Riley Adams's Blog, page 228

Looks and Personality

Yesterday a good friend of mine flew into the Charlotte airport with a short layover. I figured it would be a great time to catch up with her in person while we had a cup of coffee (there's a Starbucks right outside of the security check-in.)

While I was waiting for my friend's plane to land, I was milling around in front of the security checkpoint. I must have looked like I was up to no good at all because a security guard kept leveling suspicious looks at me. Of course, I did carry my h...

Writing About People We Know

It's always really interesting talking with readers about writing. Their questions are always really different from writers' questions.

In the past I've never noticed much similarity in the questions I get, but recently, at different events, I've heard variations on the same question several times.

Do I write people I know? Do people I know wish I'd write about them? Do I write about myself?

Writing people we know: When the readers were asking about putting real people in books, they ...

Resources for Bloggers

The online community of writers is such an important resource for all of us. Writers share a ton of industry information, are supportive when we hit writing or industry snags, and offer tips and friendship through their blogs.

But sometimes, we all get a little burned out.

I was skimming through my Google reader and read this post writer Anne Annie ran on her blog, in favor of "slow blogging:"

BUT, and this is a big BUT—blogging takes a humongous chunk out of your writing time...

Talking to Book Clubs

I'm looking forward to meeting with a book club tonight at Uwharrie Books in Locust, North Carolina.

Book clubs are usually a lot more fun for me than signings. At most signings, the folks who come into the bookstore have no idea who you are (unless they've come out specifically to see you) and may not be interested in the types of books you write.

At a book club, you've got a group of people who've chosen your book to read. And the sales pressure is off, which is always a real relief...

The Boulevard of Broken Dreams…for Writers

One thing that I noticed during my book tour was how many people would like to be writers or authors.

A couple of times, writers approached our table at signings. They wanted to know our secrets for getting an agent or getting a publisher. And, yes, the word "secret" was actually used by one of the people.

My mind boggled a little at the thought of boiling all the publishing advice down into the quick sound bite they seemed to be looking for. Avery Aames, who was with me, was very good to p...

Twitterific

Here are writing links that I've posted to Twitter for the past week. (And there are fewer tweets—I went on a Tweetcation while I was out of town.) :) If you're looking for a particular topic, just plug in your keyword into the search box at the top left-hand corner of the blog (on the black header right above my blog name…next to the Blogger symbol…the small search window is next to the magnifying glass) and the roundup with your subject will come up. To narrow your search down on the...

What's Your Specialty?

A few times this summer, we've gone out to eat with our son and he's been dissatisfied with his meal.

He was really excited about the food when he ordered it, but when he got the steak from the seafood restaurant, or the seafood salad from the deli, he wasn't thrilled with the results.

I wasn't really connecting the dots on my end, either. But finally (I'm slow sometimes) I realized there was a pattern to the problems with his orders. He wasn't ordering the specialty of the house....

Marketing vs. Creativity

I've basically trained myself to be creative on demand—and leave my muse out of the equation all together. Inspiration is too unpredictable—I seem to get better results from just old fashioned perseverance.

But there are times when it's more difficult to write than others and I wonder if there are other writers out there in the same boat.

I'm going to limit my observations here to genre writing, which is all I'm familiar with. But—and this is a generalization—I think that genre writers are...

Writing While Traveling

I was basically out traveling for almost two weeks. But—I still had writing to do.

Actually, while I was gone, I had a call from my agent. I had revision requests on a project I'm working on and she suggested I knock them out in two weeks. That meant that half of that time I would be on the road while working on the edits.

I've always been able to work while I'm gone—but I'm not nearly as productive when I'm traveling as when I'm home.

So this is what I did—and I thought it might help...

The Trouble With Smart Phones

It's so good to be back and blogging again! I missed it more than I'd thought---and especially missed visiting with all of y'all!

It's been a busy couple of weeks, starting out with the book tour and then ending up by catching up with family in Alabama and South Carolina—and my daughter's 9th birthday and subsequent party.

One thing that's been different from other trips out of state is that I was more plugged in than usual.

I've always traveled with my laptop, but usually didn't connect...