Ugh! I totally fell off the blogging wagon… to be fair I do have an 8-month-old who is keeping me on my toes! I didn’t intend to stop blogging, but well, it happened. However, I’m back! So check out some writing tips I gathered from my writing friends!
I’m hoping to blog at least once a month for the foreseeable future.
Kelly Garrett, novelist, says, “Figure out your own process and what works for you, and don’t worry if other people approach writing differently. For example, some writers are pantsers, and some are plotters. Some people write daily; others set a schedule of a few times a week. But while the advice to “always write daily” or “always outline your book before starting” isn’t inherently wrong, it doesn’t mean it’s right for you. If you’re a pantser who sits down three times a week for an hour, and it works for you, that’s awesome. If you’re an outliner who writes daily, that’s equally wonderful. As long as the process works for you. This being said, listening to how other writers work can be useful to give you ideas on how to fine-tune your own process.”
Kelly Garrett’s debut novel, The Last To Die, was a 2018 Oregon Book Awards finalist. When not writing, Kelly spends her time hiking with her Great Pyrenees mix and seeking out new coffee shops. After growing up in a small, rainy town on the Oregon Coast, Kelly now calls Portland home, where she organizes several literary-related lecture series. She’s an alumnus of Pacific University. You can track her on twitter as @garrett_kelly and on both Instagram and Facebook as @writerkellygarrett.
Michael Mohr, writer and editor submitted a blog post he wrote that seemed fitting for my request of giving out writing advice. The writer/editor relationship: Patience.
From his post, “The reality is that writing and editing (and publishing) take a long. Freaking. Time.”
Mohr is a published, Pushcart Prize-nominated writer, former literary agent’s assistant, and freelance book editor.
Carolyn Martin, poet. Her poems appear in publications throughout North America and the UK and her fourth poetry collection, A Penchant for Masquerades, will be released by Unsolicited Press in 2019. (check out the interview I did with her).
Martin’s writing advice is about poems, but it could just as easily be about prose.
Place your senses on high alert for sights, sounds, smells, images in whatever environment you find yourself: at home, on a bus, in a mall, at a poetry reading. Wherever. Jot down what they tell you. For example, one day I sat quietly in my family room and opened my senses to the refrigerator growling, the clock ticking, the furnace clicking on and off, a plane casting a shadow as it passed the sun, the raucous birds in the trees. Each of these images eventually worked its way into poems.
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