Tag: authors

The Competition?

The establishment would have us believe that, as writers, we have to compete and that, regrettably, there is no level playing field on which to conduct the competition. To begin with, just knowing all the rules of the game is an almost impossible task, there is a secret covenant; just when you think you’ve got the rules they change them.

According to the establishment – the established, traditional publishers, the established, traditional media, some of the established, traditionally published authors, all of which make up the established, traditional mind set – there are only so many readers to go around; and they don’t want to share! Continue reading “The Competition?”

Honesty and the Self-Publisher

Raymond Chandler

A Guest Post
by George Copeland

When Raymond Chandler wrote that poor writers are dishonest without knowing it, he had no reason to suspect there’d one day be a militantly tenacious army of them slinging their stuff with the ad hoc marketing arm of social media. Bad writing has always been with us, but what’s new in its current form is the rise of a concomitant philistine ethic, a seeming celebration of the act of writing itself, not of a more deliberate and circumspect writing culture in search of excellence for its own sake. It’s a touchy subject. Bring the problem up in a room of indies and you’ll get the hard stare of rough men sniffing out the double agent in their midst. Continue reading “Honesty and the Self-Publisher”

Is She Geeking Out AGAIN?

Author Eva Caye

by Eva Caye
I can’t help myself. As an author, words are important to me. My goal is to write with clarity, but sometimes I have to consult Thesaurus.com, tasting the flavor of all possible words to pick the precise one I need. That’s when ‘It Happens’; when I’m stuck in word-selection-mode, I get a little geeky.

The OCD-editor-in-my-brain cackles madly. “Showtime!” She hovers behind me as I pull up the online thesaurus. “Mission parameters?” Continue reading “Is She Geeking Out AGAIN?”

The Difference Between a Writer and an Author

William Faulkner

Every once in a while, I see the question brought up in a Facebook discussion group, or posed even here on the blog. There are those who equate the word author with only the highest literary form. The word writer is reserved for the next echelon of those who sully the art for mere profit, writing populist tripe about sparkly vampires and little boys going off to some sorcerer’s academy. But at least these were published by a genuine traditional publishing house.

Then, I suppose, are we mere doodlers and scribblers—little better than chimps with keyboards, the indies. We are the “Cousin Eddie” of the entire tradition. No respectable publisher would have us. Why don’t we just die? Oh, the humanity. Continue reading “The Difference Between a Writer and an Author”