excoriation This is a painful word any way you cut it (or scrape it). Excoriation signifies one of two things, either the scraping or removal of the skin or the denunciation or rebuke of someone. They are similar, but distinct meanings. On the one hand both meanings represent the tearing apart of someone, either literally …
It’s almost time. The little science fiction novella I’ve been working on all summer, The Jammer and the Blade, is almost ready for release. I’ll reveal the cover and the actual release date this coming Thursday. If you missed the excerpt I posted from this story a while back, you can find it here. Until then, …
spile I came across this word just recently while reading A Tale of Two Cities. It’s my first time reading Dickens and I’ve been quite impressed with the author’s mastery of prose. As with many older books, the vocabulary is rich and sometimes beyond me and ‘spile’ proved to be just such a word. In …
nook & cranny Well, you get two words this week. And most of you are probably familiar with them. They are often used together and frequently can be found on the lips of mothers to admonish their children to a more spirited level of cleaning. Not just a passing straightening up of a disorganized room, …
There are no uninteresting things, only uninterested people. -G.K. Chesterton
I saw this exchange posted a while back on Pinterest and it made me smile. I’m almost certain that anyone who has ever gotten any enjoyment out of a story has had this experience. As I wrote a while back, the characters we read about often become our friends while we’re following their journeys and …
transom This word refers to the surface of the stern (rear) of a boat or a support beam that runs atop a door or window. For this, the word might qualify as something obscure except those with a good nautical or architectural vocabulary (I love architectural terms, by the way). A lot of vocabulary is …
It is a good rule after reading a new book, never to allow yourself another new one till you have read an old one in between. – C.S. Lewis
