Angela Booth's Writing Blog

Does Grammar Matter To You?

The ever-encroaching use of "like" instead of "as if" can offend traditionalists, such as in the sentence: "I feel like I'm going to be sick."

Mixing up your modals - "might" and "may" - is another bugbear. As is the grocer's apostrophe, so-called for its frequent appearance in fruit and veg shops advertising apple's, pear's and sundry other green's. "Can I get…?" is for some an offence that should lead shopkeepers to frogmarch the culprit off the premises.

via www.bbc.co.uk

(Sigh) Yes, I hate bad grammar.

Amazon's In Love

Welcome to Kindle Love Stories, brought to you by Montlake Romance!  Kindle Love Stories is a weekly podcast for readers who are unabashedly in love with love, romance, and happy ever afters!  Kindle Love Stories is your weekly book club with your best friends, an escape where you’ll hear great love stories, author interviews, new book and author suggestions, and the latest Romance news, trends and buzz-worthy conversations happening online. 

via apub-blog.amazon.com

Amazon's giving romance authors a huge boost, with their new Kindle Love Stories weekly podcast.

Get inspired. Fall in love, and write a romance... ;-)

Got 5 Minutes? Use Them to Generate Cash

Make a list of ten companies with display advertising.

Fire up your Web browser. Do these businesses have websites? What’s on the sites?

Businesses which buy display advertising are spending money on marketing. They may need a writer – for press releases, Web content, email advertising – right now, or they may need one later. Either way, you’re a local. This is a good thing; they’ll be more inclined to hire you than than they will a writer who lives in another state, or another country.

via www.fabfreelancewriting.com

I've had several questions along the lines of "how can I make money writing?: So this is for you, if you're a writer who wants get paid to write.

Read the above article -- and the other article I wrote on 5-minute cash generators as well. Follow the advice.

Learn the Money Mind Trick

Your mind is an association machine. Buddhists refer to “monkey mind” – like a cageful of monkeys, your mind leaps from one association to another. Emotion teases your monkeys, so anything which stimulates an emotion arouses your creativity.

When writing, emotion is GOLD. Over the years, I’ve managed to write with enthusiasm about compost, pet food, and iron rebar. Not because I find these topics inspiring, but because I’ve learned the emotion-inspires-creativity mind trick.

via angelabooth.com

Want to make writing fun? It can be. Discover how the "money mind" trick works.

Book Deal: Blogger Jack Monroe Turns Lemons Into Lemonade

She began attending council meetings and writing about politics and budget meals on her A Girl Called Jack blog following encouragement from friends. She used a Nokia E72 phone to write and upload her posts as she does not own a computer.

via www.dailymail.co.uk

Single mom and blogger Jack Monroe teaches her readers to make the most of what they have. She does it superbly herself. Here's her blog, A GIRL CALLED JACK.

Her ability to turn lemons into lemonade won her a book deal from Penguin.

She talks about her book deal here.

Allow Yourself Time to Write

‘The time we have alone; the time we have in walking; the time we have in riding a bicycle; are the most important times for a writer. Escaping from a typewriter is part of the creative process. You have to give your subconscious time to think. Real thinking always occurs on the subconscious level.

via dangerousminds.net

Tip: you can give your subconscious mind orders. Tell it what you want. It's smarter than you are; it has your entire life on which to draw.

As Candace Pert would have it, Your Body Is Your Subconscious Mind. Carl Jung believed your subconscious was much more than that.

Theories about your subconscious mind needn't trouble you.

Direct it. It will accept the instructions you give it.

Sookie Ends, (Some) Fans Outraged

"I wrote the best book I could, and I'm confident I stayed true to the characters I'd been writing for so many years. It's disappointing to have people impugn my character in such a personal way, but I hope on the whole that many people are entertained by the book and find it a satisfying end to Sookie's adventures,"

via www.guardian.co.uk

I haven't read the Sookie Stackhouse books, and won't. The last vampire novel I read was King's Salem's Lot.

However, I've seen some of the drama unfold online... Whatever else she's feeling, I'm sure that Charlaine Harris is pleased with the reaction to the final book. She created characters people care about, and that's everything an author could want.

(Corrections made after generous tweet from Steve Tannuzzo ‏@BostonProWriter -- mental block, dislike all things vampire.)

(Giggle) Renowned Dan Brown, Prosperous Author

“Think of all the money you’ve made,” recommended the literary agent. That was true too. The thriving ink-slinger’s wealth had allowed him to indulge his passion for great art. Among his proudest purchases were a specially commissioned landscape by acclaimed painter Vincent van Gogh and a signed first edition by revered scriptwriter William Shakespeare.

via www.telegraph.co.uk

The funniest article I've read all week... :-)

Writing Fiction: Get Help - Team Up

Writers said they got more done in a week than they'd done in months, achieved goals they'd been trying to achieve for years, and found writing easier and much more fun.

Several writers told me that they'd finally gone full time. Others, who were job hunting, managed to make a full-time income from their writing.

In nine cases out of ten, they told me that their life turned around because of one small thing...

via www.writingchallenge.net

Here's your chance to get the help you need writing and selling fiction or nonfiction.

If You're a Writer Who Loves To Cook

You know you can make money writing, recipes, right?

Here’s a way to share your recipes, and cash in. This article, How to Create an iPad App to Share and Sell Your Recipes | Appifier Blog reports:

“With Appifier, you can easily create your very own full-featured iPad recipe app to share and sell your recipes. It’s so easy, you can get started in under 60 seconds and you won’t even need to write a line of code. “

via www.fabfreelancewriting.com

I know many writers are good cooks, so here's a way for you to not only get a little recognition, but perhaps make a little cash.

How to Get Ebook Reviews Without Slitting Your Wrists | Write a Book: Just Write A Book Blog

Study Goodreads’ reviewers carefully

I’ve just written an article about increasing ebook sales, in which I discussed Goodreads’ Author Program. Join Goodreads, and create your author profile.

Once that’s done, look for books which are similar to yours, and which sell well. For example, if you write contemporary romances, find hot-selling books in that genre on Goodreads. Choose the books which are most similar to yours – in plot and voice. Read the reviews.

via www.justwriteabook.com

Getting good reviews is a challenge. However, reviews sell books, so it's worth the effort.

The Last Tycoon: Watch This Movie Clip

BOXLEY: I don't think you people read things. The men... The men are dueling when this conversation takes place. At the end, one of them falls into a well and has to be hauled up...in a bucket.

STAHR: Would you write that in a book of your own?

BOXLEY: Of course I wouldn't. I inherited this absurd situation.

STAHR: Let me ask you, do you ever go to the movies?

BOXLEY: Rarely.

STAHR: Because people are always dueling and falling down wells?

BOXLEY: And talking a load of rubbish!

via www.huffingtonpost.com

Watch the movie clip at the end of this article.

Think about it.

It will improve your writing.

Writing a Book? Create a Daily Goal

Create a daily word count goal.

To do this, decide how long your book will be. These days, with digital publication, a book’s length no longer matters. It can be 10,000 words or less, or $300,000 words or more. As a rule of thumb, most novels come in somewhere between 70,000 and 100,000 words.

Let’s say you’re writing a thriller, and your total word count will be around 100,000 words. If you write a thousand words a day, it will take you over three months to write your book. Work out how many days off you want each week, and get out your calendar. Mark off your working days.

via www.justwriteabook.com

Goals are essential; they keep you writing.

Writing a Book? Publish It Yourself

Now it’s all about the money.

To hell with the story.

As he said, publishing companies are merging, big publishing companies are buying small companies, and small publishing companies are dying miserable deaths and going out of business.

The man behind the desk no longer cares about books. He cares about money.

He doesn’t read novels. He reads only the bottom line.

via venturegalleries.com

For most writers, the big advantage of traditional publishers over self-publishing has always been editors.

That advantage has gone, it seems. Publishers are cutting down on editors.

You might as well hire an editor and publish your book yourself.

Just Five Minutes Makes All the Difference

On the blog this week, I ran “Five-Minute Money: Ten Fast and Easy Cash Generators for Writers”.

The article discusses simple little things you can do which will be powerfully effective over time.

Jan, one of my students, called me to tell me about #5 — “5. Contact a Client to Catch up.”

She had five minutes, so she called one of her clients. She hasn’t spoken to him since last September. He not only gave her a big new project, but also give her the phone number of one of HIS clients. Just 24 hours later, she had three new gigs, which will make her a total of $8,450 over the next few weeks.

via www.fabfreelancewriting.com

This week on our freelance writing tips blog, we're running a series on blogging.

We kicked the week off with the "5-minute blogger."

Just five minutes can make all the difference in your writing life.