The Writing Process

Critiquing out of your Genre

A few months ago, one of my critique buddies, Judith, asked for recommendations for books on writing middle grade novels so that she could more thoughtfully critique middle grade manuscripts. While I was appreciative of her dedication to her critiques, I was hesitant to steer her to my favorite titles for fear that I’d lose… Read more »

Double Dose of Query Advice

Two blog posts about querying arrived in my Google Reader on precisely the same day. Both offered wise advice. Nathan Bransford at Curtis Brown, discussed the benefits of batch querying. Shelli Johannes at Market My Words hosted author and query master, Elana Johnson, who lists the top five query mistakes. Ignore these posts at your… Read more »

How is a Picture Book Like a Golf Swing?

One of my favorite golf pros practiced simplicity in his instruction. Rather than giving me twenty-minutes of pointers to think about during my five-second swing, he’d address just a few. One of his more memorable lessons was when he placed me in perfect body position at address, then backswing, then finish. He had me hold… Read more »

Shhhhh! I’m NaNoing.

Sorry it’s been a little quiet around the “Romp” lately. I’ve been NaNoing. I just hit 30K words and I think I’ve found my ideal daily word count – 2500/day. It keeps me in character for a few hours. It stretches me. It feels hard but doable. It knocks off a couple of short chapters,… Read more »