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Writing Stuff

How Much More Do You Have to Learn?

Penrose never-ending stairs optical illusion from the movie Inception

In my last post, I lamented how it’s hard for us to see our learning curve and know how much more we have yet to understand.  I wanted to know how close I was to that elusive “destination” of knowing everything I need to know about writing. *pshaw*  Silly me for […]

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April 7, 2011

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Would You Ever Turn Down a Contract?

Thumbs down

The comments for my last post were fantastic—thank you!  The range of opinions really got me to think deeper about the traditional vs. self publishing issue. Many people wrote in with circumstances for when self publishing works (and possibly works “better”).  Others noted situations where traditional publishing is the only […]

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March 31, 2011

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Are You Teachable?

Boy learning to ride a tricycle

Over the past six months, I’ve received feedback on my work from many sources—contest judges to beta readers.  A lot of them told me things I didn’t want to hear. It would have been very easy to get defensive and react along the lines of:  Didn’t they read it?  It’s […]

March 22, 2011

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Should Beta Readers Match Your Market?

Square peg in a round hole

Several months ago, I ran a post about what to look for in a critique partner.  One of the points I’d made was to evaluate whether a potential critique partner was familiar with our genre.  Only someone knowledgeable about our genre would know the expectations for pacing, character development, etc. […]

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March 10, 2011

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When Is Rejection a Good Thing?

Runner at starting block

I get a brief reprieve from the deadline cave this week while I wait for feedback from my awesome readers.  When I first sent my work out to them, I felt great.  This work was as good as I could make it. But going back to last week’s perfection posts […]

March 8, 2011

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A Perfectionist’s Guide to Editing: 4 Stages

Red funnel

Yes, I’m still under deadline, but an interesting issue came up in the comments on my last post about perfectionism.  Perfectionists tend to be nitpicky, no surprise there.  But there’s a time when that trait is very helpful, and a time when we need to ignore the compulsion to tweak. […]

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March 3, 2011

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What Creates Good Writing: Instinct vs. Skill

African Lion

I’m still in the deadline cave and self-banned from Twitter, but I wanted to post about something I’ve realized through this revision process. It’s probably safe to say we all want to get better at our jobs, whether that’s writing or something else.  But how much of what we do […]

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February 24, 2011

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The Truth about Writing Contests

Chess Faceoff

Opinionated statement alert: Every writer should volunteer to judge a writing contest.   And not simply for altruistic reasons.  No, we should do it because we can learn from reading others’ work, as it’s much easier to see mistakes in prose other than our own. My friend Anassa Rhenisch had […]

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February 17, 2011

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6 Techniques for Using Music to Help Our Muse

Girl with Headphones

Lately I’ve been struck by how similar music is to writing.  Both arts use a non-visual medium to create an emotion.  And often, just like writing, music is meant to create movies in our mind for a do-it-yourself music video. If you’ve ever watched a movie with the sound turned […]

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February 15, 2011

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