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 term: Belisha beacon… When I read a juicy novel, I particularly enjoy the way it sends me scurring to the dictionary or the […]
What’s a ‘Belisha beacon’? Read More »
Reading time: About 3 minutes Are you fastidious about planning for your desired word count? If not, you should be. Read on to learn why…. Whenever a writer asks me why it’s so important to know their word count goal before starting to write, I tell them the following story.
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Reading time: About 1 minute This is my weekly installment of “writing about writing,” in which I scan the world to find websites, books and articles to help other writers. Today I discuss a blot post about song lyrics in books… Have you ever noticed how rarely you’ll hear the
Can you quote song lyrics in books? (Without being sued?) Read More »
Viewing time: 3 minutes 31 seconds The Write Question is a weekly video podcast about writing that I started in 2017 and that ran, more or less weekly, until April 2022. This is a republication of the issue #6, about how to recognize good writing, which ran on Feb. 24/17. Transcript:
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Reading time: I like to share interesting pieces of figurative language I encounter in my reading. I write today about a series of images from Sarah Polley. You may know Sarah Polley as a TV star, famous for her role as Ramona Quimby in the television series Ramona, based on Beverly Cleary‘s books. Subsequently
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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: sehnsucht… I was being lazy when I read the novel The Italian Party by Christina Lynch. It was an easy, unchallenging book described by The
What is ‘sehnsucht’? Read More »
Reading time: About 3 minutes Do you usually try to hide your mistakes? Or have you had the opportunity to learn why mistakes are good? I’ll never forget a mistake I made early in my career as a journalist. I was 24 years old and running a community newspaper. A
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Reading time: About 1 minute This is my weekly installment of “writing about writing,” in which I scan the world to find websites, books and articles to help other writers. Today I discuss a post about guest posting…. When I started blogging more than 15 years ago, I had 34
The benefits of guest posting Read More »
Viewing time: 3 minutes and 32 seconds How to break procrastinating habits? The Write Question is a weekly video podcast about writing that I started in 2017 and that ran, more or less weekly, until April 2022. This is a republication of the issue #5, about how to stop procrastinating, which
How to break your procrastinating habit? (video) Read More »
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 from Virginia Feito… I can no longer remember who recommended the first novel of Virginia Feito to me. Raised in Madrid and Paris,
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