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I received a LinkedIn notification of a book release, from a man I respect. The premise was intelligent, and I perceived the plot to be in-depth and a challenge, which thoroughly tempted me. The problem was: 1. About six other authors I already read have books out. Some were released the end of 2021, some just coming out, some due out in the next couple of months. 2. I belong to a book club, and that’s about ten books I’m obligated to read. 3. I have a dozen books to be read on my nightstand that I seriously want to read and digest to groom my own genre. 4. That doesn’t count the bookcase in my bedroom that holds the secondary TBR (to be read) stack that I’ve hoarded for a couple years. Books I refuse to give away because they showed a crazy amount of entertaining promise. So, here is a book I want to read. I suspect it falls into the bookcase category in terms of priority, which pains me, because I want to read it now. I just can’t because of the others that hold MORE promise to me, or that I’m more obligated to read. Which means More

“Having the freedom to read and the freedom to choose is one of the best gifts my parents ever gave me.” ― Judy Blume, bestselling children’s author Book banning is back in vogue. I don’t care which politics people adhere to or whether or not they have children, but I am not fond of book banning. Years ago, every six weeks when my children received report cards, I took them to the bookstore where they were allowed to buy whatever book they wished. I did not care if it was age appropriate. I did not care if it had a warning on the cover. I did not care if the person at the register looked sideways at me for allowing my children to read something that might lean too adult. Why? Because the rule was whatever book my sons purchased,  I would be reading it, too, and they had to be willing to discuss it with me. I want the liberty to read anything. I want the liberty to try and understand why other people think differently. I want to read about worlds I probably won’t enter, or read about the ones I may be faced with some day. I want More

“Sorry, but we’re in crisis mode over here. Everything nonessential is getting cut. But call us when this COVID thing is over.” Just like that, my two-year university contract doing international education strategy development vanished. Worse still, my consulting business appeared to be sliding straight toward a cliff. Higher education was on the skids, and my source of income had flatlined. Could I wait this out, or was it time to cut bait? In March 2020, no one knew how things would play out. What I did know is that I was 62 with no evident skill set that I could, in a pinch, or a pandemic, leverage to generate revenue. My background included a PhD in political science and a lackluster academic career that I had left 15 years earlier to run an educational foundation, which I then parlayed into consulting work in international education. But with existing gigs evaporating and universities concerned for their survival, the prospect of hustling new clients looked bleak, not to mention exhausting. It was time to move on. I just needed to find a talent that I could monetize, was good at, could do anywhere, and was in demand. Being late in life More

The point is to learn how to write anything book-length, and the first one you write, actually reaching THE END, may need to be your trial run. You really need to see if you can do this first, and that book, with all its warts and scabs, could show more of your flaws that you care to reveal. Most successful writers have a novel that didn’t get published. “I wrote two books with this poet character, neither of which was published, but the important thing is it taught me I could write a book. Maybe not a publishable book, but a book with a beginning, middle, and end. …I (learned I) love being in the middle of novel and knowing where I’m going next. Taking that long path.” ~Peter Swanson, the Sunday Times and New York Times best-selling author of eight novels, including The Kind Worth Killing, winner of the New England Society Book Award, and his most recent, Nine Lives. Peter Swanson, in an interview with CrimeReads.com (https://crimereads.com/shop-talk-peter-swanson-on-why-hell-never-outline-a-mystery-novel-again/), now can write for a living. His first two novels, mysteries about a poet, landed him an agent then a publisher. Then both quit their jobs and left him with nothing. More

After enduring 21 Covid months cringing through virtual events, the experience boils down into a secret sauce for going pro when going on camera. Shifting a virtual event from the level of suck to success is a skill every author needs since virtual connections increase opportunities for professional exposure and more book sales. Seven easy (and cheap) tips can shift you from novice to pro. Camera Positioning: Eye-to-Eye Position the camera just like real-life communications at eye level. Looking people directly in the eye is the most personal connection in life. The camera is the viewer’s eyeballs. A laptop camera on the desk shows your nostrils; a camera set on top of a monitor is a recipe for neck strain. Set the laptop on books or platform with the camera perpendicular to the keyboard and even with the eye. Put the camera in front of the monitor at eye level. Look in the Camera Lens It’s tempting to look at the screen when participating in a virtual event. When answering a question in real life, look at the questioner. In a virtual event, the question comes from the speaker on the other side of the lens, not the monitor. It’s More

Earlier this year I lost another family member. At the funeral, I caught myself giving more attention to the impact this person had on other people, and how it’s not about how they died but how they lived. Yeah, maybe trite and cliché, but the shift from mourning to celebration mattered to me. To pine too much over the loss is to deny them recognition for what they donated in life. As writers, we hope to have donated something to be remembered. That revelation took me home to tweak my own plans for when I’m gone. While losing someone is a burden on whomever is left behind to take care of affairs, methods can be used to lighten the load. I already had a will, and my intellectual property is specifically mentioned in it and handled separately from other assets, but I refined my plans. Hopefully, these ideas can help you. 1) Make sure someone you trust is in charge, and while you are still around, hold conversations with them so there is no doubt what you’d like to happen. Their questions might tell you what you forgot to cover. 2) Plan for your intellectual property specifically, on its own. More

When I started my writing career, I maintained my corporate job, which offered me the stability I needed after surviving leukemia and the respite of part-time work during my long convalescence. I took a very business-like approach to jumpstart my writing life. Find feedback fast Corporations invest in intensive employee feedback to help people grow fast and produce better results. Employees can be more efficient only when they know how to leverage their strengths and mitigate their weaknesses. As a lifelong self-doubter, that kind of feedback helped me grow into managerial roles in the corporate world in less than two years. Naturally, I wanted feedback on my writing to grow just as quickly. I found NYC Midnight, a series of writing challenges with prompts, tight turnaround times, and feedback from judges in the film, publishing, and literary industries. With this method, I produced at least two pieces of writing for each contest, which cost me far less than what a professional critique would have for one short story. It also forced me to commit and create a portfolio of good work in short spurts. I didn’t win any of the competitions, but I came away with constructive feedback that might have More

The more someone else can write your piece, the less valuable it is. I receive many submissions for FundsforWriters, and the majority of them can be written by almost anyone. How to write for parenting magazines, how to schedule your writing day, what makes for a successful writer. The advice could be copied and pasted from multiple places on the web because they are so generic. That’s why we ask that the piece be full of anecdotes (first-hand experience) and ingenuity (unique snippets of advice not seen elsewhere). You’d be amazed at how many people think that nailing the word count qualifies the piece. You’d also be amazed at how many people ignore the word count, period. But what will reject a piece just as quickly as lack of attention to word count, is being common and submitting a piece, the likes of which can be found on every writing mill and blog on the Internet. Whether talking about an article to FundsforWriters or a novel to a traditional press, the bottom line is if someone else could write something similar to yours, it’s worth less. The world wants originality and freshness. Whether a publisher, agent, magazine editor, or editor of More

Memoirs and legacy books have never been more popular. It is natural to want to memorialize oneself, to create a written portrait of one’s life to pass down to children and grandchildren, or to publish one’s story as a lesson from which others can learn. However, not everyone who wishes to tell their personal story has the ability to write, and many who do need help shaping their stories or sharpening their words. Writing and editing memoirs and legacy projects can add to a professional freelancer’s income stream. Ghost Writing Memoirs For writers with a strong resume, ghost-writing the memoir of a celebrity can be quite lucrative. A celebrity’s name can sell books, but that doesn’t mean they can write them. Some ghostwriters work independently, others work for companies like Kevin Anderson & Associates. But most clients will be like mine. Deborah Nelson wished to write about losing her daughter in a tragic incident and how her own life spiraled into a “black hole” afterward. She had several false starts, a journal she’d kept, newspaper articles, some notes; but she didn’t know how to pull it all together. She sent me her materials and, after several phone conversations and numerous More

It’s a familiar feeling for the writer. Once he or she has finished a manuscript, essay or book of poems there is a sigh of relief and a feeling of satisfaction for a job well done. The writer puts the work aside for a bit, then takes it out again and starts the editing process. Changes, additions, revisions—constant polishing until it is “perfect.” The writer is now ready to release their work into the world. Their baby, their treasured piece, goes into the hands of a select few beta readers. A warm feeling ensues until the comments start to come in. “I liked it but I’d change this part.” “Did you know you repeated yourself?” “That sounds dated. I’d change it to this.” “Overall, it’s a good story but I think it could be better.” I’ve had these reactions to my work. And after many decades of writing I’ve concluded that my primary emotion should be one of gratefulness. Gratitude that someone took the time to read my work and had the courage to make suggestions for improvement. They saw the flaws, the holes and the areas to be fixed and were willing to speak up and to tell me More