writers

Speakipedia Podcast #26: David Murray

Transcript Dave Bricker  (00:05) Want to expand your speaking and storytelling skills and grow your influence business? This is Speakipedia…

7 months ago

Speakipedia Podcast #22: Paula Rizzo

Transcript Dave Bricker (00:07) Want to expand your speaking and storytelling skills and grow your influence business? This is Speakipedia…

8 months ago

Speakipedia Podcast #18: Pauline Butcher Bird

Dave Bricker: Want to expand your speaking and storytelling skills and grow your influence business? This is Speakipedia Media brought…

9 months ago

Writing is Design: Avoid Writing Clichés for Better Prose

Since time immemorial, clichés have sneaked in the door when we least expect them to. They're low-hanging fruit for writers…

11 months ago

Publishing Straight Talk

There are plenty of good reasons to self-publish, but not all are profit-oriented or even rational. Before you invest in…

11 months ago

Verbs: Spice Up Your Writing with Verbs that Rock

Verbs are the engines that move your writing and your readers, but many authors don’t spend enough time choosing the…

11 months ago

Book Design Basics: Choosing a Book Font

Selecting a book font seems simple enough, but important subtleties and fine points of typography are not obvious to the…

11 months ago

The Singular They is Now Officially Correct

Find your favorite writer and give them this message: They no longer have to mire their writing down with awkward…

11 months ago

Publishing Advice – Practices & Principles

The following publishing advice is based on my own experiences and those of my clients. I hope you find it…

11 months ago

Want a Traditional Publishing Contract? Do Your Homework

This article discusses the pros and cons of traditional publishing. Abandon your biases, study the business of publishing, and choose…

11 months ago

Book Design Basics: Quotation Marks and Primes

Writers often ask about the difference between "straight" or "dumb" quotation marks and traditional printers' quotes, commonly referred to as…

11 months ago

Writing is Design: Two-Word Writing Clichés

Two-word clichés are perhaps the least obvious kind. Unless we’re vigilant, they sneak into our prose, steal color, mask our…

11 months ago

Track Changes – The Essential Tool for Writers and Editors

If you’re not using your Word Processor’s Track Changes function, you’re missing out on one of the best writing tools…

11 months ago

The Perfect Book Sales Page

Tom Morkes published The Perfect Book sales Page on his blog. I'm usually the first person to reject formulaic approaches…

11 months ago

Publishing Scams and How they Work

Many self-publishers start their book projects with unrealistic expectations and misunderstandings about how publishing works. A huge industry has arisen…

11 months ago

Self-Publishing Scams: Keep the “Self” in Self-Publishing

Here's an addendum to Publishing Scams and How they Work. I wonder why so many authors, after spending thousands of…

11 months ago

Writing Ergonomics: Avoiding Injury at Your Desk

This article explores ergonomic solutions to writers’ repetitive stress problems. As static as it may seem, writing is a physically…

11 months ago

How to Produce Audiobooks with Amazon ACX

This article explains how to produce and market a professional quality audiobook using Amazon ACX. Through ACX (Audiobook Creation Exchange),…

11 months ago

Tabs, Indents, and Margins: How to use the Tab Ruler

This article explains the tab ruler found on every word processor and typesetting application. Understanding the simple and elegant split…

11 months ago

Fine Control Over Justified Text

Page layout programs like Adobe Indesign and Quark, allow typographers to exert fine control over justified text to remove gaps…

11 months ago

Commatose: the Oxford Comma, or Serial Comma

The Oxford comma, or serial comma is a subject of constant debate among writers. Do we need that comma before…

11 months ago

Encouragement for Those On The Path to Better Writing

So many writers get discouraged. This stinks. I quit. Others are overconfident. They've always had "a gift for words" so…

11 months ago

A Manuscript is Not a Book: Ten Tips for Manuscript Preparation

In my work with writers, I come across many common technical problems with manuscripts. These usually spring from the best…

11 months ago

Creative Nonfiction, Memoir, and the Nature of Truth

A few years ago, I attended a nonfiction-writing workshop where I was told by the instructor that to qualify as…

11 months ago

Not Selling Books? Did you do the Math?

You threw a grand party but nobody came. Your novel is so good but you're not selling books. What happened?…

11 months ago

The Grammar of Book Design

Are images analogous to words? Is what makes a sentence sound "right" the same thing that makes an image "pop"…

11 months ago

Writing is Design: Shy Away from Timid and Passive Writing

"Passive writing" refers to a specific set of grammatical circumstances where emphasis switches from subject to object. The money was…

11 months ago

Writing is Design: Boring Words & Generic Descriptions – Not Nice!

Generic descriptions are telltale signs of lazy writing. Add color to your writing by replacing overused and boring words. It's…

11 months ago

Writing is Design – Writing Dialogue: He Said. She Said.

Dialogue presents challenges for writers. Some prefer to simply declare what was “said.” Many authors feel that “said” is both…

11 months ago

Writing is Design: Eliminate THAT Fat From Your Writing

The word "that" is often abused. "That" is a perfectly useful pronoun but it's often the useless fat that slows…

11 months ago

Blogging to Build a Speaker or Author Platform

How can speakers, indie writers, and self-publishers use a blog to build a platform? This article explains how to publish…

11 months ago

Book Cover Design: Judging a Book by its Cover – Part 2

Part 1 of Book Cover Design: Judging a Book by its Cover critiqued "professional" covers taken from Amazon's Editor's choice…

11 months ago

Book Cover Typefaces and Cover Design Horror Stories

I recently responded to a question in a writers’ forum from an author who was in the process of designing…

11 months ago

How Many Spaces After a Period? Ending the Debate

Few subjects arouse more passion among writers and designers than the debate over how many spaces should follow a period.…

11 months ago

What’s a Professional Editor Worth?

What do you think a professional editor's pay scale should be? Assume that a proofreader would be at the bottom…

11 months ago

Book Cover Design: Judging a Book by Its Cover – Part 1

Nothing screams “amateur” like a poorly crafted book cover. The standards for book design aspired to by trade publishers are…

11 months ago

Co-Publishing – Alternative Path or Another Trap for Writers?

I recently published a post about the difference between vanity publishing and true self-publishing. Fundamentally, the article defines a publisher…

11 months ago

Reality Checklist for Self-Publishers

One question that loops endlessly on writers’ forums is “How can I sell more books?” The question is a natural…

11 months ago

Self-Publishing & Vanity Publishing: Confuse Them and Pay the Price

What is true self-publishing? What is the difference between self-publishing and “vanity publishing” or “subsidy publishing?” How do these differ…

11 months ago

Why You Need a Professional Editor

After completing the final draft of a manuscript for my fifth book, I wanted a reality check. I hired a…

11 months ago

Proposed Standards for Book Typography

The word processor has placed new burdens on writers to understand how to use italics, big and small capitals, dashes,…

11 months ago

Straight Talk About Book Reviews

Book  reviews are critically important. Have you ever read a book hoping it would get better, only to find that…

11 months ago

Gatekeepers and Self-Publishing

Indie publishers complain that the mainstream publishing establishment acts as a "gatekeeper." Many readers rely on big publishing houses to…

11 months ago

Self-Publishing: Art or Business?

The very idea of "book marketing" is vague. It's like subsuming advertising and fine art sales into a single realm…

11 months ago

Indie Publishers, Bookstores and Readers – the Indie Ecosystem

Indie publishers are everywhere and so are indie bookstores, but apart from their names, the two have little in common.…

11 months ago

Book Design Basics – Dashes, Hyphens and Dots

This section on dashes, hyphens and dots goes beyond typographic aesthetics to explore how we can communicate more effectively as…

11 months ago

Self-Publishing IS Real Publishing-The Difference is up to You

The notion of real publishing­ as opposed to self-publ­ishing and the stigma surrounding it is obsolete. I have no objections…

11 months ago

The Single Most Important Contribution to Publishing

Many readers still love to feel the subtle emboss of letters stamped on paper with metal type. I was rummaging…

11 months ago

Book Design Basics Part 2: Optical Margins, Indents and Periods

Part 2 of Fundamentals of Book Design explores optical margins, paragraph formatting and spaces. Read about margins, layout and leading…

11 months ago

Book Design Basics Part 1: Margins and Leading

Book design is a lost art. Though book design discussions usually focus on covers, consider how much more time a…

11 months ago

Book Typography: The Crystal Goblet by Beatrice Warde

Designers, writers and publishers will benefit from Beatrice Warde’s eloquent perspectives on the craft of typography, the power of type…

11 months ago

Self-Publishers Should Not Be Self-Editors

Editing is one of the first hurdles you’ll encounter as an independent writer. Your fan club is your enemy. Encouraging…

11 months ago

Book Distributors: What’s in it for Publishers?

There is a direct relationship between the number of sales you can expect from a book distributor and the value-added…

11 months ago

Self-Publishing? Get Real(istic)!

There are plenty of good reasons to self-publish, but not all are profit-oriented or even rational. Before you invest in…

11 months ago

Stop Picking on POD

A great technology is getting a bad rap for the wrong reasons. Print On Demand (POD) technology is often mislabeled…

11 months ago

Tips For Book Cover Design

Most book designers make the same errors. One sore spot for me and with many of my university design students,…

11 months ago

Irony

Irony—a figure of speech where the intended meaning is the opposite of the literal meaning. Here’s a soundbite from the…

11 months ago

Speakipedia Podcast #7: <br>Kelly Swanson

Transcript Dave Bricker (00:07) Want to expand your speaking and storytelling skills and grow your influence business? This is Speakipedia Media…

12 months ago

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