RWA National: Not So Fast–Finding Success While Writing in the Slow Lane

Apparently I have a theme lately, and that’s how to function as a writer in a publishing world that seems to value speed over all. What happens when your natural process doesn’t seem to match the demands of the market? Bestselling authors Meredith Duran, Julie James, Sherry Thomas, and Lauren Willig discussed how being a slower writer affects their process and their careers. The...
read more

A Look Back

As usual, I began 2013 with all kinds of positive energy and ended up limping to the finish line. It wasn’t a failure of a year, but I didn’t take the world by storm, either (not that it was on my list). As a teacher, I’m always asking my students to reflect on their work so that they can chart a pathway to improvement. In that spirit, here’s how 2013 went for me: GREAT...
read more

Dear Manuscript: It’s Not You, It’s Me

This was a painful week, one that had been brewing for longer than I’ve been willing to admit. This week, I broke up with the baseball book. I love so many elements about this story: a heroine finding herself after a painful divorce, a couple of excellent sidekicks, a hunky guy who restores houses, and baseball (of course). It was a NaNoWriMo book that I enjoyed drafting. The revising? Not...
read more

Just a Few Notes…

Revision time! My notes arrived from Dream Agent (Longest. Email. Ever.), so now I need to revise. Which is fine. I like revising. Really! The notes themselves aren’t that awful. Fixes here and there that several sets of sharp eyes managed to catch. Validation of nagging worries that I tried to ignore, but which kept creeping in. A roadmap for some progress. Little things. Really! Not at all...
read more

RWA National: Homework

Met with Dream Agent yesterday for our one-on-one. Thursday’s agency get-together in the Film Center Café was interesting and instructive (how often do you get to talk with agency folk and authors about agent-author relationships, etc.?), but this meeting was the meat of my week at RWA National. I sit down at our teeny table at the bar, and Dream Agent pulls out the longest email I have ever...
read more