Reading time: Less than 1 minute Increase your vocabulary and you’ll make your writing much more precise. That’s why I provide a word of the week. Today’s word: pyknic…. Whenever I read an unusual-looking word, I often assume it is of Greek origin. The word pyknic from Olga Tokarczuk‘s marvellous — and very funny — […]
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Reading time: About 4 minutes Time is precious. If you want to make time to write, it’s not hard. But you’re going to have be persistent and dedicated about it. My schedule is jam-packed. Each day I race between writing projects, meetings and necessary admin work that only I can do. I’m not complaining. I
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Are you spending enough time thinking? In a recent blog post, Deep Work expert Cal Newport, meditated on a quote from Ernest Hemingway in which the writer said: “My working habits are simple: long periods of thinking, short periods of writing.” As a thoughtful academic, Newport reflected on his own experiences as a writer —
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Reading time: Just over 1 minute I like to share interesting pieces of figurative language I encounter in my reading. I write today about a series of similes from Polish writer Olga Tokarczuk… Named as the winner of the 2018 Nobel Prize for Literature, Polish writer and activist Olga Tokarczuk (pictured above) has been described
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Reading time: Less than 1 minute Increase your vocabulary and you’ll make your writing much more precise. That’s why I provide a word of the week. Today’s word: everted…. I discovered the writing of Aminatta Forma earlier this year, thanks to the recommendation of a client. Her arresting and multi-layered novel Happiness — which considers
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Reading time: Less than 3 minutes Do you know how important stories are to writing? Learn how to be a great storyteller… Our dishwasher broke last week. It was an expensive model — a Bosch — and only three years old so I was plenty peeved. Making matters worse, our triplets were celebrating their birthday
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I often write about how we talk to ourselves, usually in a highly negative way, as in: My sentences are so boring. I’m a terrible writer. No one enjoys reading what I’m producing. My supervisor/editor/boss thinks I’m a loser. But I didn’t know, until I read a fabulous new book called Chatter by psychologist Ethan
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Reading time: About 1 minute I like to share interesting pieces of figurative language I encounter in my reading. I write today about a series of similes and metaphors from Ocean Vuong…. Ocean Vuong is a young Vietnamese-American poet, essayist and novelist, who was born on a rice farm in Ho Chi Minh City. Named
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Reading time: Less than 1 minute Increase your vocabulary and you’ll make your writing much more precise. That’s why I provide a word of the week. Today’s word: panopticon…. I’m a big believer in the relationship between writing and music. For that reason, a piece in the New York Times on the art of jazz piano
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Reading time: Just over 5 minutes Here are my 10 favourite articles or posts from last month, focusing on the most useful, helpful and entertaining pieces for writers. Handle your perfectionism Are you a perfectionist? Many writers tell me they are although I usually find the bigger problem is their inability to delay gratification. Still,
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