Writer Unboxed

If you’re joining us today, this is Part 2 of my interview with author Kim Richardson. She’s sharing the knowledge gained in writing her memoir, The Unbreakable Child, which recounts how she survived both a decade of abuse at the hands of — and a successful lawsuit against — the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth. [...]

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Kit Dunsmore asked: How do you deal with the different stages of a writing project, especially the ones that are least natural for you? A: At the personal level, what stops me from pushing through the unfamiliar is always fear. Fear that I’ll fail, that I’ll be mediocre, that I’ll be mocked, irrelevant. But I understand [...]

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One highlight of RWA Nationals is the RITA award ceremony. It’s pretty dazzling, with an MC, coordinated soundtrack, and large screens which display cover art and author photos between acceptance speeches. It’s the closest I’ll get to the Academy-Award experience in my life, and the two I’ve been to now gave me goosebumps. The audience [...]

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I recently had an idea for a fantastic essay about writing. It would prove controversial, but hold merit; it would change the world, or at least help my post hit a high retweet number. (Which to honest, because I’m terminally competitive, would scratch a persistent itch.) Problem was, I couldn’t nail the voice. I knew [...]

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I listened with great interest to an NPR radio show recently called ‘The Shallows’: This Is Your Brain Online. I highly recommend the 7-minute program, as the author of The Shallows, Nicholas Carr, warns us of something I think we all need to hear. As much as we’re online–for research, for platform building, for visiting [...]

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I know Kathleen and Therese meant well when they asked me to offer my best writing advice, but I gotta tell you, the idea that I could presume to do so after being here less than three months? With the pedigree of you folks? Oy. The very concept made me break out in hives. Fortunately, [...]

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Last month, I finished my new book, How To Bake A Perfect Life, and sent it off to my editor and agent, who are both speedy readers. By the time I polished up a couple of talks for a conference and returned home, they had turned it around, and I plunged into revisions. There’s a [...]

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Therese blogged about ways to jumpstart your creativity. The subject has been on my mind a lot, because I’ve spent the past month overhauling my office. It’s a great, if ordinary, space–a bedroom upstairs overlooking the street and a view of Pikes Peak and the entire Front Range, which changes daily with light and weather [...]

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A good many of you will be writing madly for NaNoMo this month, trying to finish a book in 30 days. How will you stay healthy during this time? As a veteran of numerous NaNoMo’s (otherwise known as the deadline blitz), I have a few suggestions.

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I’m going to foray into Therese’s area of expertise, which is health, just for today. Lately I’ve been chained to my computer for long patches of time as I try to finish a project, and my back has been on fire, and I feel like an old wonton folding in on itself. In desperation, I [...]

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That is a mold of a butt. Probably a nicer butt than mine, but a butt just the same. I have a similar imprint on my chair after this past week. See, I had some good news–a request for a full–and felt the strong urge to read through my manuscript. One. More. Time. After not [...]

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Welcome to 2008. I don’t believe in New Year resolutions, but I do have a few suggestions for writers wanting to start this year with energy and enthusiasm. We often talk about technical challenges on WU – plotting, character development, style, language and so on. We don’t deal so much with the health and wellbeing [...]

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