Hugh Howey: The Publishing World is Changing. How Can You Keep Up? Novelists, Inc. Conference Day 2, St. Pete Beach Oct. 2014 Hugh Howey began his presentation by showing slides on “A history of storytelling.” The order goes this way: Oral tradition Written tradition The first cubicle workers, i.e. monks transcribing by hand Movable type … Read more
Your experiences and travels provide fodder for future works and should be recorded. When I wrote travel journals years ago, little did I realize that I’d be mining those notes decades later for my Drift Lords series. I’d been to Hong Kong in 1978. Yet today, many of the sights, sounds, and sensory impressions remain … Read more
How long does it take to prepare for a conference? Soon I’ll be heading to SleuthFest in February, Lake County BookFest in March, Malice Domestic in April, the Florida Library Association Convention in May, and Mystery Writers Key West Fest in June. It can take me several weeks to get ready for each event and … Read more
Are you procrastinating about your writing career because distractions take you away from your work? Do self-doubts inhibit you? Are you unsure how to get started? Do you take too much time rereading your work and never moving ahead? Assuming you’ve created your characters and setting, follow these steps: Write a complete synopsis of your … Read more
Word choices are important when creating mood. Next time you read a scary story, look at the particular descriptive words the author uses. It takes work to get these right. Now let’s see how I put this to work for me. Here is my original paragraph: Outside, I locked up and then turned toward the … Read more
How do you balance writing with online promotion? Marketing efforts take hours on the Internet. How can you keep up with tweets, Facebook posts, Pinterest, and more? It’s not easy to strike a balance. Often the marketing tasks take over. But here are my Four Rules to guide you. (1) Writing Comes First. Set yourself … Read more
Florida Romance Writers was lucky to have Columnist Barbara Vey from Publishers Weekly speak to us about What Readers Want. Basically, they want authors to be polite and respectful toward them. They want their expectations to be met. And they want to know if you’ve reissued a book they might already have. Readers may be … Read more
I am involved in my own revisions for Warrior Lord, book #3 in the Drift Lords series. This means two read-throughs. The first round is for line editing and catching repetitions. The second round is to read for smoothness, final word tweaks, and consistency. Then I’ll send it in to my editor. When I get … Read more
Newbie writers often ask, how do you know when to stop revising and send in the work? There’s no easy answer as each of us goes through our own self-editing process. Revisions are never done. Every time you read through your work, more things pop up to fix. So when should you quit? When the … Read more
Necronomicon was the first SciFi/Fantasy convention I’ve attended. In many ways, it’s similar to a mystery conference. There were more men than at a romance con. The panels were professional and moderated by a host. Aspiring authors attended in abundance. However, here’s the biggest difference: Gamers. One darkened breakout room held 3 rows of computers … Read more