Rebecca M. Douglass, Author

I thought I'd start this post with a gratuitous sunrise photo, to sort of suggest a new year and new beginnings and all that. Maybe something that might let you believe I'm going to get myself sorted out and start blogging on something like a schedule again. That's my hope, atually. I am writing, though I've already distracted myself for a week with a trip south to remind myself what daylight is, followed by a week of being sick. Now I'm working hard on a short story that's kind of grown into almost a novella, so it might need to either get longer or shorter, but I'm not sure which. And I've started, in a tentative and timid way, the revision process for Seffi Wardwell #4,  Logged Off.  I need to get serious about that. As for the blog, which is where I was really heading, I'm going to continue with my Friday/Saturday posts of either photos or flash fiction, and will do my best to resume Monday book reviews, with at least some of them being middle gr...

I've been pretty absent from this blog space through the holidays, and it's hard getting back into the routine, but I'm making an effort! Next week I'll start with some more photos--my August backpacking trip in Montana/Wyoming, but today we have a bit of all-new flash fiction! Just one of my typically goofy little stories. I hope you enjoy it!   Dance Class  Urgle the Andromedan studied themself in the mirror and cringed. “You need to get in shape,” they said. It was a common refrain in all corners of the great space station, since anyone arriving there had been in space a long time. It’s hard to stay fit in space. Urgle considered the equipment in the ship’s exercise room. They’d long since tired of it all, and settled for minimum fitness. Their dominant arms and legs were strong enough to serve, but the lesser limbs were flabby, and their core—no good thinking about the core, which was too complex to understand anyway. While cleaning their ...

Welcome to 2026, and the first IWSG post of the year! What's in your plans? Purpose: To share and encourage. Writers can express doubts and concerns without fear of appearing foolish or weak. Those who have been through the fire can offer assistance and guidance. It’s a safe haven for insecure writers of all kinds (and come on, we're all insecure in some way)! Posting: The first Wednesday of every month is officially Insecure Writer’s Support Group day. Post your thoughts on your own blog. Talk about your doubts and the fears you have conquered. Discuss your struggles and triumphs. Offer a word of encouragement for others who are struggling. Visit others in the group and connect with your fellow writers - aim for a dozen new people each time - and return comments. This group is all about connecting! Be sure to link to the IWSG page and display the badge in your post. And please be sure your avatar links back to your blog! Otherwise, when you leave a commen...

My poet friend Deborah Bacharach ( check out her work ) suggested yesterday that writing something, anything, was the way to start the new year. I then bethought me of Crimson's Creative Challenge , which I know about because of another writer friend, Jemima Pett , who regularly posts drabbles inspired by the challenge. Time for me to join and get back to writing flash fiction. For the challenge, Crispina Kemp posts 4 photos each week and you can pick one (or more, presumably) as inspiration for a creative response. This week is challenge #67. Word count is supposed to be capped at 150.  My choice of image: A humpback stone bridge with a kiosk and a lot of mist.   I liked the image, and it resonated with the way my neighborhood was blanketed in thick fog on NYE when I got home from my hike (which had been out of the fog and in the sun, when not under the trees).  This was my neighborhood on New Year's Eve. Visibility half a block. Here's my story, for your amusement this ...

As you can see from the counter on the side-bar, I've hit the 80K mark on  Painted Over,  and from the outside it might look like I'm done. In fact, though I reached the end, thanks to some big changes that happened in the middle (major deviations from my plan!), I have to go back and change some things to make the ending work. I want to do some of that now, while it's fresh in my mind, so I'll be working on it the next couple of days, re-writing some parts and leaving lots of notes to myself in others.  This draft has been a bear, and I feel a  like I've been wrestling a bear! I can't lie: I'll be glad to put it aside until sometime next year. In the meantime, I have short stories that have been waiting patiently for attention, and can start after the holidays with the edits on Seffi Wardwell #4,  Logged Off  (or maybe  Logged Off at the Library,  but I'm leaning to the short and crisp for my titles just now. Feel free to offer opinions). Just on...

It's the last first Wednesday of the month for 2025 (cue "how did we get here so fast?" comments), and time for the IWSG post.  Purpose: To share and encourage. Writers can express doubts and concerns without fear of appearing foolish or weak. Those who have been through the fire can offer assistance and guidance. It’s a safe haven for insecure writers of all kinds! Posting: The first Wednesday of every month is officially Insecure Writer’s Support Group day. Post your thoughts on your own blog. Talk about your doubts and the fears you have conquered. Discuss your struggles and triumphs. Offer a word of encouragement for others who are struggling. Visit others in the group and connect with your fellow writer - aim for a dozen new people each time - and return comments. This group is all about connecting! Be sure to link to the IWSG page and display the badge in your post. And please be sure your avatar links back to your blog! Otherwise, when you lea...

Time for one of my occasional writer's update posts!  I've been home for a month now, which means... I'm about to head about again, to spend Thanksgiving with the kids in the Bay Area. But it also means that I've had long enough to get into something of a habit of work. With what results? I'm 36K into the draft of  Painted Over,  which will eventually be #4 in the Seffi Wardwell mysteries. That's the big thing. I'm averaging nearly 2200 words a day, which is in my target range. I have also been tinkering with a couple of short stories, and trying to figure out where to start and what to say in a short memoir piece. Probably too much to keep in my head all at once. On the administrative side, I have set up a store with Buy Me a Coffee! That also means I have the link for people to donate if something I share really excites them, though I'm not going to hold my breath. But having the store means that when I am doing direct sales at events I can offer a lin...

Really? I'm writing? Well, okay, at this point that's stretching it. But I'm staying home for a while and back at my computer. More specifically, I am plotting and planning and getting ready to start drafting a new novel. I even have a tentative title:  Painted Over . I kind of liked  Portrait of the Artist as a Young Corpse,  but that's a bit long and maybe a bit geeky.  I'm still at the stage where I'm having fun tossing around big ideas and coming up with characters, writing their stories, and wondering what new personal challenges Seffi should face. It's starting to come together in my head, so I can reasonably hope to start the first draft within the next couple of weeks. I'm looking at bringing back some peripheral characters from both  Edited Out  (#3 in series, released Aug. 25) and #4 , Logged Off   (possibly  Logged Off at the Library , but I'm leaning toward the shorter title. Feel free to offer your opinions on all this in th...

It's the first Wednesday of the month, and that means IWSG day! Purpose:   To share and encourage. Writers can express doubts and concerns without fear of appearing foolish or weak. Those who have been through the fire can offer assistance and guidance. It’s a safe haven for insecure writers of all kinds! Posting:   The first Wednesday of every month is officially   Insecure Writer’s Support Group   day. Post your thoughts on your own blog. Talk about your doubts and the fears you have conquered. Discuss your struggles and triumphs. Offer a word of encouragement for others who are struggling. Visit others in the group and connect with your fellow writers - aim for a dozen new people each time - and return comments. This group is all about connecting!   Don't forget you can post your link on the IWSG Facebook page .    Let’s rock the neurotic writing world! Our Twitter handle is @TheIWSG and hashtag is #IWSG   The awesome co-hosts for...

I was chatting with a couple of young women the other day, and used the words "writing" and "work" in the same sentence. That got a reaction from one (another word geek) as she said something like, "but writing's fun!" Thus this brief meditation on how fun writing is and sometimes isn't. Because while I can't think of anything I'd rather do, work-wise, there are times in the process when writing is, in fact, a great deal like work. I've been editing  Edited Out for what feels like ages, which might explain why just now I'm not thinking writing is the most fun work ever. Having spent two whole days just contemplating my shortcomings with regards to comma usage, I find myself wondering if I even know English well enough to write (note: it is my native language and really, I do. But commas!). I figure it takes me about 6 weeks to draft a novel, and 6 months to revise it. Then I am astonished, every single time, to realize it takes anot...

It's the first Wednesday of the month, and I'm excited that it's not only IWSG day, but I get to be a co-host! Purpose:   To share and encourage. Writers can express doubts and concerns without fear of appearing foolish or weak. Those who have been through the fire can offer assistance and guidance. It’s a safe haven for insecure writers of all kinds! Posting:   The first Wednesday of every month is officially   Insecure Writer’s Support Group   day. Post your thoughts on your own blog. Talk about your doubts and the fears you have conquered. Discuss your struggles and triumphs. Offer a word of encouragement for others who are struggling. Visit others in the group and connect with your fellow writers - aim for a dozen new people each time - and return comments. This group is all about connecting!   Don't forget you can post your link on the IWSG Facebook page .    Let’s rock the neurotic writing world! Our Twitter handle is @TheIWSG and h...