Category: How To and Tips
How to Co-Write a Novel and Remain Friends
One day while walking with an author friend we had an idea for a story with dual protagonists. Why not write it together? Kristy Tate, a USA Today bestselling romance author and I decided to co-write a women’s fiction novel a year ago. This was our logic: She writes romance. I write suspense. That’s the […]
Living the Reality, Adjusting the Dream By Mary Keliikoa
When I was young, I dreamt of a big wedding. Long white dress. Cascading bouquet of white flowers. A church full of my closest friends and family, and of course saying I do to my best friend and soulmate. I had it all planned out. The reality was when I did fall in love with […]
Literary Daydreaming
When I was younger and upset about something, my mother would sometimes encourage me to take the long view. Although she was talking about perspective, of course ‒ that, in a few days, whatever slight I felt wouldn’t matter so much ‒ my younger self took her words quite literally. I’d go stand outside on […]
Female Connection And Inspiration
Writers are often asked: “What was the inspiration for your book?” and their responses are, not surprisingly, all over the map. Some writers take their inspiration from a specific place or event. For others, it comes from something they read or watch. I’ve even heard of a few that were inspired by a particular smell. […]
Who Says Poetry Is Dead
“Poetry is dead”, they said. Tell that to the woman who doesn’t have time to read a novel. Tell that to the woman that would give anything for a thirty second read that makes her feel something other than the hustle of trying to be #allthethings With the recent release of my debut book, SHE: […]
The Surrender to Creativity by Emerald
by Emerald I’ve said it many times. I’ve acknowledged it, expressed it, recalled it, foreseen it, and most of all, known it. And still I resist it. It goes something like this: Someone asks the proverbial writerly question, “What’s your writing process like?” And with a carefree smile, I respond, “Well, I’ve found that what […]
Believe In You By Anju Gattani
Stories don’t just fall from the sky like shooting stars, right? Wrong. When Duty and Desire fell in my lap 19 years ago, it wasn’t an idea, a concept or a seed. Not even a fruit that fell from a tree. But a scene that harpooned my soul. We had moved from Singapore to New […]
Making Nonfiction Your Own By Jennifer Keishin Armstrong
It’s tempting to say that every book is like your first, but the very good news is that it’s not. Having just published my sixth book, I’ve seen your future—if you’re anywhere between books one and five—and I can assure you that it does get easier. It never gets easy, of course. And every one […]
Writing Uncertainty in Uncertain Times
In the period since WWII and the Cold War, it is doubtful that we have a frame of reference for the uncertainty with which people lived in the past. Until the unprecedented danger and constrictions of COVID-19, our era, in contrast to previous history, has come to expect that life is fairly free of dangers, […]
What Running a Bookshop Taught Me About Writing By Natalie Jenner
By Natalie Jenner Four years ago, I realized my lifelong dream of opening a small bookshop near the shore of Lake Ontario, in an idyllic and vibrant downtown community. For someone who had long ago given up trying to get published, yet still craved a way to make books a bigger part of her daily […]
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