Want A Bunch of Reading Over the Next Year?… As many of you know, starting on the 10th of this month, meaning Friday, I will be doing a challenge to publish 67 books in one year, my 67th year. 67 in 67. That’s right, in my 67th year on this planet I want to publish 67 major titles with my name on the cover. Publish. No stand-alone short fiction, only major books with my name on the cover. Here is the plan: — 20 new novels (four are in the publishing process now, the rest must be written in time to make it through the publishing process this year.) —…

Strangest Almost-Start I Have Ever Experienced… I was all set to fire up on the short story challenge for November. No issues at all. And then nope. Just nope. I was even planning on starting early because it had been a while, so got to my writing computer at 10 p.m. Nope. Not blocked. Just nope, it didn’t feel right. Something was off. So I went to do my normal solution to figuring out stuff I can’t put my finger on… a nap. And when I woke up I realized my focus was on the 67 published books in my 67th year. And my 67th birthday isn’t for another week…

Great Storms Rolling Over… So this is a quick one while the power is still up and I can use my phone as a hot spot for the internet. Smith’s Monthly subscribers and Patreon supporters should have an issue of Smith’s Monthly yesterday. If not and you think you should have, write me. Challenges still have a spot or two left. —————- I’ve been surprised there hasn’t been more interest in this young adult bundle. It has some amazing books and writers in it. The book I have in this new bundle is a pure western young adult called The Life and Times of Buffalo Jimmy. I hope this winter…

Been Going Steadily All Day… Took out about forty Black Cat Magazines from 1895 to 1900 for Billy at Pop Culture to sell. That was fun. They are very rare and mostly in fantastic condition. They are a digest-sized magazine that Kris and I have had for a very long time and neither of us have any reason to ever look at them. So off they go. Then I worked up at the office the rest of the afternoon and then home to do email and other stuff all evening. Got a few more brave souls signed up on the challenges starting in October, but still room. Any questions, feel…

A Lot Like What Is Needed To Write A Novel… Since I have been talking about the challenges the last two nights, and I got some great letters today from a few brave souls who are interested, I thought I would go over in general the attitude it takes to do a challenge like these. First off, you can never consider the writing “work” in any regard. Writing is play, what you come home from work to do. So part of the attitude about these challenges (or just writing in general) is take the word “work” away from it. You do the best you can and release and move on.…

A Few More Details… For those interested in the challenges I announced last night, here are a few more details about them. Still lots of room in both challenges. First I want to stress the point of this is to help writers and have fun and get some novels and stories done. I also function as a form of cheerleader along the way to help you keep going. — For the novel challenge, you can start writing in September as long as you have no more than 50% of the novel done before October. — Short story challenge only goes two months, but the novel challenge goes to January 15th…

I Am That Crazy… I am going to do it again. I am offering to be a first reader for some of you. I am basically done with all the reading from the summer challenges I did. Those challenges were simple and turned out to be fun for me. And the writers who participated said it challenged them to get writing done they might not have gotten done. And they all got the workshops. That was the idea. Push the writing and get me reading your work and also get workshops out of it. So I looked at my schedule for the next year and realized the only chance I…

Almost Over… We are almost at that moment when new writer’s wake up and sort of wonder what happened to all those great goals they had early in the year. What happened was family, gardens, summer vacations, travel, sports, and so on and so on. I had some fine writers who powered through the Time of Great Forgetting because of a challenge with me. I’m finishing up reading everything this coming week and it has been great fun to watch the writers return their focus back to writing after vacations, after life took them away. It was a honor to watch them all get through the challenges and everyone was…

PLUS WORKSHOPS… I spent my entire afternoon and evening at the south store and at the auction that happens in the same small mall as our south store once a month. Wonderful fun and I got some stunning stuff. Stunning meaning I paid little and will be able to sell for a lot of money. (grin). Made it home by 9 p.m. to cook dinner and then do e-mail, some reading, some introductions I needed to do for a project, and then workshop stuff. And speaking of workshop stuff… If you are signed up for the August online workshops, you should have gotten a letter from me tonight. And if…

FOUR NOVELS IN ONE MONTH… Burn Card: A Cold Poker Gang Novel is printed and sitting on Kris’s spot for her to read when she gets time. I wrote four novels in one month while working a day job, getting rest, having a life, and so on. The only reason I could do this was because I have all the myths of writing that were jammed down my throat by non-writers out of my mind. I have always admired the old pulp writers, so over the years I have studied what they did, how they did it, and slowly incorporated what I learned into my own writing. I try to…