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As I said yesterday, it was fun and enlightening to read your answers to Friday’s questions. One thing surprised me: the number of people who are still thumbs-down on Kindle. Now admittedly, it’s not for everyone. But it is a legitimate and valuable tool for people who read a lot. To all of you who…

O…M…G… did you READ all those comments from Friday’s post??? What fun! Y’all are so entertaining… you should be, like, writers or something. (If you haven’t read them, scroll down and do it NOW.) So I guess the little mixer was a success, what with all the chatting going on. I’ve read all your comments…

Friday is typically the day I ask you a question and let you talk amongst yourselves until we meet again on Monday. But I’ve been remiss as a hostess (as my southern readers will attest). I mean, here you are, all these strangers showing up in my virtual living room, and I haven’t even helped…

One thing I want to do more on the blog this year is let you know about new releases from WordServe clients. It’s more than just self-promotion and kudos to the author (although admittedly, that’s part of it). I also hope that by telling you a little about each book’s journey to publication, I can…

As we all settle into this new year, many of us are thinking about our resolutions, our goals, our dreams. What will we do this year that brings us closer to what we desire? This year, many of us will move ahead with concrete milestones that show we’re reaching our goals. Many of us will…

If you’ve been around publishing for long, you’ve probably heard of the infamous slush pile. Where did that term come from? It generally means the stacks and stacks of manuscripts that come in over the transom. The stacks that editors and agents do their best to read, skim, glance at, or at the very least,…

Hey everyone, I’m now on Twitter. Click here to follow me. My Twitter updates will also be on the sidebar of this blog. Because I KNOW y’all want to know what I had for breakfast and when I’m going to scrub my toilet. AND because I just couldn’t figure out what the heck to do…

The following is another re-run. Enjoy! When publishers or agents receive unsolicited manuscripts, we say it “came in over the transom.” Ever given much thought to what that actually means? There’s a varied folklore surrounding the phrase, but here’s what I’ve pieced together. A “transom” is a crosspiece, usually made of wood. The word has…

I’m on vacation… but due to the wonders of modern technology, the blog is NOT on vacation. This is a re-run. “When am I going to stop feeling so bad about rejecting people?” My husband muted the football game. “What?” “When am I going to get a thicker skin? When is it going to get…

Happy holidays! Can I just say how amazed I am that SEVEN people sent me queries on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day? What’s up with that? Does an agent’s in-box EVER get a rest??? Apparently not. Well, I’m on vacation now so anything that comes in will be unanswered until January. The following is a…

Written and typed by Lauren, age 9* “The toys are all gone,” cried the elves. They all ran around looking for Christmas toys. “We can’t be out of everything! We are out of screws so we can’t build dollhouses for girls and Nerf guns for boys. Santa is going to be sad.” Just then Santa…

Good morning and happy Hanukkah! We have contest finalists today… and we’re VOTING. A big thank-you to everyone who scribbled down the first thing that came to mind worked long and hard to compose your beauiful haiku for the 17 Syllables Contest. Here are the five I’ve chosen as finalists. VOTE IN THE SIDEBAR. One…

So, you know I’m not the Wizard of Oz, right? And I’m not God? Okay, good, just checking. Because sometimes I get these letters from people that seem to imbue me with powers that I just don’t have. Like this one I received in response to a very kind rejection letter I’d sent (this is…

Looking for some terrific holiday reading? Need some inspiration to get that first novel finished? Here is a list of 10 great books that were the first novel published by each of these authors. (In some cases, the only novel they published.) This isn’t meant to be discouraging. Every writer has a first book… sometimes…