Blogging in the Shower

I'm always blogging in the shower. The isolation, the quiet, the warmth, and the steady stream of water from multiple shower heads relax my body and free my mind. Ideas arrive with ease and I write in my head until I can get to the computer or my iPad. Or sometimes even a piece of paper.

I've been blogging at HP for a little over two years now. I came to it after many years of print and radio reviewing and writing across genres: mystery, novel, short story, psychology, historical fiction, memoir, psychology.

I love the short form, sticking close to five hundred words, because it's a challenge to stay focused, clear, and detailed all at the same time. The brevity allows for the kind of rigorous multiple revisions I love to do, and except when a blog is very time-bound, there are no deadlines to struggle with.

When people ask me what the difference is between working on a novel or a short story, I tell them that I can do something with stories that I can't do with a novel. I can usually keep a short story in my head, see all of it in the way that the discoverer of fractals could envision equations three-dimensionally. That's even more the case with a blog.

I also tell people that working on a novel is like having your unemployed brother-in-law moving into your basement while he tries to find a job, whereas working on a short story is like having a low-maintenance weekend guest.

That would make blogging like a coffee date with a good friend.

Lev Raphael is the author of Rosedale in Love. Check out the trailer here.