It starts with falling down. In the snow. And not being able to get up. Art Hritus. Ben Gay. Johnny Walker. Three men I don’t want to meet up with these days. Of course I wasn’t wearing boots. The mittens had been left on the kitchen counter. I didn’t even have a hat. The wind and the snow came up out of the open expanse of fields and pasture as soon as I got out of town on Hwy 47. I was headed for Weston, Wisconsin, where essayist, Nancy Runner was having a book launch event. Driving 35 mph in a 65 mph zone out in the country during a total white-out. How funny would it be if I get stuck and have to walk for help? Seriously, the snow and wind made driving conditions extreme. I pulled over at the next road crossing and turned around and headed home. I met Nancy Runner in Neenah at the Wisconsin Writers Association conference. In the fall. When it was sunny and warm. She had attended one of the sessions where I gave a presentation about publishing. With the charm of Angela Lansbury and the wit of Erma Bombeck, Nancy told me about her idea for a book, Early Birds Flock Together: Joys, Sorrows—and Laughs—in Senior Living. She wanted to know where she might find a publisher and how to go about it. We had a great conversation and I enjoyed looking at her writing portfolio. Nancy hired Swenson Book Development for…
This past Saturday, May 14, Jill Swenson and I attended the Lakefly Writers Conference in Oshkosh, WI. This was my first time attending a literary conference and I experienced the joy of participating in a community of Wisconsin writers. Sponsored by the Friends of the Oshkosh Public Library, the Lakefly Writers Conference is named after the insects which annually appear briefly in early May along… [Read More]
Filed Under: Dixie Jarchow, Elizabeth Koehler-Pentacoff, Friends of the Oshkosh Public Library, Lakefly Writers Conference, Oshkosh Convention Center, Ruth Percey, The Missing Kennedy, Tom Cannon
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Who should you send a query letter to? Agents – If you are writing fiction, memoir, or a children’s books, you must have an agent who will represent your work to publishers. Publishers – If you are writing nonfiction or poetry, you can query the publisher. TIP: Research the agency or publisher. Visit their website and check their submission guidelines. How do I find… [Read More]
“I am looking for authors with a distinctive voice.” “Great premise but I couldn’t connect with the writer’s voice.” “The voice isn’t strong enough in the first ten pages to make me keep reading.” So what do editors mean by “voice” when they talk about the craft of writing? Voice is the individual writing style of an author. It’s the way a narrator tells their… [Read More]
Anyone who enjoys the painstakingly difficult process of writing probably has a love for words, which inspires their masochistic writer’s journey. Those who understand the slight intricacies of words and the importance of sentence structure choose their statements wisely, editing, re-editing, and editing again. This process is multiplied twofold for a writer who speaks more than one language, carrying with them the difficulty of creating… [Read More]
Filed Under: Carolyn Porter, colloquial expressions, French, Newell Searle, Paris, Spanish, Tracy K. Smith, translation
When you write a book length manuscript you need to keep the story moving forward. Every scene, every sentence, every word should serve to advance the storyline. When editors talk about “pacing,” they refer to the narrator’s ability to keep the reader turning the page. Have you ever heard someone tell a joke that went on for so long by the time the punch line… [Read More]
Filed Under: composition, dialgoue, flashback, foreshadow, pacing, Punctuation, rhythm, tempo, varied sentence length