Tag Archives: Greyhaus Literary

In the Blogosphere: 9/12-9/17

Posted in This Week in the Blogosphere by

“In the Blogosphere” is a series, which lists links to writing-related blogs I’ve stumbled upon throughout a given week (usually).

I’m admittedly behind with my Blogosphere posts—I have about 50 links saved, dating all the way back to June (oh noes!)—but they are all still worth a look.  I’ll catch up eventually, right?

GET WRITING!

My weekend plans fell through, so now I will be sitting at home [probably with all the lights on all weekend because this will be the first time I’m staying home alone at my house—how lame am I?] with my computer and my beagle.  Which, as much as I love them both, can also both be time sucks!  But I’m buzzing on my WIP right now and would LOVE to get to 30,000 words by Sunday.  It will be a bit of a challenge, but I’m up for it.

Adorable little baby time suck. And a bunch of crap she'd dragged out everywhere and was chewing up. (And my husband's foot.)

All-grown-up time suck. 🙂

That said, here are some resources—some of which I’ve used and some of which I haven’t yet but might have to employ this weekend, in order to get words written.

  • Write or Die—You can set your word count and your time goals, and this interface will get IN YOUR FACE [well, if you set it that way] until you reach your targets.
  • WriteRoom—This is for Mac users.  It’s a full-screen writing environment that rids you of the “clutter” of word processing programs.  [Referred to by The New York Times as the “ultimate spartan writing utopia.”]

  • WordWatchers—This has been working for me this month—and this isn’t just shameless self-promotion, as a number of writers have been getting tremendous amounts of work done using this writing program.  It’s through The Write-Brained Network and, like its sister weight-loss program, is something each individual designs to fit his or her lifestyle.  All us Write-Brainiacs participating have set challenging goals, and while we haven’t all been hitting them each week [guilty!] we have been getting tons of work done. And, some people have finished entire projects or gotten over slumps, due to the prodding encouragement of others.

QUERYING & SUCH

Here, literary agent Jennifer Laughran busts publishing industry myths that most writers believe or have heard.

Yeah, but this is real, though.

Two takes on the 5 stages of querying:

  • The first, a guest post by writer Anne Gallagher on the Guide to Literary Agents blog
  • The second, by the inimitable Tahareh

When when those rejections come, Holen Mathews at GotYA offers some constructive questions you need to ask yourself.

SOCIAL MEDIA TIPPAGE

Social media got you down? [If you’re Greyhaus Literary’s Scott Eagan, then yes.] Author Jody Hedlund offers some advice on how to use it effectively without allowing it to take over your life—and writing time.

And here, Daily Writing Tips lists 40 Twitter hashtags for writers.

CRAFT

I was going through my saved posts for “In the Blogospheres” today and came across this little jobby, by Heather Trese at See Heather Write, on the importance of having a pitch . . .

. . . which goes hand in hand with the post I wrote this week on plot vs. situation.

It was really hard to narrow down which picture I found to be the chachiest. So I went with this one.

Here is a lovely post by Christina Mandelski over at Will Write for Cake wherein she discusses the importance of setting in a story.

And here, Writing for Digital talks about the value of a good editor.  One edit quite possibly changed the entire course of American history!

FANGIRL LOVE

I heart you, John Green.

I heart you, Meg Cabot. [the Allie Finkle #6, Blast from the Past, review she links to at the end of this post is MINE!]

PLUG!

Inky Fresh Press interviewed little ol’ me!

Grounding is important.

Happy weekend, everyone! Come harass me on the WB or Twitter and make sure I’m getting my words written!

In the Blogosphere: 2/15-2/26

Posted in This Week in the Blogosphere by

“In the Blogosphere” is a weekly series, which lists links to writing-related blogs I’ve stumbled upon throughout a given week.  Most posts will be from that week, but if I find some “oldies but goodies,” I’ll throw those up here as well.

I never find as much time to read blogs as I want, but here are a few posts that struck me this week—and last week, as I slacked and didn’t do a Blogosphere post last week.

SOME SPLAININ’ TO DO

I don’t know if it was just the places I was checking, but it seemed like a lot of industry peeps wanted to explain a lot of things to writers this week.  Maybe the winter freeze is making people write bad queries?  Or maybe it’s making writers whinier?

Among my favorite entries were by WordServe Literary‘s Rachelle Gardner and Carina Press‘s Angela James.

On her blog, Gardner explains why lit agencies have submission guidelines as well as why she might reject one’s work after she’s requested a partial or full.

James explains why they don’t give personalized rejections as well as why manuscripts are rejected in the first place.

LIT AGENTS

Ever a sweetie, Curtis Brown Ltd.‘s Nathan Bransford reminds us, as writers, to appreciate our biggest supporters, our loved ones.

Love you—and thanks for everything, Kyley T!

Over at Greyhaus Literary, Scott Eagan gives some advice on how to write young adult lit—or how not to write it.

This post on titles by FinePrint Literary‘s Janet Reid made me laugh, and it also answered some questions I had about the process.

RESOURCES

On her blog, Write on Target, YA and women’s fiction writer Debra L. Schubert posted this vlog, wherein she and her agent, Bernadette Baker-Baughman of Baker’s Mark Literary Agency talk publishing.

Being that much of my job now relies on waiting for responses from others, this post, by Peter Bregman over at Harvard Business Review, helps put a lot in perspective in terms of what to do when your voicemails and e-mails go unanswered.

Ring, dammit, ring!

QUERY HELP

On her Web site, kids’ lit author Hélène Boudreau makes writing queries look easy with this breakdown.

Here, Nathan Bransford talks about the difference between being savvy and sucking up; and here, he discusses the theory some have about querying in batches.

For another take on dissecting queries, check out QueryTracker‘s Query Ninja, Elana Johnson.  We’ve got sharks, we’ve got ninjas . . . what’s next? 🙂

. . . And here two takes on post-query etiquette:

-and-

TONGUE-IN-CHEEK QUERY HELP

On her Probably Just a Story blog, Laura Ellen Scott parodies Writer’s Digest‘s 21 tips on how to get out of the slush pile.

REALITY CHECKS

Andrea Brown Literary Agency‘s Mary Kole reminds us that getting an agent is not a magic bullet to publication; and, in this post, The Intern talks about why agents and editors would *like* to set you straight when you send bad queries—or non queries, as it were—(but why they just can’t).

As seen on TV.

CONTESTS

Some awesome peeps are giving away some awesome prizes!

Break out your tap shoes: Kids’ lit author, the award-winning Beth Kephart wants to know your definition of dance.  She’s giving away signed copies of her second YA novel, House of Dance, to two lucky commenters with the best entries (contest ends March 5).

Want to have your fiction published in Writer’s Digest?  Here, WD’s Zachary Petit lays out how to enter their monthly Your Story contest.

The paperback, out this March.

ALSO

Check out my recent interview with Books & Such Literary Agency‘s Etta Wilson on the Guide to Literary Agents blog.

Writer’s Digest and Writer’s Digest Books is calling for reviews and success stories, so show them some love, if you’ve ever used one of their trillions of resources and hearted it.