Tag Archives: Writing

My head is still spinning. Hidden Traps is OUT!

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It’s been two weeks since my nonfiction book Hidden Traps was released, but I haven’t had a chance to breathe. The lead up to release was filled with preparation of supplementary materials and handouts, guest blog posts, and interviews for radio and video broadcasts. On release day, I ran my first webinar. This weekend, I’m presenting at the RWNZ conference on this topic.

OMG, IT’S THIS WEEKEND!

There’s so much to do, and this is on top of my normal schedule. What exactly have I gotten myself into?

Let’s take a step back and look at where this book started and the steps along the way.

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Aspiring Writer: The Sequel

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In a post last year, I spoke about the term aspiring writer and how it’s a term that I dislike. Back then, I had this wonderful circular argument about how if you write, then you are a writer — no aspiring about it. Regardless, I still see an insane number of people who insist on calling themselves aspiring writers.

Back when that original post first came out, someone had commented on one of my Facebook discussion groups that the term writer referred to a person who was paid to write.

To be fair, the term applies to people who want to make a career out of writing. Writer is a professional term.

You have no idea how much my skin crawls at this concept. Clearly, my arguments using the definitions in Merrian-Webster were insufficient to get my point across. Perhaps the Oxford English Dictionary might sway the ideas. So here goes.Read More→

Manuscript is too long, so split it… NOT!!!

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I have lost count of the number of times that someone has told me that I should take my long manuscript and split it into two (or three) and call it done. This particular conversation comes up every single time I mention to anyone how long my manuscript is, and it’s actually not outrageously long — it just happens to be over 100,000 words. But let’s face it, my work is high fantasy, and I would struggle to think of any high fantasy novel that wasn’t over 100,000 words (a high fantasy intended for adult audiences).Read More→

Ghostwriting: I won’t do it…

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Recently, I was approached by someone to become a ghostwriter for their adult thriller novel. Mixed emotions ran through my system. The initial inquiry was heartfelt with a story of a friend who had recently passed away, resulting in the writer struggling to get her mojo back. I did sympathize, but the fundamental tenants behind ghostwriting to me are just wrong.Read More→

There is no such thing as an aspiring writer…

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There is a term that I have seen bandied around in the bios of various writers, and it’s a term that I don’t like: aspiring writer.

What I don’t understand is how one can aspire to be a writer. You can aspire to be an author. You can aspire to quit your day job to become a full-time writer. You can aspire to share your writing with the world. But aspire to be a writer?Read More→