The Journal: Writers Are Ageless

In today’s Journal * Writers Are Ageless * Of Interest Today’s post is a guest blog, a repeat of Dan Baldwin’s most recent Writing Tip of the Week. It is posted in its entirety by permission of the author. Enjoy. Writers Are Ageless A young whippersnapper friend of mine seriously and politely asked, “What’s is it like being old?” I thought for half a second and said the following. “My friend, I am young enough to hike, climb, scramble, trip, fall, get up and camp all alone in some of the most spectacular country in the world. And I’m experienced … Read more

The Journal: General Tidbits

In today’s Journal * Quote of the Day * The quote of the day… * This is the year you’ll finish your book * I was glancing over * If I May * Of Interest Quote of the Day “Publishers can’t publish without writers.” Dan Baldwin in “Son of Why Is This A Good Idea?” (see “Of Interest”) The quote of the day is a massive UmYup, a solid statement of fact, and one that is empowering for writers. From early school, we are taught that our creative subconscious (and ourselves and whatever we’ve learned) are inadequate to tell a … Read more

The Journal: Nothing Really

In today’s Journal * Nothing really * Of Interest * The Numbers Nothing today, really. I suspect this will be the shortest post I’ve ever put up. I’m posting today only to send you the “Of Interest” links below. I hope you will find them helpful, hopeful or amusing. Talk with you again later. Of Interest See “Offend Me, Please!” at https://danbaldwin.com/f/offend-me-please. See “Twitter Tutorial – From Zero to 12K” at https://killzoneblog.com/2021/10/twitter-tutorial-from-zero-to-12k.html. If marketing is important to you, this is a good article. See “7 Simple Social Media Tips for Successful Authors” at https://www.thepassivevoice.com/7-simple-social-media-tips-for-successful-authors/. See “Blue Origin unveils plans to … Read more

The Journal: David Farland and Dan Baldwin

In today’s Journal * Quote of the Day * David Farland * Dan Baldwin * The end of the novel * Of Interest * The Numbers Quote of the Day “It’s been my belief from the beginning that there is virtually nothing an author can do to significantly impact sales. The best way for an author to sell books is to write more books.” John Gilstrap David Farland I’ve been linking to a series of posts by David Farland in “Of Interest.” So far he’s posted ten lessons. There might be more. I don’t agree with everything Farland says about … Read more

The Journal: Shared Worlds and Poetry

In today’s Journal * Quotes of the Day * Shared Worlds and Poetry * I thought the novel * The Numbers Quotes of the Day “It’s the job that’s never started as takes longest to finish.” JRR Tolkein “All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.” JRR Tolkein “[What matters is] who you are and how you treat people, not what you signal.” FarnamStreetBlog.com. Dean announced in today’s post (linked below) that the Shared Worlds class is still open to anyone who wants to jump in and write for anthologies. And there … Read more

The Journal: An Addendum

In today’s Journal * Quote of the Day * Topic: An Addendum * It will be interesting, * The Numbers Quote of the Day “My advice to writers who think they’re out of ideas is to tell them to write the word ‘The’ and then follow with another word and… bing-bam-boom straight to the Moon, Alice… there’s your idea.” Dan Baldwin Topic: An Addendum One addendum to yesterday’s post — Everything you are able to learn and absorb and put into practice about writing or anything else is dependent on whether you’re ready to learn and absorb the lesson. Much … Read more

The Journal: On Blatant Censorship

In today’s Journal * Quote of the Day * I’m posting today mostly * That there was a glitch * The Numbers Quote of the Day “PG suggests that a more widely recognized term for deplatforming is political censorship. What punched PG’s deplatforming button was not the criticism of Mr. Peterson’s ideas and writings, but rather the verbal lobbying directed to [Penguin Random House] to pressure the company to cease publication of Mr. Jordan’s writings.” The Passive Guy I’m posting today mostly to get “Of Interest” out to you, and mostly the first item in that section. I hope you … Read more

The Journal: Election Day

In today’s Journal * Quotes of the Day * Today Is Election Day * Another great day of writing * Of Interest * The Numbers Quotes of the Day “The cat sat on the mat is not the opening of a plot. The cat sat on the dog’s mat is.” John LeCarre “The thing I like best about being a writer is the escape it provides.” Yer Uncle Harv Today is election day. I know, old news. But if you live in the United States, this is probably the most important election day of your life. Today the citizenry and … Read more

The Journal: Very short post today

In today’s Journal * Quote of the Day * Very short post today * Of Interest * The Numbers Quote of the Day “It is a good rule in life never to apologize. The right sort of people do not want apologies, and the wrong sort take a mean advantage of them.” PG Wodehouse Very short post today. I was going to publish this Journal entry yesterday, but we had a wide power outage in southeast Arizona and the power came back on a little too late to file this. As it turns out, I didn’t have a lot to … Read more

The Daily Journal, Wednesday, August 7

In today’s Journal * Last Saturday * Topic: I Rescind My Topic Statement * Daily diary * Of Interest * The numbers Last Saturday, August 3rd, I wrote about flash fiction. A respondent from Japan and I have been exchanging comments on that post. In one of them he metioned “100 Word Story” at http://www.100wordstory.org/. Interesting website. That put me in mind of 55 Story, a book I bought a long time ago that started me writing flash fiction. You can find the current edition here. If you’re interested in writing flash fiction, I recommend the following (though all of … Read more