My proposal is in the mail – finally! Don’t get me wrong. I met my deadline, but I’m glad I’m finished. It was a long hard road to put everything together.             I now need to look back and reflect on my process. I need to evaluate, in the stages and deadlines I set, where [...]

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I learned a valuable lesson the other day: don’t take things for granted, no matter how “reliable” they appear to be.             Last week I heard from my publisher that the illustrator for my non-fiction picture book had signed his contract. Although I was joyful, my excitement was marred a bit by a question the [...]

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Are you teachable? Whether you’ve been writing for 1 month, five years, or twenty years, you need to be teachable. There is always something to learn.             I have learned and gleaned lots of valuable information from my critique group, the Wordsmiths. The ladies who make up our happy octave could collectively compile a wealth [...]

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Do you have a Creative Cache? Actually, that’s just a fancy name for an Idea Box. I think every writer should have one. This is where you store all those little (or big, if you have the room) items that will inspire your upcoming stories.             You don’t need a super fancy container. A shoe [...]

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For some reason people have a view of writers sitting in their isolated mountain cabins or island bungalows, typing up their grand opus with only the bears or birds as company. Writers do need quiet times to work (although in my household, that is a rare commodity), but writers cannot stay isolated. They need to be [...]

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