My Works SHOWING & TELLING
"Show—don't tell." How many times have you heard this standard bit of writing advice? It's so common in writing courses and critiques that it has become a cliché. Writers are often told to write scenes, dramatize, cut exposition, cut summary—but it's misguided advice. The truth is good writing almost always requires both showing and telling. The trick is finding the right balance of scene and summary—the two basic components of creative prose. Showing and Telling shows you how to employ each of these essential techniques in the appropriate places within a narrative. You'll learn how to: write scenes and cut exposition compress time and summarize background information create graceful transitions effectively inject interpretation and more Between Revolutions: an American Romance with Russia
"...a compelling memoir that reads like a novel."-- Booklist “...vivid... precisely detailed and convincing... as involving and moving as a novel” -- Kelly Cherry Michener Award-winning Laurie Alberts provides a unique glimpse into the lives of ordinary Russians during the last years of the Soviet empire, while portraying the difficulties of American/Soviet relations on the most personal of levels--the ways in which Cold War politics warp human connections. Fault Line
“This beautifully written …memoir rips open the wounds of first love in search of what one person can be held accountable for in the ruin of another.” --Chip Brown, author, Good Morning Midnight ”An utterly compelling elegy, a courageous... confession, and ...affecting inquiry into responsibility, influence, and fate.” --Speakeasy The Price of Land in Shelby
“Narrated in turn by each of these skillfully drawn characters, “The Price of Land in Shelby” offers a portrait of rural New England stripped of any trace of sentimentality.” –The New York Times. “...a deeply observed, profoundly moving tale of the five Chartrain siblings of Shelby, Vt. and their cousin Jamie as the six grow from the insecurities of adolescence to the insecurities of middle age...” --Chris Bohjalian, Burlington Free Press Lost Daughters
"...examines the complexities and pain of mother-daughter relationships. Fortyish Allie Heller became pregnant as a teenager and gave her daughter up for adoption; when the child reaches 21, Allie can try to reestablish contact. Travel writer Allie composes a personal and family history to help her daughter understand her background. Sections of this narrative are interwoven with the story of daughter Lila, a college student raised in a peripatetic military adoptive family, a young woman who seeks an abortion when she becomes pregnant; Lila then heads west to try to locate her birth mother. "Coherency comes from narrative," Allie hopes, but she cautions her daughter that they're descended from a long line of "mothers who lie." The shocking nature of those lies and their consequences lend power to this affecting novel.-- Booklist Goodnight Silky Sullivan
"...deadeye characterization and lucid prose...Alberts' subtle imagination and voice make for a poignant, resonant collection." -- Publishers Weekly, starred review "Laurie Alberts is a writer who can take you to near and far places and make those various places (and the people in them) shine and pulse with real life. With a wonderful combination of high energy and honest modesty, Alberts writes in clear strong sentences that do not come between the reader and her thoroughly imagined, credible world of fiction. Goodnight Silky Sullivan is a collection to celebrate, a book to cherish."-- George Garrett Tempting Fate
"Beautifully written, richly characterized...Laurie Alberts has given new meaning and resonance to a classic American subject...self-discovery in the wilderness."-- Cleveland Plain Dealer |
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