Category: Writing

  • Update on the book

    I am in the homestretch trying to finish the book. I have printed out the entire manuscript, and I’m going through it carefully making edits and corrections and additions. This requires very close attention to detail because I am the author of what will be a ‘self-published book,’ and I need to provide the printer…

  • Work Update

    The website and blog have gotten to the point where they are nearly done, for now. Ben and I are getting together tomorrow to make final adjustments. Then he is going to turn the website over to me and I am going to focus on some blog postings and perhaps receiving communications from interested readers.…

  • Excerpt from Chapter 1 of the Memoir

    But by May (1984) I wrote, “Libreville has now become an expensive, anxiety-producing, alien place.” So, tired of the noisy city where I had no real work to do, I returned to the interior, got off the train, and caught a taxi from the Eurotrag train station into the boisterous riverine town of Ndjolé (a…

  • Website Correspondence

    Thanks, Fred. That additional feedback helps. “professional and attractive” is what I want!! I’m paying Ben to design the website and show me how to maintain it after he is done. We are working together well now after a sluggish start. Normally he designs websites for small, profit-making businesses, so I am a different kettle…

  • Hectic but Exciting

    Times are hectic but exciting right now. Ben and I are working to finish the website that will be used to “get the word out” about the book, my memoir, me, my research in Africa. I like the way the website is coming along–black background, Times New Roman font, lots of photos, lots of blog…

  • Poster board on my wall with 60 photos

    Poster board on my wall with 60 photos

    After several years working on this memoir, I had the revelation that I needed to make much better use of my 300-some photos from Gabon. Usually they reside buried away in dark, closed photo albums sitting on dusty bookshelves. Well, I followed the insight obtained from watching one too many CSI detective shows where the first step…

  • Two Shots of Adrenalin

    After 2.5+ rather solitary years working on this memoir, I have received two needed shots of adrenalin: 1. meeting up with Ben, who is developing a website for me, one that I will use to advertise me, my research, and my memoir and help to sell the book; 2. using Ben’s reference to make contact…

  • Writing is only partly a conscious activity

    I have not even looked at the memoir in two or three days. Sometimes it is good to just leave it alone and let the thoughts and energies percolate silently within my unconscious. I find that night time when I am going to bed is a good time to ponder the writing I have done…

  • My Memoir has “Stabilized“

    My Memoir has “Stabilized“

    My memoir has 10 chapters that, over 2 1/2 years, have “stabilized“ and remained more or less the same, the titles and general subject matter. I have revised each of these chapters countless times, 10, 20, 30 times, each revision allowing me to perceive the entire chapter in a new and hopefully more sophisticated, insightful…