WRITING HIGH IMPACT FICTION: DONALD MAASS
Lately, I’ve been going through a ‘books on writing’ craze. First it was ‘The First Five Pages,’ by Noah Lukeman, then it was ‘Writing with Emotion, Tension, and Conflict,’ Cheryl St. John, and now it’s ‘Writing 21st Century Fiction: High Impact Techniques for Exceptional Storytelling,’ by Donald Maass. Donald Maass, for those of you who don’t know, is an NYC based literary agent—he proudly recently moved from Manhattan to the nice part of Brooklyn—and is, sort of, a literary
WRITERS: NEVER GIVE UP!
I’ve talked about this before but I want to talk about it again as it pertains to writing and writers: The art of patience and indomitable spirit. If you haven’t been writing for long, then you don’t yet fully understand the fear, anger, sadness and rage that comes with being a part- or full-time writer. Mainly this comes in the form of bold-faced rejections from agents, publishing houses, and literary magazines and journals. But it also comes in the form of society being…wel
LITERARY AGENT SUBMISSIONS: BE CAREFUL, TAKE YOUR TIME, DO IT RIGHT
“All things come round to him who will but wait.” Henry Wadsworth Longfellow A word to the wise—all you aspiring authors out there—regarding submitting your book to literary agents. Be careful, take your time, and do it right. Let me elaborate. As many of you know, I recently attended my fourth year in a row at the San Francisco Writers Conference, in San Francisco, California. It’s a fantastic conference and, if you can rake together the $650, it’s totally worth the 3-4 days
ARE YOU READY TO WORK? THE BUSINESS OF WRITING AND BOOK EDITING
If you haven’t already, pre-order my book editing client Christian Picciolini’s memoir, “Romantic Violence: Memoirs of an American Skinhead.” It is the profound [true] tale of a neo-Nazi skinhead in the late 80s in Chicago who jumps into the white power movement at 14 and gets out at twenty-two. After the depression, he found out he’d been duped, and who he really was. In 2010 he co-founded “Life After Hate,” a non-profit that helps youth disentangle from gangs and teaches no
