Tag: featured
What My Facebook Post Taught Me About Writing
Nothing is Simple I’m not one to shy away from criticism. In college, creative writing professors not only taught me how to adapt to it but how to charge towards it, arms outstretched shouting, “here I am, make me stronger”. I hadn’t anticipated the impact that would have with one simple post on a writer’s […]
Better Together
Five years ago, I was close enough to having a finished manuscript for my first novel, Even in Darkness, that I began to seriously explore how to get it published. The novel was a fictional rendering of the life story of a relative I’d known and admired and whose resilience and glass-half-full life philosophy deeply […]
She Is Fierce: Collecting Women’s Poetry
It’s an exciting time for poetry. Slams and performances are attracting huge audiences; book sales are booming; some of today’s biggest online superstars are poets. Women are at the forefront of this movement: winning prizes, headlining festivals, topping bestseller lists and connecting with thousands of readers in digital spaces. It has not, however, always been […]
Last Author Standing
I’m not here to tell you how to write a book. You’re doing this already. Otherwise, you wouldn’t be perusing this website or reading this article. I want to tell you why you should keep writing—or not. If you fit the criteria set below, novelist will be your profession. You write because you have more […]
Writing HIM
HIM, my debut novel which published at the end of August took almost a decade to write. When I used to tell friends I was still writing the same book 5,6, 7 years later they’d look at me perplexed. ‘What on earth is it? The bible?’ In the end it seemed easier to keep my […]
What Makes A Brilliant Book?
What makes a brilliant read? That is a very good question. What makes you pick up a book up in a bookstore or hit click on your e-book store? I have to be honest; I’m a bit of book buying addict. I’m sure even by reading at least two books a week (which is about […]
How Stories Begin: I Was a Coward and Became a Writer
Stories, including those that develop into novels, begin in all kinds of ways. A real-life person you wonder about, a situation you read about in the paper, an intriguing name you feel would make a great character, something that keeps gnawing at your imagination—there are as many ways as there are plots. In my case, […]
Writing Under Contract
My second book was the first I had to write under contract. Having a publisher was something I had been working towards for the best part of a decade, and I felt sure that it would take the pressure off. All that stress about where to publish my work would be a thing of the […]
Asking for Trouble
Asking for Trouble Like many women, I hate asking for help. Perhaps because I have been reared as part of a generation of independent women, perhaps because I have been taught that I am a capable individual, perhaps because I am a people-pleaser by nature, I cringe every time I ask anyone to do me […]
The Post-Publication Blues
Launch Day for my debut novel BABY TEETH was amazing. My agent Sarah was in town and we spent the day together, and then we joined dozens of friends and family members at the bookstore that was hosting my launch. I’ve never had a proper graduation, or a prom, or a wedding, or any other […]
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