Straight talk from the sisters about blood, sweat and ink
Many writers are so overwhelmed by the number of fiction genres and subgenres they can’t decide where their story fits. If you want to land an agent or self publish, picking the right genre is crucial because it helps your book connect with buyers. Being between genres might sound exciting, like you’re breaking new literary ground. However, …
Continue reading “G is for Genre”
I’ve always believed that a story is created for the story’s sake, and not to fit a mold or template. I subscribed to the notion that if characters lived, they were intrinsic to the novel’s unfolding, and their agendas might differ from that of the author. There’s magic in that conflict between writer and work; …
Continue reading “Mixing Genres: Are We Committing Career Suicide?”
I’ve spent the past five years exploring the publishing industry from different angles: as an MFA student, as an associate literary agent, as an editor. I’ve been a writer for a lot longer than that, and my first book, Breathing through Buttonholes, was published in 2003. But the writer I was back then looks nothing like …
Continue reading “Honoring Creativity: Discerning The Angels And Demons Of Writing Advice”
Once upon a time authors didn’t have to think much about their genre, or their reader demographics. They just wrote stories and never worried about the book finding a slot in a high traffic section of the bookstore. Some of my writer friends still feel this way; they don’t care about genre labels one way …
Continue reading “Do We Really Need Genre Labels?”