Click to find out more about:
Fiction: Palm Tree Pipe Dreams, A Song Across the Sea, The Rosebud Burglar
Stage Plays: Cora Lynn Beauty Can Change Your Life, The Bucket List of Booze Club, Antares Awaits, Community Service, one act plays
Nonfiction: The New Old Maid
Other: Twelve Short Plays You Can Do for Free, Monologues for Auditions, (Directors Aren’t Tired of Hearing)
Fiction
Palm Tree Pipe Dreams (literary fiction)
Southern California is weird, and it gets a lot weirder in Palm Tree Pipe Dreams, a dystopian comedy set in the near future. Traffic in Southern California finally reaches critical mass and comes to a complete halt. The neverending traffic jam puts a stranglehold on the region. While politicians argue over possible solutions, residents come up with drastically different ways of doing things. Cars are renovated into living quarters. Vendors take to the streets. The air turns smog-free. Aspiring screenwriter Ira O’Reilly struggles to adapt to the new reality, but he he is soon unemployed, broke and homeless. Then things really get bad for him. Ira’s journey is hilarious and heartbreaking, a revealing look at ambition, imagination and love. Get Palm Tree Pipe Dreams here.
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A Song Across the Sea (A historical romance)
(writing as Shana McGuinn)
Tara McLaughlin survives family heartache and a catastrophe at sea but refuses to give up her dreams of a career on the stage. This sweeping saga takes her from a farm in rural Ireland to being a penniless immigrant in the U.S. (after an ill-fated voyage on the Titanic). Along the way, she must contend with the loss of her beloved brother, danger from a relentless stalker with underworld ties who is obsessed with her and her love for Reece Waldron, whose wealth and social status puts him at a distance she can’t seem to navigate.
“A Song Across the Sea” is a richly detailed story full of memorable characters, suspense and passion.
Excerpt:
Suddenly Reece was beside her, a dark form silhouetted by the distant lights from the mansion. They came together breathlessly as the mermaids in the stone fountain looked on. In his arms at last, Tara finally knew the end of a long, bitterly felt hunger. There was no strangeness in his kiss, although it had been so long since their last one. It was the familiar, waking dream she’d been living ever since she met him.
After a long time, Reece said: “There are some things you must know, Tara.”
Click here to get your copy of A Song Across the Sea!
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The Rosebud Burglar (a Victorian romance)
(writing as Shana McGuinn)
Risking all for love…
As a wealthy, aristocratic and beautiful young lady in Victorian England, Raine Grenville has everything she wants: clothes, jewels, and eager (if unexciting) suitors. The highly unsuitable Garrett Creighton sparks extraordinary and unwelcome new feelings in her, but whatever future they might have is plunged into doubt by a change in fortune, and Raine’s foolhardy recklessness…
In the best traditions of Victorian Romance, The Rosebud Burglar is a sweeping, suspenseful tale that takes readers on an adventure of the heart. Click here to get your copy today.
Stage Plays
Cora Lynn Beauty Can Change Your Life (full length drama, 2 F)
~Winner, 2022 Community Theatre Association of Michigan Playwriting Award
~Chosen for Michigan Playwright Festival, 2024
Synopsis: Assigned to be hotel roommates at a Cora Lynn Beauty convention, Harlene and Stacey clash over everything from craft beer to country music and line dancing – even erupting in a “Bible off” following a revelation by Stacey. Along with their baggage – both literal and figurative – it turns out that they have both brought hidden agendas to the convention – agendas they hope will help them transform their lives. While the two women struggle to find common ground, larger events upend their plans and bring them to a new understanding of each other.
Click here to access Cora Lynn Beauty Can Change Your Life. Photo by onderortel on Pixabay.
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The Bucket List of Booze Club (full-length dramedy, 5 F, 3 M) –
Produced by:
~Rosedale Community Players, Southfield, Michigan, Oct. 2023
~Freshwater Theatre in Minneapolis, Minnesota May 2022.
~Barefoot Productions, Plymouth, Michigan, Oct. 2016
Staged readings by:
~Renegade Theatre Festival, Lansing, Michigan, 2026)
~Magenta Giraffe Staged Reading Festival, Detroit, Michigan 2013
Synopsis: Four longtime friends gather weekly to work through their problems while working through a list of exotic beverages like absinthe and slivovitz, on the premise that it’s important to try everything once. The serious illness of one of the friends leads to revelations of anger and jealousy and ultimately becomes the catalyst for change – of one kind or another – in all of their lives.
Click here to access The Bucket List of Booze Club on www.newplayexchange.org.
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Antares Awaits is a full-length comedy about ambition, spirituality and how internet fame can come back to bite you in the- well, you know.
~Produced online during the pandemic by The Roial Players at Michigan State University. Click here to watch this incredibly imaginative staging on Youtube.
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Community Service is a dramedy for middle school and high school actors. A group of students meet up for a community service project at a facility for displaced families. It’s good for the folks who live there but less-than-ideal for Lexie, who has been keeping her housing-insecure status a secret from her classmates – most of all her sometimes-tutee, sometimes-bully Madison. Is the jig finally up? Follow this group of students as they discover that you can’t just look at a person and know what they’re going through. Young actors and audiences will appreciate both the humor and the honesty in this play. PUBLISHED BY YouthPLAYS. 25-30 minutes, 5 F, 2 M, 1 any gender. Click here for information about Community Service.
One act plays
The following have been performed by/at Dirty Blondes Theatre Company (NYC), Detroit Fringe Festival, Rosedale Community Players, TLC One-Acts Festival, St. Dunstan’s One-Act Festival, Extra Mile Playwrights Theatre events, West Coast Players One Act Festival (Clear Lake, FL), Boxfest Detroit, Two Muses Women’s Playwrighting Festival, Monster Box Theatre,
- Rich & Melanie’s First Date – a comedy about two zombies who met on ZombieMatch.com – and the server who doesn’t want to wait on them.
- Jack Writes Home – a drama based on letters my father wrote home during WWII.
- Boobs – a comedy featuring two very competive breasts who don’t realize what they’re waiting for.
- Scene in Black and White – a drama about race and assumptions. Winner of Audience Favorite Award.
- Cleaning Out the Attic – comedy. A senior citizen has a secret hobby that is discovered and disrupted by his grandson.
- Color Blind – a dramedy. Two college freshmen find that the baggage they brought to their new dorm room isn’t all in suitcases.
- Going Nowhere – a comedy. A flight delay reveals that a couple is not just stuck in an airport terminal – they’re stuck in a relationship that’s going nowhere.
- It Goes Without Saying – a romantic drama. A rehearsal of a community theatre play unleashes some surprising feelings, forcing one character to brave his soul and another to consider a life-altering decision.
- Mama Rosa’s Cucina – comedy. An Italian restaurant owner creates magic and romance with her cooking – but the results aren’t always what she expected. Or wanted.
- Ruin Porn – drama. A tour of Detroit’s once-magnificent, now decaying buildings turns into a confrontation between one of the city’s longtime residents and one of its newer ones.
- Such a Small Word – drama. A woman tries to re-start her life after a terrible mistake, but finds that the past is something that won’t stay…in the past.
- The Angel Thief – drama – An elderly woman is forced to confront her fears about change when new neighbors make their way into her life.
- The King of Rejections – comedy – Two roommates compete over which one’s dreams are being thwarted the most, until a girlfriend throws a curve that changes the balance of the contest.
- There’s Nothing Wrong With Me – comedy. An encounter at a public beach reveals what appears to be a toxic relationship – or is it?
- Who Goes to Antarctica? – dramedy – Longtime friends are forced to confront the truths about their marriages when a brush with infidelity brings long-simmering frustrations to the surface. Won an Audience Favorite Award.
Contact Me About My Plays: howtowritelikeabadass@gmail.com.
Nonfiction
The New Old Maid: Satisfied Single Women (nonfiction)
Never-married women from all walks of life tell their stories with unflinching honesty and wry self-awareness, whether they’re discussing unhappy childhoods, men who didn’t measure up, or the fun and frustrations that come with being an independent woman. An entrepreneur, a successful businesswoman, a teacher, a psychic medium and others offer fascinating glimpses of their lives and the choices they (mostly) don’t regret making. The New Old Maid will put to rest stereotypes about unhappy spinsters, and replace them with a new understanding of why some women remain single and what their lives are really like.
In addition to sharing the stories of real-life women, The New Old Maid takes a look at how depictions of fictional old maids in books, movies, stage plays and TV shows have evolved over time – and explains why such portrayals matter.
The New Old Maid speaks to a topic that’s trending and a demographic that’s growing. The percentage of never-married women in the U.S. has been on the rise for decades, with more women identifying as single and eager to discuss what that means. Click here to get your copy of The New Old Maid.
Other
Monologues for Actors (that directors aren’t sick of hearing)
Looking for something powerful to use in your next audition? A monologue that will showcase your talents – but not one that the director has heard many times before?
Avoid giving the director a case of monologue fatigue with a piece that has either been done to death, or is strongly associated with a particular, high-profile actor. The monologues in Monologues for Actors (that directors aren’t sick of hearing are guaranteed fresh, although they have been vetted by actors and directors. Get it here.
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Twelve Short Plays That You Can Do for Free
I’m making my favorite short plays available for production, with no licensing fees. The plays in this collection explore relationships involving lovers, roommates, relatives, neighbors and two strangers connected by tragedy. The stories range from hilariously twisted (There’s Nothing Wrong with Me) to poignant (It Goes Without Saying), from shocking (Such a Small Word) to thought-provoking (The Angel Thief). Frustrated ambitions, transgender zombies, boobs, romance and race – no topic is off limits.
Click here to get Get Twelve Short Plays That You Can Do for Free.
Write Like a Badass 