Category: Contemporary Women Writers
On Finding Our So Now What
Why I Wrote Willa’s Grove by Laura Munson Book ideas are always coming to me. I’m usually working on a few at the same time and always in different genres—different ways to find the truth. That’s what I’m after: truth. Each book begins with a central question—some quirk of humanity that gnaws away at me. […]
What Makes Christmas Romance So Special?
By Nan Reinhardt I love the holidays, don’t you? For years, it’s been my second-favorite time of the year, only fall beats the holiday season for me. But I’d written five romance novels before I discovered the enticing world of Christmas romance stories. I’m an avid reader of romance—have been all my life—but I’d never thought […]
Step Away From Your Comfort Zone
By Beverley Harvey For the last month, my writing has stalled. Spectacularly. It’s not time, opportunity or commitment that I lack, it’s motivation and self-belief. Like myriad writers, I am prone to introspection, anxiety and low self-esteem. No sympathy required here; I count myself lucky that I manage these personality traits – and that they […]
Getting Ideas And What To Do With Them
Getting Ideas (And what to do once you’ve got them) As writers, we often get asked: “Where do you get your ideas from?” It’s a question that always tickles me. Perhaps it seems as though we writers have admittance to a special “world of ideas” that ordinary people can’t access? Perhaps we seem so much cleverer […]
Headstrong: Surviving a Traumatic Brain Injury
Headstrong: Surviving a Traumatic Brain Injury She didn’t see the hammer. For a fraction of a second JoAnne Jones saw a young black face, framed by a black hoodie, and then she descended into a place where she felt and saw nothing. Jones survived this sudden assault by a stranger, but it left her with […]
How To Develop Music As Its Own Character In A Story
Mathea Morais’ novel THERE YOU ARE (October 8, Amberjack Publishing) is coming-of-age story about two friends returning to their racially segregated hometown of St. Louis in the aftermath of Michael Brown’s death and amid the awakening of the Black Lives Matter movement. Drawing from her own roots in St. Louis, work as a hip hop culture writer […]
Crime Writing Tips
One of the late great Elmore Leonard’s top tips for writing was ‘Leave out the parts readers tend to skip.’ I’m a devotee, which is why ‘Cut to the chase’ remains my mantra for writing strong crime fiction. In essence and, as brutal as it is, boring bits have to go. Sounds easy, doesn’t it? […]
I Wrote This Little Book
Rachel Levy Lesser A few months ago, I ran into a friend at a smoothie shop I frequent in my town. This friend of mine was drinking a smoothie with a friend of hers — someone I didn’t know. The conversation went something like this. My friend: “This is my friend, Rachel. She is an amazing writer and she has this new book coming out.” My friend’s friend: “That’s so cool. What’s the book […]
My Route To Publication
Route to publication through oft-asked questions… Did you take a writing course? My first big step to moving from writing as a hobby to writing professionally came when I applied to take the Curtis Brown Creative course. There’s nothing like reading out your work to a room full of writers to clarify what is working […]
Professional Envy
We’ve all experienced professional envy at least once in our lives. When a colleague gets a pay rise and you don’t; when you’re skipped over for a promotion; when one person on your team always seems to hit their targets. But why do we never talk about professional envy between authors? While I’m sure we’d […]
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