Charlotte Lit’s Blog

Welcome to Charlotte Lit’s literary arts blog. What you’ll find here: reviews, interviews, craft essays, previews of literary arts events, and anything else that catches our attention.

Cathy Pickens

A Little Bit Afraid

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A hundred people gathered for a lunch-and-learn session on developing their creative process. Just a quick look at creativity as a discipline rather than an airy flight of fancifulness. As part of that process, I encouraged them to fill their creative wells by seeking experiences outside their comfort zone, what I call “rambles.” One woman […]

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Jennifer Halls

Runes

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Runes are ancient. They are the symbols from which our alphabet was developed. The first historically documented use of runes in a systematic way (as words) is 50 C.E. It is not known when the first symbols were written, then used to mean the same thing over and over. Scholars still study and argue how […]

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Betsy Thorpe

Query Letter: Going Beyond the Pitch – Knowing About Who You Are

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I’ve read thousands of query letters. Thousands and thousands. At the beginning of my career, the queries came from agents. They were polished. They were short. They were resting on the laurels of that agent’s reputation. If a high-powered agent sent a submission to me or my boss, I knew I had to put whatever […]

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Paula Martinac

What’s a Sensitivity Reader…and Do I Need One?

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The fairly new term “sensitivity reader” might make warning bells go off for authors, who need to have artistic freedom and be free from fear of censorship. No fiction writer or memoirist wants to have their portrayal of characters from a different race, class, gender, or culture than their own stamped with a big “WRONG.” […]

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