I didn’t even know I was supposed to have a media kit, or press kit, or whatever you want to call it. Did you? Do you even know what one is? I had heard of these things before, but I never really gave them much thought. Until now. In doing research for a new book release, I discovered that I should not just create a media kit for the release, but it should also be a crucial marketing tool. This … Read More »

New year or not, I’ve resolved to figure out the hidden secrets of social media countless times over the past years. The formulae seem easy, yet my calculations are always off. Knowing that social media is a huge part of a writer’s marketing strategy, I decided to get some help from the experts (i.e., Google) on how to focus my efforts in 2021. Unsurprisingly, consistency is key. I am not very good with this and get bored after about a … Read More »

Tears sell books. It’s true. I don’t have any stats or evidence to prove this, but it’s just one of those fundamental truths. When we dive into a book, we want to explore the reality conveyed in that book, to become part of the story. This involves emotional involvement and without it, books get put down. Creating emotional impact is arguably the single most important, and perhaps most difficult, aspect to writing fiction. Without it, the story is doomed from … Read More »

One night while watching TV, an ad popped up that was perfectly targeted at me thanks to the glory of internet tracking. The ad promoted a software package that promised to take your mediocre writing and transform it into tomorrow’s best-selling novel. (I may be exaggerating slightly…) It demonstrated features ranging that could fix things from grammatical errors to stylistic issues, insinuating that perhaps it could replace the job of a decent editor. Could such programs be useful for a … Read More »

It’s October, that time of year where our fears come out to play. It’s also the perfect time to face our fears as writers. How do I know what your fears as a writer are? Let me begin with a story. During my first few years as a professor, I was lamenting with a colleague up north about the job. Rather, it wasn’t the job that was the source of my anxieties, but my own feelings of inadequacy and fears … Read More »

People love to give advice. Start any new venture and you’re bound to run into someone who can inundate you with well-meant words of caution or a litany of rules that must be followed. Writing is not immune to these bouts of unsolicited free advice. Whether we like it or not, writing has rules that we must adhere to. Or do we? Writing is an art, a craft meant to be free from the restrictions of the structured world. Indeed, … Read More »