Career
The Credibility Gap
This was a tough post to write. I felt at times that I was arguing with myself on these issues, but maybe in today’s “journey” through the topic of author credibility you will sense the struggle that Christian authors confront and maybe some truth with be revealed in the process. If you were a mathematics professor at a junior college and had a revolutionary insight related to something about …
Turn Envy Upside Down
Envy is one of the seven deadly sins and not easy to conquer. Who hasn’t felt jealous over someone else’s success, especially when it doesn’t seem deserved? Seeing an outright enemy succeed is even worse. It doesn’t have to be this way. Instead, take your feelings of envy and put them to good use. That is, make those feelings work for you so you can succeed. Here’s how: When someone in your sphere …
Mistakes Writers Make in their Queries
The pile of unsolicited proposal, queries, and manuscripts (both email and physical mail) is an unending source of delight and frustration. Delight when an amazing idea from an amazing writer arrives like a special holiday gift. Unfortunately that doesn’t happen as often as I would like. Instead there is a litany of things authors do time and again. If writers would treat their query or book …
The Truth About Criticism
Last week I talked about limiting the amount of mean criticism you have to put up with. This week, let’s revisit that topic, only to learn from it. Yes, we can learn when someone is mean to us. We’ve all had unhappy feelings when attacked. Maybe it’s a twinge in your chest or gut, a reflexive desire to lash out, a sense of unfairness, of being misunderstood. Maybe it’s all of those. Everyone has …
Criticism – What Are They Really Saying?
Any time you send a book – or even an article – into the world, you subject yourself to both praise and criticism. Sometimes praise seems embarrassing but criticism can hurt. By criticism, I’m not referring to the helpful, constructive kind. I’m talking about the mean kind. When someone says something hostile, consider that it’s not about you. That person is expressing what matters to her. The …
A Word to the E-mail-Wise: Don’t Assume
I received an email from a client the other day, asking a question. I read it, and as I did so, I made an assumption as to the motivation behind her question. So, as you can imagine, I responded with that assumption firmly in place. Her email response was short and to the point. And just a bit miffed. As I read what she wrote, I realized the motivation I assigned to her question was wrong. …
Unpublished and on Social Media as an Author? Why?
It’s hard to get through a week without seeing at least one article on platform. Well, here’s yours for the week! We agents ask authors for a platform, but I have found that unpublished authors wonder how or why they should show a professional presence on social media. That question is understandable. Without a book, what is the author promoting? Promoting Yourself? Yes, you are promoting …
You Might As Well Face It, You’re Addicted to Input
With great fear of being sued by Robert Palmer for messing with his song lyrics: You like to think that you’re immune to the stuff…oh yeah It’s closer to the truth to say you can’t get enough You know you’re gonna have to face it You’re addicted to love INPUT. Publishing is such a subjective field of endeavor that at one point or another an author, editor or …
Don’t Waste Your Time
Some days…those rare, out-of-the-blue, once-in-awhile days…God speaks an amen that reminds me all this is worth it. This past Saturday was a day like that. I spoke at a writer’s conference and had a delightful time. At the closing sessions I spoke on passion and why we Christian writers do what we do. How the goal can’t be publication, but obedience to the task God has given us. How writing for …