Regency romance, romantic mysteries, & writing tips too.
In a recent writers’ group meeting, we discussed writing fiction and the value (or otherwise) of the writing dictum: “write what you know”. A new member, who’s a new author, posed a question. She’s writing an American Civil War novel, inspired by Gone With The Wind… and a family diary. “Does that mean,” she asked, … Read more
Feeling overwhelmed? Try a brain dump so you can see everything you need to manage. Then you can decide how you’ll manage it. Brain dumps are useful anytime you feel stressed. Productivity guru David Allen is the author of the book, Getting Things Done: The art of stress-free productivity. In the book, he popularized brain … Read more
Did you set goals for 2020? Unfortunately, whatever goals you set, life got in the way. You may be reluctant to set goals for 2021. If you’re thinking “why bother about goals?” here are some reasons: You can’t hit a target if you don’t aim. Your shot may be way off the target (or the … Read more
A reader asked about “getting things done for writers”: is there a special strategy for GTD which helps with writing? (Here’s an article on GTD which has some useful tips.) We’ve discussed Getting Things Done several times at our writers’ group meetings. Some members are keen on it, others not so much. Getting things done: … Read more
At a recent writer’s group meeting, we discussed writer’s block. This affliction is real. It can paralyze you. Almost everyone in our group has suffered from it, so we discussed useful tools and strategies to help us to manage it in the future. If you’re dealing with it right now, ask yourself whether you can … Read more
One of the biggest challenges in writing fiction is finding truly good ideas. We discussed finding great ideas in a recent writers’ group meeting. Several authors maintained that the perfect idea hit them after they’d started writing about a character who intrigued them. Some authors relied on inspiration and others said that they had too … Read more