As most of you know, I turned my manuscript in early (yay me!) with all of the edits from my editorial letter except one completed. I detailed what I had done in the email, explained why I’d chosen not to do the last small thing (I’m saving it for the next book), and sent it […]
Writing a Series
As most of you know, the last few weeks I’ve been researching series writing as a way to get my head around not only my next book (no. 2 in a series), but also the next however many I get to write with this world and characters. As a reader I hate the series that […]
Promotion Tricks I Learned From DragonCon
Monkey see, monkey do. Or, more accurately, when a human sees someone failing, the human tries something different. The human sees someone succeeding, then he/she does exactly the same thing. Our ability to learn from the examples of others can get us in trouble sometimes, as we all stampede towards a particular stock or children’s […]
A Big Sigh of Relief
For those who’ve been following the blog, I’ve been very quiet lately. This is for three reasons: one, I was heads down working on revisions for my new deadline, and two, this takes up a lot of time. I also had jury duty this month, which in my county is surprisingly involved, and I visited […]
Focus
Writing is the interesting process of getting the unconscious and the creative parts of your brain to do work. This often involves silencing the (also essential) editing part of the brain until the words are on paper, and yet making this section you’re writing fit nicely with the rest of the story, and making it […]
Heads Down Editing
Since I haven’t updated the blog in a couple of weeks, I thought I’d drop in and let you know how the editing process is going. It’s been a lot like pushing a heavy-laden wheelbarrow up a slope; tough at first, but as I go on it’s building momentum and I’m figuring out where to […]
What is Good Fiction?
Ever since I’ve gotten back from Odyssey, I’ve been struggling with how to integrate their teaching with my own system of fiction. Since the system I wrote under originally sold two books for me, I wanted to hold onto it. But the central principles of Odyssey kept echoing in my brain, so that when I […]
Editorial Letter
On Monday I received my editorial letter, that lovely document from an editor where they tell you what they’d like from your book in revision. Since I’d heard a lot of horror stories from other writers, I was nervous going into it. I had mentally prepared myself for anything from a major gut of the […]
Stuck on Plot? Look at It Like a Child
One of my writer friends recently asked me a question. “How do you plot?” she asked. “I keep getting stuck in the details and can’t pull it together.” I suggested she tell the story like she would to a five-year-old child, in broad terms and without going into a lot of detail. Stick to what […]
Impossible Things Before Breakfast: Or, the Mindset of the Writer of Fiction
To be a writer of fiction, you must believe in several impossible things before breakfast. You must believe in people who never lived, places that never existed, and series of events that never happened. This is the easy part. What is harder is seeing these made-up things clearly, so clearly that you can describe them […]
