By Alex Kava Research shows that reading fiction beats stress better than any other activity, including listening to music or taking a walk. It lowers the heart rate and eases tension in the muscles. It also creates a distraction by transporting our minds away from whatever is causing our stress....
7 TIPS TO UNPLUG & BEAT WRITER’S BLOCK
By Alex Kava According to artist, Chuck Close: “Inspiration is for amateurs. The rest of us just show up and get to work.” But what if it’s not about inspiration? What if you’re really stuck in a manuscript. You can’t move forward no matter how many bad paragraphs you force yourself to...
THREE CHRISTMAS CLASSICS THAT ALMOST WEREN’T
By Alex Kava A Christmas Carol, It’s A Wonderful Life, and Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer. They’ve become synonymous with Christmas, but did you know they almost didn’t happen? A Christmas Carol In 1843, Charles Dickens already enjoyed literary success with several novels, including Oliver Twist....
DAHMER AND OTHERS: WHY SERIAL KILLERS FASCINATE US
by Alex Kava Last month, Netflix’s DAHMER—Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story was the streaming platform’s most watched new show ever in its first week. At a time when violent crime makes the daily news, what is it about serial killers that we can’t stop watching? Harold Schechter, author of The...
THE CAREFUL AGING OF A SERIES CHARACTER
by Alex Kava Alex Kava’s Grace and Maggie O’Dell are two of readers favorite characters. Last month, I received this Facebook message from a reader with a great question: “Maggie O’Dell was my introduction to thrillers back when I was maybe 14 or 15 years old, so I’m really happy there’s this...
LETTING MY CAREER GO TO THE DOGS
by Alex Kava Spoiler alert! It’s a good thing. It was nine years ago this summer when I decided to write a new series. The latest installment (#11, Stranded) in my long-running FBI profiler series was scheduled for release in August that year. Pre-orders outpaced previous books. The publisher even...
ALFRED HITCHCOCK AND A WAITRESS NAMED RITA
I’ve always been a fan of classic movies. “Sorry, Wrong Number,” “Gaslight,” “Rear Window.” Talk about building suspense. The classics definitely knew how to do it. I’m a visual writer, so I need a scene to play out in my mind before I can put it into words. But to build suspense, it’s not just...