We’re Well In To Camp

It is April 11, which means I am arriving at Camp Nanowrimo eleven days late. This is a virtual thing, so no camp counselor is looking down over their nose and clipboard at me, tapping their pencil on the page. I knew I was going to miss a few days of camp due to spring…

More Writing Lessons from Normal Life

I was recently helping my daughter with one of her college application questions—okay, it wasn’t that recent; it was a few months ago. But when I was done helping her edit said question, I jotted down a note to blog about what I had learned from the experience. I haven’t needed that note until now…

Novel Planning: a NaNoWriMo Update

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…

The All-Important Character

One of the things I have learned about writing while writing is that it often takes writing to learn about writing. Make sense? You know, I like to read about writing, everything from plotting journals to autobiographies of writers (and magazines, oodles of magazines). But in some ways, there is nothing like writing, and then…

The Life of a Writer in a Few Hundred Bulletted Words

Things I don’t particularly like about being a writer: Marketing Publicity Talking to people, especially answering questions on the spot (Crotchety!) Not getting paid for long periods of work Tweeting Distractions (from working at home) Not being taken seriously Self doubt Snooty writers and snooty critics Needing a GRE or 12 conferences in Hawaii Editors,…