-
Cat Picture That Has Nothing to Do With Anything
Two of our three cats sitting in windows enjoying the fresh coastal air. Galley is the old orange guy, Sir Duke is the new kitten. This is for you, Kris. (grin)
-
The New World of Publishing: The Real Price of Traditional Publishing
Authors Pay a High Price for Traditional Publishing. This new world of publishing now allows authors to make many publishing choices after they finish a book. That’s a great thing compared to just ten years ago. Now an author can go the old traditional route, they can go full indie and do everything. Or they can publish somewhere in the middle, taking responsibility for all the work, but hiring out parts, or all of the tasks needed to be done. A thousand choices in the process now. And that’s a very, very good thing for authors in the abstract. But all choices have costs. This post is about the costs of…
-
Stages of a Fiction Writer: Chapter Six
(Almost done with this short book. One more chapter after this. Patreon supporters, you will get the full book sent to you when it is all done. Please note: This is advanced reader copy. This has not been proofed. That will be taken care of when I turn in the final book to WMG Publishing.) STAGES OF A FICTION WRITER Chapter Six Stage four in writing is hard, at best, to describe because for most writers, it is a level of craft that is impossible to see. So how do you move through stage three and get to stage four writing? Mostly, the answer boils down to one simple thing:…
-
Stages of a Fiction Writer: Chapter Five
(Every day or so, sometimes longer, I will put another chapter here of this book. Patreon supporters, you will get the full book sent to you when it is all done. Please note: This is advanced reader copy. This has not been proofed. That will be taken care of when I turn in the final book to WMG Publishing.) STAGES OF A FICTION WRITER Chapter Five Starting into stage four, the top stage. I got a question after the last chapter when I put that chapter on my blog. “How many writers are in stage four?” Think of stage four as a decent-sized town. Selling stage three writers could fill…
-
The Top Five Dumbest Business Practices in Publishing
The Top Five Dumbest Business Practices in Publishing From the real world perspective, publishing is really, really, really known for its head-shakingly stupid business practices. But inside of publishing, these practices have become so common and set in “the way things are done” as to be defended by otherwise sane business people. So I figured I would honor Dave Letterman’s departure with a quick top five list. I’ll give the real world equivalent of the publishing practice, then the actual publishing practice, working down to the most stupid publishing practice of them all. There are many others. I try to deal with a lot of them in the Killing the…
-
Stages of a Fiction Writer: Chapter Four
(Every day or so I will put another chapter here of this book. Patreon supporters, you will get the full book sent to you when it is all done. Please note: This is advanced reader copy. This has not been proofed. That will be taken care of when I turn in the final book to WMG Publishing.) STAGES OF A FICTION WRITER Chapter Four Almost all writers reading this will be in stage three. If you see yourself in stage one, all focused on the writing and polishing of words, you can move quickly out of that once you understand the location you are stuck in. And then start making…
-
Stages of a Fiction Writer: Chapter Three
(Every day or so I will put another chapter here of this book. Patreon supporters, you will get the full book sent to you when it is all done. Please note: This is advanced reader copy. This has not been proofed. That will be taken care of when I turn in the final book to WMG Publishing.) STAGES OF A FICTION WRITER Chapter Three As we move into stage three, it’s time I bring in the poker analogy I promised earlier on in the book. As I said, I have always had cards in my life. I paid most of my way through college with cards, and also played professional…
-
29 Great Years
Twenty-nine years ago today, Algis Budrys instructed me to give another writer a lift from Albuquerque, New Mexico to Taos for a week-long workshop. That writer was Kristine Kathryn Rusch. Here is a picture of what we looked like in 1986. We have been together ever since. Here is what we look like hundreds of novels, hundreds and hundreds of short stories, and 29 years later. Happy Day, Kris. It’s been great fun, to say the least.
-
The Stages of a Fiction Writer: Chapter Two
(Every day I will put another chapter here of this book. Patreon supporters, you will get the full book sent to you when it is all done. Please note: This is advanced reader copy. This has not been proofed. That will be taken care of when I turn in the final book to WMG Publishing.) STAGES OF A FICTION WRITER Chapter Two Stage two of commercial fiction writers is again a stage we all go through. I was no exception, never met a writer who missed this one. However, many writers can go through this stage quickly, often in a year or so. But at the same time, this…
-
The Stages of a Fiction Writer: Introduction
(Every day I will put another chapter here of this book. Patreon supporters, you will get the full book sent to you when it is all done.) STAGES OF A FICTION WRITER Introduction About twenty-five years ago, I was struggling to figure out where I was on the path to becoming a fiction writer. I had sold novels, lots of short stories, been an editor, owned a publishing company, and had readers buying my books. But honestly, none of that mattered to me. I liked it, sure, but my goal was to be a better writer, a better storyteller, actually. And I had no idea at all where I was at…