• Home
  • about
    • blog
      • Nothing Is Wasted on the Writer
      • #DinnerwithDragonwagon
      • Deep Feast
      • #WidowhoodWednesday
    • media: interviews / profiles / articles
    • radio / video
    • cookbooks
    • publications list
  • books
    • children’s books
    • novels / fiction
    • poetry
    • reviews of CD’s books
  • Mentoring
    • testimonials
  • contact
  • “Is that your real name?”
    • Subscribe
  • FEARLESS WRITING™ 2023

Crescent Dragonwagon

ANGELS, ARRIVING IN SNOW: A NON-CHRISTMAS CHRISTMAS STORY

ANGELS, ARRIVING IN SNOW: A NON-CHRISTMAS CHRISTMAS STORY

By Crescent Dragonwagon

I NEVER BELIEVED IN SANTA CLAUS. NOT EVEN AS A KID, FOR REASONS I’LL MAKE CLEAR. BUT THE JURY IS STILL OUT ON ANGELS. If you want an inspirational, heartwarming story about Christmas, look elsewhere. I grew up the child of adamantly non-practicing Jews, in Hastings-on-Hudson, New York, then predominantly Irish-,  Polish-, and Italian-Catholic. My mother, Charlotte Zolotow, used to… Read More

Filed Under: Fearless Writing, Nothing Is Wasted on the Writer

THE 7 STEPS OF WRITING ANYTHING: YOU’RE SO VAIN, I BET YOU THINK THIS POST IS ABOUT YOU

THE 7 STEPS OF WRITING ANYTHING: YOU’RE SO VAIN, I BET YOU THINK THIS POST IS ABOUT YOU

By Crescent Dragonwagon

 “CLOUDS IN MY COFFEE.” I’M SURE I DIDN’T HAVE TO SAY ANY MORE THAN THAT TO FIND YOU SINGING CARLY SIMON’S, “YOU’RE SO VAIN.” THE STORY OF HOW THAT SONG GOT WRITTEN IS HOW EVERYTHING GETS WRITTEN. Remember “You’re So Vain” by Carly Simon? There’s an apocryphal story about it. Decades ago Simon was flying across country to New York… Read More

Filed Under: creativity, Fearless Writing, Nothing Is Wasted on the Writer, writing, Writing Courses Tagged With: Carly Simon, creative process, creative writing, David Geffen, how to write a hit song, James Taylor, Joni Mitchell, songwriting, Warren Beatty, writing

ABOUT  TUESDAYS WITH CRESCENT

ABOUT TUESDAYS WITH CRESCENT

By Crescent Dragonwagon

Low-key, high-energy, challenging and gentle, Tuesdays with Crescent is a 10-week, once-a-week small writing group. It takes place on ten consecutive Tuesday evenings, in real time (6:30 pm to 8:30 pm Central).  You may attend from anywhere, online, via Zoom, or physically (in Fayetteville, Arkansas). Participation is limited to 12. In just ten sessions, you will shift from anxiety to… Read More

Filed Under: Crescent Dragonwagon, Events, Fearless Writing, self-understanding, personal growth, writing

CHARLOTTE ZOLOTOW’S “SLEEPY BOOK” AWAKENS IN CHINA

CHARLOTTE ZOLOTOW’S “SLEEPY BOOK” AWAKENS IN CHINA

By Crescent Dragonwagon

A PERSON HAS A LIFE, WITH A DEFINITE AND IRREFUTABLE BEGINNING, MIDDLE, AND END. BUT, WITH A BOOK IT’S NOT SO CLEAR. I spent a recent Sunday, improbably, working on an introduction to the forthcoming Chinese edition of a children’s book entitled Sleepy Book. Written in 1956 or ’57 and published in 1958, its author is Charlotte Zolotow, my late… Read More

Filed Under: Books, Charlotte Zolotow, Fearless Writing, Nothing Is Wasted on the Writer, Writing Courses Tagged With: children's book illustrations, children's books, literary executor, reissues, Sleepy Book

DEAR ROSALEE, ABOUT THAT WHOLE FUTURE QUESTION, & USING OR NOT USING, & SOME STUFF MY WRITER-FATHER (WHO USED TO BE A DRUNK) PASSED ON TO ME …

DEAR ROSALEE, ABOUT THAT WHOLE FUTURE QUESTION, & USING OR NOT USING, & SOME STUFF MY WRITER-FATHER (WHO USED TO BE A DRUNK) PASSED ON TO ME …

By Crescent Dragonwagon

SOMETIMES YOU JUST DON’T KNOW HOW IT’S GOING TO COME OUT. OR EVEN IF IT WILL. BUT IF YOU HANG IN THERE ANYWAY, TRANSFORMATION IS POSSIBLE. IN FACT, IT MIGHT BE ON ITS WAY TO YOU RIGHT NOW, HERE’S WHAT MY EDGY, ALCOHOLIC, WRITER FATHER – WHO LATER SOBERED UP – TAUGHT ME ABOUT THIS. About three years ago, a… Read More

Filed Under: Fearless Writing, Maurice Zolotow, Nothing Is Wasted on the Writer Tagged With: AA, daughter, father, Los Angeles, Maurice Zolotow, sobriety, transformation, writing

BILLIONAIRES, ROME, & APPALACHIA: WINNERS, LOSERS, GENEROSITY

BILLIONAIRES, ROME, & APPALACHIA: WINNERS, LOSERS, GENEROSITY

By Crescent Dragonwagon

Last week, in Louisville,  Kentucky, I noticed a nice-looking — okay, cute — somewhat formally dressed man, seated alone across the aisle from me on the bus. He was youngish (I’m 64, so a shocking number of people now look youngish to me). He seemed a little jittery, not quite at ease. This was the last night of the 39th Annual Conference… Read More

Filed Under: Fearless Writing

HOW I MET HIM, LOVED HIM, LOST HIM: BLUEGRASS, APPLE CRISP, & FEARLESSNESS IN THE FACE OF MYSTERY

HOW I MET HIM, LOVED HIM, LOST HIM: BLUEGRASS, APPLE CRISP, & FEARLESSNESS IN THE FACE OF MYSTERY

By Crescent Dragonwagon

I blame, or credit, Carol Gaddy. She heard me reading poetry between sets of a bluegrass band at a now-defunct nightclub in Eureka Springs, Arkansas. If you are silly enough to attempt such a reading, you will find your poetry greatly improved by the endeavor. The feedback is like no other:  if one single phrase isn’t smacking your audience upside… Read More

Filed Under: #WidowhoodWednesday, Fearless Writing, Nothing Is Wasted on the Writer

Are you a real writer? The sure way to find out…

By Crescent Dragonwagon

It's 9:24 a.m. I have to leave at 10:00 to drive a deeply depressed friend to her therapy appointment. I am in the middle of writing one of my long, thoughtful, typical essay-type posts, which my friend Ronni Lundy calls "blongs." I left it, and began writing this instead. I have a bowl of Irish oatmeal beside me, cooked with… Read More

Filed Under: Books, Crescent Dragonwagon, Fearless Writing, Nothing Is Wasted on the Writer, self-understanding, personal growth Tagged With: fame, friendship, getting things done, Ned Shank, real writer, write every day, writer, writers, writing

uncovering: a yak, a six-year-old, and some witches walk into a post…

By Crescent Dragonwagon

…that particular morning, that little girl in Atlanta did have a question. A real question, and, as I have said, she asked it with solemnity and gravitas. Her manner made me wonder later if she, literal as all children are, had perhaps been puzzling over it for weeks, as I remember puzzling over why “witches” were in the Pledge of Allegiance. (“And to the Republic, for witches stand…”)
“Do you believe,” that little girl asked me, “that it’s true that you really can’t judge a book by its cover?”

Filed Under: Charlotte Zolotow, Crescent Dragonwagon, Fearless Writing, Nothing Is Wasted on the Writer Tagged With: appreciation, artists, Charlotte Zolotow, children's book illustrations, children's book writing, children's books, compassion towards self and others, Crescent dragonwagon, David McPhail, illustration, Jerry Pinkney, Little Brown, writers, writing

“fixing to” … and a message via indigo bunting

By Crescent Dragonwagon

The original inventers of twittering have been coming and going from the feeder all day today. Whenever I look out, from the bathroom window upstairs or the french doors in the kitchen downstairs, different visitors are at the cafe. Finches yellow as canaries, finches as reddish-purple as if they’d bathed in grape juice. Sparrows, in tweedy brown-gray-black-white. Black-caped chicadees. Grosbeaks,… Read More

Filed Under: Crescent Dragonwagon, Fearless Writing, Nothing Is Wasted on the Writer, Writing Courses Tagged With: anxiety, Arkansas, birds, change, compassion towards self and others, cornbread, Crescent dragonwagon, death, Eureka Springs, fear, Fearless Writing, grief, grief & grieving, grieving, hope, indigo bunting, love, natural world, Ned Shank, resilience, spring, Vermont, writer's memory, writers, writing, writing workshops

creative discontent: lasting father-wit, & a writer/innkeeper’s ex-files

By Crescent Dragonwagon

I used to be an innkeeper. I used to be a daughter with a living father. I am neither of these things now. Yet both reside within me. Both come into my present life at unexpected times. They did today, a moist, misty day, one in which I felt slightly out-of-sorts. Perhaps this very out-of-sortness is what brought to the… Read More

Filed Under: Crescent Dragonwagon, Fearless Writing, Maurice Zolotow, self-understanding, personal growth, Writing Courses Tagged With: Ann-Margret, appreciation, cornbread, David Koff, death, Eureka Springs, Film, Food and Drink, gardening, gradual transformation, grief & grieving, Houdini, John Wayne, love, Ned Shank, Ricky Jay, Rumi, Steve Zolotow, T.S. Eliot, writer's memory, writers, writing

Part 1: love / dead cat

By Crescent Dragonwagon

I sometimes tell my writing students “Start out with a clear purpose, but be willing for that to change in the course of writing. ” Well, case in point. In this post, sparked by an e e cummings quote, I set out to explore the idea of how one becomes lovable… and wound up writing, mostly, about a dead cat…. Read More

Filed Under: Crescent Dragonwagon, Fearless Writing, self-understanding, personal growth, Writing Courses Tagged With: appreciation, cats, change, David Koff, death, death of a pet, e e cummings, Eureka Springs, friendship, gentleness, gradual transformation, grief & grieving, home, love, Momaday, narrative, Ned Shank, writer's memory, writers, writing

  • 1
  • 2
  • Next Page »

Read Aloud with Crescent and Mark

NOT A LITTLE MONKEY, by Charlotte Zolotow, illustrted by Michelle Chessaree

"So, the little girl climbed into the big waste-basket and waited." ' Oh no,' said her mother, ' we don't want to throw you away.'"There are many ways to express love and the need for attention. Here, a busy mother and her just-a-bit naughty little girl tease each other affectionately — the little girl making her point without even uttering a word.That's today's story time — read aloud by the author's daughter at Crescent Dragonwagon's Writing, Cooking, & Workshops, with Mark Graff's "text support" and discussion."Just right for two-to-fours, the humor of this true-to-life story of a mischievous little girl who blocks her mother's attempts to clean house will elicit giggles from the lollipop set." Kirkus Reviews

Posted by Crescent Dragonwagon's Writing, Cooking, & Workshops on Thursday, June 4, 2020

Read Aloud with Crescent

Read Aloud with Crescent

The Washington Post on Crescent’s Lentil Soup Recipe

The Washington Post on Crescent’s Lentil Soup Recipe

Greek Lentil Soup with Spinach and Lemon, photograph by Tom McCorkle, Washington Post

Bean By Bean Cookbooks

#DeepFeast Recipes

More Posts from this Category

Dinner with Dragonwagon

More Posts from this Category

 for children:

A NAPPA Gold Winner
NAPPA


"... like a warm luminescent blanket at bedtime... softly lulling." -- New York Times


"(With) weary animals, Dragonwagon offers an “alphabet of ways to sleep,” smoothly working in some alliteration..."
- Publishers Weekly (starred review)


Available at:

Crescent Dragonwagon page style=

read aloud with Crescent Dragonwagon

Until Just Moistened

Until Just Moistened

Available for Purchase

Copyright © 2023 · Darling theme by Restored 316