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The Problem of a Writing Rut…
Especially with Short Stories… I am not talking about writing short stories themselves. I am talking about a topic rut. Honestly, never noticed this before now. I can get writing on novels and stay in the same topic for one or two novels before needing to break free and write something else. No issue. With novels could always tell when I was burning out on a topic or series. I come back to topics and subjects all the time over years of time. No issue there either. But had an interesting, if not short-term thing happen tonight. I didn’t want to write another cat story. I was burnt out on…
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Slight Bump In Challenge
As Expected… Which is why I talked about how I can do two and three and even once four full short stories in one day. I expect to get behind. And my focus is to hit 31 stories in January to start with. My bet is the reason I am behind a story or so is the same reason many of you are behind. Major election which flipped the Senate… Up most of the night watching that. Got up today, did some shopping as planned and had riots in Washington by the time I got home Since that is history and stunning beyond words, had to watch that, and then…
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Sale Ends Thursday at 5PM…
So Almost Over… I sent this letter out to everyone who has signed up on the WMG Publishing Teachable web site for workshops if they did not block email. The half-price sale on WMG Publishing Teachable is almost over. Everything half price including the new Collection series of classes. Any questions, feel free to write me. And please, as I say at the end, stay safe over the next number of months. ——– WMG Publishing wants to help you all once again get through this, so until 5 pm on Thursday, January 7th… Every WMG Publishing Workshop, Lecture, Pop-Up, Class, or Subscription on Teachable will be HALF PRICE! That’s right, on…
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January Regular Workshops Starting…
January Workshops Starting Tuesday and Wednesday… Also, the first new Collections Class (Portals) is starting on Tuesday. And also the second Holiday Crime class from the Holiday Kickstarter is started if you are signed up for that. So lots going on and the sale has three more days. For half price of anything on Teachable, just use the code Resolution. And if you have any questions, feel free to write me. Also, all the February workshops are there and able to sign up for. Below is the list of both January regular workshops starting Tuesday and Wednesday and the February list of workshops. Class #1… Jan 5th … Covers 101…
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Four Days Left On Workshop Sale
Ends on Thursday at 5pm West Coast Time… Everything on WMG Publishing Teachable site is half price. Just put in the code Resolution. In case you missed it, here is the full first post about the sale and why we are doing this… Covid in Getting Worse… I honestly never would have predicted this last spring. Not in a million years. But at least now we have some hope on the horizon with the vaccines going out. But they won’t do much good especially over the coming months. Back when WMG Publishing did what we all thought here would be the last workshop sale in May, we had an expectation…
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Story #1 of Challenge
I Promise I Won’t Do This Every Day… But for the first story, I figured it was worth mentioning. And more than likely I’ll talk about the challenge once a week or so as it is going on. And post small thumbnails of covers. So for story #1 I wrote a story I needed to write for the Year of the Cat #11. It is called “Cat Running Wild” and it is a Pahket Jones story, who is a spin-off of my Poker Boy and Ghost of a Chance series. I have done 7 Pahket Jones stories so far. She is a superhero in the world of cats. Story was…
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Math is the Friend of Prolific…
And the Enemy of Excuses… Writers who want to hold dearly to the myths of writing must stay away from math. Math can be super deadly to writer’s fears and myths and beliefs. Math, after all, is just numbers. So let me point out where this is glaringly clear in a simple example. You write 250 words of fiction a day, shorter than many of your emails. Most writers can do that in 15 minutes or less. So you do that every day, you manage to make your writing important enough in your life that you carve out 15 minutes a day to do it. 250 words x 365 days…
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New Year Starting…
Writing This Safely From Home…. …On New Year’s Eve, after midnight. 2020 has left the building. 2021 shows ugliness to start and promise over time. So thought I would talk about the writing challenge I am going to set for myself and some thoughts on how you could ramp up a writing challenge in the New Year. Here is how I would suggest you come at doing a writing challenge in 2021. Decide where you want to be at the end of 2021 with your writing. Some people use word count, I use project or story counts, but I do track words just for fun as well. On good years…
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Book #4 Published…
Book #4 in the Challenge… I am working to publish 70 things in the year when I am officially 70. That year started back in the middle of November, so four means I am a little behind on pace. I count only novellas, collections, novels, and anthologies (or magazine issues) with my name as editor on the cover. In other words, major books. I may also pace along with a different 70 challenge with stand-alone short stories, but will see on that. I expected to be behind at this point. Basically I need to publish about 6 books a month. I have some things coming up that will help catch…
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Started On #45
Actually Started Interior Layout on Smith’s Monthly #45… Ran into a few problems that I will solve tomorrow with a little help. But minor. The real issue is going to be getting all the ads and such I do throughout the book for my own books, rebuilding a lot of them, making sure the art is linked, and so on. That will take a few days and it will get easier as I go along with every issue I am sure. So tonight I decided to fire up my rusty short story paperback cover skills. Been most of a pandemic since I had done too many of them, if any.…