“Unputdownable.” “Reading this book was a treat, and I didnt want to put it down until I found out what happened and how the story ended.” No doubt about it, novelist Hallie Ephron knows how to write page-turning mysteries. A member of an illustrious writing family, Ephron came to writing fiction later in life. But [...]

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Kath here. Today’s post is the first from WU’s newest contributor, Rosina Lippi. Enjoy! For the historical novelist – for anyone interested in history – the internet has brought about a revolution. We are floating in a sea of information that deepens and spreads minute by minute. It’s incredibly empowering, but it also has its dangers. [...]

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We begin writing with a burning, a need to say something, to tell a story or explore an idea. We begin in delirious happiness, skulking away to scribble in private, stealing moments to capture a paragraph, a character, an essay. We slip into a study or a coffee shop with laptop or Clairefontaines and fountain [...]

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From CNN: Best-selling author John Updike has died at age 75 after battling lung cancer, his publicist said. From Wikipedia: John Hoyer Updike (March 18, 1932 – January 27, 2009) was an American novelist, poet, short story writer, art critic, and literary critic. Updike’s most famous work is his Rabbit series (Rabbit, Run; Rabbit Redux; [...]

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First, my happy news: The Last Will of Moira Leahy was involved in a four-way book auction in Germany, and sold to the highest bidder! Foreign sales can be important because the advance that foreign publishers pay to your US publisher goes against your US advance (unless you retained foreign rights, which we didn’t). Put [...]

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By all accounts, 2009 will be challenging for everyone. Luckily, it is also the year of the Ox, which is, according to Chinese lore, the perfect sign to clean up the world’s big fat financial mess. Eugenia Last writes in the Toronto Daily Sun: I am here to enforce honor and fair play To set [...]

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WU reader Julia Weston asked this question in response to Therese’s post on Facebook and building an author website: I’m an unpublished fiction writer and, after reading all the comments, I have to confess that I’m a bit intimidated by all this. Why? Because I’m unpublished. I have a finished manuscript and I’m preparing to search [...]

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The reviews for Hallie Ephron’s debut suspense novel, NEVER TELL A LIE, have been raves: “Lovers of classic mysteries will adore Hallie Ephron’s Never Tell a Lie … You can imagine Hitchcock curling up with this one.” — USA Today. “Ephron doesn’t miss a searing beat as she plunges the Roses into an abyss of [...]

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Some of us are architects, some of us pantsers (though I suspect most of us have a portion of each in us). A whole lot of people pants their pants off every year at NaNoWriMo, but that’s in private. I want to share with you a round of extreme pantsing, done in public for everyone [...]

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It’s amazing to think that it’s been only three short years since Therese and I decided we wanted to start a blog to empower other writers and share insights into the crazy world of publishing genre fiction. Running WU has been exhilarating, sometimes time-intensive, but always rewarding.  But mainly, we want to thank YOU, our readers, for [...]

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Some questions for me this week. Therese, Do you think your nonfiction credits have helped or hindered you at all? Does your nonfiction writing experience tie in with fiction? Are you going to continue writing nonfiction now that the fiction is going to be published? Cathy J Thanks for the questions, Cathy J! I worked [...]

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Valued contributor Sophie Masson sent us this note and we had to share: Hi Kathleen and Therese, am writing this in an internet cafe. Just wanted to tell you that my October post for Writer Unboxed, Natural magic, was judged as one of the best blog posts for 2008 on the Online Opinion web site. [...]

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