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Lessons Learned from a Writing Life Part One
Some readers can be fickle and fame fleeting Your latest novel will be the most popular thing since sliced bread one minute, but the second the next trend hits, most readers will forget you ever existed. Fame is fleeting. Do what you do because you love it. That passion and love will attract loyal readers and super fans who will…
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Be Prepared to Change Lanes
This blog post is not going to be popular writing advice, but the truth never is. The big advice in indie land right now seems to be to find a niche genre and then stay in your lane. This means writing one kind of book, nothing else, and never branching out. I think this is the biggest mistake (that most writers…
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Indie Authors: Don’t Get Scammed
Dear Fellow Indie Authors, I care about you and and we need to have a talk. We need to talk about why the beginners among us are such easy targets for scams and bullshit. As you know, independently publishing your work does come with some legitimate expenses. But it also comes with a bunch of scam artists trying to take…
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A Writer’s Priority is Writing – Not Managing ALL the Social Media.
Today, I (and many other writers) received a survey from a marketing mentor asking about TikTok. Apparently, this is the direction advertising and selling books is heading. Mind you, for a young, tech-savvy fifty-year-old, I am perfectly comfortable with video, including platforms like TikTok. Chatting with an audience is easy if I know in advance what I want to say.…
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21 Things You Need to Know About Writing as a Career Before You Quit Your Job. #amwriting
I know – I know! Geez, Steph, way to piss all over someone’s dreams. But I don’t think people really understand what it actually takes to sell and THRIVE as a self-employed writer, and a lot of that depends on your personality, your productivity skills, your strengths, your motivation, your weaknesses, and whether or not you have someone to support…
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The Myth of Exposure #AmWriting
Having been a professional writer for many years, and having worked at my career for over 25 years, the one word I hate to hear more than anything is “exposure”. When I was young and aspiring, and desperate for publication, I heard that word tossed around a lot. “Come do a reading. It will be great exposure!” “Submit to this…
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10 Ways to be Successful: Hacking It
I thought I would throw out some of my thoughts today about how you become good at something, and how you become successful with it, because I’m not sure everyone out there understands this. I often get a lot of email from people wanting to become good at magick, or writing, or some other skill, but they don’t know how…
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Planning All the Things
I have a confession to make. I’m a bit of a planning junkie. I’m not always as meticulous with my planning as I should be, but when I am, I’m far more productive. I started to get back into my meticulous planning habit this past September when I discovered my life felt like it was sliding off the rails with…
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Author Events and How to Manage #random
A friend of mine recently came to me asking for advice about attending an upcoming con. She wanted to know what authors (and other types of exhibitors) should do (and should not do) to make a con successful. She enjoyed my response so much she said I should post a blog that might help other authors. So, that said, here…
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Honest Encouragement
It’s my belief there are two types of encouragement in the world. The first is unconditional. No matter how unrealistic or idealistic one’s goals are, unconditional encouragement is where you tell someone they can do whatever they want no matter what. My mom gave me a lot of unconditional encouragement when I was growing up by telling me I could…
