Anne R. Allen's Blog... with Ruth Harris
Writing about writing. Mostly.
When my post on three questions to ask before you self-publish went viral last week, Thriller and SciFi author Jeff Carlson asked to join in the discussion. I think you’ll find this account of his experiences eye-opening. Thanks, Jeff! Using Both Sides of the Sword by Jeff Carlson Anne and I go back to the 1990s and my […]
by Anne R. Allen Self-publishing is the trending subject in Cyberia. Last week my post on self pubbing got over 2500 hits. And 60 comments. It not only made “Best of the Best” of Jane Friedman’s “Best Tweets for Writers,” but got a shout-out from publishing blog-god Nathan Bransford. (Thanks, Jane and Nathan!) I’m amazed. Many thanks to all […]
by Anne R. Allen I often hear from new writers who are afraid their plots will be stolen if they talk about their books online or in critique groups. But I tell them to rest easy. Writers have a lot to be wary of these days—faux agents, bogus publishers, e-book pirates, content mills, James Frey—but […]
by Anne R. Allen We’re in the midst of seismic changes in the publishing world, with new quakes altering the landscape on a daily basis. The pulp paperback is in its death throes, as mass market houses like Dorchester slink into ignominious bankruptcy. Kindle and the Amazon $2.99 e-book/70% royalty paradigm have changed an […]
by Anne R. Allen A friend who saw the film The Social Network last week said she had one of those back-in-high-school nightmares afterward. You know the kind: you can’t remember the way to class, haven’t studied for the Algebra test, and suddenly realize you’re still wearing your pj’s. You may be a successful fifty-something attorney […]
by Anne R. Allen Nathan Bransford has spoken. He says it’s never too early for writers to start using social media. Perhaps one day we’ll all be issued Twitter accounts in the womb. Since Nathan is a Thought Leader in our industry (according to Klout) I have a feeling a lot of writers are scrambling […]
by Anne R. Allen It’s been quite a week. Let’s hope we’re done with disasters for a while. To my neighbors who got evacuated at 7 AM on Friday—and to the tens of thousands affected by the horrors in Japan—my heart goes out to you. I started this blog exactly two years ago today: […]
by Anne R. Allen Several readers have emailed me recently with questions I often ask myself: 1) How can I tell if a new writing project is going to be marketable? 2) How do I stop bouncing from idea to idea, frittering away my precious writing time? 3) If I don’t know what to […]
by Anne R. Allen I’m working on a couple of new projects—watch this space for exciting developments—so I’m running a New! Improved! version of an oldie-but-goodie. The original post garnered a visit and an approving nod from agent Janet Reid—the Query Shark herownself. ****** I belong to the generation of women who were told we […]
by Anne R. Allen I have a confession to make. My high school nickname was “Zombie.” The moniker was intended as an insult, but I loved it. I dressed in black, dyed my hair a dead ash color and wore ghastly white lipstick. I was goth before goth was cool. My senior year, my family […]
by Anne R. Allen “Careful or You’ll End up in My Novel”…that’s the message on a T-shirt I see at writers’ conferences a lot. It’s been a popular item in the Signals Catalogue for years. It’s interesting that most writers I’ve met who wear them say the shirt was a gift from a friend […]
While I’m in bed, sick as a Schnauzer, be-virused and ensnotified, and my brain seems to have gone on a journey somewhere far, far away, one of my favorite authors, Catherine Ryan Hyde, has kindly offered to Pay It Forward with a guest post…Anne Some Notes on Self-Editing by Catherine Ryan Hyde I’ll open with the […]
by Anne R. Allen Charles Dickens has a lot to answer for. With the publication of his Christmas Carol in 1843, he single-handedly made Christmas our biggest cultural holiday. Before the debut of his (self-published) little novella, celebration of the holiday had all but died out in Anglo-Saxon Christendom. The pen is powerful indeed. A Christmas Carol revived […]
Anne R Allen’s Blog With Ruth Harris