What is Writing Success?

Authors and Books, The Business of Writing, The Craft of Writing, The Writer's Life

As I was wrapping up the Story Camp Women’s Writing Retreat, prepping for the arrival of the Fiction Among Friends writers in the next retreat, and hustling to complete my blog post for this week, my friend author Rhett DeVane shared the following with me. Though I...

Query Letter Essentials

The Business of Writing

The query letter is effectively your written pitch to an editor or agent, enticing them to read or request your work. It is your first shot at gaining and, more importantly, HOLDING the editor’s/agent’s attention! Keep it simple. I’d use the KISS anagram, but I hate...

5 Free Marketing Tools for Authors

The Business of Writing

by Shannon Bell Authors, especially when starting out, don’t have huge marketing budgets. What money we do have, we want to hold onto. Whether you have a traditional publisher or go indie, marketing your book is still up to you. This means you need to try to use the...

Is Post-Publication “Depression” Real?

The Business of Writing, The Writer's Life

Culling my files recently for idea-notes, I came across an unpublished article that I wrote nearly three years ago. In our last blog post (My Book, My Daughter), artist and author Licia Berry shared her story of nearly abandoning her book after publication, so I was...

My Book, My Daughter

Authors and Books, The Business of Writing, The Writer's Life

It isn’t unusual for artists and writers—even experienced and successful ones—to pour heart and soul into a precious creative project, seeing it nearly to completion, only to abandon it. Have you done that before? This week, artist, author, and speaker Licia...

A Writing Event Right for You – Part 3 of 3

The Business of Writing, The Craft of Writing, The Writer's Life

Nothing matches a writing retreat as an immersive experience to focus on your writing and on you, the writer. My participation in several retreats this month has been the inspiration for our series here on workshops (Part 1), conferences (Part 2), and writing...