Your #1 Secret Weapon: Writing Communities
Building a supportive network takes time and courage. Novelist Katrin Schumann argues that it’s worth starting to cultivate community early on, even if your instinct or your preference is to work alone. This post first appeared on JaneFriedman.com.
I’ve always found people who make movies to be awe-inspiring—in order to evoke a world and a story on screen, they need to work together with dozens of other professionals, from front-end people like actors and directors, to back-end people like sound editors
Katrin Schumann
Countdown to Your Book Launch
Katrin Schumann explores what it's really like for authors in the months before launching a new book into the marketplace.
A book launch is a prolonged, and frankly rather strange, experience. You've already been working for what seems like ages (and sometimes is ages) on a manuscript. Eons pass as you prepare that manuscript for the reality of a commercial marketplace: editing, cover design, interior design, more editing, acknowledgements, nightmares about who you've forgotten to acknowledge, and diving into promotional activities. Your book--it's themes, characters, the whole point of it--seems far away now. It's become a product, one ...
Katrin Schumann
Why You Need to Figure Out Your Book's Genre
Authors bristle at having to fit their books into neat boxes according to genre—yet the industry and readers continue to demand that we do so. Katrin Schumann explores why, and how best to find your genre.
Personally, I've found it quite challenging to figure out the genre of my novels. It seems overly simplistic to categorize my own work according to genres, and differentiating between them can be hard
Katrin Schumann
Everything Novel: Two Debut Authors Share What Drove Them to Publish
Last month at DeadDarlings, we were lucky enough to speak to two authors about their debut works. Ladee Hubbard told us about what led to The Talented Ribkins (Melville House, 2017) and Arif Anwar shared how he wrote The Storm, (HarperCollins/Simon & Schuster May 2018).
Ladee: What did it take to get The Talented Ribkins sold and onto the bookshelves?
The Editors at Dead Darlings
Starting from Scratch: Staring Down the Blank Screen
Katrin Schumann asks, what happens when, after a long time writing and editing, you once again find yourself at the beginning of an entirely new project?
Some of you have been writing for a long time, and you likely have a manuscript or two going already. You may be astonished by how long it's taking to get your writing to where you want it to be—and perhaps you're learning about the utterly transformative power of deep editing.
Katrin Schumann
@GrubWriters
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