When I was a small child, it didn’t take me long to realize music could be used to tell powerful stories. I’d pop on a 78 record and listen till my parents would cry. I listened to songs like: “Blue Tail Fly” or “Jimmy Crack Corn and I Don’t care,” “The Big Rock Canady Mountain,” “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star,”
Once you type “The End” on your marvelous, ground-breaking manuscript, all is not complete. You now need people to read and adore your book, and sing your story praises to the world. What you need is a book reviewer, someone who spends a great majority of their day just reading books and letting the world know if the book is a hit or a flop.
Do you remember Sister Maria from The Sound of Music? She sang a little song about having confidence before she plunged into the world of Captain Von Trapp and his seven motherless children. As she sang, she acknowledged her doubts and fears, but she didn’t chicken out or turn back.
Once upon a time, a critique partner told me I should put my manuscript in a box and place that box under my bed and never take it out. Imagine for a moment that you’re me. How would that make you feel in your mind and in your creative heart? Devastated, right? I wanted to slam down my manuscript and walk off the writing-playing field before the whistle blew, and not ever look back.
How many times have we read a book, or a short story, or a terrific blog post and thought to ourselves, “man, this is great. I wish I’d written it.” I do that all the time.
Please welcome author and book coach in training Carol Malone. Today she’s sharing her article regarding personal book coaching verses writer education found on the web. Enjoy! *** I’ve been doing a lot of editing lately,...
Happy New Year! Time for resolutions and goal setting. Time for me to freak out. I’ve always hated the words goal and resolution. Oh, I had them – the same every year: lose weight, save money, get out of debt. But I never thought about the plans, the schedules, the hard work it took to achieve those goals, so I bailed and failed and told myself that it was better not to have goals so I could save myself from anxiety and disappointment.
In my weekly live #askaWritingCoach chat this week, Carol Malone and I chatted about tips for doing research for historical fiction. We also gave away prizes. Catharine gave away a copy of her novel, Fight Card...
All fiction genres have plots. A story needs a story-line, something that pushes the characters from page one to the end. When we look at a mystery, we want to see how the main character is going to solve the mystery and save themselves and probably their lover. In romance, the plot HAS to be driven by the romantic relationship of the hero and heroine and by the turning points in their romantic relationship.
It’s been a long standing tradition that writing contests are not only good for finding those story jewels ready to be published, but they serve as a great platform for feedback even if the author doesn’t win the contest.
When I started writing years ago, I would have given anything for the opportunity to have a professional in the writing world take a look at my story, tell me I was brilliant. I was so thrilled to give my story to family and friends and then hurt and disappointed when they either didn’t finish reading it or dodged me when I asked them if they liked it.
Why do we let failure identify us? Why do we not realize that adversity, burdens, writer’s block, etc. are just isolated events from which we can recover? Sometimes we let failure define who we are, making us believe we’re actually … A failure!
Carol Malone and I will be chatting live today at 2pm PT/5pm ET. We’ll chat #nanowrimo, the creative flow, and answer questions about writing, marketing, and publishing your novels. Please join us live here:...
My friends and associates will always start a conversation with me something like this, “So how’s your writing coming?” or my fav, “When are you gonna publish your next book?”
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