An Author’s Favorite Words: “The End”

The End There’s something so immensely gratifying about typing those words. A hint of sadness, perhaps, but an overwhelming cause for celebration! Typing “the end” means that you have completed a huge task–one that you began with trepidation, perhaps, not really sure you had it in you. “The end” means that you’ve said what you […]

Get Thee to a Conference

One of the earliest—and most annoying—pieces of advice I received several years ago, when I first came back to writing with the aim of publication, was go to a writer’s conference. Isn’t going to happen, I said. I was a stay-at-home mother of seven, busy schooling my children, the youngest still a nursing baby. There […]

Consecrated Writing

So here we are…poised between the season of sacred beginnings and the season of personal beginnings. In just such a frame of mind many years ago I determined to consecrate my life to God, and my writing is a part of my life, so it’s consecrated too. Merriam-Webster’s dictionary defines consecrated as “dedicated to a […]

Rough Drafting

November is National Novel Writing Month, most often referred to as NaNoWiMo or NaNo.  I’m typing my way toward 50,000 words to create part of a novel rough draft. Did you catch the last two words in that sentence? ROUGH DRAFT Much of what I’ve written will, and should, disappear during an editing phase. As […]

Committed to the Journey (Part 2)

(…continued from last week…) So, if I used to be one of those writers driven more by validation than by love of story, what changed? I’m glad you asked. 🙂 It was easy to recognize the pride and impatience in others. One critique partner expressed to me that he “didn’t have time to write a […]