11 REASONS WRITERS GET REJECTED—AND WHY ONLY 3 OF THEM MATTER

by Ruth HarrisI‘m a TradPubbed NYT bestselling author gone indie. I was also an editor for over 20 years (Macmillan, Bantam, Dell) and the Publisher of Kensington—so let me put rejection into a little perspective. Let’s be clear: Manuscripts get rejected; not writers. Trust me. (Most of the time) it’s not personal. Let me count the ways. 1. THE BASICS: The reasons for rejection start with the basics, i.e. the ms. sucks. Author can't format/spell/doesn’t...

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Hello Darkness, My Old Friend: New Research Helps Writers Fight Depression

I started feeling it this last week: that dark heaviness lurking somewhere just below my conscious thoughts. It makes me burst into tears for no reason. I get clumsy and out of touch with my own body. I feel raw and unprotected. My joints ache. All I want to do is sleep, but sleep won’t come. My digestion gets wonky. Food has no taste.Depression: I’ve had bouts with it all my life. It runs in my family. I lost my father and brother to suicide.But...

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Hey, James Patterson Stole my Plot!

Plot theft. It tends to be on the minds of a lot of new writers.You were planning to write that book some day. You had this brilliant plot. Now that *#%! Patterson/Nora Roberts/Stephen King has written a bestseller with the exact same premise.Or the story is eerily similar to the one you pitched to an agent at a writer’s conference.Or you're sure your plot will be stolen if you talk about your book online or in critique groups. What should you do?Nothing.Writers...

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The Slow Blog Manifesto...and 8 Reasons Why Slow Blogging Will Help Your Career, Your Love Life, and Protect You From Angry Elephants

What is the Slow Blog Manifesto?It’s an essay written in 2006 by Canadian software designer Todd Sieling at the height of the everybody-must-get-a-blog frenzy. You can read the Slow Blog Manifesto here. Slow Blogging is modeled on Alice Walker’s “slow food” movement (the opposite of McBurgerish “fast food.”) The point is quality over quantity.Todd wrote:“Slow Blogging is the re-establishment of the machine as the agent of human expression, rather...

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