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Writing by hand
As a kid—before computers were widely available, and before I was allowed to use a computer without a strict time limit—I always equated pens and penmanship with being a Writer. There was something so...
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Music is Fuel For Your Writing
Everyone knows the expression, “Music is food for the soul.” Here’s my spin on it: Music is fuel for your writing. Last month, I had the privilege to attend one of NYU’s Media Talk series, and the one...
View ArticleWrite What You Want
I was at Yallwest a couple of weeks ago, and something I heard at one of the panels won’t leave me. “Write what you want.” Of course, this seems very self-explanatory, and I’d heard it about 100...
View ArticleListen Up!
Podcasting has been with us since around the mid-2000’s, but this past year the amount of podcast listening has increased by an amazing 24 percent. The highly addictive Serial may have had something to...
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Getting the spark back
I recently picked up Leslie Jamison’s stunning collection of essays, THE EMPATHY EXAMS, which I haven’t been able to put down. It’s one of those books that changes how you see the world, how you...
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What I’m looking for in fantasy
Science fiction and fantasy, more so than other genres, rely on worldbuilding. And worldbuilding is hard. Novels in this genre don’t just need the usual—good writing with complex characters and...
View ArticleBeing There
Last weekend I had the pleasure of being the guest of the Pennwriters Conference in Lancaster, PA, along with fellow agents Noah Ballard of Curtis Brown, Ltd. and Mark Gottlieb of Trident Media. We...
View ArticleWhatever Works
During a very energizing few days at the Santa Barbara Writers’ Conference last week, I had the pleasure of spending time with fellow agents as well as a lot of authors—published and yet to be—and I...
View ArticleThe Creative Juices
A couple of posts ago I wrote about different authors’ processes; what works for some, but not for others. This intriguing interview with Patrick Ryan that recently appeared on the Electric...
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Coco Chanel’s Guide to Sample Pages
If you follow us on our Facebook page (and you should!) you’ve already seen this post from the Penguin Random House blog about what editors want to see in a winning first page. I gave it a read and...
View Article“Ssh, I’m reading…”
I have a fairly handy knack of being able to tune most people out if I’m reading (or trying to otherwise work), but I know many people (my own mother included) who need pretty much absolute silence in...
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Pretentious much?
The thing is, writers can be inordinately pretentious and blissfully unaware of the fact. Part of the whole living in your head while trying to describe the most banal processes using language that...
View ArticleThe Long Road
I’ve long been a fan of the sweet, smart comedian Mike Birbiglia, whose off-Broadway solo show SLEEPWALK WITH ME was a hit and wound up becoming a movie which he co-wrote, co-directed, and starred...
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The inside scoop on writing for kids
All you aspiring writers out there – don’t you sometimes wish you could sit down with an experienced editor and ask a book’s worth of questions about children’s book publishing? Well, your wish has...
View ArticleBooks Aren’t and Shouldn’t Be Like Real Life
I remember the first time I attended a lecture on writing memoirs. I was expecting this lecture to tell me all the obvious things, like how to write about sad or unbelievable events and make them seem...
View ArticleMix ‘n’ Match
One of the fans of my client Chris Grabenstein wrote me recently expressing his disappointment that it’s been so long since Chris wrote one of his adult mysteries or thrillers. Since Chris took off...
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Writing by hand
As a kid—before computers were widely available, and before I was allowed to use a computer without a strict time limit—I always equated pens and penmanship with being a Writer. There was something so...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Music is Fuel For Your Writing
Everyone knows the expression, “Music is food for the soul.” Here’s my spin on it: Music is fuel for your writing. Last month, I had the privilege to attend one of NYU’s Media Talk series, and the one...
View ArticleWrite What You Want
I was at Yallwest a couple of weeks ago, and something I heard at one of the panels won’t leave me. “Write what you want.” Of course, this seems very self-explanatory, and I’d heard it about 100...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Getting the spark back
I recently picked up Leslie Jamison’s stunning collection of essays, THE EMPATHY EXAMS, which I haven’t been able to put down. It’s one of those books that changes how you see the world, how you...
View Article