1. Silas House

2. Books by Silas House

3. A few cool facts about Silas:  He is a Kentucky writer. He was born in eastern Kentucky and still lives there.  He studied at Spalding University in Louisville and received his MFA in Creative Writing.  He is a professor at Berea College in Berea, Kentucky.  He is an environmentalist and is an activist against mountaintop removal in Appalachia. He has been a speaker at the I Love Mountains rally in Frankfort.

4. Why I like Silas House’s writing  His characters are so well-crafted. They seem so real, and I care about what happens to them. He creates female characters especially well, which is impressive for a man.  The relationships between the characters are developed very well.  His description is beautiful. Silas House values nature and he brings the natural world to life for the reader through his descriptions.  His stories are meaningful. I can relate to his themes and I learn about life through the messages revealed in his novels.

5. Quotes that showcase his writing style:  Vine wanting spring to come: “I…held my hand out into the snow, which fell so lazy and carefree that it seemed it might never touch the ground. Each snowflake that melted on my palm held the promise of spring. I let it melt there, and then put it to my lips, hoping I might catch the hint of spring in that snow water.” A Parchment of Leaves (57)

6. Quotes that showcase his writing style:  Vine describing the effect of guilt: “…guilt is the worst, smallest kind of jail. I was trapped inside myself from now on—as if my soul could not flutter past my rib cage.” A Parchment of Leaves (211)

7. Writing advice from Silas The main piece of advice I give is to be genuine. If you’re not genuine, people know it in a heartbeat and they don’t respect you. To be a writer you also have to be incredibly determined. You can’t give up; my first book was rejected over and over. You have to be patient. It took me about six years to get published, from the time I started querying agents. I think that you should never have a big ego about yourself, but you should have an ego about your writing.

8. Writing advice from Silas When writing fiction, it always helps to have a geography in your mind, a space within which you can walk around and orient yourself so that your characters know where they are, which way to move, where to stand, how to be in that space. Even if you are creating a world completely different from your own, I recommend having touchstone places that allow you to get beneath the novel's skin and roam around. And a not-so-gentle reminder to all writers, and all people: get outside more often. Nothing will do a better job of making you a better writer, or a better person.

9. Writing advice from Silas Make art everyday, any way you can. Work on your novel. Or poem, essay, short story, play, screenplay. Or a painting, song, sculpture. film, photograph. Most of all, expand your notion of what art is. Anything that is made with care can be art, too….The art is in the making as much as the end product. So if you can't put your energies to that novel today, keep your creative juices flowing by making art in your own way. Bake homemade biscuits. Plant tomatoes. Hoe your garden… Read a book to a child. Have a dance party in your living room….Cut flowers from your yard and make arrangements throughout your house…. Build that deck you've been wanting. Rearrange your porch furniture. Rearrange your bedroom furniture…. My point, of course, is that we must stay creative. We must never become those people who just come in from a long day of work and plop down in front of the television or computer to numb ourselves for hours. Okay, sometimes plopping down in front of the television for a numbing session is required, but it should definitely be the exception and not the rule... Keep your mind working, churning, turning.

10. Writing advice from Silas To become a better writer--to become a better person--talk to your elders. Listen to them. Ask them to tell you stories I grew up surrounded by older people, and I stuck as close to them as I could. Most of all, I listened to their stories. Stories about hard times, old times. Stories about ways of life that were gone with the wind. But within those tales there was always something to apply to the right here and now. There was always wisdom weaving itself in and out and around their words. We live in a world where people know more about vapid celebrities than they do about their grandparents. We live in a world where we never go over to visit our elderly neighbors. Change that about yourself and it will make your life and your writing better. I guarantee it.

11. Sources Chai, Barbara. "New Voices in Writing Offer Their Advice." The Wall Street Journal. Dow Jones and Company, Inc., 2 Feb. 2008. Web. 5 Oct. 2013. House, Silas. “A Country Boy Can Surmise.” 2013. Web. 05 Oct. 2013. House, Silas. A Parchment of Leaves. New York: Ballantine Books, 2002. Howard, Jason. "Silas House: Chasing His Dream, Finding His Voice." This Month’s Issue - KentuckyLiving Magazine. KentuckyLiving.com, Feb. 2006. Web. 05 Oct. 2013.