Hank Phillippi Ryan

Listicles

Long Overdue: Books about Libraries and Librarians

I grew up in really rural Indiana, so rural that you couldn't see another house from our house, and we were so isolated my sister and I used to ride our ponies to the local library. We'd fill up our saddlebags with books, then read up in the hayloft of…

Hank Phillippi RyanSeptember 2, 2025

Listicles Popular

Literary Matchmaking: Books about the Power of Booksellers

Some years ago, an organization of writers to which I belonged hired a consultant to discover what it was that convinced people to buy a book. For this, they paid, I can divulge without telling any secrets, $25,000. When they told me about it, I thought for a second and…

Hank Phillippi RyanAugust 19, 2025

Listicles

Can A Book Become a Main Character?

You walk to your gate at the airport, pick a chair, stash your suitcase, and see, sitting next to you, a person reading the same book you are. You could talk to that person instantly, right? Because the book gives you common ground. It’s the reason you’re reading this article…

Hank Phillippi RyanJuly 29, 2025

Miscellany

Where the Writer Ends and the Story Begins

It’s the most paradoxical idea of all. Somehow, it’s both the most tempting and the most potentially disastrous. Because if we’re supposed to “write what you love” and “write what you fear,” all of us have those same passions and apprehensions about the same thing: writing! So what could be…

Hank Phillippi RyanMay 23, 2025

Novels with Surprising Structure - Tall Poppy Writers 2

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What Do “The Appeal,” “Mirror Me” and “All This and More” Have in Common That Will Blow Your Mind?

When we were little kids, if we were lucky, someone would put us on their laps and say the magic words: once upon a time. The walls would fall away, time would vanish, and we’d be transported to a new world. But I think we were also being introduced to…

Hank Phillippi RyanMarch 24, 2025

Fiction Listicles

For Auld Lang Syne: Books Set on New Year’s Eve

High noon. Midnight. When a novel or movie is set at one of those precipitous times, the conflict is built right into the story. The reader instantly knows something is ending, and something is beginning. And to put the focus of action right at that pivotal moment is a laser…

Hank Phillippi RyanDecember 30, 2024

Fiction Listicles

Real-Life Scandal, Gossip and Rumors: The Fodder for Fiction

Hester Prynne didn’t have Instagram or Twitter for her world to spread the word about her scandal — still, she was forced to wear that scarlet A right on the front of her frock. I always imagine the snippy 17th-century Bostonians whispering behind their hands, lasciviously spreading the gossip about…

Hank Phillippi RyanAugust 15, 2024

Miscellany Thrillers

Hank Phillippi Ryan on Fixing Fact Through Fiction in “One Wrong Word”

Guess what I heard? But—you have to promise not to tell. Is there any one of us who wouldn't lean closer and listen to the person who asked us that? Especially if the question was whispered, hushed, delivered with a sense of drama? “Guess what I heard?” means there's a…

Hank Phillippi RyanApril 1, 2024

Listicles Listicles - Featured Thrillers

Why She Won’t Go into the Woods: 7 Sinister and Spooky Stories

Raise your hand if you love to go camping. You will note my hand is down. Besides Girl Scout camp, where I mostly remember bugs and teasing and being unable to sleep because of the stories about the Bloody Hook of the Goat Killer, I really only went camping once.…

Hank Phillippi RyanSeptember 15, 2022

Fiction Listicles Thrillers Thrillers - Featured

A Locked Room Is Not Always a Locked Room

Do you remember when you first read The Speckled Band? The Sherlock short story by Arthur Conan Doyle where a soon-to-be-wed daughter is mysteriously killed in a creepy mansion where no one could possibly have entered her locked room? And then, guess what, ANOTHER soon-to-be-wed daughter has to sleep in…

Hank Phillippi RyanAugust 4, 2022

Listicles Listicles - Featured

10 Breakaway Reads for Spring Break!

Every reader knows about the coveted “Summer Reads” lists (usually published in June), the compilations of the buzziest books of the season. And, of course, the December “Must-Buy” holiday gift lists. But why is there not a “Spring Break” list? Maybe a spring break list could mean … a break…

Hank Phillippi RyanApril 21, 2022

Fiction Listicles Listicles - Featured

11 Books for Perilous Times

Oh, yes. I agree. It’s really tempting to pull the comforter over your head and hide until all this is over. The world seems very crazy right now, and … how do we deal with that? Here’s one thought. When the pandemic started, I was in the midst of writing…

Hank Phillippi RyanMarch 3, 2022

Fiction Listicles Listicles - Featured

Putting Together the Pieces: 9 Adventures in Storytelling Structure

We all are storytellers, right? In letters, where we are persuasive or loving or newsy. In emails, where we are planning or collaborating or gossiping. In journals, where we are unfiltered, revealing our inner selves. Or, at least, in our vision of ourselves. Even in the most mundane of documents,…

Hank Phillippi RyanJanuary 27, 2022

Listicles Listicles - Featured Miscellany

These Are a Few of My Favorite Things: Book Gifts Galore!

There’s nothing more rewarding than finding the perfect gift — to make a friend or relative happy, that’s the ultimate reward. But, and we all have to admit it, there are people who are difficult to buy gifts for. Happily, luckily, a book is always a perfect gift. The key…

Hank Phillippi RyanDecember 9, 2021

Fiction Listicles

The Good, the Bad and the Complicated: 8 Books Showcasing Sisterly Bonds

Katniss Everdeen set the bar high for sisters when she stepped in to take her sister Prim’s place in The Hunger Games. Mary Boleyn — good move as it turned out — stepped aside to let her sister Anne marry Henry VIII. Sisterly relationships are fraught and conflicted and seething…

Hank Phillippi RyanOctober 28, 2021

Fiction Listicles

8 Fiction Books Revealing the Risk of Fame

After you read a book about a celebrity you might realize you’d never want to be a celebrity. If you read a book about fame you’d never want to be famous. Because, in books, what happens? The center of attention, the rockstar, the movie star, the influential publisher ... they…

Hank Phillippi RyanAugust 26, 2021

Hank Phillippi Ryan

Hank Phillippi Ryan

Long Overdue: Books about Libraries and Librarians

Literary Matchmaking: Books about the Power of Booksellers

Can A Book Become a Main Character?

Where the Writer Ends and the Story Begins

What Do “The Appeal,” “Mirror Me” and “All This and More” Have in Common That Will Blow Your Mind?

For Auld Lang Syne: Books Set on New Year’s Eve

Real-Life Scandal, Gossip and Rumors: The Fodder for Fiction

Hank Phillippi Ryan on Fixing Fact Through Fiction in “One Wrong Word”

Why She Won’t Go into the Woods: 7 Sinister and Spooky Stories

A Locked Room Is Not Always a Locked Room

10 Breakaway Reads for Spring Break!

11 Books for Perilous Times

Putting Together the Pieces: 9 Adventures in Storytelling Structure

These Are a Few of My Favorite Things: Book Gifts Galore!

The Good, the Bad and the Complicated: 8 Books Showcasing Sisterly Bonds

8 Fiction Books Revealing the Risk of Fame

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