Today’s guest blogger, Jerry Jenkins, has written a thorough article, “How to Write a Book: Everything You Need to Know in 20 Steps.” I love lists, so of course I was intrigued to find out more. And I love it when writers talk about passion. Listed below are a few of Jerry’s steps about writing a book, excerpted or paraphrased from his comprehensive list (link at the bottom of this post). Where to start… What each step entails… How to overcome fear, procrastination, and writer’s block… And how to keep from feeling overwhelmed. Establish your writing space. If you dedicate a room solely to your writing, you can write off a portion of your home mortgage, taxes, and insurance proportionate to that space. You can also write in restaurants and coffee shops. Assemble your writing tools. Try to imagine everything you’re going to need in addition to your desk or table, so…
Thumbnail sketches
Figure drawing classes often start with timed gesture drawings of initial poses lasting as short as five seconds before the model moves. Gradually the time increases to 10, 15 and 30 seconds. By the time you get to a minute, it feels as if you have all day to capture the pose on your sketch pad. The idea is to keep you free, dexterous and more focused on process than product. Such short bursts also keep you from taking yourself too seriously—otherwise, you’d quickly become frustrated. —“Train Your Eye for Better Writing,” by Tess Callahan, Writer’s Digest September 2017 Tess suggests you can do the same with writing. “At odd moments throughout the day, in a diner or in transit, jot down gestures, expressions or snatches of overheard dialogue. . . . Whether or not these little moments make it into whatever story you are writing, they will deepen your…
The Wax Paper
The Wax Paper The Wax Paper is a broadsheet publication open to all forms of written word, image, and collected conversation. The first priority of The Wax Paper is to expand our understanding of the people we share the world with, and in doing so, expand our understanding of ourselves. Pieces will be selected on their ability to illuminate the humanity and significance of the subjects that inhabit the work. The Wax Paper was inspired by the life of Louis “Studs” Terkel. Our name is taken after his first radio show, The Wax Museum, a groundbreaking program, emblematic of his democratic fondness of variety, in which arias were played alongside folk ballads. We look to populate The Wax Paper with pieces that share the spirit inherent in Studs’ written work. Work that required patient observation, remained steadfast in its empathy, and displayed genuine vitality. Studs Terkel’s voice and the voices he collected are a necessary…
The reader reads for dialogue.
“The reader reads for dialogue more than anything. The writer’s habit is to describe, but the reader would rather hear the character.” — Anthony Varallo, May 2017, The Writer
The Rumpus
How could you resist submitting to a magazine named The Rumpus! “The Rumpus is a place where people come to be themselves through their writing, to tell their stories or speak their minds in the most artful and authentic way they know how.” — The Rumpus “The Rumpus is dedicated to fostering new voices: We want to introduce you to authors you’ve never heard of before . . .” The Rumpus has boosted the careers of writers such as Roxane Gay and Cheryl Strayed. Maybe you’ll be next on the “boosted career” list. Submit!
Super Power. . . Prompt #342
If you could have a super power, what would you choose? Why did you choose that super power? What would you do if you had that super power?
I don’t know what I’m doing . . .
“Eventually, I stop looking back and being prissy about the beginning, but I’m pretty prissy about it for a long while. At a certain point, I only go forward. I allow myself to write a chunk where I can say, ‘You know, I don’t know what I’m really doing here. It’s a bit messy.’ I cut myself some slack. I can also write with blind spots where I say, ‘I know I’m going to have to figure this out later I don’t know what the answer is right now but that’s OK,’ and I can keep writing.” —Julianna Baggott Excerpt from “Pure Writer,” by Elfrieda Abbe, The Writer Magazine, January 2016 Note from Marlene: When you get to a “stuck” place in your writing, type ‘xyz” or “something here” in red at your sticky spot.You can come back to that unsettled place later and fix it. Take a break. Get…
Emulate Writers to Improve Your Writing
The following is an excerpt from “Train Your Eye for Better Writing,” by Tess Callahan, September 2017, Writer’s Digest: “I encourage my students to read deeply a broad range of writers, and after each one, try writing a few sentences in that wordsmith’s style. For example, take a signature line from William Faulkner. . . and, while keeping the sentence structure intact, pluck out all of the nouns and verbs and replace them with your own. Don’t place these emulated lines directly into your own writing. . . Instead, the idea is to practice emulating lines so that the many different styles can work their way into your brain, spin around in the blender of your subconscious, and serve to inform your own unique voice. No art form exists in a vacuum. The impressionists were friends and rivals who hung around in the same cafes, shared, traded and borrowed, and…
Writers are such heady creatures . . .
“Writes are such heady creatures that we often forget our characters have bodies and senses. To fully imagine a life, one has to supply undeniable details about the exterior world so that when the novelist has to make the truly improbable leap to the interior world of another human being, the reader is primed to believe us.” —Julianna Baggott Excerpt from “Pure Writer,” by Elfrieda Abbe, The Writer Magazine, January 2016
Flash fiction: What it is and where to submit
“Flash fiction goes by many names: microfiction, sudden fiction, short-short, postcard fiction, etc. Its word count runs anywhere from 140 characters to over a thousand words, generally capping out at 1500. A short-short story has to handle all the fictional elements seamlessly within an extremely tight space. Give these extreme parameters, what makes a piece of flash fiction truly great?” —“Jumpin’ Jack Flash,” by Jack Smith, May 2017, The Writer “It’s a great artistic expression,” states Kim Chinquee, author of Oh Baby Flash Fictions and Prose Poetry. “Key attributes [for flash fiction]: Language. Imagery. Surprise. Things that are left out. Elements such as tone and point-of-view can fill in for the plot. Rhythm. And a smashing title and ending.” Smith writes in this article, “Hundreds of publications are open to flash fiction.” Here are some of them: Atticus Review The Carolina Quarterly Smokelong Quarterly More places to submit flash fiction….