Anne R. Allen's Blog... with Ruth Harris
Writing about writing. Mostly.
by Anne R. Allen With the self-publishing revolution, we were warned of a “tsunami of crap,” but the real problem is the tsunami of scammers. They seem to invent a new way to scam writers every day. Not just indies, but the traditionally published as well. Unfortunately, there are plenty of uninformed wannabe writers […]
by Anne R. Allen Back in 2002, a New York Times survey showed 81% of Americans want to write a book. With the indie ebook revolution, the percentage has only expanded. Of course, most of that 81+% won’t ever write a word. There’s an old, unkind joke that says, “Most people think they have a […]
by Vasalysa Zaturets You can write an award-worthy story, but nobody will find it out if your book cover design doesn’t appeal to the target audience. Book cover design matters, and here’s why: It creates the first impression and proves that the story deserves the readers’ time and money. No advertising campaign is possible […]
by Anne R. Allen A blog reader asked me recently to address the question of description in fiction. How much is too much? How much is enough? And why are contemporary novels so devoid of physical character description? Is this a new rule — or is it lazy writing? The answer to all of […]
by Anne R. Allen These days, pretty much all writers need to learn to write Web content. Yes, even if you’re a Victorian romance author whose readers care more about reticules and spatterdashers than retweets and SEO. Even if you don’t have your own blog. Any website needs content. Plus you may want to […]
by Anne R. Allen A trendy word in publishing recently is “autofiction,” short for “autobiographical fiction.” The term isn’t new. It was first invented in 1977 by author Serge Doubrovsky when talking about his memoir-sh novel, Fils. And what about those Creative Nonfiction essays that fill literary magazines? (A goldmine for memoir writers.) Can you […]
by Anne R. Allen This week, editor and former agent Nathan Bransford published a blogpost that I wanted to send to all the beginning writers I know. The title is: If You Think Writing is Easy you’re Probably Not Very Good At It. It’s a little harsher than what we usually hear from good-natured […]
Plus a COVER REVEAL!! by Anne R. Allen The term “beta reader” gets thrown around a lot in writerly circles, but I’ve discovered an awful lot of writers don’t really understand what they do. The term “beta” reader seems to come from the gaming industry. Early game developers would ask certain customers to test games […]
Fragmenting Social Media Creates a Problem for Book Marketing By Anne R. Allen I know how it is: your readers started fading from Facebook all through 2022, disgusted by invasive advertising and slimy tactics that spy on your every move. They are also fed up by those bizarre, arbitrary algorithms that send you to Facebook […]
Happy New Year to all pre-published and published authors! by Anne R. Allen I’ve been looking over some old journals from 25-30 years ago, and it’s amazing how many years I made a New Year’s resolution to become a published author. And it’s amazing how many years it didn’t happen. The journals gave me a […]
by Anne R. Allen Here we are reaching the end of another year. Some of us have reached our writing goals, and some even “won” NaNoWriMo. But a lot of us haven’t. You may have had trouble getting to that last chapter of the novel, even though you wrote the requisite 50K words. Writing a […]
by Anne R. Allen Writers know the opening chapter of a book is the most important. That’s when we grab a reader who’s browsing in a bookstore or clicking on the “look inside” function for online retailers — and persuade him to reach for that wallet and buy the book. A new writer can […]
Bogus agents are impersonating real agents by Anne R. Allen Bogus agents are ba-a-ack. Once upon a time, in the long-ago era when I was querying, fee-charging agencies and in-house editorial services were the problem. Their scams usually involved charging a “reading fee” (a no-no for legit agents) or referring writers to editorial services and […]
Anne R Allen’s Blog With Ruth Harris