I don’t have any saboteurs of my writing at the moment–and it occurred to me, that’s just the time to write this post! Because I have had writing saboteurs in the past and human nature is what it is, I’m sure to have them in the future. I love this definition of sabotage by Merriam […]
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Since I’ve been fairly immersed in pressure this week, I focused on finding more ways to channel it. Here’s what I came up with. Financial Pressure – Rar! I had some writing and publishing expenses beyond my usual monthly investment. Unusual outlays of cash have always created dissonance for me as an artist, because I […]
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A lot of us tend to wring our hands that we don’t know what to do about our problems, writing problems included. But fascinatingly, we do know what to do in many cases.
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These days I prefer listening to my reading, as opposed to absorbing books, news, and articles with my eyes. I discovered this while pursuing my initiative to sit less and move more. We’ve probably all heard by now that sitting all day is terrible for us, and as writers we tend to sit plenty! To fight […]
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An interesting phenomenon takes place as you increase word count. Over the past year, I have been writing works of speculative fiction to several different lengths including short stories (under 7,000 words), serial episodes (about 10,000 words), novellas (about 30,000 words), and novels (70,000+ words). A Novel’s Unique Spatial Paradox I’ve found that with novels, […]
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As a writer, I’ve learned to love the conference scene. Actually, I’m completely drained by large social gatherings–evidence that I am a legitimate introvert. But here’s why I have evolved to deem conferences worthy of the energy expenditure! This list is in context of a few highlights from Life, the Universe, and Everything 2015 (LTUE), […]
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This week was a tough one. No other way to slice it. Lawless internal bedlam. Can a writer be expected to create under such conditions? Here’s why my vote is yes and no. No, as in, on some level you can’t show up like you usually do. You’re taken, by your other problems. But yes! As in, […]
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Last year I took on an overarching theme as my resolve for my personal and writing life: to become more congruent. I had never gone this route of approaching my goals thematically more than specifically and loved doing it. For now, my thematic goal is…CONTENTMENT. I want to be more content both personally and as a writer, […]
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iWriter is an app for Mac and iOS with a few interesting spins on the simple text editor approach to writing and drafting. Created by iA, iWriter offers a quick way to highlight all instances of a certain part of speech, which can be a great way to amp up less-effective verbs or cut way back on adverbs, […]
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This week’s app of the week is Writer’s Studio by miSoft Studios. This fun tool allows writers and authors to create personal interactive stories on an iOS mobile device by adding animation, music, narration, and other visual elements. While you cannot use this to create rich media stories for sale, but you can use this to […]
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The Ulysses App for Mac desktop is a text editor and writing tool for many kinds of writers, from students to fiction authors. Created by a group called The Soulmen GbR, this app is currently listed as the Ulysses III…and it is cool! To create with this tool, a writer simply types content in the editor […]
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For those wanting a more immersive experience than the typical word processor supplies, take a look at a fresh interface: Ommwriter. The official name of this tool is the Ommwriter Dāna (Dāna being a Sanskrit and Pali word with a timely meaning for celebrators of Thanksgiving: ‘Giving’). This app has interesting beginnings, as it was originally an […]
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Hemingway is an app that helps writers catch errors. This goes well beyond spell check; it gives your writing a proper color-coded going-over and an overall readability score. For example, Hemingway signals excessive adverbs as well as complicated language. It catches instances where you have written in passive voice or used splintered logic. Awesome! You […]
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Distraction is the bane of any productive writer, particularly all you NaNoWriMo’s out there. You can find a slew of distraction-free writing apps, so it makes sense to start with a free one. FocusWriter stands out because it works on a variety of desktops (Windows, Mac, and Linux). It’s also pretty. You can choose among a […]
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The Productive Author 