I am still working full-time in addition to being a writer, so I am on my computer 10-12 hours a day between work and writing. I work out of a home office that is not set up ergonomically correct, so I consistently have back, neck and shoulder pain due to poor postureContinue Reading
Before I starting getting publishing contracts, I spent a lot of years writing and trying to become a better writer. A lot of years. I submitted to some publishers and agents along the way, but what really helped me to improve my writing was one thing: submitting to contests. Here’sContinue Reading
I now use a standing desk in my writing business. After researching the dangers of sitting for hours (over six hours increases your risk of, um…death), and looking into the options that are out there today for standing desks, I convinced myself I needed to make a change. I didn’tContinue Reading
“The perfect is the enemy of the good.” In writing and in life, I have to remind myself of that fairly often. Do the best you can and don’t worry about it beyond that. But I worry. I stress. There’s no shortage of things to fret about. From the purelyContinue Reading
I used to have three cats—all strays that I had “rescued” over the years—but I’m down to only one, now. Myra was with me for nearly 14 years, and was a master bug catcher and laser light chaser. Sam, my Halloween cat (she showed up all bones around Halloween time)Continue Reading
Let’s face it. No matter how creative we are, sometimes the ideas slow down. We get stuck in the mucky middle of the novel. Or no matter how many walks we take, we can’t work out a nasty plot entanglement. Or our characters fall flat, or our blogs run stale.Continue Reading
by Pat Stoltey 2015 was a bad year for me, a year of stress and discomfort way beyond my usual challenges with arthritis and fibromyalgia. The laundry list of unfortunate incidents is too long to chronicle here. Two of the biggies: I spent more than three months early in theContinue Reading
I’ve been a health writer for over 17 years, and during that time I’ve learned quite a bit about natural oils and how beneficial they are. There’s a reason we’re seeing more and more of them in skin care products these days—the skin loves them! Even those who have troubleContinue Reading
You promised yourself you’d get chapter twenty-one done today. But the day is gone and it didn’t happen. Oh well. You’ll get to it tomorrow. Tomorrow comes and goes and the chapter still isn’t done. No problem. The weekend is coming. You’ll get it done then. We all tell ourselvesContinue Reading
When you become a writer, there’s a lot that other writers don’t tell you. There’s your newfound coffee addiction, back pain from sitting in that computer chair all day, anxiety, weight gain, eyestrain, headaches, and much more. Being an author is supposed to be some magical profession, that when youContinue Reading
by Suzanne Rogerson The idea for Visions of Zarua started when I had an image of a woman hunting in the woods with her hounds. The prey had disappeared and she was scared, but I didn’t know why or what she was hunting. I loved Varnia from the first momentContinue Reading
We’re a nation who loves to eat. Not only eat, but snack, graze, piece, munch, drink, savor, and slurp. And a lot of that is done while we’re writing. We don’t think about how it affects our tummies…until it does. Then we complain. Stupid stomach! Who has time for bloating,Continue Reading