ThillerFest was busting at the seams with the industry’s legends and heavy hitters, including legendary names like Sandra Brown and this year’s Thriller Master Nelson DeMille, along with the creators of beloved famous characters like Rambo, Dr. Temperance Brennan, and Sookie Stackhouse. The four-day event was crammed to the brim with presentations, panels and author… Read more »
I just read Playing the Short Game, by Doug Smith. It had some very valuable insight about the short story market. Over the next few articles, I’ll be distilling some of his insights about short stories, as well as adding a few of my own. This week I’ll be preparing the soil, so to speak,… Read more »
Four days in Manhattan. Thousands of writers at the Marriot in Times Square. Two hotels booked, over a hundred workshops planned, over a hundred agents and editors attending (including our own Bess Cozby). Next week, July 22-25 , the Romance Writers of America national conference is going to be a dizzying experience, especially for this… Read more »
It’s great to get your posts out there and engage with your fans on social media, but if you’re building an author platform, it’s not enough. If you’re an author, you’re trying to sell books. And that means your social media platform is part of a business now—you’re going pro. And as a professional, you… Read more »
Happy Friday, Word Nerds! We’re now well and truly into summer and conference season has begun! In fact, Gabriela and Emily are attending Thrillerfest right now. In a few weeks, Sarah will be attending the Romance Writers of America Conference, and a week after that, Gabriela and I will be at Writers Digest. And this… Read more »
Welcome to the first installment of “Be Well, Write Well,” a column about writing wellness! I’m Leanne Sowul, writer, reader and educator. In this series, we’ll explore our potential for living healthy, happy lives that balance writing passion with overall wellness. Are you ready to dive in with me? Let’s grow and learn together! Writers… Read more »
Happy almost Independence Day! I know it’s not Friday, but I was so excited to share this post, I couldn’t wait until tomorrow. Plus it’s a holiday week, so here’s our regular #5onFri column, this week on a Thursday. We’re deep into summer now, and everyone’s minds are on barbecues and beach trips. But here… Read more »
I have a confession to make. My two daughters loved Junie B. Jones when they were little. Adored that whole (giant) series by Barbara Park. And I hated those books with a fiery passion. As a narrator, Junie B. was rude, impulsive and disobedient, with poor grammar and misspelled words to boot. She was my… Read more »
Thrillerfest is in just two weeks. Hear that? That’s my scream of glee. ThrillerFest is an annual conference for writers organized by International Thriller Writers (ITW). The event, now in its tenth year, brings together thousands of writers, agents, publishers and other industry professionals together each year. To borrow from Anchorman, it’s kind of a… Read more »
So far in our series Developing Themes In Your Stories, we’ve covered how understanding your protagonist’s character arc and developing your story’s premise sentence can help you consciously nurture literary themes. Today we’ll discuss a third way of mining for themes by looking outside your characters and studying the external conflict. Like with the previous… Read more »
