Full disclaimer here: I wrote longer pieces on my Patreon page and combined them together for this post. There’s a lot of learning and dithering there, as well as a fairly mediocre audio sample that you can hear if you want to join up. I wrote those pieces in the moment, so I’m reprinting them […]
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I’m writing this on Monday late which, here in the States, is Presidents Day, a federal holiday. I had planned to have two blog posts done by now, but I hadn’t even had a chance to start this one until a few minutes ago. Events conspired to prevent my best-laid plans. I had a severe […]
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I know, I know. The title is harsh. Because the topic is harsh. Remember, I have decades worth of experience watching and trying to help writers. And I have learned, to my chagrin, that some writers are beyond help. Or rather, the help those writers need is beyond anything I or any other writer/mentor can […]
Continue ReadingI taught a workshop, and spent a lot of January reading stories in manuscript. (I still have a lot to go because of a stupidly busy February.) I ended up reading a novel that was awful. The writing was good; the situation implausible; the characters all dumber than rocks. But I couldn’t figure out how […]
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I have a lot of big plans for 2023. I have to revamp the business side of my writing career. That requires a lot of work from me. I’m making this blog a process blog because it’s taking me longer than I want to get the pieces in place. But, I’m finding, that’s the way […]
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The first time I ever heard the saying, “The problems in your writing are the problems in your life,” I was having a conversation with Harlan Ellison about editing. Back when I was editing Pulphouse: The Hardback Magazine, I was feeling my way around editing fiction. I had run a newsroom and put out a […]
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In some ways, 2020 and 2021 were straightforward years. 2020 was a long scream of a year, one in which we all were trying to survive against a tiny unseen foe. We got vaccines in 2021, and while that eased some of the worry, it didn’t make the worry go away. We were still a […]
Continue ReadingI read a lot in December because I switched my schedule around, and prioritized a few other things. (I’ll probably blog about that at some point.) Having effective glasses also helped, more than I expected. I don’t have hardly any holiday stories to recommend because we set our deadlines for next year’s Holiday Spectacular in […]
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I used to train radio news announcers. I trained them how to read live and on air, a skill I learned myself while still in college. In 2021, I took a voiceover class from an impressive-as-hell studio here in Las Vegas, with the full intention that I would somehow get my books into audio. I […]
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On January 6, 2023, Michael W. Lucas made a rather important announcement on his blog. He wrote, in all caps: AMAZON IS NO LONGER MY BIGGEST INCOME SOURCE. It’s not that he added a consulting business to his writing income, or started doing in-person speaking gigs. He didn’t get a day job. Instead, he’s been, […]
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