Friday, December 23, 2011

My Failings as a Novelist: How NaNoWriMo helped me find my voice

Well, I gave it a shot but I fell short...45,000 words short, to be exact! 

That's right...this past November, I jumped on the NaNoWriMo bandwagon to celebrate National Novel Writing Month. 

I thought, "This is going to be my year!  I'm going to crank out the book that's going to make me millions, and I'm going to do it in one month!" 

I felt prepared; I had my novel idea in mind before I even signed up, I had brainstormed who my characters would be and how they would be introduced, and I set aside a daily chunk of time to devote to my novel writing.

Tuesday, December 6, 2011

How do you manage "Search Overload"?


I love these commercials!  But, until I began my online writing career, I didn't realize just how true they ring!

When I first set off on this endeavor, creating an online writing business, I spent countless hours researching.  I Googled terms close to my interests, such as "freelance copywriter", "freelance copywriting", and "making money online".  What I found was an immeasurable, almost unmanageable, amount of information. 

Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Lessons on Life: A Book Review

Having always been a Paulo Coelho enthusiast, I am forever on the lookout for his works.  When I stumbled upon his compilation of selected quotes, fittingly titled "Life", I immersed myself in it! 

I read it from beginning to end in one sitting, lapping up all its tidbits of insight like a kitten to milk. 

Then, I reread it, granting myself the luxury of lingering at every quote, relishing in its warmth.  One of my favorites, you ask?
"The fear of suffering is wors than suffering itself.  And no heart ever suffered when it went in search of its dreams."

Saturday, November 12, 2011

Where do you find inspiration for your blog posts?

Virtual Musings: Today's Cure for Writer's Block
The next step in creating an interesting, engaging blog, one that speaks to your target audience with relevance and significance, is to decide what you want to blog about.  Well, that one's easy...I want to blog about my writing services.  The question I really should be asking is, "How will I come up with ideas for my blog posts"? 

As I have discovered, sitting at my computer doesn't guarantee that I will find instant inspiration for my blog posts.  Sadly, I have wasted countless hours staring at my computer, an emply blog post screen glaring back at me, wondering what the heck to write?!?  Other bloggers make it look so easy, with their miles and miles of blog post archives taunting me as I search for some sort of inspiration and insight.

Monday, October 31, 2011

Finding Inspiration through the Written Word


So, I've been putting off publishing my first post because I couldn't decide what to write about.  I write for two other blogs, Memoirs from the Belly and Red Dirt Coffee House, but it was easy to decide how to start those two; since both are more personal in nature, I simply began with stories.

Because this blog is geared more towards my writing business, I wanted to make sure to have a great beginning: poignant, relevant, informative, and, at the same time, engaging.  So, I returned to my academia roots and conducted a little independent research; I looked through the archives of three of my favorite writing blogs and found their "maiden" posts.