Category: GKP Writing News

Writing Drabbles

Post author By Karen GoatKeeper
Post date March 27, 2026

Most of my short written pieces are my posts for on the website and run 300 to 400 words. When I wrote “For Love of goats”, I wrote shorter pieces around 150 to 200 words. Now I am trying my hand at writing drabbles, one of them anyway.

cover of "For Love of Goats" by Karen GoatKeeper — Although I wrote the various letter stories in “For Love of Goats” primarily for alliteration, many of them are short stories in fifty words or so.

Writers Digest

No writer knows everything about writing, even if some of them think they do. And there are new ideas and reminders about writing. Where do you find them?

One place is by reading a wide range of books. My reading list runs from picture book concept books through juvenile, some young adult into adult. It includes fiction and nonfiction.

As I read, I decide what I like and what I don’t about the book. The things I don’t like are things to avoid in my own writing. Things I like might change how I write.

The other place to find out new things is in magazines. Writers Digest is one of them. It mentions new authors, writing advice, agents and more. One of the other things is a writing contest.

Writing Drabbles

First there is the question of what a drabble is. It is a story in 100 words, not counting the title.

When a word count is so limited, every word counts. It is a story, so something does happen and has a result.

The Contest

There is a picture. Writers are to write a first line or a story based on the picture. The latest one is to write a drabble.

Usually I look at this and turn the page. The pictures are of things I have no or little clue about. And there is the doubt I can do this to begin with.

Inspiration

I just finished a book called “Cowgirls”. And I have always loved horses. There was that picture of a girl up on a horse.

I do have a drabble draft. Actually it is the second or third one. No title yet. Is it a real drabble? I’m not sure.

Will I submit it? I’m not sure about that either.

Writing it is challenging and fun. That is a reward in itself.

Tags word count writing, writing from prompts, writing short fiction

GKP Writing News

Making Setting Real

Post author By Karen GoatKeeper
Post date March 20, 2026

When I watch a movie, the scenery goes by like speeding by city blocks in a car. It isn’t real. Instead, it’s just scenery. Part of the challenge in writing is making setting real, not just scenery.

What aspects of this road might fit into a novel’s setting? The trees are bare indicating winter or very early spring. Gravel covers the road making walking difficult except in the clear spaces left by passing vehicles. If the weather is cold or a cold wind is blowing, would this road be pleasant to walk along?

What About Setting?

Think about a walk through your home. If you only saw this in a video, it would only be scenery. Well, maybe a bit more because it is a place you are familiar with.

Now walk through you home. This is more than visual. There are sounds. Aromas drift by. Your attention might focus on a favorite item opening up memories. Your home is a real place.

Which experience would give you as a reader greater involvement in the story? Which one would make the story seem more real?

Making Setting Real

In writing a rough draft of a novel, setting usually is just scenery except for times when the plot depends on it. This is fine. The main foci for a rough draft are usually characters and plot.

Then comes the rewrite. This is where setting comes into its own. Perhaps your main character is making bread. The dough has a smell, a feel, a look both as it is mixed and as it is kneaded. Later comes the aroma of baking bread. This changes as the bread gets closer to done.

Perhaps you main character is going someplace. If it is a city street, there are city sounds of people, vehicles, activities, smells. If it is a walk in the country, there is the feel of the dirt, smells, sounds of wind and animals, weather.

Adding some descriptions about these or other aspects of your setting brings the reader into the story.

How Much?

Just as too much backstory can put the brakes on your story, too much description can do the same. The idea is to add just enough to enhance the story.

Going back to a road. Does the road meander down a valley? Perhaps it is a straight highway through a desert. Is heat shimmering above it? Just a mention of this influences your driver. Are they paying attention or looking out the window and getting into trouble?

Getting It Right

This is where actually being in a place really matters. How can you add the sensory details if you’ve never been there? You can’t. How can you know what details really catch attention if you’ve never been there.

Even if all you do is take a walk through a similar place, it let’s you get it right. The reader can tell.

Tags novel writing, writing novels

GKP Writing News

March Reading

Post author By Karen GoatKeeper
Post date March 6, 2026

Spring arrives in March along with gardening. That makes finding time for March reading challenging.

This month I am moving a bit out of my normal genres with a thriller “The Devil’s Punchbowl” by Greg Iles. It isn’t that I dislike reading thrillers, I do. The problem is when I read these books. Just before bedtime.

cover for "Capri Capers" by Karen GoatKeeper — This is a book for bedtime reading. It’s light reading and full or humor.

Setting Up March Reading Times

In truth, this is good for setting up reading times for all year. It has to do with the types of books that fit different times of day.

I read a lot of nonfiction. These are serious books on a variety of subjects, but they require paying attention. Bedtime, when I am half asleep, is not a good time to read these.

Tucking time into the daytime hours is best for reading these books. I tend to read them over meals. At the moment I am working on “American Psychosis” which is political, a genre I rarely read, but it was recommended to me by a friend.

Late Night Book Considerations

After a busy day, a good book can help relax me. I don’t want a book I have to think a lot about. That is when something light like a cozy mystery works well.

Cozy mysteries do follow a format and get boring after several in a row. And I needed another fiction book set in the South for the library book review. Hence I picked up the thriller. Thrillers have the same problem as cozy mysteries: they have a set format and, even though they are different, seem much alike. They are usually more intense and not as good for a relaxing read.

Finding Interesting Books

The real key to finding March reading times, any reading times is reading interesting books. Reviews are not always a good way to find a book you will enjoy simply because what interests you may not interest the reviewer.

I do read reviews and take note of books that sound good. However, I go on to read the synopsis of the book. Then I make a decision on whether or not to add the book to my reading list.

Tags choosing novels to read, reading novels

GKP Writing News

Exploring New Perspectives

Post author By Karen GoatKeeper
Post date February 27, 2026

When I first began The Carduan Chronicles, there was only one ship that dropped out of a worm tunnel into a February ice storm forcing them to land in an Ozarks ravine. As the nine Carduans began to explore their new world, I began exploring new perspectives.

That fallen log looks like a wall. It is only six inches high and easy to step over. Easy unless you are only four inches tall. Walking up a ravine takes an entirely different look when you are that small.

Ozark Ravines

My Ozark home has several ravines near it. I have walked up all of them at one time or another, some of them several times. Broad or narrow, the ravines have several things in common.

One thing is water. Although the ravine may be dry much of the time, it was formed by running water racing down between two hills. Some have water in them much of the time, usually as pools here and there.

Another thing are the trees. People often think of woods or forests as static populations of trees. They aren’t. Those trees are enemies in their quest for light, water and space in which to grow.

The weakest trees don’t survive. In a few years the dead trunks fall to the ground. Bigger trees are victims of storms.

Exploring New Perspectives

The Carduans are four inches tall. Fallen trees I can step over, are taller than they are. How can they deal with these?

Ice storms are not too uncommon in the Ozarks. The Carduans come from a planet where water never freezes. They have never seen ice or snow.

Arkosa, their home planet, is hot, dry and bathed with UV light. The plants are blue or red as a protection from the UV light. Their crops are mostly grasses – think wheat, oats or rice – and root tubers – think potatoes, carrots or turnips.

These people have never seen trees or birds or the many other creatures familiar to those who walk in the Ozarks. Blue jays are taller than they are.

As the Carduans go exploring their new world, I am exploring new perspectives in mine.

Tags creating characters, novel writing

GKP Writing News

Making Characters Real

Post author By Karen GoatKeeper
Post date February 21, 2026

Perhaps you have picked up a book like this, I certainly have. The main character is someone or something you just can’t relate to. Making characters real is not that easy.

Another problem is found in those books where all the characters seem to be clones. They think alike. They act alike. All of the characters might as well be talking to themselves.

Creating Characters

There are lots of ways for an author to create a character. One way is to have a list of characteristics. Another I came across has a series of questions to answer about the character.

Anyone who does some research on writing will find other methods of creating characters. These methods do work for some authors. Perhaps they would for you. These methods don’t work for me.

My Characters

I create the bare bones of a character in my head. As I have a vague notion of the plot, the character is based on how he or she will interact with the plot. Usually I come up with a name and a basic description.

At that point, I start writing my rough draft. As I write the novel, it starts making characters real to me. They get to the point they seem like someone I could go to the store and meet.

The drawback to creating characters this way, is that I do have to go back and rewrite the beginning of the draft. That way the characters consistent throughout.

Different Characters

Making characters real is easier for me if I base them on people I have known, even slightly. This matters because it gives each character a unique voice and behavior in the novel.

Even when writing a memoir, an author is creating, rather recreating their character from a previous time in their lives. People grow up and change with time so a younger version of you is not the modern one and is, therefore, a character in your memoir.

No matter how an author creates their characters, making characters real is important so readers can enjoy your books more.

Tags novel illustration, novel writing, world building

GKP Writing News

Very Unusual Book

Post author By Karen GoatKeeper
Post date February 13, 2026

The St. Louis Post dispatch Sunday has a page of book reviews. I took a page to my library and asked about one of them not realizing it was a very unusual book.

“Bunns Rabbit” by Alan Barillaro sounded like a typical middle grade quest book. Cute, relaxing, easy reading, reminiscent of “Watership Down”. The library bought a copy and I checked it out.

Cottontail rabbits tend to have shorter ears as this cottontail shows. Yet, the domestic breeds developed from European rabbits have ears of many lengths. This is an important aspect in “Bunns Rabbit”.

Big Surprise

When I opened the book, I thought it was the beginning of a graphic novel. Each page was one picture with comments in bubbles.

It is not a graphic novel.

Bunns Rabbit rescues and makes friends with a hummingbird which breaks a taboo of her rabbit warren.

The first chapter looked like the beginning of a picture book. These pages were big pictures with text.

It is not a picture book for middle graders.

As the first hundred pages flew by, I found this very unusual book blended graphic novel with picture book with illustrated book. The illustrations remind me of a softer version of those from Peter Rabbit.

Bunns Rabbit is searching for the Fox Spirit. In the book the fox is a red fox, but only gray ones live around me.

No Surprise

The short review I originally read was right. It is a middle grade fantasy quest book Bunns Rabbit is a young rabbit born into a warren of very conservative rabbits. She has short ears when the norm is longer ears.

The warren elders plan to banish Bunns and her family. Her only hope is to seek the Spirit Fox to get a wish so she can rescue her family. Along the way she meets many other animals who also have problems needing solutions.

The Spirit Fox can bring fire to the land and is greatly feared by the rabbits in the warren.

Worth Reading

Many adults seem to feel reading books for younger ages beneath them. They are missing out on some lovely books. “Bunns Rabbit” is one of them.

The story is simple, cute and aimed for middle grade readers. That doesn’t make the questions it raises any the less valid or the solutions less important to consider.

Besides, this very unusual book has such wonderful illustrations.

Tags illustrated book, picture book, writing novels

GKP Writing News

Cowgirls

Post author By Karen GoatKeeper
Post date February 6, 2026

Forget cartoons. I grew up watching westerns: The Lone Ranger; Broken Arrow; Wyatt Earp; Bat Masterson; Sky King; Roy Rogers; Gene Autry and more. One thing was missing in most of these: Cowgirls.

Westerns love to have cowboy heroes. Big, strong, brave cowboys protect the timid frontier women. They spend their time loading guns, hiding, watching the cowboys fight for them.

Are There Cowgirls?

According to “Cowgirls: Women of the American West” by Teresa Jordan, one of five pioneers was a woman homesteader. These were not wives, they were independent women who staked a homestead and proved it out. Some built up ranches. Other women became widows and decided to stay on the ranch to run it.

These women worked digging post poles and stringing fence, working cattle or horses or sheep, breaking horses, riding in rodeos, all the things cowboys did. Some of the heavier work was beyond them physically, but most of it wasn’t. It needed doing, so they did it.

What About Children?

Forget the pampered children of today. Frontier children worked as part of the family. Ranching was hard work, not that lucrative, so everyone had to help or all would fail.

“No Life for a Lady” by Agnes Morley Cleaveland tells of growing up in New Mexico territory. As soon as children were able to sit on a horse (six or seven years old), they were helping keep track of the cattle, riding tens of miles for the mail and other things.

More modern cowgirls often take their children out with them. Now babies can stay in a truck. Once they sat on the saddle behind a parent or in an insulated box on the wagon seat. As toddlers, they are on their own horses.

Today’s Cowgirls

There are still cowboys and cowgirls. Some things have changed as tractors, trucks and other vehicles have replaced many of the horses. But fencing still needs fixing. Cattle still need to be rounded up.

Find copies or this book and other books to find out more about cowgirls, women who deserve better than a footnote.

cover of "Old Promises" Hazel Whitmore #2 by Karen GoatKeeper — When Hazel and her mother arrive in Missouri, their new house has not been lived in or cleaned in a decade. As women all over, they did what needed doing: they cleaned up the cobwebs, dust and mouse nests.

Tags homesteading, reading, rodeo

GKP Writing News

Creating Carduans

Post author By Karen GoatKeeper
Post date January 30, 2026

When the idea for the Carduan Chronicles first occurred to me, all I knew was that a space ship would appear during an ice storm, land in an Ozark ravine and leave the occupants trying to survive. The next task was creating Carduans.

Carduan Ship 19 appeared during an ice storm which forced it to land. On the way down, it had to maneuver between trees in the ravine.

How Big?

There were several considerations. I went hiking through a number of Ozark ravines trying to spot places a space ship could land. A flat area was not a problem as bluff rocks stick out in many places. However, they are small.

Ravines have trees growing in them. The ship had to be small enough to avoid them.

The final size of the space ship was thirty inches long, eighteen inches wide and high. These Carduans had to fit inside. Four inches tall worked.

Creating Carduans depended on them being small. They must blend in to avoid unwanted attention.

Physical Appearance

I now had a height for creating Carduans. They had heads, arms, legs, feet and hands. Obviously, these were small and fingers would be very slender. There would be three fingers so the Carduans would count in threes and sixes.

Of course, the Carduans could just be tiny people with a few minor changes. That didn’t suit me. How would they be different?

Many creatures on Earth have blue blood. It is not based on iron which is what makes our blood red. If the Carduans had blue blood, they would be blue.

An interesting article about chickens showed up. It seems chickens have retina cells sensitive to five different color wavelengths. Insects often see in ultraviolet.

Setting Up Arkosa

The Carduans come from the planet Arkosa. I picture this planet as dry, hot, bathed in ultraviolet light. Plants would have fall colors as the pigments for these colors can deal with ultraviolet light for photosynthesis.

Seeing ultraviolet would be an advantage. Having a third eyelid to counter intense glare or shield from dust would be another advantage.

My Carduans

So, in creating Carduans, I had to consider the setting and the origins of these creatures. This was for Ship Nineteen. But, the same creatures are also on Ship Eighteen.

Tags Carduan Chronicles, novel writing, writing novels

GKP Writing News

Tongue Twisters

Post author By Karen GoatKeeper
Post date January 22, 2026

How many times have you called an office or been called and found the receptionist barely understandable? It’s frustrating. I wish I could tell them to get a book of tongue twisters.

Aren’t tongue twisters a children’s game? Children think so. Who can say one the fastest? Who can think of one?

Try saying this tongue twister three times fast. It is a good way to begin with these verbal challenges.

What Is a Tongue Twister?

The key to a tongue twister is alliteration, the repeat of the same sound in a series of words. Such alliteration can be used in various ways in literature as well as tongue twisters.

“The Bells” and “The Raven” by Edgar Allan Poe both use alliteration. In the first one, the sounds bring out the sounds of the bells. In the second, it forms internal rhymes tying the poem together.

For children, there are some old ones: Peter Piper picked a peck of pickles; She sells sea shells by the seashore; Rubber Baby Buggy Bumpers. Can you say these three times quickly and not trip over your tongue and be understandable?

All the words in this tongue twister may begin with the letter D, but the vowel after them makes you say them differently.

What Value Do They Have?

The big value is teaching pronunciation. When learning a new one, each word must be said slowly, enunciated carefully. Once the words are mastered, speed is introduced.

No matter how fast a child says these, they must be understandable. This is the value of them. And the reason I wish some receptionists I deal with would get a book of them.

As you say this tongue twister, feel how your mouth must change shape to form these words. To say it fast three times, your mouth must move fast too.

Another value is confidence. A child who gets good at tongue twisters has something to be proud of and build confidence at mastering difficult things.

And these word games are fun.

Writing Tongue Twisters

I have loved alliteration all my life. It gives shape to the sounds of words and language. Another aspect and game would be finding homonyms.

A castrated male goat is a wether. The conditions outside is weather. Making a choice involves whether.

The three became a little story about goats. This led to more. My result was “For Love of Goats”. What will your result be?

Tags fun with words, teaching pronunciation, word challenges

GKP Writing News

Creating Characters

Post author By Karen GoatKeeper
Post date January 16, 2026

Some novels begin with a plot. Others begin with a character. But all novels require creating characters.

Where do these fictional characters come from? How does a writer find these characters?

cover for "Broken Promises" by Karen GoatKeeper — This is the only novel I have written that uses a person I once knew. He is in the book the way he was when I knew him. He is now deceased.

Asking For Trouble

Even some famous authors like Hemmingway got into trouble by using their friends, acquaintances and enemies as characters in their novels. If they were lucky, they just had to find new friends. Unlucky writers ended up being sued.

Having written this, I do base my characters on people I know, have read about or seen. But, I don’t use the people exactly. Instead I look at some trait or traits these people have and build a character around them, one that is not the original person.

Creating Characters Exercise

Next time you are out and about, look at the people around you. These people are strangers. You know nothing about them, really.

Pick out one. What do you think this person is like? Do they work? Invent a personality for this person. How would this person fit into a story or novel?

cover for "Dora's Story" by Karen GoatKeeper — Names were a big challenge in “Dora’s Story” as there were goat shows and every exhibitor and goat needed a name.

What’s In a Name?

I hate finding names for my characters most of the time. Now and then a character just has a name, but this isn’t usually the case.

Usually, the name search takes time and persistence. There are online lists. Books, telephone books, old school annuals are all places to look.

Several factors need consideration. One is the time frame of the novel. Names change in popularity or even existence over the years. Nova is not a possibility for an eighteenth century novel.

Plus, the name needs to be one the writer is comfortable with. I tend to like two and three syllable names. There’s no real reason, but I am happier with characters with names of these lengths.

Names Can Change

No matter how detailed a writer is creating characters, things including names can change as the plot evolves. New traits will emerge in the characters. They will become like people you know well.

A great compliment was paid me talking with a woman about Life’s Rules. I was describing Stephanie, my main character. The woman thought she was a real person, someone she wanted to meet.

Creating characters is important for a writer and compliments like this one make the effort worth while.

Tags novel writing, writing novels