So honored to be a part of the conversation today at talented Kate Bradley-Ferrall’s marvelous blog. along with inspired author and writing instructor Sue Bradford Edwards. Check out how “writing in unfamiliar genres can reboot your writing and challenge you in interesting and inspiring ways.” 🎉📝
From Promising to Published: Cover Reveal! 🎉📔
Cover reveal time! @jessicabelldesign knocks it out of the park again!
Why, yes, there is both a dragon and a swan-diving swimmer in my forthcoming writing craft book.🎉📔
Arriving in May. More details about the book at: Vine Leaves . More details and other covers by my amazing designer at: Jessica Bell Design.
Mindset Medicine 📔📝
Mindset Medicine: A Must-Read for Motivation
Remember that feeling of opening the decorative cover of a new journal to the first crisp, fresh page, awaiting all of your musings, pens in myriad colors at the ready? That anticipation! That knowing that you’re not entirely sure where your written journey will take you but that it will surely take you on a good, introspective journey by book’s end.
That’s the feeling, too, while reading award-winning author Mari McCarthy’s Mindset Medicine: A Journaling Power Self-Love Book.
Packed with authentic examples and can-do tips, Mindset Medicine explores a wide variety of life-applicable topics, from gratitude and respect from others to transforming your life through asking the right questions and establishing solid boundaries.
This book meets readers where they are in life and offers practical and positive next steps for setting goals step-by-step, elevating moods, and letting go of damaging thought-loops that keep a creator mired or stuck.
It’s like having your best friend who happens to be a life coach sitting with you and supporting your hopes and goals as you translate them into action steps.
Get your journals ready; you’ll surely fill them as you read (and, if you’re like me, reread—so many of these chapters invite a second and third visit) and explore an updated mindset that brings refreshment, renewed focus on your dreams, and a lot of self-knowledge along the way.
Want to read more? Great news! This book, as well as books 1 and 2 in her Journaling Power Revolution Series) and other inspiring resources, such as workbooks, are available and ready for your perusal at: Amazon and createwritenow .
Check out the other stops on Mari L.McCarthy’s Book Tour this month and next:
Featured Today on I've Got Questions 🥳
Great news! To celebrate my book birthday today, I’m featured on Clifford Garstang’s wonderful site, I’ve Got Questions.
It was a joy to talk about Writing It Real: Creating an Online Course for Fun and Profit as well as teaching, food, and other elements of the writing life.
Check out Cliff’s many excellent books as well as other interviews with talented authors.
It's Book Birthday Time! 🎉📚
I couldn’t resist staying up to ring in the book birthday of my next book: Writing It Real: Creating an Online Course for Fun and Profit! Woot! 🎉
Available at Amazon as well as signed copies at my Etsy shop, WritePathProductions.
Many thanks for celebrating with me and for all of your wondrous support!
Updates on the Writing It Real Series 🎉
🎉Just one more month until my book birthday @vine_leaves_press for Writing It Real: Creating an Online Course for Fun and Profit! Can't wait! Preorder today at Amazon.
It's even more awesome in person! 📕🎉@vine_leaves_press That holding the first printed copies feeling: priceless. Props to my amazing cover designer @jessicabelldesign . Couldn't resist sharing this moment with all of you. Writing It Real: Crafting a Reference Book that Sells has a book birthday in April, and it's available for preorder now at Amazon.
Pre-Order Time! 📚
Super excited to announce that the pre-order for my next book is all set!
Whether you’ve never taught an online class before or if you’ve been an educator for years, if you’ve ever thought about launching your own online course or brushing up on your teaching skills to bring extra pizzazz to your classroom this book is for you.
I’ve packed it with tips, advice, exercises, humor, and lots of can-do motivation to inspire the class-creation and class-launching experiences from choosing a theme through syllabus creation through marketing and more! Also, it’ll make the perfect gift for the favorite educator friend in your life this holiday season.
To pre-order and learn more: Amazon Paperback and Amazon E-book .
Breaking out the Red Lipstick 😁
It’s a red-lipstick wearing kind of occasion. While this morning started out gray and sleeting and a little blah, this afternoon turned around. I finished Day 30 of NaNoWriMo and have managed to get a few pages into Draft 3.
A package arrived tonight, and my next book was inside. That holding the first tactile copy feeling: priceless! Dropping February 2022: stay tuned.
NaNoWriMo Day 8: Reflections So Far 📝
Just popping by for a quick update about my first week of National Novel Writing Month. Here’s the scoop and the skinny on my progress. On this sunny November day, I feel like a bulleted list, so I think I shall. [Razzle-dazzle formatting, 🧚♀️done! ] Proceed:
I’m working on draft 2 of a novel about two sculptors that I finished a first draft of in September and purposely didn’t look at again since. I like to let first drafts marinate a few weeks while I work on other projects, so that when it’s time to edit I see what’s really there and not what I think is there. #writerproblems #tookabreaknomistake
Instead of writing new content this time, I edit a little each day. No certain word count each day. Unlike a traditional NaNoWriMo and yet in the spirit of NaNoWriMo’s creative marathon, I’m going rogue and savoring the process as it evolves each day. #keepingitcopacetic
I’m not writing at a particular time of morning, afternoon, or night. Each day has been different, but each day I’ve been both pleased with some dialogue and character insights as well as (on some other pages) frustrated by clunky first-draft stuff I’d forgotten about in my draft. #plotholesIgotem #charactersmademelaughandcrythough
One day last week, I edited three chapters around 11 pm-1 am. That was my longest writing day. Later that week, I had a four-sentence editing day one afternoon for about twenty minutes, aka: my shortest day. Most days, I averaged 2 or 3 pages in 45 minutes or so of the early evening. It’s ALL good and motivates me through the second draft, bit by bit.
Yesterday, I edited around 8 pages in a chapter where my protagonist finally has her own studio. #virginiawoolfvibes #aroomofherown For the first time in a week, I found myself adding two or three pages to a scene, rather than focusing on trimming. Both are needed and will happen in drafts 3, 4, etc., but it was refreshing to tie a bow on the first week by being so back into the characters’ POVs that new ideas were percolating again. #writergoals 🌻
Supporting my fellow intrepid and awesome NaNoWriMo 2021 authors! How’s it going? What projects are you working on? I want the tea. Merci beaucoup, and write on! ☕📝
Photo Courtesy of Daniele Levis Pelusi on Unsplash.com .
Insight into Developmental Editing, Part Two 📝☕
As an editor, it’s incredibly fulfilling to work with fellow writers as they sculpt their awesome novels and prepare for publication.
This year, I’ve had the complete joy to work with Ian Rogers of But I Also Have a Day Job and TRAM on his debut novel that drops in April 2022 (Vine Leaves Press). MFA Thesis Novel will leave you entertained, laughing, and thinking deeply about your own life’s path long after you’ve savored the final page.
Photo Courtesy of Vincentiu Solomon on Unsplash.com
Wonder what it’s like to work with a developmental editor? Ponder no longer! Ian does a stellar job exploring what developmental editing entails, what it’s like to communicate about your vision for your book with a developmental editor, and how authors and editors can bond over shared goals on behalf of making fabulous books.
Here’s the second (and latest) post about Ian’s developmental editing experience: ta-da! Be sure to check out his first post about developmental editing from June .
Also, make sure to check back on Ian’s site for wonderful reflections and interviews with working writers and at Vine Leaves Press to reserve and order your copy of MFA Thesis Novel in early 2022 as well as to peruse and purchase the many amazing Vine Leaves selections available.
Here’s to writers making it happen and bringing meaningful literature into the world! 📚🌟