Sue Bradford Edwards's Blog, page 132

How Many of These Banned Books Have You Read?

We are midway through Banned Books Week 2020 and this is a special year.  Banned Books Week is celebrating 20 years.  Skim this list and then tell me – how many of the top 100 banned and challenged books for the past decade have you read?  I’ll star the ones I’ve read. The Absolutely True […]

3 Warning Signs that Your Character’s Emotion May be Over-the-top

When book club meets, we talk about more than this month’s book.  In September we read If Beale Street Could Talk by James Baldwin.  We also talk about the other books we’ve been reading.  When someone mentioned a particular title, I had to admit that I hadn’t been able to finish it.  The characters were too over-the-top […]

One Way for Writers to Push Themselves Creatively: Inktober

I always tell people to push themselves creatively.  That said, I’m not always really good about taking that advice.  I get “busy” with the paid work and forget to just have fun and play.  But because I don’t illustrate, Inktober is a great way for me to play creatively. The rules for Inktober are simple.  […]

Three Things to Consider for Your Story Setting

Tonight, I was chatting with a group of my fellow authors about mystery writing. They’ve all completed and published mysteries. I’m working on my first cozy. One of the things we discussed was what annoys us enough to quit reading.  One woman mentioned that she grew up in New Orleans so when she read a […]

How-to Attend the National Book Festival

Wow!  This is the 20th birthday for the National Book Festival, put on each year by the Library of Congress.  I didn’t realize the event was this young. Not surprisingly, given all that is 2020, this year the event will be 100% virtual and there is no cost to attend.  I’m avoiding the F-word because […]

4 Steps to Retelling a Classic

I’m fascinated by retellings.  Here are 4 steps for tackling this kind of project. Read, read, read. It is always tempting to read a retelling and think “That’s not how I could re-work X.”  Instead of doing it that way, reread a few of your favorites.  Which ones really capture your imagination now?  Your taste […]

3 Times Slang Can Throw You a Curve

Idiomatic expressions are tricky.  Not familiar with that term?  An idiomatic expression is a phrase that means something other than the literal meaning of the words.  For example, when we call someone a bookworm, we aren’t calling them a book devouring bug.  We are saying that this person loves to read.  In Spanish, the phrase […]

Book Covers: The Impeachment of Donald Trump and Coronavirus: The COVID-19 Pandemic

Saturday I got the author’s copies of my two most recent books: The Impeachment of Donald Trump and Coronavirus: The COVID-19 Pandemic.  I just had to be a little silly when we took the photo.  It just felt a little ridiculous to smile and look happy while holding these two titles. When I turned in the […]

3 Creative Ways to Promote Your Book

How do you promote your books when buyers can’t come to events and you can’t do school visits?  Authors who have had books come out in 2020 have gotten creative.  Here are 5 of my favorites. An Online Scavenger Hunt To promote his book, Into the Clouds, about a 1953 attempt to reach the summit of K2, […]

5 Tips on Recharging

Raise your hand if you’ve noticed that 2020 has been a bit much.  In spite of that, I feel like I’ve gotten a fair amount of writing done. Early in the pandemic I wrote and rewrote The Impeachment of Donald Trump and Coronavirus: The COVID-19 Pandemic. I’ve also written two new picture books, Baby Browz and Four Freddies.  Baby […]