Category Archives: Writers Life

Lavish Advance Readers with Love

Writers Life, ,

Spread the Love imageFrom the beginning there have been friends of this writing obsession of mine. Generous souls who gave affection to my possibly foolhardy choice to launch yet another career. I’d edited books and agented authors and led workshops on writing and publishing. Now – after a sixteen year hiatus from writing fiction – I was becoming a novelist again.

“Good for you Alice” those kind friends said.

I also decided to step away from the traditional system that had produced my early novels and given me a successful agenting career. I’d heard about Independent Publishing – or self-publishing in its less hip description. I liked the sound of it either way. Most of all I liked the sound of challenge.

“You go girl” my same friends repeated with some new voices joining them.

The problem was I had no idea how to accomplish any of it. Not a clue how to navigate this entirely new territory. Still the encouraging voices accompanied my stumbling. In fact they not only encouraged – they advised too.

“Do this” or “You might want to consider not doing that.”

I heard and continued struggling until eventually I had a book. The first in a series no less. I called it A Wrong Way Home. The general wisdom was that one or two-word titles performed best algorithm-wise. But I liked the lilt of my longer phrases and stuck with them through book two A Year of Summer Shadows and book three A Vacancy at the Inn. Now number four A Villain for Vanessa waits in the wings.

Amidst the stumbles and struggles I needed readers who would review and post those reviews – first and foremost on almighty Amazon. I turned to my steadfast encouraging friends. Where else did I have to go? A beloved cadre responded. They used their precious time and energy – already in great demand – on my stories which they mostly claimed to enjoy.

“Keep it up Alice” they said. “I’m waiting for the next one.”

Meanwhile I discovered my weaknesses and worked on them. I prayed for my strengths to stay strong. I floundered – barely afloat – in the marketing ocean while my supporters held me above the waves. Those lifesavers are my Advance Readers now. They see the book – usually before its final polish. Their comments guide that process.

“Scrub off this rough spot here. Pay attention to that sloppy writing habit there.”

I hear and listen to their voices. I feel them with me. They are my light. I may appear to give them only an autographed copy in return. But actually they have my heart.

Alice Orr – https://www.aliceorrbooks.com http://www.facebook.com/aliceorrwriter http://www.twitter.com/AliceOrrBooks 

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A Wrong Way Home – Riverton Road Romantic Suspense Book 1 – is a FREE eBook at Amazon and other online retailers. A Villain for Vanessa and my other books are available at my Amazon Author Page http://www.amazon.com/Alice-Orr/e/B000APC22E/.

 

How to Manage Your Writing Time by Managing Your Writer Psyche

Writers Life

Time Management imageQuestion: What is my biggest writing time management problem? Answer: Me.

If you’d asked me this question last month or maybe even last week I’d have said this. “My biggest problem with managing my time to write is all of the demands made on my hours and my energy and my spirit too. So there!”

Reassessment tells me this is not the true answer to the question. Why not? Because it leaves Me totally out of the equation. As if the power in my life to live my life and parcel out my time somehow resides outside of myself in other people and other circumstances.

The true answer has been banging on my head for a while now. Often from the advice wise friends have tried without success to give me. Also from my own observation of other – or the same – friends. Even from my priest who’s been talking a lot about self-care lately.

My biggest problem with managing to find time to write is the same problem I have with managing too much of my life in general. I simply do not know where to put myself in the lineup of my priorities. As one of those wise friends of mine put it – I don’t put myself at the center of my life.

I’ve been long conditioned for this behavior. My mother used to tell me I wanted to be at the center of things. As if that wasn’t at all where I belonged. Even my sainted grandmother raised me to believe that if I wasn’t making the world a better place I shouldn’t be here.

All of which I interpreted as a clear admonition to put everybody else first. To do everything I could for everybody else whenever possible. And most pointedly – at least in my hearing of it and therefore in my head – that doing for myself or taking care of myself was a bad thing.

BTW both of those women followed their own advice. One of them did so with teeth gritted and resentment in her heart. Happenstance didn’t happen well for her. The other did so with love and kindness in her heart and she fared better. But not as well as she deserved to or should have.

Meanwhile I carried on the family tradition by leaping straight into the helping professions in first one form then others. Schoolteacher. Community organizer. Social worker. Book editor. Literary agent. That last requiring perhaps the most outpouring of self of all.

Guess where most of my time was spent through all of that. On other people’s needs. And where it was not spent. “You have a right to have your own needs satisfied.” That was another wise friend talking to me. My response was to stare at her as if she were speaking a language from an alien galaxy.

I’m telling this story first because I need to tell it. But even more so because almost every writer I know – maybe almost every person I know especially if she’s a woman – needs to hear it. Because so few of us put ourselves solidly at the center of our own lives.

In particular we don’t put ourselves at the center of our writing lives. Ask almost any writer what she’d do if she were truly taking care of herself. If she were truly satisfying her own needs. That writer at her most honest would say this. “I would spend more of my time writing. But I don’t.”

We need to change that. Specifically we need to change our minds about that and our hearts too. Otherwise we will never be able to manage our time or our energy. We will never be able to give our hungry spirits what they require to be satisfied. The opportunity to express themselves.

Not to mention we won’t be able to manage our writing careers either. So there!

 Alice Orr – https://www.aliceorrbooks.com                    http://www.facebook.com/aliceorrwriter                    http://www.twitter.com/AliceOrrBooks 

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A Villain for Vanessa ECover (1) 100 x 150px - 14.6KB - SmallA Villain for Vanessa – coming soon – will be Book 4 of Alice Orr’s Riverton Road Romantic Suspense series featuring the Kalli family and the Miller family in stories of Romance and Danger. A Wrong Way Home – Book 1 – is a FREE eBook at Amazon and other online retailers. All of Alice’s books are available at her Amazon Author Page http://www.amazon.com/Alice-Orr/e/B000APC22E/

 

How to Thrive through Downer Times

Writers Life

Black Dog imageLet’s be honest. We all have them. Winston Churchill called them his Black Dog. If Winnie could admit to experiencing the black-and-blue blues so can we.

I’ve heard a lot of folks owning up to exactly that over the past few months. Maybe it’s the failure of spring to arrive. Maybe it’s the refusal of unpleasant realities to stay away.

Whatever the motivation for a trip to Bummerville an escape strategy is needed. May I suggest three steps along that exit route.

First – Don’t Confide in Anybody but Your Journal.

The world runs on gossip. The writer world runs on storytelling gossip. We should be careful not to fuel that ride. I’m saying you shouldn’t trust anyone. I am saying you shouldn’t overestimate anyone.

People can talk without thinking. People repeat things without thinking about the damage they can do. Sometimes they even succumb to the temptation to use knowledge as currency. Especially juicy knowledge.

The more intimate the story the juicier its potential can be. And nothing is more intimate than the insider details of somebody’s emotional meltdown. The tidbit may be told with compassion. “So sorry for her hardship.” Or with bogus compassion. “Soooo sorry for her hardship.”

The result is the same. The subject of the tidbit is portrayed as down and out or on her way to getting there. An image that does her no good no way no time. Therefore Mum is the word.

Second – Smile While your Heart is Breaking.

Some call it behaving as if. Behave as if you’re fine. I know it’s fake. Worse yet I know it’s hard to do. I also know light attracts and darkness repels.

We don’t want to break down the good work we’ve already accomplished. We want to build it further. Maybe we don’t feel capable of that construction effort at the moment but we can manage to maintain a holding pattern if we try.

My brother Michael once gave me some sage advice. He suggested I take acting classes to learn more about creating story characters. I’ve come to understand the added value of making yourself into a story character when it serves your career purpose. As I said. Only your journal page requires full – or even partial – disclosure.

Third – Tell a Bright Tale Until it Comes True.

I believe in the power of professional pretense. That power has more to do with convincing yourself than it has to do with convincing others. You are the one feeling lousy – or lost – or left out somehow. You are the one who must find a way off the down escalator. The real purpose of spinning a positive less-than-total truthhood is to hear it yourself about yourself.

“The future’s so bright I’m gonna need shades.” That’s the prophecy you want to self-fulfill. Keep repeating it to yourself and everybody and one morning you’ll wake up to find those shiny lenses reflecting your vision of yourself come back to full and lovely life.

Alice Orr – https://www.aliceorrbooks.com                   http://www.facebook.com/aliceorrwriter                   http://www.twitter.com/AliceOrrBooks

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A Wrong Way Home – Book 1 of Alice Orr’s Riverton Road Romantic Suspense series – is a FREE eBook at Amazon and other online retailers. All of Alice’s books are available at her Amazon Author Page http://www.amazon.com/Alice-Orr/e/B000APC22E/