Ceara Comeau's Blog – October 2017 Archive (6)

In my previous posts, I've expressed how challenging writing can be. But, that's only half the battle. The real difficulty begins when you go to publish.



Years ago, a writer could only publish their manuscripts through a traditional publisher, but with the 21st century comes self-publishing. A writer no longer needs to beg an agent to take a look at their manuscript. The writer is their own publisher...sounds great! Right? Well it depends.



Self-publishing and…

You know the usual greeting when you first meet someone.  You exchange salutations and eventually the conversations goes around to, "So what do you do for a living?"

Generally, when I say I am a writer, I get one of two looks. The "You're kidding me, right?" or my personal favorite, "You write? Oh, that's cute."  When I first started out on this journey, I felt so insecure about my work that when I got this reaction I didn't feel writing was anything special. I ended up…

"Oh, I've edited my manuscript so many times, I forgot which draft I'm on!"



If I had a dollar for every time I've said this, I'd have enough to hire a book publicist. But is it really about how many drafts you're on? Is that a good measurement of when you should stop editing or proofreading your manuscript? Absolutely not.



When I first started out writing, I was so impatient when it came to editing my work. I didn't care about how I should improve my craft, I just…

Now, by the sounds of this blog title, you're probably thinking, "Of course you can write for a living! Just look at Stephen King or J.K. Rowling!"



This statement is definitely valid. But I think as budding writers and avid readers we often forget how much work goes into the concept of "writing for a living". It isn't just, "BAM! I wrote a book, now everybody read it!" No, there is so much more to it than that.



I've heard it said before that "writing for a living" can be…

This past weekend I attended a writing event at nearby library. A friend of mine from there asked me to come and take part. I was grateful for the opportunity as I was trying to reach out to more people. Unfortunately, no one, aside from other authors, showed up. But that's not to say nothing came out of it. In fact, this was a major learning experience for me.



You see, I've always considered myself an ambivert. This is not a term one usually hears, but its a combination of…

When I first started writing, I was about ten years old. At the time, I had just found my way into the writing world and I didn't know all that much. I was mainly self-taught and learned what I could through reading mystery books like Nancy Drew. I found the world of writing to be fascinating and wanted to discover myself through this art form.



Looking back, I wasn't all that great at it. I could write dialogue effortlessly, but descriptions were the bane of my writing existence.…