Many books sell on the strength of their authors. Authors who are bestsellers have their names above any title, riding on the reputation and good regard for prior books. New authors can reach for this power too. It begins with your author's bio. That summary of your life is important for debut nonfiction writers, with […]
Help those author newsletters get read by including all four food groups of content. Education: How to do a task, explained in a thorough but concise way. It might be the way to write a summary of a chapter. (Maybe it's a list of the contents for writing a useful newsletter.) Information: "This event or […]
A quarter-million words is what you get if you're writing four sentences a day for eight years. The total might feel like the accomplishment of your life. A quarter-mil can also haunt you and taunt you, depending on how close you get to revisions. In the span of just three weeks, I consulted with two […]
Beta reading is the turbo-charger for revising a book. Finding a beta reader or three and delivering a good beta is not simple, but there are practices and rules that make this important task easier to accomplish. During my Workshop's in-person era, writers took on beta duties for each other, twenty pages at a time […]
PR can be costly, like anything that's essential to discovery. These are not the inexpensive moments like newsletter startups, or social media posting. Sure, you don't have to spend more money than you can risk. Publicity is a cousin of advertising, though. You might get nothing from the expenditure, except the tuition we all earn […]
By the time you read this, I’ll be pitching. This weekend the San Francisco Writers Conference returns to the City by the Bay. It’s more than three days of learning and networking, with dozens of experts teaching craft and business. Hundreds of us authors, though, will be there to do more than learn. We’re there […]
This Sunday starts a new challenge for National Novel Writing Month. Every November, untold novelists try to write 50,000 words in just 30 days. I've attempted this a dozen times since I started on novels in 2004. I have never written that many words in one month. However, even my failures taught me plenty. November […]
Photo by Bank Phrom on Unsplash It's the start of production season for an author whose book I've just edited. His collection of essays will be in print and might become a hardback, too. It's time for him to consider how he will manufacture his self-published indie book. I'm not calling what we're doing publishing […]
Journaling is a worthy element of the writing life. The material is right at hand, all those things that have happened to you. Or your journal might run to dreams and wishes, or deconstruct the events you've been witness to, yesterday or long ago. A journal though, no matter how carefully and faithfully kept, is […]
Writers dry up and falter all the time in their quest to create. One great process to keep words flowing into the big file is to have an outline at hand. It's like your writing to-do list. Saying the word outline makes some writers roll their eyes and sigh. Creating by the seat of your […]
