Ten things I’ve learned in ten years as a working writer

I have been a working writer for ten years now. That means that I am actively producing content to sell it. Or, at least put it somewhere people might see and enjoy it.

Being a working writer is a weird job. You spend years practicing only to realize that you will never master it, you’ll just become a better apprentice. But there are certainly some things I’ve learned over the last decade. As I said yesterday, I hope I’ve learned something after ten years of working at it. So here are some hard-won pearls of wisdom. I hope they help you.

A yes to one thing is a no to something else

I have a too much gene. What, the person who decided to write a ton of extra content and host ten different giveaways in ten days does too much? I’m sure you’re surprised.

The problem is that I want to do everything. I want to submit to every magazine and enter every contest. I want to write so many novels and produce so many podcasts. So this is a lesson I have learned the hard way by trying to juggle too many projects at once.

If you decide to write one book, you don’t have time to write a different one. If you enter one contest, that means you have to turn down another. Everything you say yes to means there’s something you’re going to have to say no to.

There is just no other way around it. Our time is finite, our energy is too. So pick your projects carefully. Because when you pick something, it means you’re going to have to reject another thing.

You can push yourself only so hard

This one gets more true as I get older. Just as you only have so much time in a day, you also only have so much energy. You only have so many spoons, as the kids say. And yes, we all know that we can push through exhaustion and get things done. I at least was raised with this toxic work ethic. It doesn’t matter if you feel like it. It doesn’t matter if you feel sick, or if you’re in a funk, or if you did a whole lot yesterday and are still recovering. You have work to do, damn it.

Yeah, we all need to stop this. Especially when it comes to our creative projects.

Listen, I get that deadlines are a thing, but there is only so much you can push yourself before you burn out. I have pushed myself too hard for too long many times. And what happened wasn’t that I persevered and created great art. What happened was that I put out work that wasn’t as good as if I’d been well-rested. What happened was that I burned myself out and had to spend months recovering. What happened was that I got myself to the point where I hated the work, hated myself, hated everything. And that is not how I should feel about my writing. It’s sure as hell not how I want to feel about my life.

Most people do not give a damn that you are a writer

I tell people I’m a writer. Of course, I do. But the older I get, the less I tell people. Because most people, sadly, do not care. The average response I get when I tell someone I write books is, “Oh, that’s cool.” And then we move on.

Or worse, I’ll be informed that they self-published a poetry collection on CD twelve years ago, and that’s basically the same thing.

So if you think you’re going to wow someone with the fact that you’re a writer, I’m sorry to tell you that you’re not. Unless you’re Sarah J. Mass, most people do not care.

You have to love your writing the most

I have read Series of Unfortunate Events the whole way through at least five times. I have read Woven the whole way through ten times over. Many writers have read their work even more.

When you set out to write a book, you are committing to spending a lot of time with that book. Probably years, if it’s a series. Maybe years if it’s just one and you’re a slow writer. No shame there. And your passion needs to stick with you through every rewrite, line edit, revision and maybe even reading the damn thing for an audiobook. The only way that’s going to happen is if you are just wild about your story. I was, and still am, wild about Woven. I am wild about Station 86. I am wild about AA. And I have to be because I am going to spend more time with these stories than anyone else ever will.

Schedule writing time

The best piece of advice I can give anyone starting to write is to block out time to do so.

But, you might say, it’s writing. And writing is art! You can’t schedule art, man.

Well yes, you can. It might surprise you that I schedule my hobbies, too. Otherwise I’d never actually do them.

Writing is something that takes a lot of time. And if you have an already busy life, it’s easy to keep putting it off and putting it off until we’re putting you in a coffin. So if you want to write, the first thing you should do is get a planner. Mark out all the time you already have committed to things. Your day job, child care, appointments. Then take a good hard look at the time you have left. It doesn’t matter if you’ve got fifteen minutes every other Saturday, mark it out and commit to those fifteen minutes.

But I bet you have more time than that.

Writing friends are wonderful friends

I have many friends who I love. But writing friends are the best friends. Not just for networking. I find that kind of gross. But it’s amazing to have someone who understands the writing process. Who gets the joys and nightmares of the craft. Who’s read the same writing books and been irritated at the same NYT bestsellers that weren’t worth the paper they were printed on. Having writing friends to talk to about the craft and the business is a godsend.

Covers matter!

We judge books by their cover, it’s just a fact. We are visual creatures and pretty pictures get our attention. There’s nothing wrong with that. I have bought several books because the cover caught my eye.

So if you’re going to self-publish, invest in good cover art. Unless you are a graphic artist, don’t do it yourself. I’m in the process of relaunching all of my books with professional covers and let me tell you, I am so glad I am. They look so much better.

You can never predict what’s going to happen

This might also be life advice. Nothing is ever certain, and you just don’t have any way to predict how your career is going to turn out. I never thought my first completed book would sell, because everyone tells you your first book won’t ever sell. I never thought my publisher would drop me. I never thought I’d start writing for a horror review site. I sure as hell never thought I’d produce a podcast that I wrote.

While having a plan is lovely, it’s best to understand that this plan is never, ever set in stone. Things will change, and people will get sick. New people will come into your life and people you thought would always be there will leave. You might land your dream agent only to have them retire. You might sign with someone you aren’t sure of and then have them launch your career into space. You just never know.

Hold on tight and enjoy the ride.

Post more than you think you need to

This is on social media, specifically. And it’s something I’m still struggling with. Because I always feel like I’m bothering people. Especially when I post about my books. No one wants to be bombarded by ads on Instagram. People want to see my cats and dog, not my book covers.

But, that’s probably not true. If someone’s following you on social media, they probably do want to hear about your writing. I use Instagram to keep up with my favorite authors, and I want them to post about their books so I remember that they’re coming out.

So if you have a book you want to sell, let people on social media know about it. Repeatedly.

There is always another place to submit

If you’re a working writer, you’re going to get rejections. A lot of them. That’s just the way of things. There are only so many spots for stories, but there seems to be a never-ending stream of writers.

But here’s the thing. There are a ton of spots for stories. There are always new magazines, websites, podcasts, and publishing companies. And best of all, there are always new readers.

So every time you’re rejected, get your story back out there and submit it again. Write another story. Then write another one. Submit them over and over until they sell. That is the only way to break into this business, by writing and submitting over and over.

Don’t ever be afraid of rejection. It just means you’re out there doing the work.

Don’t forget to like this post and leave a comment to be entered into today’s giveaway. Today, one lucky reader is going to get a copy of Man in The Woods. I’ll post the winner here tomorrow.

See you then.

If you liked what you saw here today, please consider liking and sharing this post. Or you can support the site financially on Ko-fi.

Broken Patterns is available now for preorder! You can order it now on Amazon.

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10 things I’ve learned about blogging in 10 years

I’ve been writing Paper Beats World for ten years now. And it’s impossible to do anything for ten years without getting better at it. At least, I hope so. I’m always learning new things, trying new styles and doing what I can to make Paper Beats World a fun place to be on the internet.

So, today I want to share with you the top ten things I’ve learned about blogging after doing it for ten years. If you have your own blog, or you’re thinking of starting one, I hope some of this advice helps you.

People like hearing about how you screwed up

I messed up a book launch and wrote about it. That post got so many likes and views. My publisher dropped me, and my site traffic went up.

Posts where I talk about what’s going right don’t do have as well as the posts about when I’ve truly stepped in it. I don’t love that, but here we are.

I tell you this not to suggest you write a blog full of doom and tragedy. Rather, I want to encourage you to share your setbacks along with your wins. Instagram might be a highlight reel of your life, but your blog shouldn’t be.

The posts you don’t expect to do well take off

I try my best with every post. But of course, some come out better than others. Some I’m just more proud of, and some do better traffic-wise.

Those two things don’t always match up. They usually don’t. Posts like my series about using tarot for storytelling, which I spent so much time researching and writing, do fine. But posts about writing dark poetry, which I enjoyed writing but didn’t think anyone was going to care about, become literally the most popular post on the site of all time.

There is no telling what’s going to go viral and what’s going to end up forgotten. So you might as well just put out what you want to put out and hope for the best.

You never know what is going to be a huge drive for your blog

Do you know what I do that brings the most people to Paper Beats World? I post about them on Pinterest. That draws more traffic than anything else. It upped my traffic so much that the year I started doing it, I doubled my views from the year before.

While I don’t believe in using social media I don’t like just because it will get traffic (There’s a reason I’m not on Facebook or Twitter) I do think you should try some things out. You might like the site more than you think at first. And you might find an audience ready and eager for what you have to offer.

Quality over quantity

When Paper Beats World started, I was writing three posts a week. It was exhausting. When I stopped, I had more time to focus on what I was posting. And my views went up. Because rather than blasting out posts, I was carefully putting out good work. Or, at least better work. One good post is always better than three meh ones.

Every time I change the style of the site, views take a hit

Occasionally I like to change up the style of the site. Use a different theme, change the font. And every time I do it, numbers drop. I’m not sure why, but the math maths.

Maybe it’s because people inherently dislike change. Maybe because the site looks different they can’t find their way around. Or maybe I make too many changes too fast and regular visitors find it unrecognizable. And I wish I could ask, but I assume the people who leave don’t come back. If you’re someone who left the site for a while after a style change but is back now, please let me know why in the comments. I am genuinely curious.

Don’t judge your numbers by last month, but last year

When I look at my stats for the month, I will sometimes be depressed if one month isn’t as good as the one before. But of course, that doesn’t make a lot of sense. People are spending more time online during certain parts of the year. When it’s nicer out, people want to touch grass, not their laptops.

My outlook got a lot better when I started comparing my numbers each month to that same month the year before. It also gave me a better sense of trends over time.

Pictures matter so much

I didn’t care much about my pictures when I started the site. I was writing, after all, not doing visual art. But when I wanted to post my work on social media, a graphic was needed. And it improved the overall feel of my site dramatically when I started taking that seriously. Rather than just throwing any old thing up if it kind of made sense.

Now I use a structured type of image, to convey the feeling of the post while still looking somewhat uniform. I hope most of you can spot one of my posts in your feed at once, based on the ripped paper title.

SEO makes no damn sense, but it works

I hate SEO. I hate it with every fiber of my being. I hate that if I use a header at the beginning of a new paragraph instead of just bolding it, more people find the page.

While some things about SEO make sense, some do not. Adding graphics helps your SEO. Writing longer posts. Linking to other sites. All of those things make your site more attractive to search engines. I wish I didn’t have to take any of that into consideration, but I do. And it’s, damn it, helped the traffic.

Every post is a new challenge, no matter how many you’ve written

You would think, after writing over a thousand posts for Paper Beats World, I’d have this down. But every time I sit down to write a blog post, it feels like I’ve never written one before.

When you think about it, though, this makes sense. No matter how many books I write, every one feels like the first. Every short story, every poem. Every time I commit words to the page, it feels like I have never done this before. It further feels like I cannot possibly do it again. Whatever muse I had has left me alone, and I am a dry old sock of a writer now with nothing clever to say.

Of course, that isn’t true. But it never gets less intimidating, the blank page. It never gets easier, you just get stronger.

Content has no expiration date

The most popular post so far this year is Three Creepy Podcasts I’ve Been Loving. I wrote that in September of 2019. That is a pre-covid post, and it has more popularity than anything I’ve written so far this year.

I should probably write an updated version of that.

The point is that you shouldn’t feel down if you write a post and it doesn’t get a lot of traction right away. There’s every chance that it’ll spark and go viral later.

Words are not milk to go bad. Words are not rocks to be washed away by the sea. Words are the sea, changing and returning over and over again. We still tell the story of Beowulf. We still read Shakespeare. We still read Rosemary’s Baby. It should be no surprise that blog posts written years ago will still get some attention.

Now, I’d love to hear from you. Let us know in the comments the best lessons you’ve learned about blogging. And don’t forget, everyone who likes this post and leaves a comment will be entered into today’s giveaway. Today, I’m giving away a copy of my Preptober Planner. I’ll announce the winner in tomorrow’s post.

Best of luck, and I’ll see you tomorrow.

If you liked what you saw here today, please consider liking and sharing this post. Or you can support the site financially on Ko-fi.

Broken Patterns is available now for preorder! You can order it now on Amazon.

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Celebrating ten years of Paper Beats World

I can’t believe we’re here, but here we are. Paper Beats World is turning ten next week.

Ten! We have been here for an entire freaking decade. Ten years of blogging, writing, showing up for myself and all of you.

It’s astounding. I used to not stick to anything. Do you know how many blogs I started before this? Two. I thought for sure this would be number three.

But we are here. And we are here because you are here. Because as astounding as it feels to me every day, you are here reading this.

Because of this, I wanted to do something extra special this year. After some thought, I decided actually to do three things. All three are for you because I cannot get over how thankful I am.

Bonus posts

I will be posting a blog post every day from now to August 30th. So stop by every day for some new writing advice and community.

Brand new microfiction

If you’re following me on Instagram or Threads, you’ll be able to check out a new microfiction every day, starting tomorrow. I meant to write some sci-fi and fantasy microfiction, but they all turned out pretty creepy. I hope you like them. I’m pretty proud of them.

Daily giveaways

Finally, I wanted to give you all a gift for sticking with me through the years. So every day, starting tomorrow, I’ll be doing a giveaway for either a book or my Preptober planner. All you have to do to enter is to like the post of the day and leave a comment.

Again, I just cannot thank all of you enough. And I hope you’re ready for ten days of celebrating.

See you tomorrow.

If you liked what you saw here today, please consider liking and sharing this post. Or you can support the site financially on Ko-fi.

Broken Patterns is available now for preorder! You can order it now on Amazon.

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Waiting for the end of a series might kill the series

Who hasn’t felt this heartbreak? You get introduced to a series, and it’s love at first sight. The characters, the plot, the execution. Everything is just hitting that spot.

And then, you finish the first book or first season. So what is there to do but wait for the next one?

So you wait. And you wait. And you wait. Finally, one day, the dark truth is revealed.

Your series was canceled.

So many, many good series have been canceled before their time. Or, there’s so much time between one book or season and the next that it feels like it might as well have been canceled. And it sucks! I could just start listing off series that have ended without an ending for the rest of this post, and I’d run out of room before I ran out of titles. Just a few that still tear me up are Limetown, The Numair Chronicles, and of course the infamous Firefly.

No, Serenity doesn’t count as an ending.

And don’t even get me started on the extensive times between books or seasons. The last season of Stranger Things came out in 2022, and the next season isn’t expected until next year!

With all that being said, I understand why some people choose to wait until a series has ended before getting invested in it. Doing so would have certainly saved me from the heartache of the Santa Clarita Diet ending. And I didn’t like it, but I know Song of Ice and Fire fans probably wish they’d skipped the whole damn thing after waiting thirteen years and counting for the next book.

Here’s the thing though. Waiting to read a series or watch a show until it’s done, is just increasing the chances that it’s never going to get done at all.

The publisher is going to nope out

The publishing world is a business, like any other. And it’s going to produce what makes it money. Not what’s good, or what the editors like, but what sells. The same can be said for streaming platforms and TV networks. If enough people aren’t watching a series, there’s little chance it’ll get picked up for season two, if it even gets a chance to finish season one.

This is one of the things I hate most about the field. Storytelling is cutthroat, and I hate that creative endeavors have to be so. It’s like knowing fennec foxes will fight to the death with each other. It shouldn’t be in their nature, but it is.

The money is going to dry up

Unfortunately, we live in a capitalist society. And because of that, sometimes we have to make shitty decisions. So even an indie writer, like myself, might have to cut a project if it’s not making enough money to be worth the time.

Again, most people don’t want to do this. I love writing my stories. I want to see how my series ends as much as everyone else. Probably more. But when creative work is what’s putting food on your table and keeping the lights on, you have to make sure what you’re producing is what’s selling. Writers and creatives have to have some income from book one while they’re working on book two.

No one likes playing to an empty house

Okay, so what’s my excuse, you might ask. I don’t write for TV and I’m not traditionally published. I have a day job, so I don’t depend on my writing money to eat. So what’s stopping me from writing anything I want?

Nothing. I can, and do, publish whatever I want whenever I want. But what I want is to write stories that people read. Or listen to, in the case of AA.

If I didn’t care if other people read my work, I’d just publish it for fun and move on to another project. I certainly wouldn’t waste time promoting my books. I wouldn’t invest in cover art. I wouldn’t waste time with beta readers. I would just write whatever the hell made me happy.

But I want to put out work that other people enjoy. I want to put out work that people value. And the only way I can tell that people are valuing my stories is if they’re buying them. And if people aren’t valuing my stories, I’ll move on and write a different one.

To end today, please understand that I get the challenge. It is awful to have a story without an ending. And yes, if you jump on a new series right away, there’s a chance it might not have an ending. But if you never start, there’s even more of a chance that the story will never be able to end.

If you liked what you saw here today, please consider liking and sharing this post. Or you can support the site financially on Ko-fi.

Broken Patterns is available now for preorder! You can order it now on Amazon.

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Broken Patterns is now available for preorder

This post was almost just me typing look at this cover! in all caps. Because this cover is, let me tell you, astounding.

Isn’t that freaking gorgeous? Thank you so much, Getcovers, who did a fantastic job.

All of that to say, Broken Patterns is now available for presale. You can get it right here now, and be among the first to read it on September sixth.

Or, maybe re-read it. It is a relaunch, after all.

In Devon and Lenore’s world, magic is as common as turning a pot or fletching an arrow. What isn’t common is a man with thread magic. When Devon starts weaving prophetic tapestries, his royal family tries to keep it a secret. 

But the family can’t stay in the shadows when Devon’s uncle is assassinated and he becomes second in line for the throne. Especially when he weaves a vision of destruction for the dragon lands. 

Who is Broken Patterns for? It’s for people who love magic, dragons, and stories about people who don’t quite fit in. It’s a story about a boy who is clearly not his dad’s favorite, but holds within him the power to save a country. It’s the story of a young woman with the ability to bring light to the world, who has to fight against its darkest forces first. And, it has science wielding dragons. I cannot stress this enough, there are dragons doing science. I am so proud of that.

The journey from the start of this series to this point has been a wild one. It’s been ten years. Ten long years of learning, growing and watching the world catch fire around me. And I’ve never stopped being thankful for this story. I hope that you all love this new, updated version as much as I do.

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Why should you consider relaunching your book?

Books go through several versions in the course of their lives. My books often look wildly different from rough drafts to finished products.

But once the book is out there in the world, the revisions might not be finished. Often different versions come out of the same story. For book collectors like me, this can be infuriating. I think we all have a few books that we consider to have ‘definitive’ versions. And sometimes those versions are just impossible to replace if something (cat) happens to them.

Or you get a copy of a book, and then you find out there’s another version that is so much cooler. But you already have one copy, and do you really need multiple copies of the same book? Then you decide it doesn’t hurt to have a few copies, and this is how you end up with five copies of Christmas Carol and not enough shelf space for this kind of foolish behavior.

There are several reasons a book might relaunch or come out with alternative copies. Some make a lot of sense, and some are regrettable. And if you are a self-published author, it’s something you might want to consider. Let’s talk about why.

Commemorative copies

Everyone loves anniversaries and milestone moments. Ten, fifteen and twenty-year anniversaries are a great time to relaunch a beloved book with a new forward, new cover, or extra content. Fans of books eat this sort of thing up, myself included.

While I wouldn’t necessarily do this for every book every ten years (that would be a lot) it can be a rewarding project for you to republish a book that’s meaningful to you on a big anniversary.

Movie and TV show tie-ins

I’ll be honest, this is my least favorite reason to relaunch a book. When content gets made into a show or movie, some wiseass in the promotional department usually suggests they relaunch the book with a new cover inspired by the new iteration. If I ever stumble upon a version of the Giver with the movie poster for its cover, I might set the damn thing on fire.

But, if you like the book and the movie, this might be fun for you. And if your story gets picked up for a movie or show, this could be fun.

New covers

Of course, sometimes covers just need to be redone. There are lots of reasons for this. While I love my covers for Seeming and You Can’t Trust The AI, they don’t match the rest of the series. Unfortunately, the fantastic artist who designed them wasn’t able to finish the series. And so I will, eventually, be relaunching that whole series with new covers that all match.

The other issue could be that the original covers are just bad. This isn’t usually anyone’s fault. I think we all want to give our books the best covers we can. But as we learn more, we can and should do better. I loved the cover for Station Central when I made it. But I think we can all agree that the one for Nova is a lot better.

Then, of course, there’s a situation like the one I’m in right now. I’m relaunching the Woven series, and one of the best things about that is giving them the new covers they’ve deserved for years.

And yes, a cover announcement is coming soon.

Expanded versions

Sometimes when books are traditionally published, they get cut by the editors because they’re just too damn long. Or maybe some scenes are perfectly fine, but offended someone’s sensibilities. Whatever the reason, sometimes good scenes get cut from books.

And sometimes, the writers this happens to get enough clout and respect to go back and correct those mistakes. This has happened with at least two books I enjoyed, The Stand and American Gods. I’ve read the original, and I’ve read the expanded versions. And I can honestly say I like the expanded versions better. But of course, when a book is good enough, it’s always too short.

New publisher

And of course, books will sometimes change publishers during their lives. Or international versions will come out under different publishers. Sometimes that means that someone else owns the artwork on the original cover. Sometimes it just needs updating for any of the above reasons and it’s just a convenient time to get it done. And sometimes the new publisher just wants to put their mark on the book, which is understandable. Marketing is important, after all, and building a brand is boring but crucial work if you want your company to continue to, you know, survive.

I’m sure I missed some reasons why a book might be relaunched. I’d love to hear about them in the comments. Or, if you know of a book that has one definitive version, let us know that as well.

If you liked what you saw here today, please consider liking and sharing this post. Or you can support the site financially on Ko-fi.

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Preptober planner, 2024

August is now upon us. This is a liminal month here in Western PA, probably in other places. Signs of fall have started to pop up. Some leaves are beginning to turn, but most are still a vibrant green. The Steelers preseason is starting soon. Kids are going back to school. And while the days are still stifling hot, the nights are getting cooler. The days grow short, the nights grow long and my soul is coming alive.

Pumpkin spice is coming, my friends. Pumpkin spice is coming.

And while we’re all either soaking up the last weeks of summer or counting the days until chunky sweater weather, one thing remains the same. Nanowrimo will be with us before you realize it. And it’s time to get ready for Preptober. As such, I have updated my preptober planner for 2024.

This year’s version sports a new, darker color and updated coffee cups throughout the whole thing. More substantially, it includes two new planning pages.

Our first new page is a character injury page. I think we’ve all read or seen something in which a character is injured in one scene, only to be perfectly fine far too soon after. Was this done for convenience? Or did the author just forget about the injury?

The new planner page will help you avoid this. This includes a male and female presenting outline so that you can keep track of the bumps, bruises and breaks that your character suffers along the way.

Our second new page is a map page. I am a visual person. And it might surprise you to know that I often draw maps of my story locations so that I can keep track of things. Especially stories like Station 86, which included several levels of the space station that I needed to keep track of. I also had a map of the apartment building in Quiet Apocalypse so that I could remember who lived where and across from who.

These two pages bring us up to eleven total pages of planning goodness. You can print the planner out or just download it and write directly on the document. And while you could follow along with everyone planning on October, there is no reason you can’t get the planner now and begin your novel writing adventure.

I love this planner so much. Every year it gets better, in my humble opinion. You can get it right here now on Ko-fi for only $1.50.

Happy planning and happy writing everyone!

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Why am I still blogging?

Next month will mark the tenth anniversary of keeping this blog. Which is honestly astounding. I have been here almost ten years. In that time, I have moved three times, switched jobs, become a professional critic and gotten married.

Oh, and I’ve also published 12 books and produced two seasons of a sci-fi/horror podcast.

When I started Paper Beats World, it seemed like everyone had a blog. From teens talking teen things on Tumbler to the sea of mommy bloggers giving you recipes after boring you with the three-generational family history of their lemon squares, blogs were the hot ticket.

Now, they’re not. Now, everyone’s got either a YouTube channel or a podcast. There are so, so many podcasts. I hosted one about true crime, and I continue to write a fiction one.

And yet, I am still writing a blog after so many people have given up on them or switched to a different medium. Why? I don’t make money from this site. It takes roughly two hours a week to write, edit and post a blog. This is time I could be spending writing reviews, short stories or novels. I could be keeping up with my house, playing with Oliver or reading. So, why am I still here?

I don’t want to write a newsletter, do YouTube or start a podcast

Writers need platforms. They need a way for people to keep up with them. Otherwise, how will we know when their new books come out? I need a way to let all of you know what I have going on. And frankly, I don’t want to do it any other way.

I hate newsletters. When was the last time you actually opened a newsletter you subscribed to? Because I sure don’t. They sit in my inbox and I feel guilty for not reading them until I get tired of feeling guilty and delete them.

I really don’t want to do Youtube, because frankly, it seems like a lot more work than I need to add to my week. YouTube would mean I need to put on makeup, create a cute background and write a script instead of writing a blog post. Then, I’ve got to edit the damn thing. Oh, and I have to be careful of what I say, or the video will get demonetized or taken down.

Gross.

As for creating a podcast, this I have considered. It would just be me reading blogs out loud, to be honest. But I can see that being appealing and something I could keep up with. But again, that would include hours of audio editing that I don’t enjoy.

I still find blogging to be the best way to talk to people and the best way to consume content.

If I thought that creating content differently would be beneficial to you all, I’d consider it. I want the things I say to be accessible, and enjoyable. And maybe this is just me, but listening to a podcast where I’m supposed to learn something is often a pain in the ass. I’m often listening to them while cleaning, walking Oliver, or doing any number of things I don’t have a pen for. So if I want to write down a book title, a bit of clever dialog, or information about an herb, I have to pause the podcast until I can get to a pen and paper. It is so much easier for me to have a blog post to refer to when I have note-taking abilities.

I still like it

This is a big one for me. We all know there are things on our to-do list that we don’t want to do, we want to have done. Writing for this blog has never been one of those things for me. I’m still eager to sit down and write for all of you every week. It’s still fun for me. And seeing as how I want to throw as much joy in my life as possible, that’s important.

I want to do things I have fun doing. So, I’m still writing this blog.

I haven’t run out of things to say yet

And I doubt I ever will.

Living is a constant learning experience. And it should be. We are always learning innovative things about our craft. We learn things about the world around us. We learn things about ourselves. Very rarely have I considered what I was going to write about for the week and come up with nothing. There’s always some new book to talk about, some new writing revelation, or some new tool I just discovered.

There is always something new to talk about. And I love that.

It is the one platform I can control

Lots of writers lost an audience when Twitter sunk into the hole of self-important bullshit that is Musk. And I know it hurt some of those people. As I mentioned earlier, we have to have a way to let readers know what we’re doing. And for many of us, that is social media. But social media is fickle. Instagram is relying more and more on reels. YouTube has gone nuts with censorship issues. Threads is nice, for now.

While I still post on Threads, Instagram and Pinterest, the only platform I can be sure of is this one right here. I can post what I want when I want and I know that most of you will see it. If all of my social media was gone tomorrow, I would still be right here.

It keeps me accountable

Writers have a love/hate relationship with deadlines. I despise them, they make me anxious. And yet, I need them. I need them real bad.

With my fiction writing, I often don’t have a deadline. The story will get done when it’s done. And if I have to push it back, most people won’t even know, because I’m usually not stupid enough to announce a launch date until the project is finished.

But I have committed to be here most Fridays. I know that this is when I have to have a post up, and that people are expecting it. So if I just don’t feel like writing. If I’m dealing with burnout or depression, I have that little push to get me to my desk. And often, once I’m there to write a blog post, I start thinking of what I’d like to do with the next chapter of the book. Or a good piece of microfiction I want to write. Or an idea for a contest I didn’t think I was going to bother with.

Writing is often like that. Once you get the momentum started, it’s hard to stop. It’s just getting that momentum going in the first place that can be hard.

You’re still here

Finally, I’m still here because you’re still here. People show up every day to read something I wrote on this site. I still can’t believe it. But I hope that I’m helping you. Every day there’s a new person, or a returning one. I want to put something here that will be inspiring, or funny, or helpful. And so long as you all keep coming back, I’ll keep showing up. So thank you, from the bottom of my heart, for being here with me still.

Stay tuned for more.

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Something exciting is coming this Fall

Ten years ago, in 2014, I was not the same woman I am today. I wasn’t writing, hadn’t written for years. I had never actually finished a novel. I was depressed. I was working too much at a job that didn’t feed my soul. I didn’t like myself, didn’t like my life.

Then, I came up with a story about a boy who weaves visions and a girl who spins light.

This is not news to you if you’ve been here a minute. I talk about this every year, on the anniversary of the day I came up with Woven. I broke bread with the birds in the park and prayed that this story would live.

And it did.

Woven became my first published series. And I loved every second of writing it.

Last year, if you’ll recall, my publisher dropped all of my books without warning. And so the Woven series has been out of print for the last year.

I could have theoretically published them again right when I got them back. But I had a new season of AA coming out, and then Nova came out. I wanted to prioritize the new over a relaunch.

But finally, finally, the time has come. And I am relaunching Woven.

Book one, Broken Patterns will be coming out September 6th. It’s the story of a kingdom in danger, of magic and spinning. It’s a story of dragons.

More release dates to come. I’ll be doing a pre-sale, of course, and as soon as I have the info I’ll let you know.

I am so excited to get Woven back out in the world. It’s a beautiful story and one that I am still very proud of. I can’t wait to be able to share it again with all of you.

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Writing when someone you love is ill, part two

Last week we started talking about balancing a writing career when you have a partner with a chronic illness. If you haven’t read that one, I’d suggest starting there.

If you’ve never experienced living with someone with a chronic illness, it can be a struggle. There’s a lot to balance. And it takes a significant toll emotionally. But it’s something that plenty of people deal with every day. And if you want to have a creative career while caring for someone with a chronic illness, you can do it. You should do it. You deserve to do it. And today, we’re going to take another look at how I do it.

Decide how much or how little you want to share about this journey

Part of being a creative content creator in 2024 is having an online presence. And at least some of that online presence is probably going to be about your real life.

Mostly this consists of fun, happy things. We share content about our pets, our homes, and our writing process. We show pictures of our coffee and book signing. One author I follow shares videos of her cat using talk buttons. Another shows food pics. I like to show my tarot decks and library hauls. And, of course, pictures of my cats and dog.

Another author I follow shares info about her books and YouTube videos. She shares pictures of her adorable dog. And sometimes, she talks about her husband’s chronic illness.

It makes me feel like I’m not alone. And I love her for that. It is because of her that I decided to write this post. Her name is Jenna Moreci. She writes fantasy romance.

I bet that a lot of people I follow are also living with chronic illness. Or they have a partner who has a chronic illness. They never talk about it. Jenna doesn’t talk about it much. I don’t talk about it much either.

We don’t owe that part of ourselves to the internet. We don’t owe any part of ourselves to the internet.

When it comes to your family, how much or how little you share online is up to you and your family. Please don’t ever feel pressured to share more than you want. But if you want to share, that’s okay too.

Accept help when you can

It’s easy to feel like we’ve got to do everything ourselves. Society sure as hell tells us we should. We see people who are working full time, with immaculate homes and homemade meals.

I’m sorry, but that just isn’t real life. And when your partner has a chronic illness, you’ve got a lot of pressure on you.

It’s not just that you’re dealing with their illness and whatever demands that makes on your time and energy. It’s also that the care of the home and family will fall all on you more often than it would if your partner was able-bodied. Housework is work.

If you have a support system, let them help you. Let someone grab your groceries for you. Let a sibling take your partner to a doctor’s appointment if you don’t have time.

The darling husband and I don’t have a lot of family. For a long time, I felt like I had to take care of him, the house and the pets by myself. Over time, I’ve realized that this is unsustainable. So I started having our groceries delivered. We order in when we need to. And I lean on my friends for emotional support. I tell them when I’m struggling. I tell them when I’m scared. And that’s sometimes all that I need, just someone to listen to how hard this day was.

Ask for help when you need it. Accept help when it’s offered. You do not need to do everything by yourself.

Take care of you

I know that taking care of yourself takes time. And time is the thing you probably have the least of. But you have got to care for yourself.

Make doctor’s appointments, even if you’re sick to death of doctors. Get rest, even when you have a million things to do. Take care of yourself, eat good food, drink water, and take your meds if you’ve been prescribed meds.

We have to keep ourselves healthy or we won’t be able to care for our partner. So take good care of yourself.

Art can save us in our darkest hours.

So why would you still want to write when your partner has a chronic illness? With all the other demands on your time, why still put this extra burden on yourself?

I can’t answer that for you. But I can tell you why I still do it.

Art has saved my sanity. While parts of the writing game feel burdensome, the act of writing never has. Whether I’m writing a blog post, a review, a chapter of my novel or a short story, writing is always great. Creating is always great. Through writing, I can have a voice that I might otherwise be denied. It allows me to process my emotions. It allows me to face my demons on the page. It allows me to breathe. I do not think I would have survived the last ten years without my writing.

That’s all I can think of for now, advice-wise. If I think of other things I might do a follow-up. But now I want to hear what you think. Do you have a partner who has a chronic illness? Do you have a chronic illness that you manage while writing? Let us know in the comments.

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