Isn’t it funny how you can read another writer’s story and say, “Wow, how unoriginal. That’s been done a hundred times before,” but somehow totally overlook it when it’s your own work? I went looking through some of my unpublished or unfinished horror stories the other day and realized that one of them was basically […]
10 “Platform Building” Things You Can Do When You’ve Caught Writers Block
It happens to the best of us. You brew a pot of coffee, pick out the most appropriate music for the mood, open up your laptop and put your fingers on the keyboard. And then…nothing. You wait a minute or two, maybe fiddle around with the wording of a couple of paragraphs from a work-in-progress, but […]
Five Links Friday – Friday the 13th Edition
It’s not only Friday, but it’s Friday the 13! So the celebrate the awesomeness of the day, here is Five Links Friday: The Friday the 13th Edition, where all of the links are related to writing horror. 1. Let’s start with 3 Reasons You Should Write Ghost Stories by Joe Bunting at The Write Practice. I think […]
Your first draft sucks, but revising it doesn’t have to
“The End” Maybe you’ve waited to type those word for thirty days in November, or maybe you’ve been waiting for several years, adding words to your novel whenever you could find a spare minute. Either way, you’ve finally completed your first novel. You call your friends and update your Facebook status and your non-writer friends […]
Choosing A Pay Scale For Your Short Story
There is a lot to consider when looking at markets to submit your short stories to. From small press print anthologies, to major literary magazines, to niche ezines with limited traffic, a new writer hoping to score some publishing credits has nearly unlimited options. With this post, I want to look primarily how much to […]
Five Links Friday 2/6/15
Hey, I crawled out from under the mountains of snow to gather up the best blog posts and articles I read this week about writing. Happy Five Links Friday! Read and Enjoy… 1. While not my genre, Romance University has a great article about dealing with rejection in your writing. Check out Dealing with Rejection […]
5 Steps to Writing and Selling Your First Short Story
One of the reasons I put off writing fiction for as long as I did was that I really had no clear idea of how to start. That might sound a bit foolish, but I honestly felt that if I had no means of publishing my fiction, then writing was basically a waste of time. […]
Don’t Be Afraid of Critique Groups
As new writers, we all experience the fear of rejection. Not from publishers and editors, but from friends and family. Nothing strikes more fear into the heart of an aspiring writer than the idea of a loved one handing you back your manuscript with a timid grin, saying, “It’s, uh, good.” Somehow it’s easier to […]