Jared Dees's Blog: The Latest from Jared Dees, page 27

Immerse Yourself in Your Genre

Many successful writers offer the same and simple advice to new writers: read a lot and write a lot.

It isn’t just the act of reading that is important though. To make that reading time as effective as possible, you need to read and reflect on what authors are doing well. This will help you become a better writer.

Furthermore, you want to read everything in your genre. You need to know what your readers will have read as well. You need to be a fan first.

If you want to write a book of science...

Which is correct: Best Seller, Bestseller, or Best-seller?

Once your book sells very well, what do you call it: best seller, bestseller, or best-seller?

As is the case with so many things in the English language, multiple versions are acceptable.

Look, for example, at the names for the following lists:

The New York Times Best Sellers Wall Street Journal Best Sellers Barnes & Noble Bestsellers Amazon Best Sellers

So, there is some disagreement there.

What does the dictionary say?

There are multiple dictionaries with multiple versions:

Merriam-Webst...

Which is correct: simpler or more simple?

Many years ago I took a two-day course on Chicago Manual of Style. It was a great review of high school English classes and I learned much more than I expected. The lesson that stood out to me the most was that grammar and usage is, for the most part, a relative science. There are general rules, but the rules change and exceptions can be made.

An editor recently changed a sentence I had written in a manuscript from “more simple” to “simpler.” That seemed right to me. “Simpler” is just one wor...

Neal Stephenson’s Advice for Writers

“I have a pretty simple piece of advice to writers of science fiction or any other kind of literature, which is to just keep writing.”

Neal Stephenson
Author of Snow Crash and Seveneves

While this advice seems to be universal wisdom from successful authors, Stephenson points out two common reasons authors convince themselves to stop writing.

First, they overvalue inspiration over perspiration. They wait for inspiration to motivate them to write rather than forcing themselves to sit down and w...

The One Sentence, One Paragraph, One Page Exercise

It is surprisingly difficult to be able to explain what a project is really about while you are working on it.

If you are not careful, you can write and publish an entire book, get it into bookstores, and even have some readers and still have a difficult time explaining what it is.

Worse still, if you don’t take the time to think deeply about your book or your project, it will become about too many things at once. This is the mistake I’ve made with a couple of books already. It makes it extre...

Social Media > Search

I’ve built my career as a writer on the power of Google. People search for resources I have created and shared freely online. I’ve mastered the art of SEO (Search Engine Optimization). I know how to find out what and how people are searching for something so I can create resources that are useful for those people who are doing the searching.

I value search and email over social media so much that I basically removed myself completely from all social networks this year.

Brandon Stanton, the cr...

Write the Ideas You Can’t Get Out of Your Head

When you start to show up every day as a writer, certain ideas pop into your head and stick with you day after day.

Sometimes you try to write out these ideas and you are not ready yet. Sometimes you think an idea is one thing but then it morphs into something completely new and better. It is amazing how things things grow and develop over time.

Stephen King says that writing down book ideas is a great way to immortalize bad ideas. Judy Blume keeps an idea notebook, but she admits that she ha...

What is a platform?

“Anticipated, personal, and relevant messages to people who want to get them.”

This is the way Seth Godin defined a platform on the opening episode of the second season of his podcast.

Unfortunately, people often think of a platform as a number of followers. They think of their social media profiles or email list size and misunderstand why people follow them in the first place.

Let’s break down Godin’s definition a little further.

Evaluate your platform based on these three questions as a kin...

How I Write My Weekly Newsletters

Building an email list to serve my audience has been the single most influential thing I have done. Unfortunately, though, I wasn’t always good about actually emailing the list.

Since the beginning of this year I have started sending my email newsletter list an actual newsletter.

This has been a gamechanger for my workflow and for my audience.

My goal is to be useful and share practical resources. The email newsletters are the simplest way I can do that week after week.

I really liked reading...

Always prefer to be taught by all . . .

As a writer and former educator, I love teaching people.

The trouble is that I often feel compelled to offer advice when it isn’t really wanted.

I can get let the pride of knowledge cloud my ability to listen to and learn from others.

I love this quote from St. John of the Cross:

“Always prefer to be taught by all rather than to desire teaching even the least of all.”

St. John of the Cross

It was featured by Pope Francis in his recent document on holiness. As the pope points out, St. John of...