April, as you probably already know, marks the first Camp NaNoWriMo for the 2014 calendar year. Camp will repeat in July (no word yet as to whether or not I will be joining in) and the classic NaNoWriMo will take place, as always-always, in November. I write this March recap from one week into April,…
If you have been around this blog, long, you witnessed my first attempt at NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month), last November. (For the journey, see here.) If you haven’t, I’ll just explain that NaNoWriMo happens each November, and tens of thousands of writers and would-be-writers sign up to pound out 50,000 words during the thirty-one…
Owning a teeny-tiny publishing company, I have to wear many hats. One of my most favorite hats of all is design. Now, many indie-published authors should consider hiring someone to design the cover (and possibly publicity material), just like they should hire an editor. Lucky for me, I not only have a professional editor in…
I have been waiting more than a year for the new Haven Kimmel book, The Farm, to be released by Waterstones in England. That’s why I penned into my blog calendar to make March 2014 Haven Kimmel Month. I was going to re-read all of her books (two memoirs, a children’s book, one YA, and four…
In February, I joined something like 10,000 authors entering the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Awards contest. I did it with some reservations, because really I love self-publishing so much I am reluctant about a contract with anyone. However, a pay check and reader feedback–oh, and recognition–this is all important to my career. The catch with the…
It has been a month of the unexpected, driven by the weather and that nasty flu bug. I’m sure we were in the same boat as lots of people. Work-wise, it was Self Help month here on the blog, and I read only two books the whole month (the second, in one day). See here…
I am no stranger to the forced pause. I am a migraine patient (aka migraneur) and have been since I was five years old. I have what used to be called classic migraine, which means my symptoms include blindness or partial blindness, confusion, disrupted speech, etc. on top of the usual pain, nausea, sensitivity to…
Let’s be smart about this. I am all for intuition, as a writer. But the other day, I had a moment where my subconscious writing process made a leap to my consciousness, and that’s when one can all of a sudden share that process. We’ll call it a teachable moment. Whereas before what I was…
You know what overwhelms me? Yeah, well, plenty of things. But I am referring to my daily walks from the desk in the quiet room of the library to the restroom or drinking fountain. Book covers! There are just so many of them! There are so many great ones! And surely not all those books…
Besides being buried under the holidays, I managed to take some new head shots in December. They are needed for book promotion in 2014, so I came in right under the line. But only when my husband–a newly signed actor–needed his head shots, did I join him and our camera in the back yard for…
Sitting in my most recent writers’ club meeting, my mind wandered to the issue of the modern reader and how a writer should and would respond. Most specifically, I was thinking about the attention span and the action requirements of the modern reader. Personally, I can relate. I have adult ADHD and even though I…
With NaNoWriMo, I honesty haven’t been taking in too much to entertainment, even reading (which is like half-entertainment, half-work). My plan for these last two months was several books, but I haven’t even finished one all month (unless you count the first book of Parade’s End, which I guess we should). We did, early on,…
I hate losing. Not that I’m very competitive. I like other people to win, too. But I also hate losing and I love being first. I lost NaNoWriMo. There was no avoiding it, for me. I severely sprained my spine (read: ruptured a disk) on October 30 and spent the first several days of November…
They all said to make a plan. I even chirped the same advice to my writing friends: October should be NaNoPlaMo, National Novel Planning Month, we said. Because if you want to succeed at the 50,000 words demanded of you to conquer National Novel Writing Month in November, you want to have all guns blazing…
Still in the middle of National Novel Writing Month. Still spending five-plus hours per day getting those 2,200 words on the page. (Normally, it would be more like 1,600, but I was behind due to a sprained spine; more on that to come.) I am trying to keep writing and stop wanting to lollygag and…
In case you are unaware (and I haven’t spoken with you in the past couple weeks), November is National Novel Writing Month. Now, it is true that every day and every week and every month is some sort of official something day or week or month, but this one–believe it or not–is widely observed by,…
My intention was to find a writing group to join sometime this year. It was still sitting there on my list of Owl and Zebra goals when I was thrilled to find myself, one evening last spring, in a conversation with a new acquaintance about a burgeoning writing group which would happily include me, if…
Let’s just say you have a burgeoning career as an artist and a blogger and you get sick. Or your kids get sick. Or you and your kids get sick right before an intense vacation. We all know that one of the cardinal rules for successful blogging and successful book sales is to remain engaged…
We are living in the era of the villain. I mean, first there was Lolita, and now there is Dexter. And how many books, movies, TV shows, plays (etc.) which would otherwise be pretty classical in scope, these days, have a very sympathetic take on the villain? Suddenly, vampires are boyfriends and serial killers are…
I have been reading an article in Poets & Writers about current writers (and book sellers) in Egypt. (Yes, I am a couple months behind on my trade reading.) With the continuing upheaval (think Arab Spring and then lots more) in the country, it is precarious to be a writer or to be selling modern…
the starving artist 