Writer Unboxed

If you missed part 1 of my interview with author Billy Mernit, click HERE, then come back. Billy, an instructor with the UCLA Extension Writers’ Program and a story analyst for Universal Pictures, applied the tried-and-true rom-com formula to his debut novel, Imagine Me and You, with hilarious results. In part 2, we discuss […]

This deserves to be posted immediately. Sooner than immediately, actually, which is why I posted it now but earlier than now so as not to bump poor Billy Mernit off the top spot. Confused? No matter. Watch the video and get a laugh.
Wildly Popular ‘Iron Man’ Trailer To Be Adapted Into Full-Length Film
Happy weekend, everyone!

A while back, Teri asked if I would revisit my article on “Story as River” for Writer Unboxed. This is it as it will now appear in my forthcoming book, “Jump-start Your Novel with Kitty-cats in Action,” which is based on articles and edits from my blog, Flogging the Quill.
A tale of two stories:
Enticed by […]

We’ve been getting a spike in traffic and some e-mails of concern about me. Please let me assure everyone that I’m alive and kicking. I’d had a vague notion that there was another Kathleen Bolton out there somewhere (you run across odder things when you Google your own name, you know?). And […]

CONTEST! CONTEST! CONTEST!
Through the generosity of Ben Bella Books, three lucky readers of Writer Unboxed can win a copy of Demigods and Monsters, the anthology mentioned at the end of my post. Just answer this simple question: What was the name of the Gorgon killed by Perseus? The first three entries with the correct […]

I don’t think I’ve mentioned this, but I’m working on book chapters for a nonfiction assignment. Specifically, I’m providing the chapters on nutrition and fitness for a new book on self care. Cool, eh? So I hope you’ll forgive me if I point you toward an interesting blog post today instead of attempting to write […]

Better late than never, but Bookseller.com reports some interesting trends in YA fiction from the Bologna Children’s Bookfair: 
Fiction, especially series fiction, remained strong. Maeve Banhan, RH rights director, said: “It feels as though there is a definite move away from fantasy.” Instead publishers have been taken by the realism of a contemporary teen story from […]

The other day I engaged in the grim task of cleaning out my e-mail inbox. It had become loaded with messages, some of which were over seven years old. My long-suffering Eudora program gave me the dire warning to clean this crap out or it would quit on me.
Of course, I couldn’t help opening up […]

Debut author Billy Mernit knows a thing or two about romantic comedy: he teaches the rom-com template to aspiring screenwriters at UCLA. It’s no wonder he applied what he knows best when writing his novel, Imagine Me and You, released this past Tuesday. In Imagine, Mernit explores what happens to a man when he […]

So I’m gearing up for the paperback release of The Department of Lost and Found, which basically doesn’t mean that much since most of the promotional push goes to the hardcover release, but one thing that will catch readers’ eyes is that I have an entirely different cover for this version of the book. […]

More fallout continues over Amazon’s powergrab in the print-on-demand segment of publishing.
Per GalleyCat:
The American Society of Journalists and Authors, the nation’s trade association for freelance nonfiction writers, announced that it “is disgusted with Amazon’s announced move requiring that all print-on-demand (POD) books sold on Amazon’s site be printed by their own print-on-demand house.  Authors Guild […]

This is heartwrenching: 
Two weeks ago in North Lauderdale, Fla., funeral services were held for Russell Shaw, a prolific blogger on technology subjects who died at 60 of a heart attack. In December, another tech blogger, Marc Orchant, died at 50 of a massive coronary. A third, Om Malik, 41, survived a heart attack in December.
The […]