writers

Of Time, Authors and the Common Ground of Promotion…

During a recent discussion, Attention Self-Publishers, at Definitive Serious Writers at LinkedIn, an author lamented the difficult task of finding the time to both write and market their work.

Promoting and marketing one’s work as a writer or novelist, how best and most effectively to do this, and remained focused upon the writing of your books–that which you must to promote if it is to sell– sits at the heart of what authors–both self and traditionally published–presently grapple.

This aspect of writing and selling one’s work forms the common ground on and about which authors on both sides continually gnash our teeth and rub our palms.

All the traditional authors whom I have interviewed on my blog talk radio show, Book Talk, Creativity and Family Matters, express dismay, and challenge not always about the necessity of promoting one’s work and self, but rather, how to find the time to both promotion while one also writes, revises and edits our books.

Time stands as a writer’s most precious commodity. We all know how the Internet can devour that

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Of Reviewers, “Where the Dog Star Never Glows,” and Lifting Spirits…

Author, and editor, Tara Masih recently wrote a blog on the importance of reviewers.

Book reviewers provide an invaluable service to writers in both the areas of helping us get the word about about our work–promotion–and emotional support.

Mention in Tara’s blog is author and reviewer, Angela Lam Turpin. In addition to writing reviews, Angela is also the author to Legs and Blood Moon Rising.

Not only has Angela reviewed Tara’s book, Where the Dog Star Never Glows, she also provided a succinct and gracious review of my novel, The House, that is about to debut.

Many thanks to Angela and the many other reviewers who keeping us writers going and our spirits us.

The time and effort Angela and other reader/reviewers/writers such as her invest in reading our books and writing reviews during these tough economic times is truly a labor of love.

Recent changes in the economy and digital technology make what people like you and Angela do so important.

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Of Shrinking Advances, Entertainment, and That Which Remains Present in Translation…

One of the things we learn as psychotherapists is to interpret what clients are actually saying vs. the words they speak.

This is not to say that clients lie. I have found those with whom I have worked to be incredibly honest. They were investing a substantial amount of time and money into their sessions to learn more about themselves and how they could achieve their goals and dreams.

And yet we all have our defenses.

As a client myself, I have benefited enormously from psychotherapists who could see through my defenses and careful choice of words and lead me to the heart of the truth ebbing or perhaps bleeding through.

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Why Do I Write & What Is My Process–by Emily Kennedy

I come from a family of writers, though none of them knew it. They hid their thoughts, so eloquently expressed in letters packed carelessly in cardboard boxes and stashed in a hot and dusty attic. I found these letters from the twenties, forties, fifties when I was settling my aunt’s estate. They were there with my own, the ones I sent her throughout my childhood. I was faithful if not completely in command of my words then. I can tell that I tried to sound literary, even when describing a trip to the movies or a problem with my sister.

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Blogging, Promoting, Revising and Editing…

Whatever difficulties we have experienced with editors writers need the help of editors.

An unedited book placed on the market for public purchase diminishes our integrity as writers and demeans the skill to crafting fiction to which we aspire.

If writing a book was as simple as putting the words on paper and sending it out, then everyone would have published a book.

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Distractions, Passion and Showing Up…

Why is it so difficult to write sometimes?

Distraction.

It is the secret enemy of writers and authors that slithers in, most often unnoticed, when we have many things going on.

Ahhh, the art of multi-tasking.

Distraction presents an especially difficult challenge when good and positive things are happening for and to us.

Writers, like most artists, come to our work because we were not seen and acknowledged by our parents.

Well-meaning, and by no means Mommie Dearest, our parents held our well-being as their utmost concern when guiding, and coercing, if not blatantly steering us from pursuing the work we sought to accomplish as artists in our efforts towards financial fulfillment.

They cared for us. Yet, their ideas were oftentimes the least supportive. And so we found ways of distracting ourselves from their desires and will to have us be more normal by choosing careers offering what they felt certain would provide a more stable and secure lifestyle.

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Of Character Shifts, Balloon Boy and Well-Meaning Friends…

Entering the meat of a novel offers revelation after revelation. Personalities come forth, shift and recede into the murky lands from which they emerged. Characters shift positions in an effort to hold honor to, if not find their authentic identity. Perceptions change. The child of truth and wisdom forged by time and circumstance relays the

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