A love letter to my beta readers As I hit the send button, and my final manuscript zipped through the ether to my proofreader, I felt I should formally thank the most unexpected new friend on this book-writing journey… Critique. Do you wince at the word? At the beginning of this story, I would’ve. Hell, even six months … More Meet My New Friend
It’s Children’s Book Week! What are some of your favorites, recent or classic? Here are some of my top new discoveries. You can also check out my full list
What is that “someday” project you’ve been wanting to tackle? My writing coach (turned online friend) Deborah Reber recently published an impactful little book called Doable. Though it’s marketed to teen girls, anyone can use its no-nonsense approach to stop wanting and start doing. Included below are 10 of my favorite quotes from the book. Whatever it is that lingers … More Top 10 “Doable” Quotes
Okay. Now that we’ve covered the very first step, Logistics, it’s time to talk branding. And these days, you can’t talk branding without talking social media. As I detailed in Step 1, it’s best to register yourself as a self-publishing company that’s publishing your book. The same reasoning goes for social media. Make profiles for your … More Self Publishing and Branding
Please note that the following info is particular to print books. I’ll get to ebooks in a future post, I promise. So, you’ve weighed the pros and cons of traditional publishing versus doing it yourself, and you’ve decided to self publish. Now what? Decide which kind of self publishing you want to do. That’s right. There’s … More Self Publishing Logistics
Part of being creative is absorbing the best of the world around you and discovering how you’ll radiate it back out. Here are some of the best books that have inspired me and my kids in such a way. I hope they’ll fill you to overflowing with imaginative possibilities. BONUS IDEA: Sure, it’s nice to give gifts … More 8 Books to Inspire Creativity
In this week’s installment of book progress: building a beta reader dream team. What is a beta reader? A person who reads a book before publication and offers feedback. Although beta readers can be professional editors or writers, they don’t need to be. More importantly… Pick someone who is: 1. Interested in your project, whether as a friend, … More Building a Beta Reader Dream Team
Nine months ago, I teased that I’d be revamping my site to better focus on my human and book babies. Nothing much has happened on that front. Until now. I guess I was just feeling idle with only taking care of two kids, the holidays, three family trips, two books, a new blog partnership, and a potential new illustrator. Or maybe once you … More “Free Seattle,” New Travel Partnership, + Category Pages
My husband introduced me to this phrase. His step-father (that’s him to the left) used to tell him, “Do something, even if it’s wrong.” And that confounded him as a kid. As ridiculous as it might seem at first (of course, you shouldn’t do horrible mean things just for the sake of doing them–that would … More Do Something, Even If It’s Wrong
How do you prioritize between outside needs and internal inspiration? Well, to start with, you need to get back to the basics of the word need. For instance for the past three years, on top of my monetary and motherly contributions to my family, I felt I needed to blog 2-3 times a week, all … More How Do You Prioritize?
My Castle Heart Publications 