Aspiring Writers Resources

On a recent Saturday visit to my local bookstore, I noticed that almost every aisle, with the exception of the sports section, was filled with women. In that moment it dawned on me that as a writer I seem to always have women in mind when I think of my audience. I suppose that’s because I’m working on a romance novel, but still, it would appear that women are who’s shopping for books–and everything else–for themselves and their families.

A couple of years ago I started a magazine in Virginia called AVA–which was an acronym for Advertise Virginia. The magazine was all about small business marketing. In our debut issue, we ran an article all about the female customer. I thought I’d share some of that with you here. The article was actually written by my tremendously talented editor, Andrea DiSalvo, but I’m sure she wouldn’t mind my sharing it with you here. I think this info is as important to writers as it is to businesses.

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The Writer’s Most Powerful Customer — Women!

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I recently completed an editing job on an action/adventure novel by a first time author. When I handed over the manuscript, his first question was, now what do I do? The answer is, write a query letter.

A query letter is a formal letter sent by a writer to literary agents, editors, or publishing houses. This is a way for writers to propose their ideas. If you are a writer who aspires to get your work published, then getting this right is vital. After all, literary agents and publishers get their first impression of you and your book from this document.

Query letters should be limited to a single page and follow specific guidelines. The ideal format includes single spacing and a twelve-point font size. Your query letter would also consist of four sections in its single page format: the hook, synopsis, biography, and closing.

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What Is A Query Letter?

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My husband, who is the author of three books, was just asked by a close friend to write the foreword to his new book. He agreed, even though he’d never written a foreword before. I decided to do a little research for him on how to write a great foreword. I figured I’d share that information with you since, as an author, you may one day be asked to write a foreword for another author, which is a real compliment!

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Writing the Foreword in a Book

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Okay, so I had this brilliant idea to use creative visualization to spark my creative juices. Then my hubbie took off for Hawaii to do a hypnosis training video and took my iPod with him. Bad husband! So I decided to write about how obstinant we writers need to be to get our jobs done. So here are a few pointers from the trenches as I continue to crank out a few pages of my new novel even while spending most of my day writing business articles, brochures, newsletters and the like.

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When life gets in the way of your writing

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You may have noticed that I’ve been gone for awhile. Well, I’m back! In just the way we writers do, I’ve been mentally analyzing why I’ve found it so difficult to keep up with this blog and, admittedly, beating myself up a bit for it. Then one day it hit me in the head like a knuckle sandwich. When I’m writing all day long, taking the time to add writer’s resources to a blog is tough. Writing is a creative endeavor. Consequently, we writer’s seem to have only so much juice each day to devote to our writing. Some writer’s, like Stephen King, were born with oodles of juice. Others of us, not so much. I’m not talking about talent here; rather, I’m talking about the energy, drive, focus, concentration, and clarity of mind it takes to pump out really great writing–and at a rate we can make a living at it. This is why I’ve decided to take up creative visualization specifically for enhancing my creativity. Fortunately for me, my husband specializes in this arena. I’ve used his creative visualization processes before to help me get motivated to exercise and to get through treatment for breast cancer. So the other night I asked him if he could put something together to boost my creative writing juices so I can pump it out like a Stephen King or Janet Evanovich. Because he loves me, he said, “Yes.” So this is my first in a series of blogs about how I’m doing with the creative visualization, and how I’m progressing with my novel. Be sure to check in. Whatever happens with creative visualization, it’s almost always interesting. In the meantime . . .

Happy Writing!

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We writers are creative people. We’ve got to be in order to keep our prose fresh and inspiring. But how much of your day do you spend in creative endeavors? How many possible story lines or scene settings are you missing your everyday world just because you are too busy or too rushed to stop and pay attention? I received the following as an email forward, but I immediately thought about in the context of my writing.

Here is how the story goes:

A man sat at a metro station in Washington DC and started to play the violin; it was a cold January morning. He played six Bach pieces for about 45 minutes. During that time, since it was rush hour, it was calculated that thousands of people went through the station, most of them on their way to work.
Three minutes went by and a middle aged man noticed there was musician playing. He slowed his pace and stopped for a few seconds and then hurried up to meet his schedule.

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Are You Paying Attention to Creative Opportunities Around You?

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If you are considering self-publishing, the layout of your book will be almost as important as its content. An effectively designed layout will make it easier for people to read and understand your book. A poorly designed layout, on the other hand, can drive your readers so crazy that it will make them shut the book.

Layout According to Page Size

Know the page size of your book to determine the ideal measurements of your book layout. As books tend to have standard sizes, expect to adjust your layouts to the page size chosen for your book rather than the other way around. If you choose an on-demand publisher, they will provide you with the dimensions.

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6 Simple Book Layout Tips to Remember

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We writers spend an awful lot of time sitting in front of the computer. Many of us end up foregoing exercise or snacking while we work. Maybe you, like many other writers and marketers, have put on more weight than you’d like.

Because this is the time of year when weight loss rises to the top of most self improvement lists, I want to make sure you don’t fall into the trap that will consume so many others during the coming
weeks.

If you’ve read much of my marketing material, you know that I have 18 years of experience in the weight loss industry. Maybe you’d like to be one of my 10,000+ prior weight loss success stories…

And the really exciting news is:

The solution I am about to share with you doesn’t require you to do anything more than you currently
do - in fact, you’ll actually do a little less…

This means:

No diet to follow
No special foods to buy
No meetings
No weigh-ins
No books to read
No exercise equipment to drag-out
No drugs to take
No carbohydrates to count, and
No list of foods to avoid

To discover why the average diet lasts just 72 hours, and how to eliminate the problem where it started,click here:

http://www.90percentattitude.com/naturallythin

To Your Success!
Cynthia

P.S. You already have what it takes - you just need to re-learn
about these special attributes, and once you do you will be able
to achieve amazing results…

It all starts with one click here:

http://www.90percentattitude.com/naturallythin

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Fiction and Non-fiction writing are often compared even though they are two very different art forms. Each genre has its own set of pros and cons, and people can’t help but debate which writing style is easier or more practical for a writer to call his or her own. Let us examine the difference between these two styles then and find out how they truly differ and what similarities hold true to both.

How Does One Write Fiction?

Fiction writing reaches out to an audience seeking entertainment or food for their imaginations. They want to be transported to different places and periods or explore lives different from their own. Thus, it is only proper for any fiction writer to have a big imagination and to be very creative.

To write a good story, fiction writers must be able to come up with interesting plots and strong characters. A good handle on the pen will also give fiction writers an edge and a great writing style. These elements must be well developed and a writer must make sure to concentrate on answering the whys behind the events conspiring in the story.

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Writing Fiction Versus Non-Fiction

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Writing your very own book is not as easy as it may seem at first glance. You will have to find a theme, set up a plot, construct a good flow of ideas and then format and proofread your work.

Did your dream just die? Don’t worry! There are several book writing software products that can help you. These will be useful especially for beginning writers. Here are some of the software products you might want to try.

NewNovelist Software

This software claims that you can write your book the way you want to. It will cut-off your writing time by following the broken-down process of book writing into manageable parts. It will help you organize your thoughts better whether writing your introduction, your plot or even your ending first.

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Software for Book Writers

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