I was at a book signing recently and admitted to the person in line behind me that I was about a quarter of the way through writing my book. I should note here, she is also a writer. She immediately asked me what writing conferences I had
Read more →My tax guy said I should create a business identity that the money will go to (if I ever sell a book) rather than just my name. I don’t know whether that means I have to sign the agent contract with my “business” name or not. Generally
Read more →We now reach the third leg of the professional-writing stool: Business. At first glance, this doesn’t seem to have anything to do with the writing part of writing-as-a-profession. Business is all about the profession part, right? And logically, that means that writers who don’t care about “having
Read more →The elbow is not completely healed, but it is much better. I’m still not allowed to lift anything heavier than a coffee cup, but typing isn’t about lifting, so that’s all right. However, I’m planning to ease back into things – I’m going to be posting once
Read more →Deadlines. Some writers love them, some hate them, and some don’t seem able to finish anything unless they have one. And how many times have you heard someone say (not necessarily about writing) “I do my best work when I have a deadline to meet”? Around a
Read more →I was flipping channels yesterday and came across somebody – I think she was a life coach – giving advice to a thirty-something guy who said his dream was to become a writer. He had apparently given up (at least temporarily) when he didn’t make it into
Read more →It’s been over a year since my last post on query letters, and frankly, after writing four different posts on the topic, I didn’t think I had anything else to say. After all, the basics of query letter writing don’t change much, mainly because its purpose hasn’t
Read more →A while back, I got a deceptively simple question with an apparently obvious answer, all of which turn out to be neither so simple nor so obvious as they at first seemed. The question was, in essence, “What parts of your writing career can you talk about
Read more →Last Friday, Minnesota Public Radio reran a series of round-table shows in which they asked groups of people from various professions – teacher, musician, entrepreneur, doctor – what six things they wish they had known when they were starting out in their profession. Most of the answers
Read more →Writing isn’t any fun. At least, that is the impression I often get from listening to earnest young would-be and beginning writers discussing their work. There are all these decisions you have to make and things to pay attention to, from word choice to plot twists. It
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