How To Write When Your Father Is Dying
You will sit down to write on a Sunday morning. Your final manuscript is due to your Incubator class in 22 days. The phone will ring. Your heart will sink at the Maine area code. It will be your father’s…
Category: The Writing Life
Communication Breakdown: When reading body language is a necessity
Just over a year ago, in a paroxysm of post-election whythehellnottery, my wife and I packed up our books and moved from Boston, MA to Madrid, Spain. My Spanish was shaky at best, and still is. I spend most days in…
Your Writing, Your Business: Why You Should Hire a CPA
Equipped with TurboTax and coffee, the world of writers went forth on April 17th (why did you wait so long?) to report and value their last year of work as freelancers, teachers, you name it. I’m talking tax returns, of…
How I Changed All My Writing Habits
It is a truth universally acknowledged that one when becomes a writer paid (minimally, but paid!) for writing, one chucks all of one’s precious notions about craft and art and motivation out the window that has needed replacing for three…
You Should Read This: In Praise of the Sincere Recommendation
“I tried to like it,” she wrote in a text message. “But I just can’t.” What? I thought. How can that be? That novel had ripped me to shreds. In a good way. It had been with perfect confidence that…
Six Months until Publication: Tentative Tips from a Debut Novelist
I just passed my six months to publication date for my debut novel, Gina in the Floating World (She Writes Press). I sent in my last review of my galleys, and my baby is about to be sent to the printer for my ARCs (Advanced Review Copies), the ones sent out to reviewers. It’s really happening. I’d love to be able to sit back and enjoy the ride until my book launch on October 2, but that’s not the way it works in this do-it-yourself day and age.