Today I’d like to step out of the writing career coach role and talk a little bit about my experience as being a judge in a multitude of writing contests, for both published and unpublished writers. One misperception people have is that judges go in to these contests for some kind of personal gain. I can tell you as a judge, the only gain I get from it is helping another person grow as a writer. Nearly every writing contest is a volunteer contest. The judges are not paid in any way. The only exception to that is that in published writing contests the judge will usually get the copy of the book they are judging. Judges are giving their time out of their love for the craft, and their desire to help other writers. It’s important that writers keep that in mind when they’re reading through critiques and comments from the judges.

I, as a writer, completely understand how painful it can be sometimes to receive those critiques from the judges. I also understand how painful it is when you have one judge who gives you straight perfect scores and another judge who rips you apart. You wonder how you can even use this information to develop your writing. We’ll talk a little bit about that in the next blog, but for today I want you to think about using the comments the judge says and recognizing them as individual readers because once you’re published, the readers are going to be just as subjective as the judges are.

Understanding that people are going to have wildly different opinions and that there is some validity in each perspective, can help you grow as a writer. Understanding that judges are there to genuinely try to help you as a writer will help take away that animosity that we sometimes feel when we get those harsh critiques.

If you have questions that you’ve always wanted to ask a judge, I’d love for you to put them in the comments and get a dialog started. As I said, I’ve judged a number of categories in both published and unpublished writing contests, large and small and I’d be happy to give you the point of view of a judge and help you with your writing.

Next time we’ll be talking about how to use those comments to help you develop your writing.

Don’t miss a single posting! Subscribe here to receive these postings by e-mail. Tiffany Colter is a writer, speaker and writing career coach who works with beginner to published writers. She can be reached through her website at writingcareercoach.com.

In keeping with our theme we are now going to move from organizing our time to organizing our writing workspace. There are three ways that you need to organize your workspace.
• You need to mentally organize your work space.
• You need to organize your workspace to minimize distractions and maximize efficiency.
• And you need to know what you’re going to do each day.

Today we’re going to look at the mental aspect of organizing your writing time.

Where is it that you work? This space can be a separate office or a space at your kitchen table. Wherever it is, make that place your office. Mentally prepare yourself so that is where you write. It may seem odd, but when I was in college I read a study about the brain. It said that studying in your bedroom actually can cause problems with sleeping because your brain becomes trained to study in that place. Our brain associates different spaces with different activities.

The more I learned about that, the more I recognized the truth of that. Think about when you’re heading to work, how you’re mentally shifting. When you move from work to school, school to church, or church to sports event, think about the different ways that you change physically, mentally, emotionally with each place. This same holds true as you prepare to write. Mentally you need to recognize a single spot, even if it’s the same place where you eat. You need to train your brain to be in writing mode when you are there with your writing supplies.

The next thing you need to do is warm up your mind. That means you begin to think about what you’re going to write as you get ready to go write. If you’re working on a novel, start playing scenes in your head. If your writing an article, think about the previous articles you’ve written or the interview you just did. Put your brain in the writing frame of mind instead of sitting down at your computer cold.

Whenever possible write the same things at the same time of day. When I began writing I had a newborn, a 2 year old and a 4 year old. I caught writing time between naps and diaper changes. I was able to write my first full novel in two months during that time because I worked the story through when I was feeding one of the babies or watching Barney for the 900th time.

Next time we’re going to deal with minimizing distractions, but for today take some time to determine where it is you’re going to work if you don’t already have that. If you do, look around that workspace and see what kinds of things that are currently distracting you from getting your writing work done. Is it set up in a way that’s conducive to accomplishing your goals? Then mentally prepare. And get writing.

 Don’t miss a single posting! Subscribe here to receive these postings by e-mail. Tiffany Colter is a writer, speaker and writing career coach who works with beginner to published writers. She can be reached through her website at writingcareercoach.com.

My next book is Historical Romantic Suspense.

What?

In a world of genres even that is slicing the pie pretty thin. But it aptly describes Stars in the Night and a growing subset of fiction.

Read more here.

Don’t miss a single posting! Subscribe here to receive these postings by e-mail. Tiffany Colter is a writer, speaker and writing career coach who works with beginner to published writers. She can be reached through her website at writingcareercoach.com.

What if?

What if there’s an old wardrobe in my house that leads to another world?

What if there’s a monster under my bed, and he’s scared of me?

What if I follow that odd rabbit with the pocket watch into his burrow?

What might happen?

Read more here.

Don’t miss a single posting! Subscribe here to receive these postings by e-mail. Tiffany Colter is a writer, speaker and writing career coach who works with beginner to published writers. She can be reached through her website at writingcareercoach.com.

There’s No Mystery About Mysteries

by: Donn Taylor

“Nor should there be. The mystery as a separate genre has been around at least since Edgar Alan Poe invented the detective story. But its ancestry goes back much further, perhaps as far back as Oedipus’s saving Thebes by solving the riddle of the Sphinx. The mystery is a specific instance of the quest motif in which the hero sets out to accomplish an objective and suffers various adventures along the way. Medieval romances are classic examples. The quest of the mystery story is for the hero (male or female) to discover who committed a particular crime, usually a murder.”

Read more here.

Don’t miss a single posting! Subscribe here to receive these postings by e-mail. Tiffany Colter is a writer, speaker and writing career coach who works with beginner to published writers. She can be reached through her website at writingcareercoach.com.

“Why I wasn’t born 100 years too late. Folks often ask if I always wanted to grow up and write books about cowboys. Nope. Not me. I never wanted to be a writer. But I did grow up on a California farm in the San Joaquin Valley and dreamed of being a cowboy. I had Roy Rogers PJs and curtains and a plastic statue of trigger on my dresser. Read more here.

Don’t miss a single posting! Subscribe here to receive these postings by e-mail. Tiffany Colter is a writer, speaker and writing career coach who works with beginner to published writers. She can be reached through her website at writingcareercoach.com.

Need to give your business some more face time? Are you a writer who needs to know how to connect with readers or other clients? Last week we talked about how to market your writing.  This week I want to point out what writing business owners NEED to connect with current and potential customers.
 
Newsletters
A Newsletter informs your customers of changes, benefits, features, and specials on a regular basis.  E-newsletters are quickly becoming a more popular option from the print version, giving customers the option to receive your news immediately through e-mail.  This is also a great way to promote your websites.

Fliers
Fliers or pamphlets are great advertising aids.  Distribute them when you or your employees meet with potential customers.  The fliers give the customer something tangible to remember you and your meeting.

Websites
Billboards on the highway are a way of the past.  Websites are now the coffee shops where you will develop a relationship with people interested in your products and services.

White Papers
A mix between a brochure and an article, white papers are great marketing or sales tools.  White papers give detailed information to your customers while pointing them to the benefits of using you for that service.

Don’t miss a single posting! Subscribe here to receive these postings by e-mail. Tiffany Colter is a writer, speaker and writing career coach who works with beginner to published writers. She can be reached through her website at writingcareercoach.com.

Today we are interviewing author Jennifer AlLee. Her most recent book, The Pastor’s Wife, is available through Abingdon Press.

As a child, Jennifer AlLee lived above a mortuary in the heart of Hollywood, California, which may explain her unique outlook on life. Her publishing credits include The Love of His Brother, a contemporary romance from Five Star Publishing (November 2007) as well as skits, activity pages, and over one hundred contributions to Concordia Publishing House’s popular My Devotions series. Her latest novel, The Pastor’s Wife, releases February 1, 2010 from Abingdon Press. She’s an active member of American Christian Fiction Writers and serves as the Nevada Area Coordinator. Jennifer resides in the grace-filled city of Las Vegas, Nevada with her husband and teenage son. Visit her website at http://www.jenniferallee.com/

The Pastor’s Wife: Maura Sullivan thought she knew what she was getting into when she married soon-to-be pastor Nick Shepherd. But when “the other woman” in her marriage turned out to be her husband’s congregation, she ran. Three years later, she’s back in the small community of Granger, Ohio, for the reading of a will that names both her and Nick as beneficiaries. Now Maura must face the husband – and the congregation – she left behind.

View the book trailer on YouTube.

Jennifer took a few minutes to talk about publishing from a writer’s perspective with Writing Career Coach.

Writing Career Coach: Tell us about your book, The Pastor’s Wife.
Jennifer AlLee: Simply put, it’s a story of love lost, found, and rebuilt again. It opens with Maura Sullivan returning to Granger, Ohio, six years after she left it. Though she vowed never to return, now she must face all the disappointments she tried to leave behind; a husband who ignored her, a congregation she couldn’t please, and a God who took away everything she loved.

Nick Shepherd thought he’d put the past behind him until the day his estranged wife walks back into town. Intending only to help Maura with her crisis of faith, Nick finds his feelings for her never died. Now, he must face the mistakes he made and find a way to give and receive forgiveness.

As God works in both their lives, Nick and Maura believe they can repair their broken relationship and reunite as man and wife. But Maura has something to tell Nick before they can move forward. It’s what drove her to leave years earlier, and the one thing that can destroy the fragile trust they’ve managed to rebuild.

WCC: How do you plan and write your books?
JA: When I began my writing journey, I was a seat-of-the-pants writer all the way. This means I’d sit down at my keyboard with little more than an idea and let the story unfold from there. But over the last few years, I’ve become a bit more strategic. I’m still not a detailed outliner. And don’t even get me started on character sketches… they drive me crazy! But I’ve learned that it helps me to write a very loose outline. It’s more like a synopsis, which every writer needs to know how to write anyway. That little bit of pre-planning helps me avoid hours of staring at a blank screen.

WCC: What is it like working with editors? Do you have tips for getting along and building a great relationship with them?
JA: I love my editor at Abingdon Press. Barbara Scott is an amazing woman. But sometimes the editing process in painful. It’s hard to hear that you need to rewrite the entire first chapter of your book! The most important thing to remember is that you and the editor have the same main goal: to make your book the best it can be. One huge advantage the editor has is objective perspective. I may think that every word of my manuscript is golden, but the editor can stand back and see the thin, tarnished spots. A good editor is your best friend and a smart writer will take advantage of her knowledge.

Read more of Jennifer’s interview at Examiner and find out how she maintains balance.

YOU COULD WIN!
Leave a comment on this posting and you could win a copy of The Pastor’s Wife. The drawing will take place on Feb. 9, 2010. This give away is for US residents only. There is no fee to enter.

Other books by Jennifer AlLee:
The Love of His Brother

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Tiffany Colter is a writer, speaker and writing career coach who works with beginner to published writers. She can be reached through her website at writingcareercoach.com.

                Randy Ingermanson, known to many in writing as The Snowflake Guy, has released new software that takes the snowflake method of story writing and helps writers craft their stories, proposals, character sketches and other aspects of the writing process. He offers a number of free articles on his website including on outlining the snowflake method.

 He is running a special through Friday, November 20, 2009 at midnight where he is offering this new product at 80% off. Details here: http://www.advancedfictionwriting.com/links/96.php

                According to his website Ingermanson holds a Ph.d in physics from U.C. Berkeley and is the author of six novels and one non-fiction book.

                Randy’s Advanced Fiction Writing E-zine is the world’s largest electronic magazine on fiction writing craft. Hundreds of people sign up for the free e-zine each month. He also speaks regularly at a variety of writer’s conferences.

                More information on Ingermanson’s e-zine, The Snowflake Pro or for contact information you can visit the Advanced Fiction Writing Home page.

                In the interest of disclosure: I personally purchased a copy of this product and found it to be extremely easy to use and exceeded expectations. In about an hour I had the skeleton of a book project I’d been working on. The series of prompts makes the process of prewriting like a Q&A session. I was thinking about character arcs, motivation and take away. I was so thrilled with it I wanted to pass this information along. I received no compensation or free products for this endorsement.

Tiffany Colter is a writer, speaker and writing career coach who works with beginner to published writers. She can be reached through her website at http://www.writingcareercoach.com/
Tiffany is a speaker and teacher. Find out about available topics for your group’s next event.
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She writes a blog for the Christian writer Tuesdays at Writer’s Rest.