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There isn’t a better compliment on the planet than this. I was at a book signing, having just spoken to attendees about how I got to where I was with writing, and how I put some of my stories together. We got to the end, when folks bought books and came up to speak, and […]

When my youngest of three children started kindergarten, I returned to teaching English at the community college after a ten-year hiatus. I became so disillusioned with problems in the classroom (students texting under desktops and aggressively asking me to alter their grades), I decided instead to teach adults who were in love with writing. I […]

I received an email from someone with CAPS and exclamation points about a FundsforWriters sponsor charging for her services. The promotion promised the customer would attend and walk away with a pitchable submission. The reader was upset the promoter neglected to say in that sentence you had to pay $20 per month for the experience. […]

An indispensable tool, the back-of-the-book index enables nonfiction readers to find information efficiently and quickly. Writing those indexes offers another income opportunity for freelancers. As a lover of nonfiction, I decided to add indexing to my freelance writing and copy-editing business. What better way to spend my time than going through a biography or how-to […]

I am so tired of book banning being designated a political tool. A Republican or Democratic thing. And I wish book banning wasn’t painted with such a broad brush, as if banning a book applies to every venue across the nation, or in many cases, across a state. Book banning is a phrase now used […]

Winning a writing contest can be an affirmation that a writer is talented, but to those that write, enter, and lose, losing can be disheartening and make a writer question their ability and talent. Surprisingly, however, a losing entry can be a boost to your writing income, especially if you challenge yourself to enter contests […]

I’ve had two inquiries of late about how to pitch a column for a newspaper. Everyone wants to know the right way to approach an editor, and I offered several suggestions. 1) Offer a piece to the paper, stroking them that you felt this piece fit them exactly, and you wanted to contribute to your […]

I began my full-time writing career a few months before having my baby, and that new parental perspective helped provide the inspiration for many articles. I write nonfiction in the form of reported articles on everything from health to travel, but also more personal opinion pieces where I share my view on the world. As […]

Publishers are struggling to get ahead of AI, artificial intelligence, and its impact on what is being published and by whom. They want to continue publishing to be done BY WHOM not BY WHAT. I just ran across this post from Candlemark & Gleam, a publisher of speculative fiction, which gives you an idea of what […]

“Hi, I’m Rod, where are you from?” Ok, I admit, it sounds like a cheesy one-liner, but seriously, where are you from? As authors, we are constantly seeking the next idea, the idea that might turn into a sellable book or article, the idea that just may put our names on the lips of readers […]

In my research for FundsforWriters, I was studying contests and grants. I don’t often talk about the winners of these funds because that would take twice the size of the newsletter that’s already pretty long, but a particular one had shown a snipper of one of the winners, and it drew me in. I wound […]

Not long ago, a local literacy group asked multiple authors to appear with their books and promote literacy. They met at a library. They announced it in a few places, but it had little success. The leader sent out an email to attendees and whomever else he knew in his literary community asking for advice […]