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Today I had the pleasure to meet Ben Fountain, who came to lunch at the San Francisco Writers’ Grotto. Ben’s first novel, Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk, debuted this month. His short story collection, Brief Encounters with Che Guevara, won a PEN/Hemingway award, a Barnes & Noble Discover Award for Fiction, a Whiting Writers [...]
Writers’ groups, also called critique groups, can be invaluable resources for writers. They provide the structure and support of an MFA workshop without the high cost of tuition. But not all writer’s groups are equal. Get in the wrong group, and you may do more harm to your writing than good. How do you know [...]
As a freelance editor and someone who has hired several freelance editors, I wanted to give my two cents about if/when/how you need to hire an editor. Anne Allen wrote a wonderful post about this topic Sunday as well. Be sure to check it out when you’re done reading this:
1. Do I need a [...]
Two weeks ago, I wrote a post titled “If Publicity Doesn’t Sell Books, What Does?” in which numerous published authors offered insider tips on how they publicized and marketed theirs books, and numerous writers responded. This week, Paul J. Krupin, a publicist who blogs at Direct Contact PR, offers his perspective on the publicity debate. [...]
UPDATE: The winner of The Edge of Maybe contest is …
KRISTAN!
It was a tough decision for Ericka, so she took her top six choices and randomized them. Kristan, please email me your latest address, so I can forward it to Ericka. And everyone else, if you’re in the Bay Area, don’t miss Ericka’s [...]
To all my writer friends and followers out there, here’s a valentine for you:
You’ve spent days, weeks, months, and years Gallantly confronting your writerly fears The blinking cursor, like the blank page Is daunting to writers at every stage But you never give up, you keep trudging on You’re the hero of your journey, [...]
Today I have a wonderful post from Sarah Baker, a former editor for Viking/Penguin and Simon & Schuster in New York, via Constance Hale over at Sin and Syntax. If you haven’t visited Sin and Syntax yet, go check out the Salon. It’s full of great articles about writing and publishing like Gianmaria Fanchini’s post [...]
1. Get over your fear of self-promotion. Just do it. Now. Done? Good. I get an email newsletter from professional coach Martha Borst every week. It has her photo at the top and an image of her book cover on the side. I don’t see that and think, “Oh God, there goes Martha promoting herself [...]
The week before Christmas, I looked at my birthday notifications on Facebook and saw that it was my friend Chris’s birthday. Facebook has this new feature that allows you to wish your friends happy birthday without even visiting their walls. But because I know some people post fake birthdays to protect their privacy, if I [...]
What are your New Year’s resolutions? Mine are:
1. Run the Oakland Half Marathon on March 25, no matter how slowly. I ran this marathon in 2010, and then in 2011 I wimped out after a 10-mile run two weeks before because I hadn’t trained enough. My ego didn’t want to run it slower than [...]
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