For the first, oh, decade or so of my writing career, I thought my writing was pretty good. So I didn’t understand why magazine editors found it necessary to take my perfectly serviceable sentences and render them “less interesting.” That …
Writing Craft
Top Ten Ways to Declutter Your Writer Brain
blogger: Cynthia Ruchti
Are these THE Top Ten ways to declutter your writer brain? More accurately, they are a few of the ways. But that would have made the title too long and not great for search engine optimization. (SEO–We …
Promised Yourself Last Summer
We’re on the cusp of another summer. In parts of our country, that means the grills are being uncovered after a long winter’s hiatus. In other parts, the grills are being pulled back under the pergola for a little …
Five Flagrant Fiction Flubs
When I read fiction for pleasure I strive to turn off the “internal editor” as I read, but lately I’ve come across a number of glaring mistakes that pull me right out of the story. Let me address five of …
The Laugh-Cry Formula for Writing
Long ago and far away, I was employed by a non-profit that had developed a large publications department. We produced everything imaginable in print, including books for all age groups and a magazine with millions of readers. While working there, …
How Many Words?
A couple of years ago I ordered the bundled ebook of A Game of Thrones. It weighed in at 3936 pages! I’m just thankful I don’t have to lift the book in order to read it. We all hear …
Too Fast?
By Wendy Lawton
Anyone who is trying to build a career as a writer knows that making a living in the early years is an almost impossible challenge. But when a writer has sold a couple of books and had …
Tidying Up Your Grammar
By Janet Kobobel Grant
I’ve been editing in one capacity or another all of my adult life. Why, I just finished editing my grandson’s résumé for his first job out of college. And I’ve edited all sorts of work-related documents, …
Quick Character Labels
By Wendy Lawton
I was reading a fiction manuscript last week that quickly described a character as a cripple. I winced when I read the word and stopped to think about why I had such an immediate revulsion. After all, …
A Manuscript’s Death Knell
by Janet Kobobel Grant
I’ve previously extolled the benefits for me in reading Publishers Weekly. Each issue I peruse provides me with some insight or confirms I’m correct (or that I’m incorrect) about some aspect of publishing. Because publishing is …