This video is presented by Samantha at Frances House. Frances House offers copyediting, proofreading, and research assistance for fiction authors who want their book to be at the top of everyone’s list. Based in Canada, serving authors from all over the world, you may visit Franceshouse.co for more information and to connect with Samantha.
This page is
about Meredith Sue Willis, her teaching, projects,
and books, which include novels and short fiction for adults;
stories for children; and nonfiction on writing and the writing
process. For a full list of her books, see the column on the right.
Click here
for information about MSW's upcoming
appearances, teaching and workshops. There is also information
for writers (Resources for Writers and
A
Journal of Practical Writing) along with reviews
of all kinds of books and excellent things to watch, listen
to, and read online.
If you discover broken links or typographical errors, please contact us at msw@meredithsuewillis.com.
Review of Love Palace
Hilton Obenzinger says, "In Martha, Meredith Sue Willis has created a great hardboiled narrator. She’s been hurt and pissed off, mainly by her two “rotters,” her father and her ex-husband, and the world that’s dealt her a tough hand, and she finds relief through sex and constant instability, confiding in her therapist, when she can afford her. She’s ready for change, and stumbles into the Love Palace, a church, a social center, and an organizing HQ for its elusive charismatic spiritual leader, and by happenstance she becomes its administrator. The Love Palace is among the last low-income housing buildings in the riverside New Jersey neighborhood being overrun by gentrification, and it becomes the focal point for a fight to save what’s left. The Love Palace is a catalyst, pulling together multiple lives and stories into a pulsating community. Martha ends up cajoled to marry a much younger man, scion of the rich couple who owns the Love Palace as a project of their church – or at least we think they own it. The Love Palace community fights eviction and demolition, and knowing who owns the building is crucial – and knowing the truth about the spiritual leader as well. The novel is filled with surprises and revelations as the mysteries peel away, and Martha grows increasingly capable of handling the madness of seduction, deceit, and betrayal. Love Palace, the novel, is a delight to read, and Martha is a tough character worth meeting again and again."
Buy it from Bookshop.org or any of the usual online hardcopy suspects.
Also available as a Kindle book on Amazon, and for most e-reader formats at Smashwords.com.
Articles & More for Readers and Writers
Rediscovered: Libraries Today: West Virginia Library Commission
Interview with Meredith Sue Willis about Their House
Danny Williams' March Adventures in Editing
See Ben Shepherd's suggestions for online marketing. He sells services, but has lots of free ideas too.
More Jane Friedman--here's her page on self-publishing: https://janefriedman.com/self-publish-your-book/
Notes on using "past habitual" passages in prose narrative: this is the unspecified past of "she always used to" and "every Sunday in summer we would." In fiction and other story telling, this is a natural drafting technique which often works best in finished stories when it comes into focus/leads to a very specific example of the habitual scene. "Every Sunday after church we would gather for a cold dinner. At least, we did until the fateful Sunday just before the war when Brother stood up and announce,..."
Jane Friedman's "Hot Sheet" of new agents & presses from 2023
Have you wondered about Meredith Sue Willis's books? Read a Sample.
More for writers: Free lectures from Authors Publish
New Short Story by Meredith Sue Willis at Cold Mountain Review: "The Sweetest Man Who Ever Lived."
- Audio Recording of MSW reading "The Sweetest Man Who Ever Lived.
- A New Way to Get Ideas for What to Read: Shepherd.com
Have a listen: West Virginia Writers... ...at https://www.wvstories.com/ -- audio recordings, materials for teachers and much more! Produced and hosted by Kate Long."
Latest Issue:New Books For Readers #232. Reviews of books by Jim Minick, Clarice Lispector, The Porch Poems, George du Maurier,Louise Fitzhugh, Natalia Ginzburg, Marilynne Robinson; Kathleen Watt; Hambly,Connelly, Alison Hubbard, Imogen Keeper, James McBride, Jenny Offill. Reviews by Hilton Obenzinger, Eddy Pendarvis, Diane Simmons, Suzanne McConnell, and Christine Willis.
Latest Issue: Hamilton Stone Review #49 Fall 2023 Poetry: Robert Gibb; Tony Beyer: Erin Wilson; Lynn Gilbert; Rochelle Robinson-Dukes; Bruce McRae; Barry Seiler; John Repp; George Moore; J.R. Solonche; Mary Dean Lee; Jennifer Dotson; Stephen C. Middleton; Priscilla Atkins; Cordelia Hanemann; James Owens; Eugene Datta; Daniel Romo; V.P. Loggins; Leonore Hildebrandt; Joel Aleghetti; Rizwan Akhtar. Prose: Stephen Combs; James Hartman; Eleanor Lerman; Pegah Ouji; Li Ruan; Daniel Ruefman
Dialogue punctuation: Reedsy's six "unbreakable" rules for dialogue punctuation.
"Review for Writers" Danny Williams on MSW's Love Palace
Various types of third person in fiction
Check out my collection of articles for writers
New Essays at A Journal of Practical Writing: George Lies on Switching from 3rd to 1st Person in Fiction. Eddy Pendarvis on Free Indirect Discourse
Eva Kollisch, memoirist, teacher, and Progressive and LGBQT activist Died this week. See the obituary in the The New York Times here. Her memoir with Hamilton Stone Editions is The Ground Under My Feet
The Iran Book News Agency (IBNA) has just announced that "Juvenile fiction book Billie of Fish House Lane by American author Meredith Sue Willis has been published in Persian and is available to Iranian Children." See announcement here.
Soledad in the Desert is available directly from Montemayor Press as well as from various online bookstores like Bookshop.org (part of the profit goes to local bookstores!) and Amazon.com, as well as brick-and-mortar stores. Saving Tyler Hake available directly from Mountain State Press as well as from Amazon. Their Houses is available from the usual online suspects as well as directly from the publisher.
E-Book Editions of MSW's Books
(To buy any of these e-books, click on the image. They are also available at the Kindle Store and at the Nook Store as well as the iBook store and other e-book stores.)
In Memoriam
Taxicab Willis-Weinberger Extraoredinary Budgerigar
March 2006-March 30,2020
E-mail List and Free subscription to Books for Readers and Writers
Irene Weinberger Books.... an imprint of
Hamilton Stone Editions
Check us out!
Contact information
E-mail Meredith Sue Willis at msw@meredithsuewillis.com
Complete List of Meredith Sue Willis's Books
MSW's Bookstore: A percentage always goes to
local brick-and-mortar bookstores.
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Meredith Sue Willis Author and Teacher is licensed under aCreative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.