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Pitch Prep: What Makes a Great First Page?

January 5, 2012 Writing Stuff
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It was a dark and stormy blog post.  *snicker* We’re continuing to prepare for the January 10-16th Pitch Your Shorts pitch session by tackling the issue of story openings.  (Check out Tuesday’s post for everything there is to know about pitching.) While the purpose of a pitch is to get a request, the purpose of a story’s [...]

Tagged as: advice for writers, Edittorrent, feedback, information dump, Jami Gold, Janice Hardy, page turning stories, paranormal author, pitch session, story openings, tension

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How to Force a Story to Evolve: 6 Revision Tips

December 27, 2011 Writing Stuff
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*Quick Reminder: Don’t forget the Pitch Your Shorts pitch session coming January 10th.  Get your 10-60K stories ready.  More details to come.* I hope everyone is having a wonderful holiday season, no matter what holidays you celebrate.  While I’m enjoying some time with my family, I’ll share this post originally written as a guest post for [...]

Tagged as: advice for writers, character flaws, editing, feedback, Jami Gold, paranormal author, point-of-view, theme

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Are All Cheap Ebooks Crap?

December 20, 2011 Random Musings
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In my last post, I asked how much people would be willing to pay for ebooks.  Most comments agreed with my thoughts: Ebooks should be less expensive than paper books because of DRM, ownership, quality, and physicality issues.  What surprised me, however, was the number of people turned off by $0.99 ebooks. The comment section [...]

Tagged as: advice for writers, authors, branding, ebooks, ereader, feedback, Jami Gold, Kindle, paranormal author, self-publishing, social media, story openings

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The Best Reason to Blog – Part 2

November 24, 2011 Random Musings
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Today is Thanksgiving in the U.S.  The day we eat too much food, roll our eyes at the antics of our extended family, and think about all the things we’re grateful for.  Or in my case, wait for the tryptophan to kick in from the turkey so I can catch up on sleep. Last year [...]

Tagged as: blogging, deadlines, feedback, happiness, Jami Gold, paranormal author, RWA, social media, Twitter, writing contests

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What Comes After a First Draft?

September 20, 2011 Writing Stuff
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Last week, we talked about how stories change from the initial story seed to the first draft.  Then it dawned on me that I’ve experienced that same evolution between a first draft and a finished draft, where so much changed that I hardly recognized the original story any more. For fun, I’ve used Microsoft Word’s Compare [...]

Tagged as: advice for writers, editing, feedback, guest blogs, Jami Gold, paranormal author, perfectionism, story seed, theme

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Where Do You Get Your Ideas?

September 15, 2011 Writing Stuff
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Artists of every type find inspiration all around them, and writers are no exception.  Ideas might come in the form of a dream, a “what if” question, an overheard conversation, etc. Those are all fairly normal sources of inspiration.  Personally, I’ve been inspired by dreams, “what if”s, an 80′s music video, a mutation of another [...]

Tagged as: feedback, Jami Gold, Jami is insane, listening to characters, muse, page turning stories, paranormal author, romance novels, story openings, story seed

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What’s the Hardest Scene You’ve Ever Written?

September 1, 2011 Writing Stuff
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(Note: I am not Tawna Fenske, so that title is not a euphemism for anything.  Sorry.  However, this post might include a reference to a shower scene of one woman with two guys.  Or not.) I mentioned last time that one day of the weekend was taken up by writing-related stuff.  What I didn’t mention [...]

Tagged as: advice for writers, feedback, Jami Gold, Jami is insane, listening to characters, muse, paranormal author, plotter vs. pantser, risk, romance novels

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Do You Write for Yourself or Your Readers?

August 25, 2011 Writing Stuff
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Many writers, especially new ones, talk about how they write for themselves.  When we first start out, we might not know if we’ll even be able to finish the project, so it makes sense that we’re writing for ourselves. We want to get this story out of our head.  We want to see if we can write [...]

Tagged as: advice for writers, authors, beta reader, critique partners/groups, dreams, editing, feedback, Jami Gold, page turning stories, paranormal author, perfectionism

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A Rating System for Books, Part Two: How Can We Include Context?

August 2, 2011 Random Musings
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Thanks once again to all who responded to my last blog post about whether books should have a rating system.  And I say that not just because I didn’t need my flame-proof jacket.  *smile* Many shared thoughtful ideas here on my blog, Google+, and Twitter that helped me refine my opinion.  If you haven’t read that article [...]

Tagged as: antagonist, beta reader, book ratings, feedback, head-hopping, Jami Gold, omniscient, paranormal author, point-of-view, romance novels, Twitter

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What’s Your Blogging Style?

July 21, 2011 Writing Stuff
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Last week, Cheryl Reif asked the question on her blog:  Short or Long? Which Way to Post…  She wondered if people preferred reading blog posts that weighed in at the “recommended” 300 words, or if people enjoyed longer posts. Anyone who reads my blog knows I don’t follow the 300 word formula.  *cough*  In fact, [...]

Tagged as: advice for writers, beta reader, blog hop, blogging, branding, feedback, Harry Potter, Jami Gold, paranormal author

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