James D. Best

  With the exception of the Monitor vs. Merrimack (CSS Virginia), naval battles get short shrift in Civil War books. McPherson certainly fil...

Writers can be a competitive bunch and can say nasty things about others in their profession. A good barb needs to be pithy and clever. Her...

Elmore Leonard wrote great opening lines ... first sentences that immediately drew the reader into the story. Elmore Leonard The St...

Bender General Store and Inn In the early 1870s, the Bloody Benders were a family of serial killers on the Kansas prairie. The four m...

I don’t believe there are only seven basic stories types, or that all stories are about “a man goes on a journey or a stranger comes to tow...

The spine is the most undervalued aspect of book design. This is especially true today, when so many indie-books only publish elect...

I don’t believe in muses. Writing is not a matter of inspiration. It's more of a compulsion. Think about all of the famous authors tha...

We're about to drive to Garnerville, Nevada with friends. We'll stay with other friends who happen to be relatives. It looks lik...

Patrick deWitt One of the great things about submitting a book for editing is the sense of freedom to do something other than write. I...

Are books becoming obsolete? Is a library the only place we’ll be able to see these odd antiquities? Will librarians admonish us “don...

What famous author's real name was Howard Allen O'Brien? Unless you already know, you'll never guess.  11 Points (Because Top...

I’m making pre-editing revisions to my latest book . I want to share my goals for a final pass-through for any of my books. After I have t...

SAGE in Northridge, CA is doing a dramatic reading of Tempest at Dawn . The SAGE Society is a learning-in-retirement organizat...

If your name was Louis L'Amour and you wrote about men tougher than nails, would you adopt a penname? Frederick Faust used Max Bran...

Frederick Faust was one of the most prolific writers of all time, publishing nearly thirty million words in his lifetime. Faust had more...

Portrait of Grey at Monument Valley Zane Grey was an athlete, avid fisherman, and a lifelong philander. Grey was introverted and rem...

Zane Grey The three greatest icons of the Western novel are Zane Grey, Max Brand, and Louis L'Amour. Sure, other authors have writ...

Today is a fresh start.A whole new year. Three hundred and sixty five days to write and enjoy life. Maybe I have that backward. My New Ye...

Huffington Post Books published an article titled " Bad Reviews Of Great Authors. "   When you get a bad review of your work, i...

The Virginian: A Horseman of the Plains  by Owen Wister was one of the first mass-market bestsellers. The 1902 novel received immediate cr...