Category: Contemporary Women Writers
How to Avoid Writing Burnout
Writing is hard work. We all know that, right? We take an idea, move it along, push it this way, that way, leave it alone, return to it, and sometimes scratch altogether. Once we’ve got something substantial, we tear it all apart and put it back together again. We offer our pages to the world, […]
How I published Four Books in Two Years
For several years I wrote novels that didn’t get published. I wrote them, sent them to my mother or a friend to read, and then put them away. They weren’t strong enough; that’s what I told myself. And in retrospect, I was probably right about those early books. Two of them are collecting dust in […]
How Newspapers Inspire Fiction Writers
Historical documents can be treasure troves for fiction writers. We’ve all read stories based upon real historic events, or people, and no doubt some authors were inspired by historical manuscripts, either accessed in an archive, online, or in biographies. Letters, diaries, wills, government records – these are rich seams for writers to interrogate and use […]
To Be or Not to Be Agented, That is the Question
I never asked this question. Instead I asked how quickly I could get myself an agent. Unagented authors aren’t taken seriously, I reasoned. You can’t approach big houses without one and I wanted readers and a big contract. Getting an agent was the only way to achieve this goal. So I sent out queries, alphabetically, […]
How to Tackle the Writing Wall
My first encounter with the running menace known as “the wall” happened at 1:00am on a humid July night in Wakefield, Massachusetts. My sneakers were slapping sandy pavement littered with discarded paper cups. The taste of the twilight summer gnats thronging Lake Quannapowitt was still fresh between my teeth. In the sixth hour of the […]
Procrastination? Just an Unwelcome Visitor
Every day, around 4:00 p.m., I get this craving to write, like others yearn for a cup of tea or a chocolate biscuit. Sometimes I manage all three. Though usually just tea and choc. Some folks say it’s writers block – I call it procrastination. It walks in, shuts down my laptop, follows my every […]
A Day in the Life of a Writer
I would love to be able to say that I’m a full time writer, with an agent, PR officer and secretary to manage my career, organise promotion for me and type up stories I’ve dictated onto a voice recorder whilst sipping cocktail on a balcony (or reclining on a chaise longue Barbara Cartland style). However, […]
Planning the End or Ending the Plan?
Incredible what a tweet can do. On 18 April Barbara Bos of this esteemed site posted a quotation from Rose Tremain, “In the planning stage of a book, don’t plan the ending. It has to be earned by all that will go before it.” I raised the query whether this was clever, or just poor […]
It’s Like Having An Alter Ego, But Harder
If you were to meet me on the good days, standing beside our minivans in the school parking lot, you’ll most likely see a woman wearing the uniform of an American suburban mother: boots zipped over jeans, hair that’s been flat-ironed too many times, dark sunglasses. On those good days, the ones where I behave […]
Finding My Voice
I lost my voice during my second year of college. And then I found it again after the plane crash. Wait. That’s not exactly right. I didn’t find it again until YEARS after the plane crash. And to be accurate, I didn’t “lose” anything. I put aside my voice in a valiant effort to pursue […]
Recent Comments