You can read all the writing advice in the world, but in the end, it all comes down to how YOU approach the page or the screen. To help illustrate how we’re all just a little bit different, I’m taking a standard list of questions about writing and posing it to dozens of different writers. As you scroll though their answers, I think you’ll see we’re all as individual as fingerprints or snowflakes. And if you’re a writer who’d like to participate in this questionnaire, please email me.
Reading time: About 2 minutes Thanks to his earlier career as a journalist, Bretton Loney says he learned that the act of simply putting his bum in the chair was essential to writing success. Bretton Loney is a novelist and non-fiction writer who has independently published three books: The Last […]
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Reading time: About 1 minute Susan LeBlanc says that having a deadline is the most useful strategy for helping her to write…. Susan LeBlanc was born in Halifax, N.S., and worked as a print journalist for twenty years. She later taught journalism at the University of King’s College. Turning to
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Reading time: About 2 minutes So many great works have been written under harsh circumstances, says writer J.T. Siemens, it should be seen as lame to look for excuses not to write…. J.T. Siemens is a Vancouver-based personal trainer, but his true love is writing crime fiction. To Those Who Killed Me, the
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Reading time: About 2 minutes Rebecca Morris says the simple activity of walking helps her to pay attention to the sensory details so important to her work… Rebecca Morris is a Montreal writer who published her debut novel, Other Maps, in September 2024. Her short stories have won the Malahat Review
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Reading time: About 2 minutes Lynda Williams swears by the contrarian but life-affirming motto that we can do some of our best work on our worst days…. Lynda Williams is a short fiction writer based in Calgary, Alberta. Her stories have appeared or are forthcoming in Grain, The New Quarterly,
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Reading time: About 2 minutes Sue Murtagh says she lost a lot of time because she felt that if she couldn’t be an amazing writer, it would be a waste of time to even try…. Sue Murtagh lives in Halifax, Nova Scotia. She is a graduate of the Alistair MacLeod
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Reading time: About 2 minutes Christine Switzer says that when she doesn’t feel like writing, she refuses to try to persuade herself that she does…. Christine Swtizer is a poet whose work has recently been featured in Growing Toward the Light, an exhibit at All Saints Austin featuring art and
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Reading time: About 2 minutes Lea Taranto says that writing is all about getting down words, any words, so that the project actually exists. The finessing comes later, in revision. Lea Taranto is a disabled Chinese Jewish Canadian writer who lives with OCD and comorbid disorders. An MFA graduate of
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Reading time: About 4 minutes Taslim Jaffer says that using a process journal has been a game-changer for her writing. Read this interview to learn the other strategies she employs…. Taslim Jaffer is a writer, editor and writing instructor from Surrey, B.C. with an MFA in Creative Nonfiction from University
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Reading time: About 2 minutes Wayne Ng says the biggest obstacles to most writers are internal ones — largely the fear of rejection and public ridicule. “Explore this,” he says. “We all have it.” Wayne Ng is a child of Chinese immigrants born in Anishinabe territory in what is commonly
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