Many of you know that I’ve been writing historical novels for what seems like forever, but haven’t yet published a book. There have been times that I’ve felt less ambitious about it, and times when I doubted my own ability to achieve my publication goals, but overall I’m committed to making it happen. For those […]
editing
The Life-Changing Magic of Cleaning for Writers
How often have you heard a writer say, “I couldn’t face my manuscript, so I cleaned my closet instead?” On the surface, this remark seems to be entirely about procrastination and the weight of creative work. But is it? What if decluttering, organizing and cleaning are skills we writers truly need? Decluttering is a lot like […]
Writing Life Update: Submit, Edit, Focus
The last time I updated you on my writing life, I was working on The Creativity Perspective and my second historical novel, BLIZZARD. That took me through the beginning of August. At that point, I finished the first draft of BLIZZARD and closed down The Creativity Perspective website for awhile. So what have I been […]
Re-Post: How To Edit Like A Musician (and other links)
Note from Leanne: I’m choosing this post as the second in a series of re-posts not for its initial popularity, but because it’s a subject near and dear to my heart: cross-pollination between the practices of music and writing. All creative professions have a lot to learn from each other, and figuring out how my […]
Writer’s Un-Block
I don’t believe in writer’s block. Really, I don’t. But I do believe in bad writing, and that’s what I’ve been doing for the past few days. I’ve started two different posts to publish today, and I don’t think either of them are good enough to finish. And they were book reviews, which aren’t the […]
The Non-Writing Writer
Back in December, in my post Finished, I said that the hardest part of writing my novel, completing the first draft, was over. Well, I was wrong. Turns out the hardest part is re-reading that first draft, considering what needs to be edited and fixed, and realizing that one possible solution involves removing one or two of […]