Five Lessons from Writing a Novel in a Month
Sunday, November 30th, 2008 Posted in Writing | No Comments »Yesterday I announced that I had finished writing my 2008 National Novel Writing Month effort, a post-apocalyptic sci-fi novel called The Least. This was my third attempt at writing a 50,000-word novel in 30 days (that's 1,667 words per day). ...
NaNoWriMo 2008 Winner
Saturday, November 29th, 2008 Posted in Writing | 2 Comments »I finished. I just crossed the 50,000-word mark, wrapped up my epilogue and stuck a fork in The Least, my 2008 National Novel Writing Month novel. Whew. It was quite a sprint at the end, when I wrote more than 6,500 words ...
NaNoWriMo 2008 Update
Thursday, November 20th, 2008 Posted in Writing | 2 Comments »For those who don't remember or haven't been paying attention, I'm participating in my third National Novel Writing Month right now. That's when I consume massive amounts of chocolate and caffeine and write a 50,000-word novel in 30 days. After ...
NaNoWriMo 2008: The Least
Saturday, November 1st, 2008 Posted in Writing | No Comments »Oh yeah, I started writing a novel today. Again. It's called The Least (it's a working title, I know, I'm not thrilled with it either). This is the third time I'm participating in National Novel Writing Month, the pressure-cooker event ...
NaNoWriMo 2008
Saturday, October 25th, 2008 Posted in Writing | No Comments »Next Saturday begins National Novel Writing Month and I think I'm going to partake again. I mentioned a few weeks ago that I was editing my last novel in vague hopes of finishing in time for NaNoWriMo 2008. I wasn't ...
Editing my Novel (Again)
Saturday, September 20th, 2008 Posted in Writing | 1 Comment »In the past few weeks I've been working on editing my novel. Yes, the one I said I was starting to edit a year ago. The one I finished writing almost two years ago. It's called Turn Left at the ...
Unclear Writing: What Does That Even Mean?
Thursday, April 10th, 2008 Posted in Writing | 3 Comments »Here's a real life writing example from the 'what does that even mean?' file: "Mike's personal history and present ministry evidences in The Foursquare Church indicate his unique gifting and calling as regarding his new pursuits among us." It comes from a ...
Pick Your Words Honestly
Wednesday, November 28th, 2007 Posted in Business & Marketing, Writing | No Comments »I have a client that needed to cancel an event this week. But that's not how they're phrasing it. Instead of canceled the event was withdrawn. What does that even mean? I understand what they're up against. They don't want the negative ...
Writing Bad Copy
Wednesday, November 7th, 2007 Posted in Writing | 1 Comment »While writing ad copy for a missions organization tonight I almost wrote the phrase "missionary position" in an entirely non-sexual context and for a moment didn't realize how bad that would have been. Then I realized it and wondered if I ...
79% of Books Sell Less Than 100 Copies
Friday, October 12th, 2007 Posted in Books, Writing | 1 Comment »Some depressing stats for writers from Chris Anderson's The Long Tail: In 2004, 950,000 books out of 1.2 million tracked by Nielsen BookScan sold fewer than ninety-nine copies. Another 200,000 sold fewer than 1,000 copies. Only 25,000 sold more than 5,000 ...
