species so unique is the complexity of our communication. We like to think of language as a fixed,...

[A note of apology: Ideally this should have been a Halloween-themed post, but the spirit didn't move me until this week.] As the waning...

"No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin or his background or his religion. People must learn to hate, and...

It's not always easy to market your editing skills. As someone who's been doing this for a few years now, I see two main reasons: 1)...

Photo by Francisco Fernandes on Unsplash Welcome to The Village Wordsmith blog. I never really thought of myself as a wordsmith until my team members at the George Lucas Educational Foundation started using that term to describe my skill set. I finally embraced my wordsmith identity with that year's Halloween costume. The following comes from a services ad that I later posted when seeking new clients. I don't know about you, but whenever I hear the contemporary term "wordsmit

INTRO: OUR MAN IN KIEV In December 2009, I heard from Dmitry Duda, an entrepreneur in Ukraine who'd seen one of my ads on craigslist. He...

INTRO: MARY-MARGARET NETWORK BLOG POST # 7 To the best of my knowledge, this seventh post in my series was never published. And the ride ended here. I have absolutely no memory about what I would have said in blog # 8, "Envisioning Your Ideal Project." Photo from Flikr KNOW YOUR LIMITS Recently in this space, I revisited some humiliating lessons about interactive writing and client management from early in my career. Thinking about them made me cringe even though I'm older an

INTRO: MARY-MARGARET NETWORK BLOG POST # 6 This sixth post in my series was published 3/18/10. See the intro to post # 1 for the what and why of this whole naive memoir. Photo by Clem Onojeghuo on Unsplash INTERACTIVE WRITING: MY FINEST HOURS My previous few posts were about awkward learning experiences in the interactive and gaming industries. Now let's offset those nightmares with happy stories of what I'd call dream projects. I was hired to do something I love, worked with

INTRO: MARY-MARGARET NETWORK BLOG POST # 5 This fifth post in my series was published 12/17/09. See the intro to post # 1 for the what and why of this whole naive memoir. Photo by Ryan Johns on Unsplash LEARNING THE HARD WAY The freelance business model has a big trial and error factor. Even if you always do the same thing, doing it for a new client introduces surprising variables. So let's talk trials and errors. As a self-styled writer for interactive games, I went out to s