Angie's Place

Neighbor? Him?

Did you get that contract yet? You know, the one you expected after your most recent conference. Hmm, I wonder what’s taking so long. Didn’t anyone hear of responding in a timely manner? Sometimes it feels like editors, agents, and even other authors are distant—on the other side of the road walking away. 

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Loree's Lough Down

Write What You Know...or Not

That sounds crazy and way-out, given that we all cut our authors’ teeth on the maxim. But the truth is if you write only about what you know from personal experience, you’re limiting yourself—not only in story but in ways you can touch readers, too.

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At the Movies

Sarah’s Key

Based on the novel by Tatiana De Rosnay, Sarah’s Key is a wonderful combination of Hollywood and foreign film that provides edge-of-the-seat action as well as intellectual, introspective drama common to French cinema. A Holocaust film, it reveals the horrors of World War II that are typical to this genre, yet it is different...

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How NOT To Get Published

How Not to Get Published: The Sequel

Previously we looked at some of the nuts-and-bolts problems that keep manuscripts from transitioning from slush pile to contract. Potholes in the road to publication, so to speak. But there are more subtle potholes a writer needs to avoid. These subtle potholes are less about format and style and more about the internal workings of the writer. Or, in the words of Pogo Possum, “We have met the enemy and he is us.”

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