Betsy Horvath's Blog, page 8

The Importance Of A Production Schedule

Although I love the holiday season, I’m a HUGE fan of January 1st.  That’s when the new year stretches out before us unsullied by our footsteps. What will happen in 2017?  What will we accomplish? Anything is possible. But, as with everything else, possibilities only become realities if we actually do the work to make […]

We Never Know (some thoughts about 2016)

2016 has gone now, and it took a lot of famous people along with it. David Bowie. Alan Rickman.  Gene Wilder.  Prince.  Garry Shandling.  Florence Henderson.  Doris Roberts.  Glenn Frey.  Muhammad Ali. George Michael. Carrie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds only one day apart. And those are just the ones I can think of off the […]

A Gift That Came Early

The holiday season is all about gifts. Whether you get gifts under the Christmas tree, or during the eight nights of Hanukkah, or the seven days of Kwanzaa, or celebrate the gift of light at the solstice, most of the holidays happening in December include gifts. This year I received a wondrous gift a little […]

‘Twas The Evening of Christmas

Setting – Christmas evening, inside Betsy’s brain Our Cast of Characters –  Betsy – your humble author Skipper – a chipmunk and Habit Implementation Specialist sent by the Muse Council to help Betsy develop good habits. Coffee – the beverage of champions.  He is always with Betsy in one form or another. Muse – She […]

Getting New Covers (and New Cover Reveals!)

One of the first things you hear when you start going the independent author route is that you need to get professional covers for your books.  You hear things like:  “Don’t try to do it yourself!” and “A bad cover can kill a book!” So, of course, I tried to do my book covers myself. […]

It’s Good To Have Goals

As I mentioned in last week’s blog post, I’ve become quite introspective here at the end of the year regarding my author business.  Or lack thereof. This introspection has led me to think about my reasons for doing this writing thing (again) and to identify a primary objective for what I want to achieve with […]

Finding an Objective

Hello, dear readers, and welcome to December. Soon it’s going to be 2017!  Yeesh. I always get somewhat introspective at the end of the year, thinking about where I’ve been and where I’m going.  Because of who I am, I also beat myself up for not making as much progress as I think I should […]

Focus

Too many distractions can make you forget what’s important.  At least, they can make you forget what’s really important to you, to the reality of your situation and your life in all its many aspects. Life goes on despite massive change and uncertainty.  We work and play and love and laugh and pay bills and […]

Keeping On

When we left Betsy many weeks ago, she was staring at the shining cities of the story worlds she was creating.  Harry, the white gerbil who is the Guide on Betsy’s Quest to become a successful independent author, was with her.  Harry wants to upgrade from white gerbil to white hare or even a white […]

Distractions

dis·trac·tion dəˈstrakSH(ə)n/noun 1.  a thing that prevents someone from giving full attention to something else. “the company found passenger travel a distraction from the main business of moving freight.” synonyms: diversion, interruption, disturbance, interference, hindrance   “a distraction from the real issues.” 2. extreme agitation of the mind or emotions.  “he knew she was nervous by her uncharacteristic air of distraction” synonyms: […]