You want to know how bad a writer I am? I used “by the time” twenty-one times in my current manuscript. I used it twice on the same page. That’s how bad a writer I am. You may not find “by the time” on any list of crutch words, but it appears to be a crutch of mine. I also used “just” two hundred and fifty-two times. “Then” two hundred times. “Turn,” “so,” “right,” and “looked” each more than a … Read More »

I’m in querying mode again. It’s not fun. When animals fight, the loser will sometimes expose their jugular vein for a quick finish off. No such mercy in the publishing industry. It’s more of a slow death. Endless, sometimes. Not bitter. Just sayin’. “If you don’t hear from us within sixteen weeks, it’s a pass.” Sixteen weeks! And that’s not the worst of it. At least during those four months (!) there’s hope. Through this process I’ve relearned what I … Read More »

Lemme tell you something I hate. I hate it when someone comes to a writing group or asks me to critique something and says, “I just wrote it this morning.” Whatever you wrote this morning is not fit to be read by anyone but you. And if you’re any kind of half-decent editor, you won’t like it much. Rough Draft? Don’t Be Daft. The random collections of letters, some formed into words, that fly off your fingertips is not your … Read More »

We talk about the “Publishing Journey” because it would be too awful to call it what it is. Hard Slog. Impossible Mission. Death March. Do Everything Right, See If the Universe Cares Sorry, even if you follow all the querying and pitching advice on all the FWA Blogs and everywhere else, you still face an uphill battle. The most important thing is to produce a high-quality manuscript, so you hired an expensive editor. Also important is to research agents and … Read More »

“Hey! I’m working here!” How many times have you yelled that at someone, or wanted to, when they were making noise or had the gall to talk to you while you were writing? But to be fair, how were they supposed to know you were deep in a complex passage of the next great American novel and not browsing social media? (Or were you? Never mind.) The more important questions are: What are you writing? Who are you writing it … Read More »

Working as a reporter at the Pentagon, I learned a lot of fun acronyms. Among my favorites was MOOTW (Pron: MOOT wuh). It’s short for Military Operations Other Than War. When you think about it, that describes much of what the military is called upon to do: peacekeeping, humanitarian operations, disaster relief, dispute mediation, even diplomacy. I want to propose the creation of a new acronym: AOOTW (Pron: ah-OOT wuh)—Author Operations Other Than Writing. Like MOOTW for the military, AOOTW … Read More »