There have been a few condescending articles throughout the years about why adults should not read young adult literature. I won’t bother linking to any of them, because I think they’re totally wrong and don’t deserve the web traffic. Despite how these articles denounce YA lit, adults still make up a large percentage of its… Read more »
When you hear the term “break out of your comfort zone” you probably think about something drastic like sky diving or quitting your job to live on the road. These are completely valid ways to break out of your comfort zone, but you don’t have to do anything nearly so drastic to find the perfect… Read more »
When I made my first attempt at NaNoWriMo, I was living in Florence and was quite literally inspired every time I turned a corner. As I walked down the quaint streets, beautiful sentences would write themselves in my head. One might assume, then, that my writing reflected the splendor of the city; elegant as the… Read more »
When you search for a book to read, do genre labels drive your choices? They certainly affect mine. If I want a fast paced, edge-of-your-seat-experience I look for a thriller. If I’m in a puzzle-solving mood, it’s off to the mystery section. And I expect them all to have elements of suspense. And yet, on… Read more »
Stephen King says, “If you don’t have the time to read, you don’t have the time (or the tools) to write.” Most of us know that if we really want to improve our writing we need to read, a lot. But most of us also have day jobs, families, and adult responsibilities on top of… Read more »
Graphic novels are enjoying a great deal of popularity these days, with some of them taking home some significant awards. El Deafo by Cece Bell, was named a Newbery Honor Book in 2015, the first ever graphic novel to win this distinction. The graphic novel Smile, by Raina Telgemeier, was an American Library Association Notable… Read more »
It’s hard to believe 2015 is almost over! One of the things we encourage here at DIY MFA is reading with purpose. Every reader may not be a writer but I think it’s safe to say every writer is a reader. We asked five members of the DIY MFA team to tell us what their… Read more »
Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you probably know that November is National Novel Writing Month, NaNoWriMo for short. What you may not know is that it’s also Picture Book Idea Month—PiBoIdMo! Tara Lazar created PiBoIdMo for picture book writers who want to get in on all the zany fun novelists have in November… Read more »
What’s up with all the long-running series for middle grade readers? For the purposes of this article, I’m talking specifically about books series that span more than fifteen books—in fact, some of them feel like they might never end! Kids love them, adults perhaps less so when our bookshelf threatens to collapse from the weight… Read more »
Military history is often an underappreciated genre supposedly filled with stuffy biographies, or a litany of dates and battle names. When I took on the project of writing Flying Colors, even I approached the genre with the same perspective. As I would with any new project, I began with exploring possibilities and took to reading…. Read more »
