Mining for Words

I recently revisited a long piece I wrote almost a decade ago. In my mind, this piece was a novelty, a learning experience, an ‘awkward first date’ of a story. ‘Our noses bumped when our braces locked, making me sneeze a booger onto her face’ type awkward. I don’t know what prompted me to look it up after all these years. Nostalgia? Masochism? Boredom? Anyway, I did. And I was very surprised at what I found.

It didn’t suck. Not only did it not suck, I really liked it. The writing was good and crisp. A little different than the way I write now, but not as much as I would have thought. The plot holes and forced patches that I remembered were not there. I decided it deserved to live. So, I am bringing it back to life. Continue reading “Mining for Words”

Inspiration Strikes at the Worst of Times

Author Greta Burroughs

by Greta Burroughs

For the last week, I have been sitting at my computer, wracking my brain trying to finish a short story. After seven days of madly typing away, only four paragraphs appear on the screen in front of me. The countless hours working on this one story and that is all I have to show for it? The right words elude me. I have deleted more material than I have saved. Where is my inspiration? Why won’t the words come to me? Have I lost my ability to write?

Desperation has set in. All I can think about is the stupid story. I need a distraction, maybe some housework. No, too close to the computer. How about yard work? Nope, I still look at the window of my office and the siren song from my computer lures me back inside. Continue reading “Inspiration Strikes at the Worst of Times”

Getting the Blurb Right by Ken Magee

Author Ken Magee
Author Ken Magee

You’ve just spent six hard months slaving over a hot computer. You’ve now written and polished your book, and then polished it a little bit more. It’s your baby and you love it. You spend another three months finding a publisher and a further three agreeing everything from the title to the cover design. So a year of your life is invested in a fantastic novel and now you’re ready to go… not quite, you need to sort out the blurb.

Is it important? YES, it is, in fact, one of the most important components of the whole book package. How can I be sure, well, I ran a poll on two well known sites for readers in the US and the UK. The poll was entitled “Top reasons for buying a book”. Once the voting was completed it was very clear what really mattered. High on both lists were things like genre, recommendations and read other books by the author. However, the blurb came number one in the US, and number two in the UK. That shows you just how important it is to get it right… your book will not succeed without a well written blurb. Continue reading “Getting the Blurb Right by Ken Magee”

Freebie Friday Ramp-Up

Let’s get ready to rumble! You’ve got books to give away, there are people waiting to jump at em. It’s a marriage made under the blue-light special. Or something. Whatever it is we want to help. That’s what we do here.

This is how it works: Each Thursday, we will put up a post like this one, calling for anyone who has a book to give away for FREE should provide ONLY the following in the comment section below:

1.  Book title
2.  Author name
3.  A one sentence blurb
4.  A link to download the book

The book must be free to anyone who clicks over to the link – not just Special Secret Squirrel Club members or whatever. You know who you are.

On Friday morning, we will randomly select five of these titles to post in the Freebie Friday Frenzy, a special vitamin-fortified post which will include book covers, link and blurb.

So let’s give it a try, shall we? Please make sure to follow the RULES above. Now, go ahead and tell the world about your free eBook: