I first met author J.A. Marx this summer when I interviewed her about her debut book, Destiny Defied. During that interview she spoke about publishing industry standards, so I asked her come back and share more. J.A. has made a special offer for my readers with her post today. See the details at the bottom…
Whether you submit with regularity or not, it’s important to track your submissions. How else will you follow up if you have no record of the magazines and editors (or agents/publishing houses) to whom you have submitted your work? I keep a simple Excel file with the following info: Date submitted Magazine name Editor’s name…
“Bloated, chunky, dull dialogue is a five-alarm warning to the reviewer that you can’t write salable fiction,” says James Scott Bell in his book The Art of War for Writers. Dialogue, like any other part of your novel, must move your story forward. An important part of good dialogue is the distinctive voice of each…
I want to accomplish as much as I can when I’m writing, so I utilize keyboard shortcuts. Many of these MS Word shortcuts translate over to other word processing programs such as Scrivener (the one I use). Here is a list of MS Word keyboard shortcuts to help you save time as you write your…