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“Man is born as a freak of nature, being within nature and yet transcending it….The human being would indeed go mad if he did not find a frame of reference which permitted him to feel at home in the world in some form and to escape the experience of utter helplessness, disorientation, and uprootedness. There […]

I joined the Chapin Chamber of Commerce this week. I used to belong to it, but they weren’t very receptive to folks who worked from home and had no brick and mortar storefront. Very old school. Well, four years later, two years of COVID later, and two chamber CEO’s later, they are welcoming everyone with […]

A small local coffee shop advertised an author signing. Since I had to be in the area, I attended, to make a fellow author feel better. Having sat in that chair and been through that stress, I vowed to buy a book, regardless how good or bad it was. After all, it takes guts to […]

Recently, the president of Freelancers Union said that one of the biggest challenges for freelancers is “getting paid on time, if not getting paid at all,” noting that the majority of freelancers get stiffed by their clients from time to time! That was me once, but let’s cut to the happy ending because I don’t […]

Serialized fiction is a story told in parts and unveiled in installments over a period of time. Think of a television show where a new episode is released each week, just instead with a story and a new chapter published each week.  This concept has been around for nearly two centuries.  Charles Dickens kicked off […]

I can’t teach you a surefire way to earn money as a writer, but I can offer you hope, assuming you’re willing to work hard and put yourself out there. This is my story. The income that accompanies my journey starts at zero, goes up to $150,000 at its peak, and then back to zero […]

Some of us are more logical in our writing, the thrill of publishing sitting on our shoulder like the devil, pushing us to make the words earn their keep. Others of us are more spiritual, the joy of creating our only drive, with publishing not a worry. The grand majority of us fall on the […]

How many times have you visited a website only to discover it had not been updated in six months or even a year? How is a reader supposed to know you’re still writing if you don’t refresh your pages now and again? The mere existence of a website doesn’t cut the mustard with an eager […]

The number of classes, appearances, books, and podcasts for writers boggles the mind. It almost feels like teaching writers makes more money than actually doing it. Out of curiosity, I briefly study most of those opportunities that come across my desktop, and, believe me, I’m on a lot of mailing lists. If they appear interesting, […]

We all know the benefits to donating our time and money: warm fuzzies, tax write-offs,  the gratifying sense of purpose and general knowledge that we’re helping others and making the world a better place. But in donating, when do we as writers sell ourselves short and where do we draw the line? When is charity […]

(Read Parts 1 and 2 of this three-part series online.) 3: Production and publication With the book hitting its crowdfunding target, it was time to look at production and publication. We had a fantastic copyeditor, Hayley, who carried out what Unbound called a developmental edit. She spotted lots of errors, some quite structural, and did […]

You may not realize it, but I wrote the chapter “How Much Should I Charge?” in the 2022 Writer’s Market this year. It was a humongous assignment, and until I did the research, I didn’t realize how much had changed in the last five years as well as mid- and post-COVID. Freelancers are very much alive and […]