the writing life

The Journal, Wednesday, February 14

Hey Folks, Happy St. Valentine’s Day! Well, I’m learning a lot about writing thrillers from reading Jack Higgins and Lee Child. But I’m all about cutting learning curves (mine and other’s) so this morning I also signed up for Dean’s “Writing Thrillers” online workshop. It’s a classic workshop, meaning no homework, but it’s also half-price at only $150. Six weeks of instruction, and I’ll get through it in a week or so. Probably I’ll work on that whenever I need a break from prepping my latest novel for publication or working on the StoneThread Publishing website. Another good thing about … Read more

The Journal, Tuesday, February 13

Hey Folks, Not sure what’s going on in my head currently. I have to slow down, I know that much. Probably today I’ll try to finish getting StoneThread Publishing up to par, and then do the necessary things to publish my previous novel. I gave up on the notion of reading it to my wife. We’re both too tired in the evenings for that sort of thing. When I do return to writing, well, I’m kind of losing interest in my WIP, The Age Exchange. Not really, but sort of. The thing is, I’m itching to write a true thriller. … Read more

The Journal, Monday, February 12

Hey Folks, My excellent first reader, Kenneth Flowers (krf1952@gmail.com) got my 28th novel back to me via email yesterday with his feedback. I’m such a fortunate guy. He said he looks forward to the sequels, which served to remind me I wanted to write some sequels, that Keeper of the Promise was only the origin novel for a series. (grin) So there’s that. At the moment I’m deep in an SF novel, and then I hope to take a shot at writing a thriller. But sequels. Yes. I spent most of yesterday working on the StoneThread Publishing website and reading … Read more

The Journal, Saturday, February 10

Hey Folks, Wow. You know I recommend using Draft2Digital as one of your ebook distributors. Part of the reason is the smooth user interface on their website. Another (big) reason is that they are teamed with Books2Read to provide a Universal Link for your book. Ostensibly, this means you can post that Universal Link on your website, Facebook or wherever. When would-be readers click the link, it shows them all the stores where your book is available. They they can click on the link for their favorite store to buy your book. All well and good, mostly. Purely by accident, … Read more

The Journal, Friday, February 9

Hey Folks, Well, another good “Of Interest” section today. Today will probably be another non-(fiction) writing day for me. I’ll work on the copyedit I started yesterday on my wife’s memoir, and then I’ll probably round out the day by reading. Still resting up fron January, I think. Topic: About Publishing and Publishers A young writer got in touch with me earlier today to ask my recommendation on publishing. She mentioned that she was “talking to a publishing company that is a subsidiary of Hay House.” I didn’t look up the company, but a little bell went off in my … Read more

The Journal, Thursday, February 8

Hey Folks, Good stuff in “Of Interest” again today. Well, mostly a day off today. Mona will be at work this morning. While she’s doing that I’ll be working on a copyedit of her recent memoir. That will probably take up the morning and part of tomorrow. Otherwise, I’ll spend an hour or two reading today. Then this afternoon we’re going to Sierra Vista for a combination of shopping and just getting away for a few hours. Of Interest See “Eight Ways to Tell if Your Author Site Has Been Hacked” at https://the-digital-reader.com/2018/02/07/eight-ways-tell-author-site-hacked/. There’s a cute video re Dean’s new … Read more

The Journal, Wednesday, February 7

Hey Folks, Not sure what I’ll do today for writing, other than this. We’ll see. In the meantime, Dean and Kris have come up with two new workshops. See “Of Interest” below. As it turned out, I wrote a blog post for HarveyStanbrough.com. Almost a thousand words. Some of you will like it. It’s titled “The Use of Italics, Revisited.” I moved the other pre-posted ones out, so the new one will post next Tuesday. Well, also as it turned out, today I finished cycling through the short story that I’m turning into a novel. It took about two hours … Read more

The Journal, Thursday, February 1

Hey Folks, Well, here we go again. I was out in the Hovel poking around and found another short story that I’ve wanted, for awhile, to turn into a novel. The short story is titled “Going Back,” and it was considerably larger than itself even when I first wrote it. I’m interested to see where it will go and to watch it develop. As I glanced over it, the characters begain speaking to me and my fingers began moving over the keyboard. Before I realized it I’d added over 1000 new words. Feels good when that happens. I’ll be interrupted … Read more

The Journal, Tuesday, January 30

Hey Folks, I meant to post this yesterday. I really did, but there wasn’t a lot to talk about. Mostly I worked on the copyedit yesterday, as I will today and tomorrow, and took care of a few household chores. *** Well, the hits keep on coming. On the tail of losing a paternal uncle a few weeks ago, yesterday I lost another one. I am now officially the Old Man of the Stanbrough clan. Clifford Jerry Stanbrough was a tin-can (destroyer) sailor, a gunner’s mate, in the early 1950s. After that, he enjoyed a long career as a photographer, … Read more

The Journal, Sunday, January 28

Hey Folks, I think we’re nearly over being ill. Other than this tiny bit of writing, I’ll spend the rest of the day doing nothing. The plan for tomorrow is to write and to work on the copyedit I received recently. Awhile back I mentioned that I wish Mark Coker over at Smashwords would publish a print version of his podcasts for those of us who would rather read than listen. Finally this morning I found he’s been doing that all along. You can find the Smart Author Podcast homepage at https://www.smashwords.com/podcast. Once you’re there, you’ll see all the episodes … Read more