One writer to another, if you want to be a better writer, you must read good books. I suppose you could read only books in your genre (which is recommended) but reading good authors to see what they do with the craft is quite mind-blowing and educational and will help in the long run to … Continue reading »
Posted in February 2012 …
Books I Want To Write
I have been writing off and on since the age of 15, but only seriously now for five years. I have a list of books I want to write someday after finishing the adventure parody epic I’m writing right now. For many of these I have outlines or have started them. Here they are: 1. … Continue reading »
When Is My Novel Too Long?
You may have heard the story of author J.R.R. Tolkien who wrote The Lord of the Rings as one book before his publisher looked at him from across the desk and said “I’m sorry, John. This book is just too long. Break it up, will you?” I am not saying that a massive tome will not … Continue reading »
5 Reasons Why Writers Need Social Media
As a writer, I would say that social media has to be one of the greatest tools I could use to get the word out about my work. When I published my first book, I used Facebook to announce book signings and updates about how the book was selling. That was 2009, and I’ve been … Continue reading »
How to Get Out of a Rut As a Writer
Ever feel like this as a writer? I just finished a rather lengthy project for a friend and now after two weeks I’m coming back to the novel I am writing. I started in on a chapter last night and just found that the juices that were flowing two weeks ago had been completely used … Continue reading »
Paying Someone to Publish Your E-Book: Pros and Cons
I’m pretty tech savvy, but this is not true of everyone. There are a multitude of services out there that will produce an e-book for a decent price. Be wary of some of them because they are a scam, and always get everything in writing even if it is an e-mail. Remember: Amazon Kindle Direct will … Continue reading »
Getting Into College: Sports or Academics
; As a teacher, I have many students who are also athletes who struggle so hard to be very good at their chosen sport as well as work very hard academically to make the grade. My hat is off to these students who as a whole are forced to work harder at academics because of … Continue reading »
Teacher Pay Raises: Breaking the Stigma
I have been teaching English in a public high school for 13 years. We stopped getting our step raise as of 5 years ago and my wife and our four children have been living off of that salary, watching the cost of living go up by the day in this country. I read a story … Continue reading »
Common Core Standards: Requiring Students to Think
As an English teacher in Oklahoma, I have been under the failed No Child Left Behind rules for some time now. Recently, NCLB was “forgiven” for my state by the president. I guess this means that we are not to be held accountable by the federal government if a student is truly “left behind.” … Continue reading »
The 25 Funniest Analogies (Collected by High School English Teachers)
Reblogged from Writing English: UPDATE: Tens of thousands of readers have found this post and hundreds of you have commented. A few have said that these analogies were actually taken from other sources and were not written by high school kids at all. Now, we have a link that ends the debate. These analogies are … Continue reading »
