So you love to write, you’ve finished your first draft of a short story (or maybe something longer) – but how do you make your work as good as it can be? A circle of writing friends to nurture and critique your work is fairly important, because we all reach a point where we think our work is as good as it can be, and we can’t see potential weaknesses ay more. But there are a few things you can do for yourself as you start to edit your first draft: The ‘was’ edit! Do a search for the word ‘was’ and replace, where possible, with more direct and active verbs. Consider the difference between: “The girl was standing by the door, waiting for him [...]

This week, I was invited to give a talk at the Muskoka Author’s Association in Bracebridge. The audience comprised writers and people of all ages who hoped to publish work in the future. They asked me to tell the story of writing and publishing The Finding Place. When I told them how many years I’d been writing before having anything accepted for publication, one of the participants asked: why didn’t you ever think of self publishing? I thought I’d address that question here. Self-publishing is a far more respected and viable avenue for a writer than it ever was before, and a route chosen by a vast number of authors. In my view, though, it’s only a viable option if you have (or can develop) [...]

The wonderful thing about book signings, I’m discovering, is that you have the opportunity to meet all sorts of interesting readers! This weekend, signing at Word on the Street (the biggest literary festival in Canada) I met everyone from the grandfather of an international adoptee who bought the book to read himself before giving it to his grandson, to an 8 year old gifted student who told me she’d finish my book in an evening, to a librarian looking to add books to her school’s underfunded library. Readers of all ages from 8 to somewhere in their 90s! It was about so much more than signing a book – it was a chance to connect. I really hope some of those people will connect with [...]