Following these suggestions will give you a “clean” MS Word file that compiles to ePub and Mobi without mysterious blank pages and extra lines in it, and with chapter headings properly formatted. If you use compilers such as Jutoh, Atticus or Vellum, the clean file will also reduce bad results when you import to those […]
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How many words you write in a single hour is the atomic number for fiction writers. When you’ve been keeping a writing log for a while, the number becomes a highly accurate predictor of how much you can write in any single hour, no matter the circumstances. Once you have calculated this number, your whole
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The Missing Factor That Demolishes Habit Building And A System To Use It We fiction writers understand the power of tiny habits. We get that routine and “just starting” are key tools to get a lot of writing done. But there’s another factor involved in building small habits that is critical, yet is often overlooked. BJ Fogg,
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4 Ways to Write What You Know And beat that hoary old aphorism into submission An email I received from a newbie writer has me shaking my head. In part, they asked: I want to write thrillers. If I’m to write what I know, how do I get the experience I need to write them?
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This might be another of those moments 2007 was the year Amazon released their first Kindle eReader, and indie publishing took a light-year’s leap forward. I’ve often wondered if I would be any more successful if I’d jumped into indie publishing in 2007, rather than waiting another four years to commit. If you’ve ever said anything
10 Unexpected Ways Writing Fiction Helps Readers It’s MUCH More Than Simply Entertainment If you’ve written and published a lot of fiction, there’s a good chance that somewhere along the way you’ve had a dark night of soul–where you’ve questioned why on earth you’re putting yourself through this torture day after day, only to hear
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I’ve edited a lot of fiction. Read a lot of it, too. I can nearly always spot the newer writers, because their control of point-of-view slips frequently. They drop into the dreaded telling, instead of showing, often without realizing it. And their narrative voice sometimes doesn’t match the character’s voice. There’s usually more evidence: Setting
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5 Powerful Reasons Why Indie Fiction Writers Should Keep Work Logs They’re not sexy, but essential if you want to get more written Is there anything more geeky than a fiction writer keeping a word count log? I mean, we know when the novel is finished when we reach the end of the story. At
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Discipline tends to get a bad rap these days. In productivity circles, it is equated to white-knuckling your way through tasks with iron-jawed determination, which will naturally and absolutely end in failure. In diet circles, discipline is the same as holding your teeth together, sitting on your hands and mutely shaking your head “no” when
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Whenever writers talk to me about being prolific, the objections writers raise tend to slide into two ancillary subjects: Both of these arguments aren’t really arguments at all. They’re 1) a mindset and 2) a choice. Or, really, they’re both just mindsets. They’re damned invasive mindsets, too. Many authors recognize the fallacy of both arguments
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