Women on Writing - WOW and WOW!
Women On Writing is an online magazine and community for women writers. Among major topics are novel writing, indie publishing, author platform, blogging, screenwriting, and more. Lots of contests and general jocularity sans frittering on the part of Earth's most powerful humans.
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As a traveler, I’ve migrated throughout the United States—from Michigan, to Hawai’i and in between—landing, finally, in Portland, Oregon. I was chasing that dream we were all told we wanted, only to realize my own. After earning a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Illinois-Chicago, I landed a laboratory position along the Gulf Coast of Texas, analyzing wastewater and soil samples. When I’m not testing what comes out the other end of the toilet, I’m writing. Currently, I am working on a speculative fiction novel in which humans have discovered an exotic fuel source that burns clean and renews itself, sparking a war with galaxy-traversing space rats. …
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A blog tour is a marketing campaign that involves coordinating a series of blog posts and online promotions to create buzz and generate exposure for your book. It typically involves collaborating with bloggers and influencers who have an audience that aligns with your target readership. These bloggers will read your book, write reviews, host author interviews, and feature guest posts or excerpts from your book on their blogs. The goal is to reach a wider audience and generate interest in your book within their established community. The Blog Tour Framework Here's a breakdown of the framework for a typical blog tour: Identify and contact bloggers: Research …
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Interview by Nicole Pyles As a writer, it's important to picture the goal you have in mind for your work. Without it, it's easy to stumble in the dark, uncertain of the direction of your writing future. That's when vision boards come into place! Being able to create a visual of the goals you have for your writing career has tremendous benefits. Today, I'm talking to Marla J. Albertie, author of the book, The Ultimate Brag Book About Yourself. She's also a career, life, and executive coach and is currently pursuing her PhD in I/O Psychology. Her Vision Board Mastery course is self-guided, allowing you to create the vision you have for your life. We're chatting about her c…
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Cold Case/Max A few years ago, I wrote a blog post about how being a writer has ruined watching TV for me. It hasn’t stopped me from indulging in numerous shows and documentaries (I even review true crime docs for my podcast), but today I want to discuss one of my all-time favorite procedural shows, “Cold Case.” Not to be confused with “Cold Case Files,” Cold Case featured fictional stories and premiered on CBS in 2003, running for seven seasons. Each episode focused on a cold case unit in Philadelphia, and it had an amazing soundtrack that tied into the time period of the case. I rediscovered the TV show on the streaming service Max (formerly HBO Max) awhile back, and …
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It’s mid-May in New England, and nature is delighting us Northern folk with flowering trees and shrubs, grass that is quickly greening, warm breezes, and signs of life in our flower gardens. With hours more sunlight in the mornings (and evenings) now, I wake each morning by 6:15 and throw on a baseball hat to get a 45-minute walk in around my neighborhood before starting my work day. The neighborhood streets are especially beautiful this time of year, with an abundance of trees putting on their best springtime frocks: pink crabapples, white dogwoods, magnolias in a beautiful blush shade. Not to be left behind, shrubs demand equal admiration: fragrant lilac bushes, cheery…
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I'm excited to interview Tara May Flanagan, one of our runners-up in our Fall 2022 Flash Fiction contest. Before you read our interview, make sure you read her story "Morning Coffee" and then come on back. First, here's a bit about Tara: Tara is a writer and editor living in Lake Tahoe, California. Tara’s first love is books, and she spent six years working in the independent bookselling industry. Samples of her work, including short stories, blog posts, and novel excerpts, are featured in Sick Lit Magazine and at her website, taramayflanagan.com. ---- Interview by Nicole PylesWOW: First of all congratulations on winning runner up! You managed to capture perfectly the str…
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Earlier this year, Renee wrote a post about using Nextdoor for writing inspiration. Ever since that post, I've been looking for ways to use this website as a source of creativity. I began to think of Nextdoor as the police blurbs you'll see in local newspapers (which I don't get physical copies of anymore). However, there were a few snags. I'm not one to go to the Nextdoor app, and usually just get the notifications in my email. So, rather than adding a rabbit hole of distraction during my day (like social media does to me), I used email notifications. All of those short email blurbs of neighborhood complaints turned into interesting story starters. And I wanted to share …
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Sophia’s Bio: Sophia Zhang is a young Chinese-American writer born and raised in the California Bay Area. Her writing has been awarded by Scholastic and Youngarts, and is pending publishing in The Blue Marble Review. She’s interested in exploring intergenerational family dynamics, her Chinese heritage, grief, beauty, and love in her work. Apart from writing, Sophia loves history, pickles, and Taylor Swift! If you haven't done so already, check out Sophia's award-winning essay "Ungrieved" and then return here for a chat with the author. WOW: Congratulations on placing third in the Q2 2023 Creative Nonfiction Contest! How did you begin writing your essay and how did it a…
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They say you should aim to be rejected 100 times per year. This refers to submitting to literary journals, but there is something to be said about this theory. If you are submitting, your chance of acceptance goes up. So if the more you submit, the more chance you have of being published, why are you worried about all your rejections rather than focusing on sending out your next query? I believe everyone has to do what works for them, and I can only share my own experiences and suggest what worked for me. The rest is up to you. But if you’re feeling like all those no’s are a sign you should stop querying, think again. Some pretty famous authors got rejected more than yo…
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When I first jumped into the writing world, I approached it like a good student: researching, studying, learning, applying. And though everything was a bit overwhelming--with a lot of homework—I finally felt like I was on top of things. For about twenty minutes. I mean, when you consider that it took hundreds of years for writers to go from penning words to typing words, the profession crawled along. And then technology arrived and zoom! It’s impossible to catch up with the constant innovation. The next new thing comes around just about daily. It's enough to make your head spin. So when I see something new in the writing world, it might take a minute to make an impression…
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How active are your questions? One of my favorite newsletters is Sarai Mitnick’s Making Time. Making Time is her year-long experiment on making time to be creative. Sarai isn’t all about getting up an hour early to write or creating lengthy to-do lists. Instead, she focuses on creativity and getting to creative endeavors because they make her happy. In her last newsletter, she encouraged her readers to use active questions to make time for the things they want to do. What’s an active question? It’s easier just to show you. First we’ll start with questions that are not active. Let’s say that your goal is to write 10 pages a day. At the end of each day, you may ask y…
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I'm so excited to announce the blog tour for Write Out Loud by Naomi D. Nakashima. This book is perfect for helping people who have been struggling with anxiety and fear finally start writing their book. Join us as we celebrate the launch of the book, interview the author, and give away a copy to one lucky reader. Here's more about Write Out Loud: Are you still struggling with your book? Feeling overwhelmed or creatively blocked with self-doubt, fear, and general anxiety about what it means to write a book? Are you still wondering if you have what it takes to even write a book? Not all fears are created equal. Write Out Loud is a step-by-step guide to help you identify th…
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I'm thrilled to chat with Meredith Baker about her award-winning essay, "The Choice." Meredith and I chat about crafting a one-sentence essay, coping with writer's block, and finding inspiration in nature. Meredith's bio: Meredith has historically been a chronic overachiever, amassing a string of letters after her name and awards until life took an unexpected turn that forced her to slow down. After becoming a victim of crime, she embarked on a journey to share her experience through creative writing with the same tenacity she once applied to her career. Meredith lives peacefully near the beach where she finds inspiration to write. She remains in hiding from her perpetrat…
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I am excited to interview Tal Valante, founder of Litwise. Her business' mission is to make reading and writing more accessible, widespread, and engaging. Today, we're talking about her background, how Litwise got started, and how you'll benefit from the program. Her latest course is called "Unleash Your Inner Character Creator." It includes a 14-lesson workshop, where you’ll dive into a variety of topics, including: Building complex, multi-dimensional charactersCrafting engaging character arcsWriting believable dialogueOrchestrating a colorful cast And so much more! Even more importantly, you’ll work on personalized assignments, develop a character during the workshop, …
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Last week, I was frustrated with my current work in progress. I finished the first draft of the novel in November 2021 as my National Novel Writing Month project. When I have hard and fast deadlines (and when I blab to everyone I know that I’m writing a book in a month) the work gets completed. When I don’t have any sort of accountability, I fail. Last fall I left my full-time editing job, telling myself I would focus on my true crime podcast and finishing the revisions on the 2021 NaNoWriMo book. It is now seven months later and while I’m producing bi-weekly episodes of the podcast, the book revisions have stalled. I have scribbled a few notes about changing the family …
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gracepoore’s Bio: Grace Poore is from Malaysia. She works for an international LGBTIQ human rights organization and recently returned to writing fiction after a long hiatus. Her short stories, published in her own name and under the pseudonym, V.K. Aruna, have appeared in Our Feet Walk The Sky: Women Of The South Asian Diaspora (Aunt Lute Books, 1993), The Very Inside: An Anthology of Writing by Asian and Pacific Islander Lesbian and Bisexual Women (Sister Vision, 1994), Pearls Of Passion: A Treasury of Lesbian Erotica (Sister Vision, 1994), Women Images & Realities: A Multicultural Anthology (McGraw Hill, 2003), and various journals, including Conditions Thirteen In…
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I'm so excited to announce our latest blog tour with Patricia Eckerman Ambas. Her children's book I Can't Wait to Love You Forever is perfect for a family about to welcome another baby. Read along as we share more information about her touching book, interview the author, and giveaway a copy to one lucky reader. First, here's more about I Can't Wait to Love You Forever: A new baby in the family is so exciting! But what do you do if YOU are the “baby” of the family? Will Benjamin be ready to be a big brother when it’s time? Full of playful love, follow Benjamin on his daily adventures with Mommy, which just might prepare him to be a big brother. Publisher: WordLife Press…
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Bethany Jarmul is a writer, editor, and poet. Her work has appeared in more than 50 literary magazines and been nominated for Best of the Net and Best Spiritual Literature. Bethany enjoys chai lattes, nature walks, and memoirs. Originally from West Virginia, she lives near Pittsburgh with her husband and two young children. She’s currently working on two nonfiction chapbooks (one about growing up in West Virginia and one about motherhood) and a prose poem chapbook. Bethany also offers affordable editing services for writers. Connect with her at bethanyjarmul.com or on Twitter: @BethanyJarmul. interview by Marcia Peterson WOW: Congratulations on winning first place in our…
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By Barbara Noe Kennedy If you want to break into travel writing, you don’t need to travel far and wide for that amazing story. Think about what place you know best—where you live! You have the inside scoop on what happens in your location, including museum, hotel, and restaurant openings, under-the-radar things to see and do, what plants bloom and birds arrive when, fun angles that only locals know. Whether it’s a metropolis or tiny village in the middle of the countryside, you’ll find plenty of stories to tell (and sell). Probably half of the travel stories I write are about Washington, D.C. Why? Because I live and breathe it, I’m an expert. For example, I’ve written a…
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Work that you love just doesn’t feel like work, right? Whereas work that you do not love (and in fact may not like even a little bit) feels like a grind. And these days—spoiler alert!—I’d much rather just write than work on the writing-business tasks. This startling epiphany came to me recently whilst having a conversation with a non-writer friend who asked about the latest news: SHE: How’s the writing going? ME: Oh my gosh, I’ve just about got all the characters introduced and this time, it’s a poltergeist thing. SHE: Hold on. This is the new book? I meant the one you finished. How’s the publishing going? ME: Oh. Um… There’s no need to share the part of the conversat…
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Drew grew up as a military BRAT on bases and places around the world. Accordingly, she has developed a chronic case of wanderlust and surrenders to it whenever possible. Drew has a varied work history including advancing civil rights protections, teaching middle school sex ed, and serving as everyone’s favorite barista. In her free time she reads old books, writes sad poems, and travels when pandemics allow. ----------Interview by Renee Roberson WOW: Hi Drew, thanks for joining us today and congratulations! “Swerve” is one of those stories you savor, and then read again so that you can pick up on all the nuances sprinkled throughout. How did you first get t…
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We here at WOW! Women on Writing are excited to launch the blog tour for Anomaly Aftermath by returning author Hugh Fritz. This book is perfect for anyone who enjoys historical fiction, contemporary action, and/or near near-future science fiction. Read on to find out the author's inspiration behind this novel in an exceptional author interview, and enter to win a copy! Anomaly Aftermath is the third book in the Mystic Rampage Series. If you haven’t read the other books, you will still enjoy reading this one as a stand-alone, but warning… you may be running out to buy the others as well because the storyline is fascinating! Here's a bit more about Anomaly Aftermath: Soleil…
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As a blog tour manager and a public relations consultant, I say a lot of thank you's during my day: "Thank you for placing my client in the article!" "Thank you for considering them for your podcast!" "Thank you for writing your review of that book!" However, I admit, sometimes I forget. It gets busy. I delay because of other priorities. I say to myself I'll get to it later. And then I don't. But then, a reminder comes in. And I get an email that says something like this: "Hi Nicole, Did the author read my post? I didn't even get a comment. I spent a lot of time on that post." A blogger has even asked me to remove them from my list because of this reason. And I feel ba…
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For those of you who aren’t familiar with the phrase cross pollination, it is when the pollen from one plant variety fertilizes the flowers of another variety. That’s the botanical definition. It is also when one thing influences or inspires another, such as when your other hobbies and interests influence or inspire your writing. It’s something I’ve been thinking about after reading How We Got to Now by Steven Johnson. In his book, Johnson discusses the long-term effects that various inventions have had on society and the world. For example, Guttenberg’s printing press led not only to the proliferation of printed books and increased literacy but also a rise in the use …
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Jennifer Braunfels is a writer and high school English teacher from Maine. Her work has appeared in the Whiskey Tit Journal and on the Free Flash Fiction website. She has received honorable mentions in various Flash Fiction contests. She’s currently working with an amazing editor, putting the final touches on her first novel. You can find out more about her and her writing at jenniferbraunfelsmaineauthor.com. Find Jennifer on Instagram @jennifer_braunfels interview by Marcia Peterson WOW: Congratulations on placing as a runner up in our Fall 2022 Flash Fiction competition! Can you tell us what encouraged the idea behind your story, “Surrender Ridge?” It’s rather dark! J…
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