Terry Shames's Blog: 7 Criminal Minds, page 22

Nobody Knows Nada, by Gabriel Valjan

Nobody Knows Nada

 

We all have to promote our work if we want to succeed, butthere’s a lot of ground between hiding one’s light under a bushel and beingthat pushy author people hide from at events. What are your best promo ideas and what’s the most egregioushard-selling you’ve come across?

 

I think it’s safe to say these two things:

 

1. Nobody knows what works

 

2. Most writers are introverts, so self-promotion ‘feels’uncomfortable.

 

Implicit in the question...

Do What I Say, Not What I Do

 Q: We all have to promote our work if we want to succeed, but there’s a lot of ground between hiding one’s light under a bushel and being that pushy author people hide from at events. What are your best promo ideas and what’s the most egregious hard-selling you’ve come across?

 

From Susan

 

I’m a mid-mid-list author with great professional reviews, a tiny cohort of Amazon individual reviewers, friends and readers who show up at my launch events and buy many books at the store. The bookstore likes ...

Cooking versus cushions - by Harini Nagendra

 November is a busy month, at least in the USA. Some people send out for, pay someone to, decide to stop bothering with . . . the same things other people lovingly prepare, take pride in, look forward to. What bits of adult life would you ditch / have you ditched? What "chores" feel like treats?

November is a bittersweet month for me. It signals the end of the year, reminding me of the many promises I made to myself in January, which I didn't quite get to - but then, after November comes December...

My Work Is Never Done from James W. Ziskin

November is a busy month, at least in the USA. Some people send out for, pay someone to, decide to stop bothering with . . . the same things other people lovingly prepare, take pride in, look forward to. What bits of adult life would you ditch / have you ditched? What "chores" feel like treats?

Me doing a chore poorly so I won’t be asked to do it again.

I’m a doer. Not some spoiled rich kid with people to do my bidding. I handle these tasks myself.

So what are some of my regular chores? 

1.) I keep ...

Bring on the donkey work

November is a busy month, at least in the USA. Some people send out for, pay someone to, decide to stop bothering with . . . the same things other people lovingly prepare, take pride in, look forward to. What bits of adult life would you ditch / have you ditched? What "chores" feel like treats?

by Dietrich

Like anybody, I’m all for ditching chores I don’t like to do. Who wouldn’t want to have more time for the fun stuff? It’s better to be munching a carrot than doing the donkey work, but let’s ...

Let me Cook!

 

Terry here, with our autumn topic. November is a busy month, at least in the USA. Some people send out for, pay someone to, decide to stop bothering with...Thanksgiving dinner! While others lovingly prepare, take pride in, look forward to doing it. What bits of adult life would you ditch / have you ditched? What “chores” feel like treats? 
 I love this question. Let’s start with “treats.” I know several people who hate to cook, and for them it’s a chore. Me? By now, everyone probably knows tha...

Finding Our Groove

November is a busy month, at least in the USA. Some people send out for, pay someone to, decide to stop bothering with . . . the same things other people lovingly prepare, take pride in, look forward to. What bits of adult life would you ditch / have you ditched? What “chores” feel like treats?

Brenda starting off the week.

Being an adult means doing a lot of repetitive chores - cleaning, shopping, cooking, paying bills, and on and on. All of these tasks are real time-eaters, and as every writer o...

“The arc of the moral universe,” and Other Stories Ripped from the Headlines, by Josh Stallings

 

Q: As we head into a rather big news week - do you ever write stories “ripped from the headlines”? How much do you rely on current events to fuel your work?

A: I feel I sometimes write “ripped from the headlines that are about to happen”. I wrote a short story Life Time Appointment, not long after that beer swilling rapist Brett Kavanaugh was installed on the Supreme Court, but before they overturned women's rights to bodily autonomy. It was a dark futuristic tale that came true way too fast. ...

While my first draft gently weeps, by Catriona

As we head into a rather big news week - do you ever get stories “ripped from the headlines”? How much do you rely on current events to fuel your stories?

Ha-HA-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha. If that's how we're spelling hollow and yet deranged laughter. I'm writing this on Wednesday night and my kneejerk answer is to say that this week's big news doesn't fit anywhere into my fictional universe. But let's see. 

(I'm illustrating the rest of the blog, not with book pics for once, but with a few recent snaps fr...

Be Here Now by Eric Beetner

 As we head into a rather big news week - do you ever get stories “ripped from the headlines”? How much do you rely on current events to fuel your stories?

I don’t typically write anything that is “of the moment” or places it in a specific here and now. I’ve written period pieces set in the 1930s, the 50s and the 60s. For those books the time was a factor in the story for sure. And you have to get the details accurate to make the world believable in everything from pop culture to news of the day....