The F Word
I want to talk about a difficult subject, and to do so I’m going to have to use a word that a lot of people don’t like. It’s an F-word. Not that one. No, not that one either. The word that makes people so uncomfortable is Failure (which means my grandma can read this and not get mad at me). It turns out, I know a lot about this word, […]
The State of Things
It’s been a busy couple of months here at stately Grayson-Coats manor. A lot going on. Like, a lot a lot. Jimmy and I spent a few weeks furiously planning the wedding. We have a tentative date (Oct 12th), and we pretty much have our colors (grey and purple) and the overall flow of the ceremony, as well as our attendants selected. Our priest has agreed to marry us (which […]
The 5 Stages of an Author’s Career
The other day my writing group was discussing a post by Dean Wesley Smith, about five levels in a writer’s life. It was focused on their skill level, and while I found it valid, it also didn’t speak much to me. I started thinking about the various levels there are to a writer’s actual career (and I use the term loosely). There are five distinct stages to this, with a […]
Flight of Ideas
A lot of people like to ask writers, and other creative types, ‘Where do you get your ideas?’ And that is, in many ways, the wrong question. I, like many other writers, have a thousand ideas before breakfast (to plagiarize Lewis Carroll). Coming up with ideas is not the problem. At least, it’s not the problem the way the people who are asking about it mean it. Ideas kind of […]
New Beginnings
This is a big week for me. On Tuesday, the Spring Semester starts, and I will find myself a full-time student again for the first time in 13 years. This will not be my first experience as a ‘non-traditional’ student. In 2009, at the age of thirty-six, I went back to school to get a CIS degree. But that was while I was raising young children full time and […]
My 2023 in Sales
I hardly ever look at my sales dashboard on the kdp site. I maybe check in once a week (or less) It’s not that I don’t care, its that looking at it too often drives me to despair. But tonight, I took a look to see how 2023 went. I’m not going to use specific numbers but focus on comparing this year’s performance to previous years (no one needs to […]