How to get your WIP (Work In Progress) in shape… or, you aren’t done when your think you’re done! Too many new independent authors finish their first draft and immediately publish it on KDP or Smashwords. That’s not a great idea. Books typically go through multiple levels of review and revision before they’re ready to…
Category: Blog
Writing Retreats are Back
I’m just winding down from my first in-person writing retreat in what seems like fifty years. This one was within driving distance of my home in Milwaukee, was small (14 people) and affordable and I have to tell you, it reminded me of all the reasons I’m such a conference junkie. Yes, I’m that person…
Congratulations to our 2021 Writers of the Year!
Sue Hinkin – Traditional Writer of the Year Originally from Chicago, Sue Hinkin is a former television news photographer, NBC-TV Art Department manager, as well as a college teacher and administrator. A Cinematography graduate of the American Film Institute in Los Angeles, she now lives in Littleton, Colorado where she is a new grandmother of twin girls….
Don’t Toss Those Writing Fragments!
You’ve got them lying around somewhere, don’t you—one- or two-page writing scraps that you dashed off at some point? Maybe they were character sketches you wrote while working through a how-to book on characterization. Or maybe they’re tucked into a notebook you used at that last workshop you attended, where the instructor had you do…
Travel Journaling
There’s something about traveling that sharpens my writing perspective. In a new place, my thoughts feel unbound, sniffing out every possibility like a dog that’s slipped its collar. In these moments I find unexpected clarity about nearly every aspect of my life, from careers to relationships to plot lines, and from realizations ranging from the…