Holding Patterns

How do you begin a blog post you never wanted to write? How do you type the very words you never wanted to see again? How do you convince yourself that there's anything good or fair or right in the world when you get the news that your loved one has cancer? Again. I don't [...]

Belonging

We almost bought a brand new house today. Drove an hour and a half northeast and spent all day touring a beautiful, half-built, small mansion in a spacious 1-acre wooded lot in the Poconos. Then we deliberated long hours on whether it was right, where we'd put the garden, the pool, the chicken coop, and [...]

A Year in the Life

It’s a very good day. An important day. An anniversary. No, not a wedding anniversary, or a dating anniversary, or a birthday. Today marks one year since my husband had a drain tube pulled after six months of complications from surgery to remove a cancerous tumor that invaded his pancreas. One year. The difference between [...]

Indie Author Storms

Maybe it doesn't quite have the ring of Indiana Jones, but I think Indie Author Storms has a nice sound to it. So why did I decide to go indie and what’s next? I’ve been writing seriously for seven years, querying for four, and have four completed manuscripts—some of them with quite wonderful feedback from [...]

The Value of One Year

Can you measure the worth of a year? How do you set the price? In dollars? In euros? In pesos? Can you put a price on it at all? When you get a cancer diagnosis, you find out just how much your time with loved ones is really worth, and just how much more of [...]

2017 Stats

Hey, writers and readers! It’s once again that time when everyone you know in the writing world looks back and reflects proudly on their accomplishments throughout the past year. I’ll admit that when I look at the writing statistics of other writers & authors this year, I immediately relapse into another bout of Imposter Syndrome. [...]

The Spirit of the Season

Happy Holidays, friends and family! This is the official 2017 Storms Christmas letter! (Look - I even went red and green! Festive!) Before you start in on me about how lame I am for sending you to my blog for warm wishes of holiday cheer, remember it’s been a fairly tough year. Go easy on [...]

Falling Down

It’s Saturday. More specifically, it’s the Saturday after Thanksgiving. I’m supposed to be happy. We are full-fledged into the Christmas season. I should be baking Christmas cookies (and eating half of them) while my husband strings the lights outside and I watch from the warmth of our living room. The kids should be bouncing off [...]

The Weight of Doubt and Exhaustion

It’s been a long time since I blogged. Then again, it’s been a long time since I’ve written anything, truth be told. There’s a complete and utter exhaustion that comes with caring for someone with a long-term illness and until recently, I was really good at pretending it didn’t exist. Enter wall. Accurate footage of [...]

A Beautiful Sight

I watched the sunrise with my best friend yesterday. From the thirteenth floor, caged balcony of a Philadelphia hospital, we braved the early morning chill and watched the sun slowly bathe the buildings around us in a golden glow that made even Philadelphia look almost serene. (Almost.) A Bryce Canyon sunrise, it was not, but [...]