I’m on a high, about to jump into my final round of revisions! But I’ll pause for a moment to compile some links for you from this week: The paradox of memoir, Ami Spencer writes, is the more personal details you reveal, the more readers will relate. Author James Patterson is a publishing machine. And […]
Every once in a while I come across a piece of writing advice that really resonates with me. And when I reviewed Elizabeth Gilbert’s Committed last week, I forgot to mention that she had one of these bits in her book. In Gilbert’s prologue, she writes about her difficulties writing Committed, how she ditched her […]
Every week I read the New York Times’ Modern Love column. Not because it’s about love (although that helps). I read it because it’s often a good story. Occasionally it’s written really well. And since a different contributor writes the column each week, it always has a different voice. In other words, reading this column […]
Some weeks I scramble to find enough links to make this roundup worth your while. But like last week, here again I’ve got plenty to share: For the Love of God, People, The Slush Pile Isn’t Dead at The Rumpus. A rebuke to a well-read Wall Street Journal article. In the New York Times, one […]
I’m constantly making mistakes throughout this book-writing process. I suppose that’s normal when you undertake a project for the first time and have no one to guide you through it. But it’s frustrating, especially when I think about how much time I would have saved had I done everything right the first time. What am […]
I don’t usually review books on this blog. Hell, I don’t even know how to write a book review. But because Elizabeth Gilbert’s Committed was the much-awaited sequel to what’s arguably the most popular book in my genre, Eat, Pray, Love, I’m going to tell you what I thought of it. When I say much-awaited, […]
Want more helpful tips on writing? Sign up for my free newsletter. Did you know Amazon.com has a new function that gives a word count for each book? (I did not discover this myself. Props to Suzanne for pointing it out.) This is awesome enough for me to get excited over. Why? Because it allows […]
Don’t you love when your Google Reader is bursting with awesome information? So much good stuff out there this week, including several memoir-specific posts: From Pimp My Novel: The Importance of Negative Reviews. If reviewers don’t have anything nice to say, should they say anything at all? A guest blogger on Guide to Literary Agents […]
Every writer knows it’s important to read within your genre. For me, this is not a reason to read travel memoirs as much as an excuse. I love travel memoirs. I read every one I can get my hands on. And now that I’m writing one, I read them in the name of research. One […]
You know what irks me? It’s been a year since I posted on my travel blog, and it still gets more hits than this writing blog. Okay, not quite a year. Since January, I’ve posted twice on Inkslinging in Africa — once in March and again in May. But I’m working hard to increase readership […]