Heinlein's Rules On Writing

The late Robert A Heinlein had 5 rules for writing:

1.) You must write.

     This is true, you can't get published without writing something.

2.) You must finish what you write.
     You will never get published if you never finish what you start.

3.) You must refrain from rewriting, except to editorial order.

     Now this one, I don't necessarily agree with, Tolkien rewrote the beginning few chapters
     of the Fellowship of the ring 3 times before he settled on the 4th version.

4.) You must put the work on the market.

      Unless you don't want to get published, it has to go to market.

5.) You must keep the work on the market until it is sold.

      Again, true, keep selling.

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King's rules: 

1) Start the next story. Especially while waiting edit approvals. If your book bursts into orbit, you may be asked for another, be ready.
2) Don't get discouraged, keep at it!

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There are all kinds of variations of these rules out there, look around, go to writer's conferences (if you are able) and join critique groups (or start a critique group, Tolkien and Lewis had the Inklings, what do you have?)

The Jargon of The Publishing Industry

What is a beta reader?

Glad you asked!

Authors, attempting to get a book published (mostly first-time authors, or those self-publishing) need to have a form of proof-reader called a “beta reader.” Beta readers take your manuscript and roll through it, in the case of reading my manuscripts, perhaps with great pain!

Their primary responsibility is to tell you how they found the story, did it flow? Were the characters believable? Were they all the same? Is the outcome a case of Deus Ex Machina? Do they want to know more, maybe see a sequel? A good beta reader can point out grammar flaws, spelling mistakes and find other errors. I tell my beta readers to be as anal as they like, it may hurt, but if I am skilled enough and thick-skinned enough, I can take it and will learn from what I am told.

Beta Readers

Beta Readers...

Nail biting time! My manuscript is back in the hands of beta readers. It will be interesting to see the results of this, the last beta reader had OCD and forgot she had laundry in the washing machine.

But, these are two new readers. FRESH EYES!

I am chewing up my nails wondering what they will come up with!

The hunt to get published

What a task!

Getting published, that is (which I haven't, yet) is almost a full-time
job in and of itself. I have edited, edited, and edited again. The manuscript has gone
through a beta-read. And now, as an agent has confirmed to me, it needs to go to
a professional, freelance copy/line editor. The market is so incredibly
competitive, I'm told, that most agents now look for any excuse to reject a
manuscript! One agent showed a stack of manuscripts his agency had
received over a 30-day period, the two piles (one being self-published
books for evaluation) were probably 2 1/2 feet tall between them! That
was for 30 days! No wonder it's so difficult to get published!

Stay tuned!

Grammar Tools Redux

Things I've seen from Grammarly:

Imagine part of a sentence, like this:

...it was the end of the week, so they would...

Grammarly now enters confused mode, then announces that the comma was unnecessary. So I delete the comma, Grammarly then promptly underlines the word week in red and tells me there should be a comma after week. add the comma, and we are back to where we started, with Grammarly telling me it is unnecessary... Sigh. My solution was to put a period after week, delete the word so, and capitalize the word they, at this point, Grammarly was all happy...

Grammar Tools

Grammarly is a useful tool, but don't rely on it 100% for everything, I have seen some suggestions from the interface which were quite incorrect.