As you probably know, I’ve been working towards the goal of getting published for several years now. Last year I had some success with my short stories, managing to get three of them accepted by various e-magazines and digital sites. That success only encouraged me to work harder to get my books in front of publishers to try and get them published as well. Then, in October, I received my first book contract for my YA Superhero novel, “Mik Murdoch, Boy Superhero”. The book is the first in what I expect to be a six-book series. I was (and still am) very excited about this development, but, as I have said many, many times, publishing is slow. I know where […]
Read moreTag: revision
Wash, Rinse, Repeat
I’ve been doing a bit of introspection the past while. Maybe it’s natural, being a new year and all, and it is something I do from time to time. I do it as a self-improvement exercise. I look at what I haven’t liked in the past while and try to see what my role was in it. Perhaps I was too laid back or maybe I was too intense. Did I make the most of opportunities or did I let self-doubt intrude. I won’t say that it always works but I do believe the process keeps me moving in the right general direction. It’s one of those things that is never a single iteration either. I try to do it […]
Read moreDeveloping New Writing Habits
Many of us have some bad habit in our writing that we need to fix. It may be that we do too much telling of the story or too much dialogue. My personal bad habit is skimping on the descriptive elements in the story. I think it has something to do with being in too big a hurry to tell the story. So what do I do? Well, for starters, I start adding more description. There’s the no-brainer. But how? I’ve never been a fan of description for descriptions sake. It has always felt like padding the story. No, I’ve got to spend more time using the character’s various senses for one thing: sight, smell, taste, touch and sound. Now […]
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